Monday, May 25, 2009

We're Here!!

It has been such a very long time since I blogged but I have a good excuse -we’ve finally moved!

On top of which, our broadband is not back on until 2nd June so I am currently on-pay-as-you-go dial up (hence I have written this off line and am just going to cut and paste it in when I’m online!). I am struggling to cope with being offline, only being on for between 15 and 30 minutes a day late of an evening. So if you need something, don’t email me! Use my EO number (available to EO members from their newsletters, or its on the Freedom for Children to Grow or EO websites under “press”).

Moving house with six people, including one ASD child, one Aspie child and one Aspie adult is NOT recommended. Especially moving house with no van or lorry and doing it all just using a 7 seater car. We’ve been backwards and forwards between Mum’s and our new house so many times that I think the car knows the way on its own.

It’s only three miles, but when it takes one journey just to do one wardrobe - and you’ve got 4 wardrobes - it can get tiring!

We did have one van load as a friend organised some assistance in the form of a large transit and about a dozen Mormons who came to do some “good works”!

We got the keys to the house on Friday 15th May but the carpets weren’t going in until Monday 18th. This meant that all we could do was get the kitchen stuff (crockery and things) in and put away in the cupboards.

On Monday Roarke met the carpet fitters at the house and, as they finished each room, he was in and getting on with curtain rails and making up the new beds for Samuel and William.

The fitters finished by about 3 o’clock and we started moving furniture in earnest, starting with the Mormons and their van. Tuesday was a frantic, back breaking day with Roarke and I working as hard as possible to get us in so that we could sleep there as from that evening. The house was decent enough for the boys to be able to come across mid-afternoon which mean the rest of the day was spent working around hyper children! Our first meal in the house was provided courtesy of one of the Mormon families who apparently live nearby.

We politely but firmly turned down the missionary’s offer to come and show us a DVD…

Wednesday Roarke was out all day for training for a new marketing contract that he is working on, for Hewlett Packard, so I was in the new house on my own. Most of the day was spent pottering around unpacking bits and pieces, and trying to organise myself in the kitchen. The boys and I had a nice meal together; we are all benefiting from having a separate dining room and lounge, instead of everything all being in one, and it seems to be helping William with his eating too. Jonathan is loving having his own seat at the table!

Jonathan of course found the whole moving thing quite confusing but has only taken a few days to adjust and is now happily pottering around. However… on Wednesday he hurt his foot. We didn’t see what happened but surmise that he slipped off the bottom step of the stairs, as he was trying to walk down them standing up (rather than bottom sliding down a la toddler). Anyway, for the rest of that day and into Thursday next he was really clingy and wanting to be carried everywhere and it was only by chance that we realised that actually he was asking to be carried because he couldn’t walk!

Having a toddler needing to be carried around made Thursday a bit of a tough day, as we tried to sort out some more furniture. I took the time out to do the shopping as I knew I wouldn’t get anytime on Friday (and we hadn’t done a proper shop the week before). In the afternoon Roarke took Josh off to SAVVY then met Chris, a friend from church, at Mum’s in order to help him to dismantle the trampoline. Chris very kindly stayed whilst Roarke went back to collect Josh out in order to put the trampoline up on his own here. In return he stayed for a meal once Roarke returned with Josh.

I must mention other friends who have helped out so much, in so many ways with our move.

Jane provided two whole days of helping to pack, organise and babysit, which was absolutely invaluable. For a lady with one child - who readily admits she can only cope with one - to put up with my chaotic household and four boys so willing shows just what a remarkable woman she is, and such a good friend.

Carrie was an absolute darling and offered to take my net and curtain material and returned to me a beautiful pair of heavy dark blue curtains for our lounge, and two hemmed voile net curtains for the lounge and for our bedroom.

Others, such as Sheila, have provided text and email support (as she was not able to get up here to help in other ways) which truly has been needed and appreciated.

We were also mightily blessed by a financial gift from someone - you know who you are - which meant so much in so many ways.

Thanks to all those who have followed our saga via the blog or facebook and have sent messages and left comments of support, encouragement and congratulations.

On Friday, having realised that Jonathan must have done more than just muscle damage to his foot, Roarke took Jonathan to A&E whilst I took the other three to the home ed meeting at the rugby club. To cut a long story short, it turns out he has a “toddler fracture” (that is, a fine hairline fracture common in kids of this age due to their soft bones) in his ankle. Roarke hadn’t finished at the hospital by the time we had to leave the club so we walked home - good job we only live a 15 minute walk away from there now!

By yesterday Jonathan was starting to stand on his foot again, and today he is occasionally walking - limping heavily and going very slowly) so it is encouraging that he is getting better.

I would think that having had yet another A&E trip with him so close to the last one has probably raised some flag somewhere. After all, we ARE home educators…

Josh has always had to either share with a brother or have the smallest box room at each of our houses, so I have been particularly pleased that here he has the largest of the children’s bedrooms. He’s been able to set up all his furniture and still have plenty of space and seems really happy with the room.

Samuel has the top room, which is the converted attic space, and also has his own toilet and wash basin. The room gets very hot so we will need to get him a fan for the summer. Him and William both have quite small rooms so we can’t use their computer desks from before but are having to save up to be able to get them the smallest pc trolley/desks that we can find.

We expected William to be the person who found moving the hardest but interestingly he’s been fine - I guess his world is so small and he is so present that he has just taken his world with him without any problem. Having his own space has immediately made a difference; he has somewhere to retreat to, somewhere to run to, a door of his own to slam ;0) He enjoys being able to scream at us all to keep out and go away, and it has been noticeable how this has helped both his over all mood and Samuel’s. I’m currently reading “The Explosive Child” as recommended by so many on the HE-SP list and I can tell that this is going to make a difference too.

Samuel has found it harder to have his own room. He’s always shared with either Josh or William and despite the fact that William was driving him mad, especially with talking late at night, Samuel is taking some time to adjust to the quiet and space of his own room. Having said that, having a place of his own and his own en suite is something that is giving him a sense of pride and maturity.


Josh is currently rehearsing for an arts festival that the SAVVY theatre group are taking part in later this week. He has lines to say this time and he is really enjoying how things are progressing.

He took the first formal step of his Bronze Arts Award this week, going to a classical music performance at the Royal Festival Hall last night with his Dad, as a Young Reviewer for Bachtrack. They had arranged for him to go backstage and briefly interview the conductor afterwards which was rather cool.

Roarke of course enjoyed himself as classical music is very much his “thing” but Josh was also surprised to find that he had a good time. They didn’t get home until 10.50pm!

Roarke is very glad to be out of where we were and into *his* own space again, though it is taking me longer to adjust. The first signs are there today though that I’m settling in - I’ve just baked bread and made a victoria sponge!

What else has been going on? Lots of stuff with church. We had Bill Wilson from Metro Ministries New York at our church last weekend which was mind blowing and life changing stuff, and I’m so excited to be part of BCC at this time.

I’m sure there is more, but at least I’ve managed to get this much down.

Oh, nearly forgot, my sister in law had her baby, Lily Rose, just before we moved.

3 comments:

The Mom said...

Good to hear you got moved at last, and hope you are settling down. And roll on June 2nd and proper internet connection!

H x

Elaine, Ellies Treasures said...

Congrats on your move - do hope you'll all be really happy there. Sounds great from what you've blogged.

Anonymous said...

Hi there,

So glad to hear that you've got into your own place at last. It sounds really great.

Sorry that poor little Jonathan hurt his foot. I bet he's a weight to carry around. Hope he's much better soon.

http://www.threedegreesoffreedom.blogspot.com