Finally, Some News Worth Sharing

It's been a week here in Trailerville. Way too early Monday morning Josh left for Arizona for 3 days on his first "business" trip with his new job here. And, of course, it rained 2 of the 3 days he was gone. This meant having to find alternative ways to spend our mornings instead of going to the playground.

So, I used those rainy days to register Zeke for school, and yes, it took me both days to get it all figured out and settled. Monday I met with the school liason lady and she was very little help. So i went down (keep in mind I have all the kids with me) to the school I thought Zeke was going to be attending and could only find a 3rd grade teacher who told me I had to go to the board of education building in a completely different part of the...area of New Jersey we're in. (I would say a completely different part of town, but it was in a different town. And it's not like it was super far, just kind of out of the way in a little place.) By this point though, all of us were tired, hungry and cranky, so we went back home.

Tuesday we headed back out and met with much success. I found the board of education building (which is WAY closer to our trailer than it is to the elementary school we were at on Monday). I was originally told that Zeke was going to have to have a physical here because the school wouldn't accept his physical from Alaska because he HAD to be seen by a doctor in the TriCare Remote system. I was also told they probably wouldn't accept his birth certificate since it's from Germany. But I went down there with what I had anyway and it all worked out. Since his physical was done in January they were more than happy to accept it, and since I also had his passport with me (even though it is expired) they accepted his German birth certificate. Of course, his passport was made when he was born so his picture is from when he was 6 weeks old. The secretary and I had a good laugh over this.

Here's where things get somewhat exciting. One of the main issues I was having with trying to decided what kindergarten to put Zeke into out here was his IEP. His IEP is written for a full day kindergarten since that's what they have in Alaska, and Alaska is where it was written. I was told that the base has a wonderful full day kindergarten, but they don't have any services (speech/OT/the things he NEEDS). The elementary school that the base sends their kids too has a kindergarten with a wonderful speech teacher, but it's only a half day school. And it was made to seem that these were my only 2 options.

A little side note here that will come into play later, there is an elementary school essentially right outside the back gate of the base (Dwyer is it's name). It is literally a 5 minute drive, if that. Yet, for a reason unknown to everyone I've talked to about it, they send the kids to a school that is on the other side of Route 80, a good 10 or so minute drive (O'Brien). Why? Anyhoo...

So, as I was handing in Zeke's paperwork on Tuesday, I explained about his IEP being written for a full day kindergarten and yadda yadda, and the secretary said, "Oh, then he can go to Dwyer." Hubba what?! That's the school that's 5 minutes away. That's the school that made me so excited about Zeke maybe going there when I first saw it. That's the school that made me feel bummed and confused when I found out it's NOT where the kids from base go. AND, he still gets to ride the bus! Of course, I could drive him if I wanted to, but I know how much he loves the bus, so yeah.

And since it is a full day kindergarten, they call it a "transitional" kindergarten, meaning he'll be in a classroom where all the kids have IEPs. It'll be the same cirriculum as a "regular" kindergarten, and he'll still move on to 1st grade next year (if he's ready), but there are extra aides in the class, so he'll get more help and all the services he'll need and require. So, now I'm super excited. God totally had all of that under control, and I just let myself stress out over things He was already working on. I really should learn that lesson some day.

Also, as I was trying to get things together on Monday for Zeke's school, one of the things I needed was a letter from the housing office stating what our address was going to be and that we do, in fact, live on the base. So, while I was at the housing office getting this letter, the housing lady told me that she was doing final inspections on our place this week and "fingers crossed" our place would be ready to move into any day next week we wanted. So, on Tuesday, after I got Zeke registered for school I took a little leap of faith, if you will, and called the movers to schedule them to bring us our stuff on Wednesday (it's the earliest they could get here), even though we wouldn't hear until tomorrow whether or not our place was going to be ready.

Well, Josh got the call today(!) and it is good. to. go. He will go in on Tuesday and sign the lease, then the movers come Wednesday and we will be out of this trailer and into our own "big home". Yay! I'm not sure when we'll have a home phone number, but our cell numbers are staying the same (for now at least). I have the address and if anyone would like it let me know and I'll send out a mass email/facebook mail some time...soon-ish.

Now, if we could just hear back about whether or not they're going be having the preschool class I want Deacon to be in we'd be all set. But hey, 2 out of 3 is very, very good. Thank you, Lord.