Moving...

Ugh! Moving stuff from place to place, not on the top of my "Best times to be had" list. But, it wasn't so bad! We packed up the stuff we were taking, the old green couch and chair have been left behind, but the dining room table made the trip, and headed north in a 4 car caravan. I am a lucky girl to have wonderful in-laws! My father and mother-in-law pulled the trailer, my sister-in-law and nephew drove their van with stuff, my Jeep was packed and of course the cruiser with hubby...why he didn't let me drive the cruiser, I have nooooo idea! After a brief stop to load up the stuff we had used for the past 3 weeks from a friend's house just south of the new house, we landed at the house we will call home for a while. In no time at all our stuff was unpacked, the girls' beds were made and we were ready to hit those beds. The girls have already decided which room to have for a playroom and it looks like a playroom already! Their bathroom is totally girlie, complete with a feather boa as a window treatment. Good stuff. I think we'll make some good memories here.

House

Searching for a house is not all that fun. I love poking into other people's houses, that is fun, but to try to picture a cold, empty house with all our stuff in it and figure out if it will work, not so much fun. But, we have had success. God is good and continues to prove Himself over and over to us and why do I think He'll let us down now? We have found an old farmhouse, complete with an outdoor wood boiler like we have at home, with 7 bedrooms, a living room and a family room, and plenty of space to run outside. So...I'm wondering now what to bring...

Moving north

When ever I go to the doctor or take the kids, the secretary says, is your address still....and I always joke and say, yup, forever! Ha! Don't you love it when you have life all figured out and then, bam! Everything changes! So, hubby comes home this summer and says, I think I'd like to put in for a promotion. There is a troop commander who is retiring and I'd love to have the job. I'm always up for adventure and I'm so proud at what hubby does that I'm like, sure thing, let's do it. You know when you want something, but you don't really think that you'll get it? That's me with this promotion. You see, the troop that he wanted this job at would require a move two hours north. So, fast forward to the middle of October to the day he went for his interview. He was sitting in his cruiser for a few minutes in the driveway, so I went down to chat with him while he was finishing up work. While we were sitting there, his phone rings and he says...This is it! And I hear a voice on the other end say, Hello, Mark, this is Pat Flemming calling... Pat Flemming, aka Colonel Flemming, Unit 1 of the Maine State Police, the one who calls when you GET the job, continues talking as I'm thinking, holy crap, we are moving! So, in two weeks time, we are moved and Mark has a new job, and we are all still alive and sane. I'm homeschooling my girls, under the supervision of their teacher, and I think we are all going to make it! Hubby loves his new job and is getting to know lots of new people. A new adventure is in the works!

You give and take away, my heart will choose to say, blessed be the name of the Lord!

The fire. Not mentioned in my previous post but a big enough part of our life now that it deserves some attention. On a cold night in March, Hubby came home from work at about 3am and an hour later an SUV drives down our driveway honking and yelling Hubby's name. He goes out onto the porch and the SUV drives announces that our apartment building was totally engulfed in fire. When I was able to finally get to the scene at about 9am, I learned that it was not as bad as previously thought. There were four families living in the building and everyone was safe and sound. The two bottom floor apartments sustained the most damage. Leaving out all the boring details and fast forwarding until July, our contractor told Hubby that the cost that we were responsible for to get the apartment building back to code was not going to be worth the money. The way the insurance was going to depreciate the building, it was not going to be cost effective. The contractor also told Hubby that he had a friend who loved buying buildings like ours, as is. All I can think of is...is his friend crazy?! Here's where the blessing comes in. The insurance money could go directly to us after we paid the contractor and paid the mortgage off. Amazing! So fast forward to today. The way it stands now is that we have no debt! The friend who loves building stripped to the studs wants to buy the place. If that isn't a blessing straight from Heaven above, I don't know what is! Something that man meant for harm, God intended for good!

It's been a long time!

Gasp!  It's been 11 months since the last blog.  So much for my good intentions of chronicling this family's adventures.  So, the Reader's Digest Condensed Version?  Okay!  Fall went by nicely, Christmas came and went way too fast but finally the days started to become longer.  We spent a week at Disney, I love that place.  I started spending all days on Thursdays at Ariel's school where Belle was welcomed in the classroom all day.  Belle's speech therapy went very well and she was deemed "cured"!  Then spring was upon us.  We had a beautiful spring!  The mud season didn't seem to last too long and I don't recall anyone getting a vehicle stuck.  An amazing feat in these here parts of the woods.  Summer was beautiful, just amazing, especially compared to last summer and all the rain we got.  Hubby would call while he was hard at work in June and ask what we were up to where I would hesitantly reply, "sitting by the pool, watching the kids swim".   I had a great tan going before July hit.  Oh, my, what a whirlwind!  We had a blast visiting my parents and cousins while hubby was doing his army thing at West Point.  That sounded irreverent.  I'm very proud of my husband.  He is a battalion commander in the Army Reserve.  He was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel a year early this past January.  His battalion instructs at West Point.  Their mission has changed recently, but I don't seem to be up on all the details.  But while he was away, it was nice to have some r&r at mom & dad's.  All of August we were out and about having fun and soaking up the sun.  It all came to a screeching halt when we pulled into the driveway the night before school started.  School cramps our style!  I could have had at least another month of summer vacation.  All the good intentions of having the kids do worksheets to keep school in their heads went by the wayside mid-July.  Now that they are back into the swing of things, I don't think they are any worse for wear.  Ariel started 3rd grade.  Eek!  I was reflecting back on September 11th of 2001 and in the midst of the heartache going on, I felt Ariel kick me for the first time.  What an amazing miracle God gives to us.  I still don't know how I deserved to be blessed with two wonderful, healthy children.  There is so much to be thankful for.  Belle started kindergarten and fell asleep on the couch while watching Wipeout at 6:30.  She woke up in the morning and told me she didn't remember going to bed.  We all got a good giggle out of that.  I asked her how she liked her first day and she says, "That was not my first day!  I went to school last year!"  I guess her one day a week in the classroom while I volunteered got her all prepped for school!  I am so thankful for our school and the teachers.  Not only do they care how my kids do academically, they truly love my kiddos and care about how they are developing emotionally and spiritually too.  I'm a lucky girl.  Having two in school three days a week leaves me with lots of time home.  Of course it has only been two weeks and I haven't made it through all my closets with my organization goals, so it's not quite awful, but it's awful quiet and lonely.  I'm glad to get all my stuff done so that when they come home I can focus on them.  It's made days not so chaotic.  So, here's to another new beginning, a new school year and a renewed sense of wanting to keep up with our adventures!

Road Trip!

I love road trips.  Call me crazy.  I love my Jeep, the way it rides, the comfy seats, my moonroof and Sirrus Radio.  I look forward to 3pm when Dr. Laura comes on.  Sanity for my insanity.  I'm usually driving down the road, yelling at the caller.  Phew....rabbit trail...  Ah, yes, road trips.  So, referring back to the insanity comment made earlier, I buckle my kiddos up and set out for my parents' house.  Alone.  With kids.  It's about a 6 hour - ish drive and usually pretty uneventful.  The drive is pretty and mostly interstate, thankfully since Ariel gets car sick easily.  So after many are-we-there-yets and a few disagreements from the back seat, we arrive safely.  The good thing about coming here is the mini mom-vacation.  Of course all they want to do is hang with the grandparents and vice versa, so I'm left with little to do but, well, blog.  We've been here for about an hour and already the girls, including my mom, have hit the hot tub.  I volunteered to get dinner going while dad is napping, like all grandpas do around this time.  Nothing much changes here in this tiny town they live in.  My mom grew up here and they live in her parents' house.  Good memories for me are everywhere.  Seeing my kids doing things here makes me think of all the fun my brother and I used to have.  I hope that my kids can make lots of memories here and carry them with them like I do.  So even though the ride seems long to come here, it's always worth the trip, even when the when-are-we-gonna-get-theres are waiting for the return trip.

Bad, Unobservant Mom

The beauty of this blog is that I have two people that read this. I feel like I can journal my heart out and it can go pretty much undetected. So, please allow me to beat myself up a bit and then pour out my heart.

Belle, my sweet baby, is growing up. It's hard at times to come to grips with the fact that she is not a baby and that since she is my last, I won't do the baby thing again. Bittersweet. So that said, when she started talking a bit later than big sister, I didn't give it much thought. The baby talk began and it was so stinkin' cute. We mimicked her and didn't call too much attention to trying to correct her. Over the past year I have changed my ways and have started to help her talk more like a big girl. I thought that her issues were, in fact, non-issues, just normal speech development that would resolve itself in time. Hubby and I discussed it on many occasions, but always came to the agreement that she is such a smart child that it would be fine. When we started school this fall at home, and I have to thank the Lord that maybe this was His whole reason not to answer our prayers and have a Pre-K at school this year, I realized that there were sounds that she could not make even when I tried coaching her through it. The week that we were doing the letter S, Sandy Sunfish, and she could not, though she tried so hard, make the S sound properly. I called up her ped and made an appointment for later that week. We were referred to a speech therapist and went for the evaluation last week. Belle tested very well, above average in most categories, for language development. Her vocabulary is right on track, if not a tad higher, for her age group. But she scored as having a severe phonological disorder. Severe. I felt like the wind was knocked out of me. Severe. I didn't hear much after that word came out of the therapist's mouth. When I pulled my thoughts together, I had her recap for me, taking notes furiously. She was so kind and very positive. I had told her before the testing that I wasn't sure if she had issues or not, but we were still having trouble understanding her at times and thought we'd be better safe than sorry. She told me she thought we hard work that the problem could be corrected in 9-12 months with 2 sessions a week for a little while and getting down to one as soon as possible. On the drive home, I fought tears. I feel like I knew there was a problem a long time ago and passed it off as age appropriate. Hubby and I had time to sit down the next morning and go over what the therapist said and we both agreed to sacrifice to make this happen. One of the things we discussed at length was to not make Belle feel different or uneasy about what was going on. I have approached the whole thing by telling her that Miss Sarrah is going to help her talk so that people won't have to ask her to repeat herself. Belle seems good with the whole thing, taking it in stride and not being too effected.

Today was our first session with Miss Sarrah. When we got into the car after an hour of her being out of my sight and parenting (this was very hard for me!!) she didn't want to talk about what she did or what was taught. I knew from Sarrah that they had worked on the "s" sound. It took a bit of riding and bribery with hot chocolate from Tim Hortons, before she opened up to tell me. She sounded like she didn't mind it too much and that she had a good time. The therapist was young and pretty and got right down on Belle's level when she came out to meet her for the first time.

It is all about perspective though. Hubby says, hey, she has a speech problem, it's not cancer. Wow. Talk about perspective. I'm thankful that finally I took her for an eval and that we are working on correcting this, even though I'm a bit mad at myself. But thinking that this is something that will be over and done with in a year and not something like cancer was just what I needed to get my brain straight! So next Tuesday morning we'll head back over to see Miss Sarrah thankful all the way that my kiddo is not sick. And knowing that I'm one lucky momma.