Back to the real world and the rest of January.

When we returned from Puerto Rico the Grandmas had survived their time with their grandkids.  We were grateful to them for taking over our duties and caring for the kids so we could get away.   When we got home the kids were already in bed and they were very happy to see us the next morning.  I was less than excited to get back into the normal school routine and cold weather, but I was really happy to see the kids.  5 days without them was long enough to enjoy my time, but any longer and I would have missed them a lot!  

Loving the beach.

I was excited to be home because we had our first doctor appointment for this pregnancy!  I love getting to hear the little heartbeat.  We took Cecilia with us to the appointment and she was very good and we told her there was a baby in mommy’s belly and showed her the picture and she seemed to understand.  She never said anything to anyone else, but if you mentioned Mommy’s doctor she would talk all about it.  She would say “Mommy lay down.  Picture of baby!”  Lucky for us that is not something that just comes up in conversation.  The kid has a great memory and will talk about things that happened weeks ago.  We will never be able to get anything past her!

When Joel went back to school he started full time in a new classroom!  He left the small classroom (4 students and 3 teachers) that was called STARS and was all kids on the Autism spectrum and went to a blended classroom (15 students and 2 teachers).  He did wonderful in the transition and is blessed to have another wonderful set of caring teachers and therapists.  We are so happy with the program he is in at the school and are so glad we moved into this school district.  Joel has been talking more since he joined the new class and has been doing great academically.  We are still working on the social skills, but they are coming along slowly.  Cecilia and I had the opportunity to visit Joel’s new classroom at the end of January and it is really different that his old classroom, but it is really great for him.  Cecilia had a lot of fun seeing his school.  Afterwards I took them on a lunch date to Culver’s.  They are both getting so big and are getting much easier to take out to eat.  They get so excited when I say we are going inside and not through the drive thru.

Selfies on the beach.

Most of the end of the January was spent worrying about my Papa.  He had been in the hospital since around Christmas day and kept going back and forth between doing well and not doing so well.  After doing well and getting moved to a rehabilitation facility he relapsed and was back in the hospital.  It turned out he had pulmonary fibrosis, there wasn’t much they could do and he went home on hospice.  My mom, my uncle, and several of their stepsiblings went to Arizona to be with Grandma and Papa.  While he was still feeling well and able to talk without a struggle he was able to talk to the kids and I and say goodbye, tell us how much he loved us and how proud he was of all of us and Brad.  We talked for several times after that too, but it progressively got harder for him.  We were blessed to have time with him in Arizona and to be able to say goodbye.  It was a couple weeks before he finally passed at the beginning of February on Cecilia’s birthday.

Our sunbathing friend.

That stress combined with morning sickness and first trimester exhaustion is the reason for the blog being so far behind.  I didn’t want to write about it and didn’t feel like writing so I just put it off for awhile.