Before I forget... the title...Mise en place - it's a french culinary term meaing everything in its place. We aren't there yet...but we are getting closer. Or as it would be yesterday, we were further from it.
We finally had our home visit last night. Our home study is now is now in our caseworkers hands and we should have the update back in two weeks. It wasn't too bad - I had to clean the house again, make sure everything was in it's place, buy new batteries for the door chime, making sure we don't have anything where it shouldn't be. I cleaned the house, the little guy helped me - he wore his "ear plugs" when I vacuumed...he did really good. He loves use the duster and dusted after I did. The house was cleaned. He went down for his nap. I mopped the floors and finished up while he slept.
After nap, I scramble to get dinner together so we can have a quick bite to eat before she gets here. Will is on his way home...I said to the little guy - "Do not make a mess. We have to keep things clean and put away." I left out a bin with Legos for him to play with, but otherwise, every toy, book, etc....was in it's place.
Have you seen the movie The Cat in the Hat with Mike Myers? The mom says to the kids before she leaves the house, "Do not go into the living room... or else." This is the vision I had in my head. And from here on, think Thing 1 and Thing 2.
I was making dinner, the little guy playing then coming into the kitchen...opens the refrigerator door to get fruit but then I hear, crash, bang...the jar of kalamata olives goes crashing to the floor. Now I have olives, purple liquid and broken glass all over the floor. I quickly get that cleaned up, glass vacuumed up, floor mopped again all the while repeating "do not make a mess" to Thing 1 and Thing 2 wrapped up in one little body. As I am still working on dinner, I hear, "ut oh". Long story short...we were like T minus 1 hour and the living room looks like a tornado came through it - every toy I haven't seen in weeks is out, the tent is out, the tunnel is out...you can barely walk. And if that wasn't bad enough - the toy room...every bin was emptied of its toys - all across the floor you couldn't even see the floor! Daddy took care of the clean up - but I am still boggled on HOW it could happen so fast, and so quiet except for the "ut oh". I have to laugh now - of course it was not funny at the time and the funny thing is, I said, "what did mommy tell you?" to which he replies - "do not make a mess." So we had a "chat" and the rest is history.
If you didn't see The Cat in the Hat, and don't know who/what Thing 1 and Thing 2 are - they are two, short, characters that do the exact opposite of what you say.
We finished our interviews, walk through the house, and we were finished. We should have our update in a couple of weeks. Can we still receive a referral during this update time? Yes, we can. There is a "grace period" to get your home study updated once it expires, but you still can get a referral during the update time. We were told again that the wait for the age range that we are waiting for is still 6-12 months with the wait on the longer end. We were asked how we feel about the long wait - and how have things changed through this waiting time. It may sound strange, but we said at first, we were anxious and really wanted to get the referral and were just waiting for the phone to ring. But now, as the time has progressed and moved on, we said that we know that God is in charge - we are a part of this longer wait for a reason and one of the reasons we feel is the sweet little, big brown eyed little man that brings us so much joy. We are thankful that we have this time to get our feet grounded and address his needs, dedicating 100% of our time and efforts to him. Thank you, Lord for this. It is a blessing.
Speaking of the little guy and food...we are day 5 on the dairy free, gluten free diet. (we limit the amount of sugar he eats too - we don't have refined sugar - sugar is not our friend). I have to say, I have seen an improvement. I wasn't sure if I would see anything, or what I would see, but by the third day, I did notice he seemed to be more organized. He seemed to calm a bit easier. He seemed more in control of his own body and emotions. I was excited to see this! I am learning about the foods and what to give him/not to give him. Telling him what we can have now and what we cannot have now. He is adjusting very well. We all are adjusting well. When we went dairy free and gluten free. we did it as a family. We didn't want the little guy to feel like he was "different" and we know that kids learn by example. So we made the change as a family.
I attempted the gluten free/dairy free version of spaghetti and meat sauce. E-man saw some fun animal shaped gluten free/dairy free pasta in the store so we bought it. Will had asked for a little "spicy" to the meat so I mixed half ground beef and half Italian pork sausage - both fresh ground from the meat department. I cheated and used an all natural jarred pasta sauce - checking the ingredients. Well let me tell ya - cooking rice pasta is different. You have to watch it. You can go from good to mush in seconds. It was edible, but
A friend warned me about the pork. Pork can be "not so friendly". She said don't freak, but just pay attention and watch him the next day. I did. we didn't have as good a day as we had had the day before. He also didn't want to eat. Hhhmmmm....even though I had bought the good stuff pork, it still affected him I have to believe...and maybe a hidden ingredient in the pasta sauce? Lesson learned - no pork and always, always make my own pasta sauce. I usually do- but not this time. We made it through the day...that was yesterday....our Thing 1 and Thing 2 day (connection??) He slept well last night, and we hoped for a better day today.
Being on day 5 - things are going really well! I was crossing my fingers he woke up on the right side of the bed and that there weren't any lingering effects. I am smiling right now. I almost feel like I have a new child today. I feel like there are parts of him that were asleep and are now awake. He has a newness in him - he looks like he feels better. He looks like he can "feel" if that makes sense. It may be hard for you as a reader to know what I am talking about unless you have been there yourself or are walking very closely with us on this journey It is so amazing to see. I haven't heard once this week that he has a stomach ache.
To see that something that we take for granted, something that we need, something that millions of children don't get enough of or any in some parts of the world...can actually be hurting us. Food. It is a funny thing.
We ventured to the gymnastics gym for their kids day out this morning. I talked to him about it, showed him pictures on their website and talked about all the places we were going to go today before nap time. I packed a lunch, PB&J on white sandwich bread and some dried fruit and nuts and iced green ginger tea. (I know...a 3 year old drinking tea??) It's a MUST to our day as it provides antioxidants that calm parts of the brain. We talked about the gym the entire time we were in the car. We got about half way there and he said he didn't want to go. He asked to go home. I told him we will go, and he can see it and then decide if he wants to play. So we got there, I opened his door and he said, "I'm excited, mommy!" I was like oh thank you, Jesus! this will be sooo good for him to run, jump, crash, do all those deep pressure sensory seeking things he needs and loves to do. We got inside, he was sitting on my hip - I went to put him down, and he clung to me like a baby spider monkey clings to his momma. We stood there, looked around, I pointed out the trampolines, the mats, the bars, all the fun stuff he could go play on. We even say a little girl from his pre-school class. I asked him if he wanted to go play with her (this is a little girl he always talks about here at home - I think they are best friends at pre-school). No, he didn't want anything to do with it. There were not too many kids either which I was happy about for his sake. Still nothing. He asked to go home. He was getting overwhelmed...his heart started to beat really fast - so I stroked his back and took him out to the car.
We got down the road, he said "it was too loud in there mommy". I constantly reassured him, and asked him if we could try again next week to which he agreed. We only made one other stop and scratched the rest to come back home. Baby steps. Sometimes, we have to go backwards to go forwards.
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