August 21

Today is first-day-of-school eve! The girls and I put their uniforms in their drawers and closet yesterday. Sarah promptly wore her gym uniform, which she will have the good fortune to wear all day every Wednesday, and Amy put on one of her jumpers and t-shirts. I made them wear smocks for eating, even though I realize they are just clothes and that I do in fact have laundry facilities in my house. I’m glad they are so excited to wear their uniforms. They are both wearing them again this morning. It may be interesting tomorrow morning when Sarah has to wear something other than her gym clothes.

The girls got back-to-school haircuts. They both wanted their hair to be short like mine is. Really? Are you sure? Are you sure you’re sure? Are you really sure you’re sure? Well, ok. I think we all love the cuts!

On Wednesday I did a little bit of SR time. I was on the floor and told Sarah I was tired. I asked how she was. Silence. I asked again. “Awake.” 

On Thursday we did a practice school run, getting up at 6am and out of the door by 7:15. We made it to Sarah’s school perfectly on time and there was very little traffic. Amy and I did a practice walk to her school and I was the limiting factor for speed. Amy ran the whole way. It took us 6 minutes.

Friday was the last day at daycare, possibly forever or at least for a while. There may be a day when one girl has no school and I have a client when I will still take them to daycare but that won’t happen often. I know I have said this before, but really, the church that runs their daycare (and Sarah’s preschool and Kindergarten) has been such an amazingly wonderful part of our life. I have always felt a warm welcome from everyone and they want me to let them know how the girls do in school. It means so much to me to have a place where I know everyone loves Sarah and truly has appreciated her presence in their midst. I know this situation actually happens in many areas of our life, but it is still something I see as a true blessing and there have certainly been places we considered for her that were not ready to delight in her. So, thank you forever to this church school!

Sarah has recently been going to an orthodontist because she has such a narrow mouth and some of her grown-up teeth don’t have the room they need to come down. Apparently doing some orthodontia now will be less painful for her than if we did it later. I’m not sure if it is less painful for the adults in her life though! She just got a palate expander on Thursday. This means she has a metal bracket on two of her upper molars and a metal device spanning the roof of her mouth. This is a perfect thing to catch food and make her gag or spit food out! It makes her salivate more so she also needs to spit a lot and sometimes just sort of overflows (onto my face and Carl’s face this morning). Things do seem to be improving with each day that passes but it has been quite challenging to find foods that she can eat without too much trouble. Even favorite foods are proving difficult. And we haven’t even gotten to the exciting part of needing to get in her mouth with a tool to turn the screw in the middle of her mouth! I’m sure Carl cannot even wait for that part to begin. Because, you know that Sarah will want him to be the one who does it. And you know I will want him to be the one who does it! And you know he…um… will be the one to do it!

Yesterday I was busy all afternoon and evening. My evening was spent volunteering at a night market festival to register people to vote. My shift was 3 hours. I spent an hour diligently asking people. I got two registrations. Many people were nice, some were not. It was harder and I felt more tired and lonely at times than I expected. Then a neighbor and friend (and her kids) from our old street walked by and we got to catch up for half an hour of wonderfulness. Then I decided to walk down to where another friend was playing music (and there were 3 other friends too). It was such a delight to hear her sing and remember times from college of listening to her sing. She has a beautiful voice and presence and hearing one of the songs from our college days had me leaking tears all over my cheeks. On the walk back to turn in my registrations I saw Sarah’s PT from when she was less than a year old through when she was 3. When this woman last worked with Sarah, Sarah was just beginning to walk independently. Now I could share that I probably get white hair from the daring physical acts that Sarah does around the house. Then I saw someone from the massage school. Then I went to my office to get some things I had left there earlier. As I was leaving the building I saw my friend and office-mate. All of my encounters with friends and acquaintances (all 10 of them!) felt so fortuitous and wonderful!

Carl took the girls to a Little Italy festival (read: bounce house) and to do errands while I was out. He asked if they wanted to get cards for me and they each picked a card, completely on their own, and decorated them and wrote in them without any help aside from Sarah needing to know how to spell clock. She signed her card “Sarah Clock.” When I got home from my evening, Carl had the kitchen clean with the cards waiting on the counter. But I had so much to tell him about all the people I had seen! So it was many minutes of talking and him keeping a secret before I discovered the cards, at which point I just imploded with the love of it all and I didn’t know what to do with myself. Seriously. My heart was just melting and overflowing. I just stood there saying, “oh….oh….oh…” and then hugging Carl and then repeating myself.

My goals for this coming school year for me…rest, hydrate, get massages and AT lessons, read, maybe consider writing a book about our Sarah-Rise intensive years or turning my updates into a book. Oh, and do laundry, groceries, food prep, house tidying, and lunch packing so that when the girls come home I am free to be with them fully when they aren’t otherwise committed. We do have quite a few after-school things and I’m hoping they have the energy. They are good things with wonderful people, continuing time with SR volunteers and seeing Sarah’s OT, who has SR love energy, so I am optimistic that we can keep everything as planned.

I’m not certain what to do once school is underway in terms of my blog and updates. I like writing every week and I know many people like reading what I write. I’m not sure it will continue to count as a Son-Rise journey though so maybe I will no longer share it on those FB groups. Or maybe I should switch to a different host website that would make it easier to follow? Or change the name? I know I don’t have to decide immediately, but it is on my mind. Thoughts and input are welcome.

One day I was sitting at my desk. Sarah came over saying, “Mom, can I…? can I…?…YES!” She never finished her question and I didn’t immediately answer. I loved her complete delight with her assumption that I would say yes, which luckily I did once she completed her question. What if we could all approach our goals this way? Even if we don’t actually always get what we want, what if we assumed with delight that we could have our dreams and turned to the world with that smiling YES!?

YES! to all of you.