Seven Saturday Snippets: January 5, 2013

This is my first ever post to the Seven Snippets link up which is hosted by Bringing the Sunshine. If you have not had the pleasure of visiting this great site and meeting Andi and her gorgeous family, you are in for a treat. Not only is she a great writer, but she is also an amazing photographer. Please stop by and show her some love!

~1~

While visiting Bringing the Sunshine yesterday and reading Andi's Seven Snippets, I saw that she posted a link to site to generate the name of your patron saint for the year. I am a converted Catholic and I love learning about the lives and history of the saints and as much as I can about my faith, so I thought, what the heck, let's see who my patron saint for this year will be...St. Dymphna, the patron saint of neurological disorders among other causes. Very appropriate given Matthew's epilepsy diagnosis...hopefully this means good things coming our way, not more challenges.

~2~



As mentioned in my last post, one of my resolutions for 2013 is to write on her more regularly and hopefully gain some new followers. The best way I think that I can do this is to set up a schedule of posts and when they will be up. Here's what I'm thinking right now:

Monday- Writing Prompt via Ellen Stumbo
Tuesday- *still undecided and open to suggestions*
Wednesday-Wordless Wednesday
Thursday-Thankful Thursday
Friday-Friday Faves
Saturday-Seven Saturday Snippets

I'm not posting on Sundays, because that's family time :)

~3~

Mommies of Miracles is starting a new virtual book club starting January 14th called "You Have Time to Read???"  I am big fan of Mommies of Miracles and all the work they do to provide a sense of virtual community to parents who are trying to navigate their way through the world of special needs and caring for medically complex kids. I am super excited about this new project they are starting and have already signed up to participate. I'm a big book junkie and that fact added with one of my favorite special needs resources is just a big bucket of win.

The first book up will be A Different Dream for my Child by Jolene Philo. A writer and speaker about special needs parenting, Jolene has a wonderful website, www.DifferentDream.com, where she helps connect special needs parents with resources they are searching for. She is one of the kindest people that I have encountered in this whole blogging and writing journey and I have her words of encouragement taped to my laptop so that they are there when I start doubting what I am doing in this journey. Her other book, Different Dream Parenting was a life raft for me when Matthew was first starting to get sick and we were learning more and more diagnoses and I'm happy to say that I passed it along to another mom who was just starting to venture into Special Needs World. I can't wait to read this book. 

The inaugural "You Have Time to Read???" book discussion group will be broken over a 12 week course complete with study questions . More information is available at  www.mommiesofmiracles.com/resources/book-study/

~4~

In an effort to step out and find some time to develop some new interests, I signed up for a Sewing Basics 101 class at our local fabric shop. I LOVED it! I can't wait to sign up for the next in the series where you learn to sew garments with elastic. I'm sure Matthew can't wait to be my model.

  

~5~

Tomorrow the hubby and I are hoping to have a movie date so that we can finally see The Hobbit. I say hope because we have been trying to go out alone together for months, but something (or a little someone) always changes our plans. If we can pull this feat off, it will be our first time out alone since The Hunger Games came out in March of last year.

~6~



I am thrilled that today I made my fundraising goal for the Special Olympics! This is my first year participating and I was able to raise $320. Aquatica will be chilling down their wave pool so that 104 other teams and myself will take an icy dip to earn all of the money we've been collecting. This event has already earned over $69,000 for Special Olympics Florida.

~7~

It's getting to be close to time to start planning a certain little boy's third birthday party. This year's theme will be Superheroes! Dad is super excited because I've finally picked a theme that is in his wheelhouse of experience. Guess I'll be haunting Pinterest from now until March trying to find all of the fun stuff that a party needs.

I hope that you all have a great weekend and stop by to visit next week!!




Weekly Wind-Up: August 26, 2012

This is the first in what I am *hoping* will be my first weekly article. These are little things that have popped in our life and in the media that caught my attention. Please feel free to comment and discuss!

 

                                                                             1.

This was the first week of school for both the hubby and Matt. The first day was weird not having him home with me, but I found ways to fill all the free time by cleaning and doing a ton of laundry. The rest of the week ended up being harder because I missed him so much and I will admit I left the school teary-eyed. All in all, his teachers said that he had a great week, that he barely cried, and the biggest shock of all--he's become a napper!

 

                                                                             2.

 Florida teacher Jaclyn Ockerman, who has been accused of slapping, pinching and forcibly pulling the faces of her kindergarten students with Autism Spectrum Disorder. Lake County School Superintendent Susan Moxley recommended her termination to the school board back in July. Ms. Ockerman is appealing her termination next month and has been pulled from the classroom and reassigned to administrative duties until her case is resolved.

 

                                                                              3.

Toys 'R'Us has released their 2012 edition of Guide for Differently-Abled Kids in stores this week. This year's edition contains a list of 100 different toys which have been evaluated and recommended by the National Lekotek Center, an center devoted to children with disabilities. Maybe if a certain little someone continues to be a good boy, Santa might pick one of these up to get some ideas for Christmas.

 

                                                                              4.

 We are three days away from the start of the 2012 London Paralympic Games! The games will be starting on August 29th and will go through September 9th, and will showcase the talents of 4,200 athletes. Unlike the 2012 London Olympics, NBC plans to show only 5 1/2 hours of programming in the United States,with the majority of coverage not showing until the competition is over. Daily highlight segments will be featured on the U.S. Paralympic team's YouTube channel.

 

                                                                              5.

I am going to be fulfilling a long-time goal of participating in the 2013 Polar Plunge at Aquatica for Special Olympics. I have been wanting to get involved with Special Olympics for many years from when my younger cousin began competing, and now being the parent of a child with special needs I am even more  In order to plunge I had to raise a $100, and as of today, I have now raised $170! So I've set a new goal of $300 and I'm hoping to reach and surpass it.  Can't wait to be freezin' for a reason!

 

 

Hope you all had a great week last week and are powered up and excited for the week to come!