In Which It's Back To Business As Usual

The kids are back in school!  Hooray!

I took a nap, a long, leisurely shower (definitely something I didn't get the chance to indulge in over the past week) and then went out to lunch with my mom at the little cafe inside our local nursery, which is always a dangerous sort of outing.  My mom is a Gardening Enabler, and whenever we go to the nursery together we feed off of each other and always end up taking home rather more than we set out to find.  I got a few starts to replenish the annuals in my herb garden, which I actually needed, and picked up a couple of flowers as well for some of the pots I have on the porch, which I didn't need at all.  It was a lovely lunch.

The kids were both absolutely thrilled to be back to school, though I believe both of them were pretty tired by the end of the day.  It's tough getting back into regular routines after a week of sleeping in!  Hopefully they'll get settled pretty quickly; we've got a very busy couple of months coming up, so it will be good to have them fully acclimated back into their routines before all the craziness starts.

All in all it was a pretty quiet day!

~Jess

In Which Connor Depilates His Doll And Eden Makes A Plan

Connor had a bit of a clingy day today; I think he's still upset about Jer leaving.  He spent pretty much the whole morning hanging on to his Gobo Fraggle doll (we are huge fans of Fraggle Rock in this house), which is his absolute favorite, and didn't want to relinquish it when it was time to go to school.  So I let him carry it in, and promised to bring it back the second school was over.  That earned me a major pouty face, but he apparently perked up pretty quickly after I left.

Gobo is looking a bit worse for wear these days, as Connor likes to chew on his hair.  I think it's about time to add a Fraggle friend or two to the menagerie, or poor Gobo is going to end up bald.  Luckily Connor has a birthday coming up in a couple of months, so that gives me time to track down another buddy for him.  His second favorite character is Red, and she has a ton of chewable hair.  I'm thinking she might be a pretty good choice.

Eden had a good day today; she turned in her request for electives next year, and I'll be going in to help her register for her classes in a couple of weeks.  It's pretty neat to see her making choices about what path she wants to take in high school, which is coming up really quickly.  All but one of her electives will be taken up by ELL next year, but for the remaining slot she chose "Leadership" as her first pick.  I think we've got an aspiring business woman on our hands!  She's also talking about the possibility of going into a math-related field, like banking or accounting.  It's really fantastic to hear her voicing realistic career goals and starting to dream about what she'll be doing.

Making choices used to be really, really difficult for her as she didn't have a lot of prior freedom in making decisions for herself, so I'm proud to see how far she's come.  Even little things like choosing what to drink with dinner or which shoes to wear used to be major struggles, but now she does that sort of thing without any trouble.  I love how she's really starting to dream about her future and realize that so many possibilities are open to her.  That's our girl!

~Jess

In Which It's Back To Business As Usual

It was so lovely to have Jeremy here for a few days!  We spent some special time together with the kids on Friday, Sunday evening and Monday, but Saturday and the first half of Sunday was just for the two of us. We drove up to Belfair, which is a little town on the Hood Canal, and stayed in a lovely B&B close to the north shore.   It's been a long, long time (really- over nineteen months) since we've had the opportunity to have a bit of a vacation as a couple instead of as parents, so it was really nice to get away!

But Jer's back in California now, and it will probably be May when we see him next, unless I can manage to find a way to sneak down there before then.  The kids are on their mid-winter break at the moment, so they're off of school and we're spending the next couple of days taking it easy here at home.  We would be out doing fun things outdoors, but it seems like the Pacific Northwest apparently saved all the rain of the entire winter for this week.  It's been coming down sideways out there most of the day.  

Connor was a bit clingy and sad yesterday and today; he's usually that way after Jeremy leaves.  I think the transitions are pretty tough on him.  Eden's gotten used to Jer coming and going, as he's been in school as long as she's been a part of the family.  It will be interesting to see how the adjustment goes once he's back at home for a good while.  It's nice to think that by this time next year I'll be waiting for him to come home from work rather than waiting for his next visit!

~Jess

In Which Long Distance Relationships Are Not Fun

I'm throwing myself a bit of a pity party over here at the moment-- Jer and I went on our very first date around this time of year a rather appallingly long time ago, and I'm getting all sentimental and missing him bunches.

It's been nineteen months now since Jer and I have been living in different states while he attends Army PA school, and I have to say I don't think things have gotten any easier.  There are times I can lose myself in the daily routine of taking care of the kids and the house, and then there are other times  I miss him so much I can hardly breathe.  

It's not like he's deployed-- we talk on the phone literally every day, and I get to see him once every
three or four months.  He's not in harm's way, and with only eleven more months to go we're well past the midpoint of our separation now and I know that in less than a year he'll be home.  But that doesn't change how difficult this whole long-distance marriage thing is.  I don't say that because I'm worried about our marriage falling apart or anything, because after weathering all the ridiculously dramatic situations we've been through in the past ten years I'm pretty sure that nothing short of a nuclear holocaust could give us much trouble in that department.

It's more that I have to remind myself two or three times a month (or day, depending on how things are going) that as a responsible adult and parent I cannot just stuff the kids in the car, drive down to California and announce that, to heck with all the really legitimate reasons why we can't be down there with him, we're moving in.

Of course I can't actually do that, because the main reason we're not down there is that Connor doesn't have a heat release mechanism and it gets to 95 degrees there in the summer, making living there an Extremely Poor Parenting Decision.  Also Jer is living in someone else's house and I doubt they'd be okay with three more people moving into their spare bedroom.  But I daydream about it a lot.

I've developed all sorts of weird little coping mechanisms to make it feel like Jer's here.  I keep a toothbrush in the bathroom for him and a pair of his shoes in the closet by the door.  I've been careful not to take over his side of the closet even though my side is overflowing right now.  I still only sleep on one side of the bed.  Sometimes after a really hard day, I'm a bit embarrassed to admit, I even pile up pillows behind my back and pretend he's sleeping next to me.

I'm so, so proud of him for doing what he's doing, and in the grand scheme of things two-and-a-half years isn't all that long.  I guess one of the disadvantages of being utterly, completely head-over-heels for the man I married is that separations like this are always going to be pretty tough.  I'm really looking forward to the day he's home for good (or at least for a good while-- he is in the military, after all) and in the meantime I'll keep on keeping on.  That's life!

But yeah, it's hard right now.

~Jess

In Which We're Back To Business As Usual

I don't have much to report today!  Eden had a half-day of school due to it being the end of the semester, so I spent the morning doing as many chores as I could, and then the afternoon running various errands and carting the children around to physical therapy and swimming.  Traffic was bad enough that we didn't get home until after nine.  Connor immediately crashed, and Eden went to bed early because she was so tired.  

So it looks like other than the unusual half-day today, things have pretty much gotten back to normal around here, which is a relief.  I'm taking the kids to the lunar new year celebration and the Asian Art Museum up in Seattle this weekend, so I'm trying to get caught up on as much as I can around the house before Saturday so I can go with a clear conscience.  Hopefully it won't be too crowded for Eden; this will be the first year I've taken her and she's not a big fan of crowds.  I know Connor will enjoy it; he absolutely loves the lion dance and the taiko drumming, and he's been plenty of times in previous years.  

I'll probably pack some ear plugs for the Little Miss and we'll give it a go!

~Jess

In Which Things Are Looking Up And I Look Back

Connor went back to school today!  This means that I can once again start looking forward to such events as gaining back a bit of my sanity and the basic mores of personal hygiene.  When your child can literally keel over and die while you are in the shower, you take really short showers.  Either that or you get up before six in the morning while the night nurse is still there to take them.  Guess which option I've been choosing.

Anyway, so Connor was just as excited to get back to school as I was to take him there, so that was nice.  He apparently had a great day, though once I got him home he crashed hard and napped for nearly three hours.  Apparently they gave him a good workout.  I'm really glad that he loves school so much and was ready to get back to it.  Both my kids are this way, actually.  Eden's favorite day is Monday, because that's the day she gets to go back to school after the weekend is over.  Eden is a strange kid; she's perhaps the only teen I've ever met who is actually enjoying her middle school experience.  I remember spending most of my eighth grade year wishing I was as far away from school as possible, so I can't really relate.

Okay granted, I'd moved to a new town my eighth grade year and had managed to break my collarbone during the summer, so I spent the first four months of school wearing a back brace under my clothing that pulled my shoulders back so I looked like I had ridiculously good posture, I had to use a luggage carrier for my books instead of a backpack, and all my clothing had to button at the sleeves.  Also the PE teacher told me that since I couldn't exercise I had to be the 'classroom monitor' and sit in the room with a clipboard writing down the names of anyone who did anything wrong, or he would fail me.

And also I was painfully shy, socially awkward, and had read every book ever written by Mercedes Lackey, which didn't help matters.  Every time I have to meet a new group of people I still have flashbacks to the time that Crystal I-Can't-Remember-Her-Last-Name told me to sit at a different lunch table because "I don't like you and no one else at the table likes you either."  I asked her which table she'd suggest, walked over, put my tray down, excused myself and then went and sobbed into my gym towel in a bathroom stall for forty-five minutes with my feet drawn up on the toilet seat so no one would see me.  Then I got detention for being late to social studies. Yeah, middle school.  Good times.

Um, anyway, got off on a bit of a tangent there.  But overall it was a good day, and I'm glad the little guy is feeling better and back in the classroom!  And I'm also glad Eden enjoys school as much as she does.  She's got enough stuff going on without having any Crystal Whats-Her-Faces in her life, so let's keep it that way, right?

~Jess

In Which I Look Ahead

We had a busy day today, and I'm pretty tired!  From the way my throat feels right now, I suspect I might be coming down with a bit of a cold.  It's that season, after all.  The kids still seem to be feeling pretty good though, so that's a relief.  It's tough when everyone gets sick.

It's been interesting hearing about Jeremy's first days of clinical rotations as he gets settled in to the new phase of his schooling.  Obviously there's a lot he doesn't share with me since the privacy of patients is really important, but it's great to hear the enthusiasm in his voice when he talks about his work.  I'm so glad that he's finding it so interesting, and I think he's really going to be a fantastic PA once he's finished.

I've been trying to do some more serious writing in the past couple of weeks; I'm starting to look forward to the time when Jeremy graduates, and while it's still almost a year away it's not too soon for me to start thinking about my plans once he's home.  If I want to eventually return to school, I need to start building up a more significant body of work.

Since I've been out of college for ten years now, I doubt my professors would even remember me-- let alone be willing to write me recommendations for graduate school.  That means I'll have to rely largely on my writing skills to find acceptance into a good school, so I need to work hard-- especially if I'm going to attempt to win a grant or scholarship, which I'll likely need as Eden's education will be our priority.  Most low residency graduate programs with a focus in English or creative writing are extremely competitive, and scholarships are even more so.

So I've got to make sure to practice my skills as much as possible in order to have a chance at getting a slot.  Cramming extra writing in on top of my current sort-of-single parenthood, caregiving, and all the other obligations I have right now is a challenge, but I've got to make it a priority if I want to meet my goal.  I love being a mother and a caregiver, and those are my main concerns right now, but that doesn't mean that's all I want to be.  I think it's important to remind myself sometimes that I'm not defined solely by my role as a mother, and that there are dreams it's important for me to hang onto if I want to be true to myself.

~Jess

In Which The Kids Are Doing Well And Loki Hogs The Bed

The kids are pretty much settled back into their school routine now, which is nice.  Connor's been making some recent strides in physical therapy; yesterday he stood up leaning against a play area with his knee braces on but without any other support for almost a minute, and he actually spent some time playing with his toys, which is more than we've seen out of him for a while.  It's hard to hold the kid's attention long enough to motivate him to work on something, so I'm happy to see him making some progress!  We'll keep working on his standing with braces for a while and see how far he goes, and when he gets bored we'll switch to something else.

Eden's been making some incredible progress in PT as well; she's currently working on hopping on one foot, which is really awesome. She's come a long, long way in the past year!  She decided she wanted to try on my high heels today and went wobbling around the room laughing; it made me remember trying on my mom's heels as a kid and doing the same thing, though I was quite a bit younger at the time.  I'm so glad I get to make some of the same special memories with her.

We've been keeping the gas fireplace turned on quite a bit, and the cats have spent most of the past week fighting over who gets to sleep in the cat bed in front of the fire and who has to take the blanket, which is clearly inferior in every way.  Loki, who almost always wins because he's about twice Cricket's size, likes to  stretch out on the blanket and then put just his head in the bed while Cricket plops down on the bare floor next to him and looks pitiful.  This is because Loki is kind of evil.  An adorable striped fuzzy ball of evil.  Apparently sharing was not one of the lessons Loki got high marks on in kitty etiquette school.

Crazy cat.

~Jess

In Which Twice The BS Happens

Yesterday, Jeremy graduated from the first phase of his physician's assistant school!  He's got a second Bachelor of Science now, which I told him meant he now had double the BS, because I'm a supportive wife like that.

I'm so very, very proud of him and extremely happy that he's made it through!  Earning a four year degree in a year and a half is no easy feat.  Our separation has been just as difficult on him as it's been on me, and the military PA school is extremely challenging, but he really buckled down and did what he needed to do.

I wish I could have made it to his graduation ceremony; I'm glad that at least some of the family got to go.  He now has another year of school for his clinical rotations in California, at the end of which he'll have earned a Master's degree.  It will be tough to have him gone another year, but at least we're more than halfway through the separation now.  He's spending Christmas with us, which is so exciting!  We'll see him in just a couple of days.

Hooray for Jeremy!

~Jess

In Which Not Much Happens

Connor's been working in a walker for a while now at physical therapy, and while he started off doing really well, lately he's been pretty much refusing to do anything in it.  So we're probably going to back off of it for a while and focus on some other things.  It's frustrating to see him lose that motivation-- especially when I've seen him propel himself on his own for the very first time.  

So we'll put the walker away at PT and try something else for a while.  I hope that we'll eventually be able to go back to it and he'll have some renewed interest in the activity.  In the meantime, we're going to work on some rolling over and supporting himself with his hands for a couple of months, and see how that goes.

Sometimes it gets frustrating that he makes so little progress, but I figure as long as he's happy and we continue to work towards him being as healthy and as successful as he can be that we're doing just fine.

Eden spent pretty much the whole day working on school work; she stayed late for science and math tutoring and then came home and worked on English until dinner.  She was a bit overwhelmed with her book report, but she kept plugging away at it and finally got her rough draft done.  I'm pretty proud of her for sticking with it.  She told me today just how much she liked going to tutoring, which is pretty much a complete turn around for this kid.  

Hopefully as we get closer to the holidays her homework load will ease off a bit!

~Jess

In Which The Kids Have A Party And Work Hard

Today the center where the kids go to physical therapy held their Christmas party!  I'd intended to take them right after school, but I got caught in traffic on the way to get Connor and by the time I got home Eden was thoroughly ensconced in her homework.  Once she starts something, she really likes to work straight through until whatever activity she's involved in is finished.  So I waited to leave until Eden got to a stopping point before we left for the party.

We ended up getting there about half an hour before the party was finished, but it was still absolutely packed.  The therapists manned tables set up around the center with all kinds of fun crafts and activities for the kids to do, and there had to be well over a hundred children of all ages there.  Connor got really overwhelmed about five minutes in, but Eden seemed to absolutely revel in the chaos.  So I ended up taking the little guy to the restroom to calm him down for a bit while she bounced from one station to the next, happy as can be.

Eden made a picture frame and a Santa beard, both of which she immediately gave to Connor.  The kids fished for prizes, and then we trooped up the circular ramp to the second floor, where they took a picture with Santa.  We finished up with that right about the time that the party was shutting down. 

Then we went back home, where Connor crashed pretty much immediately.  I think once he got used to the noise at the party he enjoyed himself, but it definitely wore him out!  Eden, however, was pretty wired when we got home; it's funny to see just how differently the kids handle the same situations.  She eventually calmed down and went to work on her book report, which she wrote on until dinner. 

It's pretty amazing to see her writing enough to fill the front and back of a page, when just last year writing a single paragraph took hours.  Now she just asks me to spell the occasional word for her, instead of having to help her read and spell everything, and even though her grammar and spelling are still pretty creative things are coming more easily to her.  It's great to see her more confident in her school work.  Also I have to admit I'm  not exactly missing our six-hour-a-night homework sessions. 

I'm proud of my girl!

~Jess

In Which We Have A Busy Day

So I spent the beginning of the day working on the kids' appointments and schedules for the next couple of months.  Then I headed over to one of the Korean restaurants in Lakewood to meet a friend for lunch.  Turns out the entire restaurant was packed full to the brim though, so we walked over to the Asian grocery store and ate in the food court instead.  It was great to catch up with my friend-- especially while stuffing my face full of tasty bi bim bap and banchan!

Then we had to do a whole bunch of shopping, because it's impossible for me to go to an Asian grocery store and not walk out with half of what's on the aisles.  I ended up with a few of the treats that Eden and I both really enjoy, like coconut durian rolls and lychee gel cups.  My pantry definitely has more of an international flair since she's come home, which is pretty awesome, and it's fun to buy food I'm not exactly sure how to prepare so we can learn together.

Eden called me on my way to pick Connor up from school to ask me if she could stay late for drama club.  I'm excited that she's starting to become interested in activities at school, and I think drama club is a great fit for her.  This is a kid who loves the spotlight!

Once she was done I picked her up from drama club, we stopped really quickly at the house and then we headed out to Eden's swim practice, where I dropped her off and headed to the nearby bookstore to sit with a cup of coffee or tea and read for a bit on seats more comfortable than the bleachers at the pool.  Eden's swim club is too far away from our house for me to go back home, so Connor and I usually find a place to go.  I swear that even with a cushion, metal high school bleachers have to be some of the most uncomfortable things ever invented.

Anyway, I had a nice conversation with a fellow writer at the bookstore, which is always great, and of course cuddle time with Connor and an hour of uninterrupted reading is always fantastic.  But I seriously need to stop drinking caffeinated drinks that late in the day-- now I'm wired.  You would think I would have figured out not to do that by now.  Oh well.

~Jess

In Which Connor Is A Sickykin

I kept Connor home from school today as he wasn't feeling at all well; he dozed upright in his chair all through our morning routine and even the car ride to drop Eden off.  So I brought him back home and put him to bed, where he slept for around three hours.  Then he perked up a little bit and I brought him out into the living room, where he watched the Broadway productions of both Phantom of The Opera and Les Mis-- both highly appropriate movies for a seven year old.  Oh well; he loves the music.

With the exception of a brief break for tea with my mother after she popped by to say hello and choir practice in the evening, I spent pretty much the whole day cleaning and belting out the lyrics to the musicals.  Connor seemed to be okay with my top-volume version of "Do You Hear The People Sing?" but the cats were extremely unimpressed.  I'm pretty sure Cricket thought I was dying in some horribly agonizing fashion.

Tomorrow the little guy has a cardiology appointment; I hope he feels up to going!  I have to schedule those things quite a bit in advance, and we need a renewal of the kid's heart medication.  We also have our first respite care session tomorrow, and it would be nice if the little guy was feeling up to meeting somebody new.  I'll be sticking around the house this first time anyway as it will be a new nurse, but I would imagine things will go much more smoothly if Connor isn't feeling crabby because he's sick.

~Jess

In Which I Spend Way Too Much Time Decorating

Connor had a seizure (he's still getting over that cold) before school today and so I let him take a short nap on my bed while I got ready for the day.  We'd been back there for about ten minutes when I became aware of a smell filtering through the bedroom door.  This was not a pleasant smell.  It was more of a Something Is Very, Very Burned And Or Possibly In Flames Right Now kind of odor.

So this morning Eden discovered that if you put those vegetarian buffalo wings in the microwave and they are not hot after two minutes, which is the heating time on the package, it is not a good idea to put them in on high for six more minutes unless you prefer your fake chicken wings hot enough that they are actively on fire when you take them out.  Thankfully there was no harm done except for the fact that the veggie wings had to be put out in the sink and were inedible lumps of charcoal and my entire kitchen is now heavily perfumed in Eau De Charred Soy.  Yum.  Any suggestions on how to get the smell out of the microwave?

After I got the kids off to school (and then returned to Eden's school with a new outfit as her old shirt apparently smelled rather strongly of burnt veggie wings) my dad came by and we got to work hanging the wall sconces I bought for the master bedroom a few weeks ago.  Apparently what happens when I don't write for five months is I spend all that time and energy redecorating instead.  I've been slowly but steadily redoing our bedroom to make it more functional and welcoming, and I've pretty much got it the way I want it now.  Since Jer hasn't been home I've been making all of the decorating decisions, so the room is quite a bit more feminine than it probably would have been otherwise, but I think he'll probably be able to live with it.

Wall Sconces of Glory

So now I have a shag rug in there, and a super comfy zebra print chair, and a whole station with an electric kettle for tea and hot cocoa and a nice little plate with various kinds of chocolate on it, and lots of books, and plants (my bedroom is a cat free zone, which is why my plants are not all little chewed nubs) and my computer, too.  I'm currently wrapped up in my super fuzzy throw, sipping hot cocoa and stuffing my face full of Andes Mints while I'm typing, and since there's a bathroom back here as well I'm seriously wondering why I even need the rest of the house.  I guess I would eventually die of scurvy or something if I never came out of my room again, but it would take a while.  I've got a lot of chocolate back here.

Squids Make All Spices Taste Better

So anyway, Dad and I put up the wall sconces, and then I stood around for a little bit being proud of them and trying to figure out how to work every conversation I have for the next week around to wall sconces so I can talk about them, and then I got a phone call from Connor's school because his g-tube had accidentally been yanked out during a transfer and they needed me to come put a new one in so I had to stop daydreaming.  Hey, it happens.

After that we went to PT, where Connor tried out a new walker, and then we came home to find a package on the doorstep with my new food-safe tins I ordered to put all my spices in (told you I had the redecorating bug).  I spent Connor's entire nap time hanging my spice rack (two Gamble bottle crates hung vertically on the outside of my pantry wall) and transferring over all my spices to their new containers.  Then I hung a gilded squid over the whole mess, because squids are awesome.  See?

So now I can find all my spices, which will be really, really nice; this arrangement is a vast improvement over their previous corner cabinet home.  The rest of my house may look terrible (with the exception of the bedroom wall sconces, which look awesome) and there's a rather odd lingering smell of burnt buffalo spices throughout the whole place, but at least I'll be able to find my za'atar when I need it!

~Jess

In Which We Get A Move On

Well that was a busy day yesterday! 

We all got the chance to sleep in a little bit because instead of heading to school, we were going to Connor's Special Sports Day.  Over 300 kids with special needs from around his school district participated.  Connor did the softball toss, the 50 meter race and the 100 meter race (which was more like 60 meters, but that's okay-- who's counting?).  Eden came along as Connor's racing partner, and she pushed his chair in the races and helped him throw the softballs.  It was pretty awesome, and the kids both had a blast.  Here's a photo of the two of them together after their first race-- Eden's face is obscured enough by her hair that I can post it.  My kids are adorable.

So Connor came home with some ribbons, which he was extremely proud of.  We ate some lunch, and then it was time for Eden to meet some of her extended family for the first time; they're up here visiting us for the weekend and exploring the area.  It's always great to have relatives in town!  So we got the chance to visit for a while, and then it was time for Eden's swim practice.  So we all drove down for that and watched the little miss practice for her upcoming swim meet. 

After that we came home, ate some dinner, put a very tired Connor to bed and then visited for just a bit with the other set of relatives that are in town this weekend.  And then Eden worked on her homework for a while on the computer before bed. 

 So basically we were on the move all day!

~Jess

In Which The Children Are Thrown Off Their Groove

We had a bit of a rough day today.  Connor has a sports field day tomorrow that he'll be traveling to another school for, and Eden is going to help out with it so she'll be missing some school as well.  In addition to that, we've got relatives coming into town tomorrow.  So because the kids are anticipating the change in their routine, they both kind of freaked out today.

I've noticed a pretty specific pattern with Eden in particular-- whenever we've got a new event, change in routine or are meeting a new person, she ends up having a really tough day the day before the event and, in the case of people, usually the day after as well.  That's pretty typical behavior for children adopted at an older age so it's certainly not unexpected, though it can be exhausting for all parties involved.

However, I think living as a hermit is going to be a bad habit to get into as well, so we'll keep working at it!

~Jess

In Which We Have A Slow Day And Think About The Future

Today I spent a good portion of my alone time while the kids were in school napping.  I never used to be able to nap, but it has now become one of my favorite activities.  This is probably a sign that I'm firmly out of young adulthood and trundling on towards middle age.  Either that or I'm turning into a cat. 

Hey.  It could happen.

Anyway, Connor spent a good portion of the day napping as well-- he kept nodding off in his wheelchair, though apparently he lasted through school all right.  Thankfully he crashed as soon as I put him down for bed tonight, so hopefully by tomorrow he'll have mostly caught up on sleep and will be back to his usual cheery self.  He was a bit grumpy today.  Staying up for forty-four hours straight tends to have that effect on people.

Once I managed to get up and moving, I went down to Target to pick up Connor's medication and to find myself a new notebook.  I've been trying to get more involved in my serious writing projects recently, and whenever I start a new writing project I have to buy a new notebook.  This is completely regardless of the fact that I already have about forty half-filled notebooks stashed away in various corners of the house.  I really pity whoever has to go through my stuff after I die, because since I plan to live to at least a hundred and twenty they are probably going to have a lot of recycling to do. 

I'm starting to try and write more for a couple of reasons.  The first is that I really love writing and it's a hobby I can do indoors with the kids, which is where I'm going to be spending a lot of my summer.  The second reason is that in another five or six years, when Jeremy is out of school and is allowed vacation time and the kids are a bit older, I'd like to find a low residency program and go back to college an earn either an M.A. or an M.F.A. in creative writing. 

However, in order to do that I'd need to actually have a body of work-- preferably published work-- to show in my application.  Also Eden will be pretty close to college by that point, and paying for one college education will be bad enough without tacking on one I would be doing less for career opportunities and more for personal gratification.  This means I will likely have to manage to land a scholarship to be able to attend, and most of the ones connected with writing are merit based. 

So you know, actually writing something once in a while that isn't a blog I cobbled together in fifteen minutes might be a good idea, right?

~Jess

In Which I Don't Write For A While And Explain Why

So I haven't blogged in about a month.  Many of you have e-mailed me or left comments asking how we're doing, which I really appreciate. 

And the truth is, we're doing okay.  Not wonderful, but okay.

Don't worry; it's not Connor.  He's fine.  More than fine actually-- he's thriving right now.  It's just that it turns out that this parenting two kids thing is kind of tough.  I know, who would have guessed, right?  It's without a doubt the best thing I've ever done and I have zero regrets, but I'm not going to pretend it's all roses and sunshine over here.  Our daughter is dealing with some really big feelings, and she's still developing the tools she needs to handle them.  Things are slowly improving, but it's a process that's going to take a long time.  She's a fantastic kid and a survivor, and she's learning and growing in leaps and bounds every day.  But we are definitely experiencing some challenging parenting moments right now.

So one of the reasons why I haven't been blogging is that I've been trying to figure out where my boundaries are in terms of transparency and honesty versus being sensitive about respecting our daughter's privacy.  I've always been a fairly open and frank blogger in terms of how I write about my experiences, but I want to make sure that what I'm putting down here is something that "Ellen" will be okay with having in the public eye.  Once her English improved to the point where I'm sure she understood what I was asking, I had a discussion with her about how comfortable she is with me writing about her.  She gave me pretty much free reign.  That's a tremendous gesture of trust in me on her part, and I want to make sure I honor that. 

So I'm still hashing out exactly how much detail I'll go into in regards to exactly what issues we're dealing with around here. Please bear with me on that one, okay?  I don't want to give you the impression that they're life-threatening or anything out of the realm of the ordinary for a child adopted at an older age; in fact we were expecting to potentially deal with much greater issues than what we've seen, and for the most part our girl is doing beautifully.  But the fact remains that she is facing some pretty significant challenges emotionally and behaviorally.  I do want to keep in mind that anyone can see this blog, and I don't want to write anything that might be potentially embarrassing to her in the future if, say, one of her classmates was to stumble upon it.

Another thing we've discussed in recent weeks is exactly what our daughter would like to be called on here.  She's decided to take an American first name when we finalize the adoption in July, and after a bit of experimentation and a lot of poring over baby name books she seems to have settled pretty firmly on one.  She'd like me to start calling her by that name on the blog, and since it's not currently her legal name that isn't a problem in terms of our agreement with our agency.  So she's chosen the name "Eden," and I'll be referring to her here that way from now on.  We'll see if that's still what she wants to go by come July, but she seems pretty stuck on it.  In the meantime, Eden it is! 

Goodness knows she has much better taste than I would have if I'd been given the opportunity to name myself at fifteen.  I was heavily into a hippy-dippy bad poetry phase at the time and probably would have named myself something like "Ebony Rose Skylark Meadowsong."  It would not have been good.

Anyway, now for something completely different.  It's time for a bit more transparency on another topic, which will also help explain my recent absence from the Internet.  I kept this concealed at the time for a variety of reasons, few of which apply anymore, so now I can share.  Savvy readers might have noticed that pictures and writing about Jer dropped off sharply a few months ago.  I think I mentioned once waaaaaaaaaaaay back in 2010 that he was taking prerequisite classes in preparation for applying to the army's Physician's Assistant Program, and then I never said anything about it ever again.  What I've been neglecting to mention for, um, a while is that he applied, and he was accepted (of course, as the man is brilliant-- not that I have a biased opinion or anything), and he started up the program last July.  It happens to be on the other side of the country-- down south in Texas.

And we, of course, couldn't go with him.

Connor doesn't sweat, and taking him down to live in an area that gets to 115 degrees in August would be a Rather Poor Parenting Decision on our part.  So we made the extremely difficult decision to do the long-distance marriage thing until the first part of Jer's PA school is complete.  We're then really hoping he'll be able to get a special dispensation to move back up this way for the second phase of PA school.  I'm so proud of him and he's been doing very well in school, which is no surprise.  I also miss him terribly.  He's been gone for about ten months now, and we have about eight months left to go.  In other words, I've been doing the sort-of-single-parent thing for nearly a year now. 

This is not particularly fun.

We talk to him every day, of course, and Skype when our lousy Internet connections allow for it.  He's able to visit us during semester breaks as well, which is pretty fantastic.  And he's not deployed, which we're very grateful for.  But it's pretty hard not having him here, and I'm definitely being stretched in a lot of ways.  As a result, when I'm not dreaming about Jer being home again, a lot of my current fantasies involve going away for a whole weekend to some little Bed and Breakfast with a maid, a 24-hour tea and chocolate service, a large bathtub and a suitcase full of books.  And I would go there By Myself.  To be All Alone.  And it would be marvelous.

I don't want to make it sound like things are falling apart around here.  They aren't.  We're actually having a lot of wonderful moments.  In the past month Connor had his birthday, took his first step ever in a walker (and then got very surprised when we started cheering and refused to do it again), Eden got her ears pierced, went roller skating, and discovered the wonders of fresh-picked corn on the cob from the farmer's market and I've spent a ton of time playing out in the garden.  So there's actually been some really wonderful stuff happening around these parts.

But in the process of trying to avoid talking about Jer being gone and figuring out what to say or not say about Eden and also doing the eight bajillion things that one does as a parent of a seven year old and a teenager, blogging started to seem less like a pleasure and more like extra work.  And if there's one thing I don't need around here right now, it's extra work.  So I stopped and took a step back.  And it was only yesterday that I realized I was beginning to genuinely miss writing here to you, and I knew it was time to start up again. 

So sorry for disappearing on you all like that.  I'm still here, we're still trucking along, and I'm still going to write about it.  No guarantees on quality, but I'm going to do my best to get back in the habit of writing every day. 

Thanks for being patient with me!

~Jess

In Which We Do A Lot Of Stuff And Things

I'm afraid I may have to turn on that darn "weed out the spambots" button-- the spam is getting kind of ridiculous now and I have quite a bit less time to spend deleting it all, dang it.

We had an extremely busy week around here!  Connor went almost ten days without seizures, which was pretty exciting.  He had about a twenty second one yesterday and a fifteen second one today, so that trend may be over.  We'll see what tomorrow brings.

The little guy had a progress report done in physical therapy yesterday.  He's now able to straighten his legs about twenty more degrees than he could a few months ago, so that's some movement in the right direction!  Connor's hamstrings are still somewhat constricted-- he can extend his legs to a 150 degree angle rather than a 180 degrees-- but any improvement in his flexibility is fantastic.  With kids who sit in a wheelchair most of the time like Connor does, hamstring shortening tend to be inevitable and if they get bad enough children can need surgery to be comfortable.  So I'm glad we're keeping him as limber as we can!

Ellen had her second swim meet this past weekend; it was a two-day affair and she swam eight events total.  She did a fantastic job, and we're pretty proud of her!  She's told us that in Thailand she didn't get to swim in very many competitions each year and they were all against other children with disabilities, so she's not quite used to this swim-meet-with-typical-kids-every-couple-of-weeks thing yet.  She had a really good time, though she was pretty tired by the end of the weekend!  She's starting to open up more to the other kids and seems to be making some friends; it was pretty neat to see all the other kids cheering for her as she raced.

I had a meeting with her teachers today; I hadn't met most of them yet and this was a good time for a check-in.  We also wanted to get the ball rolling on a 504 plan for her, and talk a little bit with her teachers about how Ellen's education might be affected by cultural differences between Thailand and the USA, her cerebral palsy, long number of years in institutionalized care, and her adoption.  All of her teachers seemed very nice and they all had wonderful things to say about her-- she's is a very eager student.  She really seems to love school and is pretty enthusiastic about learning.

Tomorrow morning she and I have an appointment up at the rescue center to pick up a pair of guinea pigs!  Unfortunately the rescue is not wheelchair accessible, so Connor has to stay home.  But I'm sure the whole family will spend quite a bit of time staring into the guinea pigs' ridiculously huge cage (no seriously, this thing is HUGE) once we get them home.  Ellen and I set the cage up today, and so it's all ready for its new occupants.  She's decided that she wants a pair of boy guinea pigs, though she may change her mind once we get there and she has to choose.  We've been talking a lot about how the guinea pigs might be "feeling" after leaving all the other guinea pigs and coming to a new, strange family.  I think the guinea pigs are going to be a rather important tool for expressing emotions around here for a while!

~Jess

In Which We Do All The Things

Well, that was one heck of a busy day!

Ellen had both her first day of school and her first day of swimming today.  It's going to be quite the schedule, though it's not quite as strenuous as her schedule was at the orphanage.  They gave us a rundown of her average day while we were there and it was. . . impressive.

She had a fantastic time at both school and swimming, which was great.  I think that having the routine is going to be really good for her. 

Anyway, so she's starting to test her boundaries and feel out what it's like to have parents, which I think is a good thing as it means she's now comfortable enough with us to relax and stop feeling like she needs to always be on her best behavior. 

Some of the frustration she's experiencing is due to miscommunications; she got pretty angry with me tonight right before bed when I asked for her school class schedule and teacher list so I could make a copy of it.  Despite being upset with me, she dutifully got out the schedule and was just sitting down at her desk with a piece of paper and a pencil when I walked into her room, asked for the schedule again more slowly and clearly, and then introduced her to the miracle of our scanner/printer. 

It turned out she hadn't understood me the first time and thought that when I said that I needed her schedule so I could make a copy of it, I was actually saying that she had to copy it out by hand before she could go to bed-- a monumental task for a child who's a beginning English language learner and one that she would have every right to be upset over.  She was pretty relieved when she realized that wasn't what I was asking for.  Also she thought the scanner was awesome.

So some of her frustration is because of things like that.  And some of the frustration is because she's a teenager.  And she probably had a preconceived idea of exactly what living in America and having parents was going to be like, and we don't always measure up.  But she bounces back quickly, and for the most part she's a joy to live with. 

Connor had a great day today as well; he had no seizures, which was really nice!  Hopefully the medication is really starting to kick in.  We did have a problem this morning-- his g-tube completely clogged and I had to take it out and unclog it in the bathroom sink, which was not nearly as fun as it sounds.  Otherwise things went well for him.

So all in all it was a pretty good day!

~Jess