Yesterday we had out sonogram! Our little tie-breaker is a GIRL! She is beautiful already!
This just amazes me... Our God is so good!
8 weeks 13 weeks
20 weeks
It is always amazing to see that sweet little baby that is living inside of you! I am so glad that we decided to take Curt and Cadie, they were adorable! I love her so much already, counting down the days until we get to meet her!
I never struggled with "depression" with my first two pregnancies. This may even be to strong of a word, however I am sad a lot (even most of the time). I guess that once you have lost a large amount of weight, one must mentally prepare themselves to enlarge again. I am doing so much better with this pregnancy (weight wise) then I did with the first two. I am very conscious of what I eat, and am exercising at least every other day (not counting all the exercise I am getting at work 
The Sedgwick County Coop implements the TEACH Method for their structured learning classrooms. We work left to right, modify everything to some sort of picture words, and every moment of these super special students days is put into a schedule. This has not been happening for the past 5 months. I do not blame the first teacher, this is a tough concept.. I am overwhelmed and I have been a para in structured learning for 3 years! Thanks to my WONDERFUL friend and mentor Shelli Locke my room now looks like a structured learning classroom!
Independent Areas One-on-One Areas
Group table Snack Table
Sensory/Therapy Room Listening/Reading
And lots.. lots.. lots of sensory!!
Too cute not to share: I have the students work through a chore strip at different times during the day. One of them is IN LOVE with the paper shredder!! Who knew?! It is the cutest thing I have seen in a while.. he giggles and laughs the entire time it is going down.. it was worth sacrificing a paper shredder at home!
The past three weeks have been a whirl-wind! My little family and I have lived at Maize South Middle School in my new room. We had to completely restructure the room to follow the TEACH Method, per the coop structured learning program (which I can’t imagine ever doing it any other way). My mentor is the structured learning teacher at Maize South Elementary, right next door to my building. She has been a God-sent for me. She spent almost as much of her Christmas vacation at school as I did. She has helped me more then I could ever thank her for. I was luck that her and I were friends before I became a teacher. When I worked for the Autism specialist I was placed in her room as a Para sub for 5 weeks, she had a para go out to lunch and just not come back!
After redoing schedules I believe (today) for the 9th time I think everyone might be back on track. Although I am sure that something somewhere will need to be restructured. Already seeing some major behaviors due to scheduling, which will of course need to be altered.
Tuesday was a teacher work day, and I once again spent the entire day working on getting our match-to-same schedules set up for my students. Since some use boardmaker photos, some use digital photos and one uses tobys everyone's schedule is different. Every schedule had to be coordinated so that they were not doing the same thing at the same time, but that everyone got 1:1, independent, plenty of sensory, a group time for my Literature group, News2You, centers and a number of other activities... I keep my kiddos super busy.
I got it okayed for my paras to come in on Tuesday for an hour to see the room/schedule changes. I have to give this group credit in that they went through 3 teachers and no one quite..with that said this means they have been able (forced) to run the room however they have seen fit. So a new younger teacher coming in and making changes did not settle very well with them. To honest I was in tears as soon as they left Tuesday because of their disapproval and disrespect over the changes I had made. I started praying right there in my classroom for strength, and that the boys would do well the next day showing the paras that my system would work.
After leaving work Tuesday I went in for our 5 month check up. Of course my blood pressure was high!! So they had me lay on my left side and they came back in 10 minutes to recheck it... the entire time I was thinking I don’t have 10 extra minutes to lay here I want to get home to my kids!! Thankfully when they came back in it was better.
Wednesday was the first day with students. My paras were of course reluctant in the morning (all but one, she is very sweet) that the day was going to work and worried what the students would do (already preparing for the worst behaviors). When the boys came in I gave them time to look around and check out the room. One of them walked straight to independent area (I showed him his name) he looked at his work strip started smiling and skipping. THIS SYSTEM WORKS!! Every other room implements it, I am not making this stuff up and I reminded my paras of this! The day went off BEAUTIFULLY for the students we had NO BEHAVIORS which is almost unheard of after a 2 week break in a structured learning classroom. Did I mention I prayed a lot!!
Today was not quite as beautiful, I took a kick to the outside of my stomach.. totally didn’t see it coming! However I now know that this certain activity triggers this student and have learned from today for future! I still have so much to learn, and I have much to learn when it comes to managing adults. I want our room to be a peaceful environment, but I also must have respect.. that is the challenge I am facing.
Although after day one and two they seem to be warming up to the changes I have made. One of them even text me to tell me thank you for being so organized and that for the first time all year she was not dreading coming to work the next day.. I thought that spoke volumes!!
While changing my bed sheets tonight, I once again noticed the spot that will always remain on my mattress from my first miscarriage, which happened in the middle of the night. I don’t always see it because I don’t change out our pillow top but every so often, normally just changing our sheets.
Tonight it really made me sad. Perhaps it’s because it is 11:30 p.m. or because Brett is gone on a service call and I am home alone (with two sleeping kids). Perhaps it is because of the high level of stress that comes with redoing a structured learning room, and managing 5 adults, and preparing schedules for 5 young men. Perhaps it’s because a woman never really forgets how heartbreaking it is to loose a child that will never be held on this side of heaven.
I haven’t been "consumed with sadness" over my two miscarriages in quite some time. I am very thankful for our growing baby, next week I will be 20 weeks pregnant (that’s half way done). However, I did take a moment to just be sad this evening. When getting in bed and opening my devotional for today there read today’s verse:
Jesus said, "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these." - Matthew 10:14
God knows my day before I even start it. He knew that I was going to need that encouragement tonight. He knew I was going to get a wild hair to "deep clean" my room! I rest assure that my two sweet little babies are in the kingdom of heaven. I pray this is an experience that I never walk again, but I know that if required to bare this cross, I can do it through His strength not my own.
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