Dear 2016, It's not me. It's you.

2016 was a busy year for our little [growing] family. It wasn't a bad year. Just busy with lots of overwhelming moments.

But let's move on to 2017! Goodbye, 2016!
2017 is going to be exciting. 2017 means Jovie will be here soon (March 😍 )!

 I try to set goals every year, but we all know how that happens. You go strong with them for a month or two then you forget. I want to set realistic goals for me and my family this year to really focus on. I am currently reading a book called, Loving My Actual Life. In this book, the author chooses different things to focus on for an entire month. I have taken some ideas that I want to focus on all year long from the book. Then, I also have my own personal goals I want to really work on.

• Quiet: I really want to relish in the quiet moments I have and use them wisely. Quiet to me is limiting social media throughout the day. Facebook and Instagram have become background noise to me. I will pick up my phone, open the app, and just mindlessly scroll through pictures and statuses. Usually, this is just to waste time. I see the three loads of laundry waiting on me, but I choose to waste ten minutes scrolling. I have really focused on my quiet the last few days. When Sam naps or goes to bed, I use this time to read, pray, and write. My prayers have become more intentional and focused. My phone has been out of sight during the day so I can spend as much time as I can playing with Sam or just watching him play. I want to soak up all the time I can with him before school starts again and our days are busy. I also know that it's ok to have noise. I just have to capture the unexpected quiet when the noise is all around. Quiet: "Be still and know that I am God." Psalms 46:1

• Mornings: Mornings can be chaotic. This is one that I really am going to commit to doing daily. I want to wake up while the house is still quiet, read my Bible, and spend time with God before the noise starts. I want to have myself fed, coffee enjoyed, dressed, and ready to go before I have to get Sam up and ready for school. We shouldn't have to feel rushed in the mornings. I want to make time for preparing the house for the day. In the book, Loving My Actual Life, the author talks about how you should leave the house how you want to be welcomed home. That means beds made, breakfast put away, and counters wiped. Coming home to a dirty house REALLY drives me crazy, but it happens all the time. I will admit that I am NOT the best housekeeper, but I love a clean house. I think if I can accomplish small things in the morning, then it will make the rest of my day not as chaotic and my house more welcoming.  Mornings: "His compassions never fail. They are new every morning." Lamentations 3:22-23

• Marriage: I want to really focus on Matthew and give him my 100% undivided attention when we are together. I want the phones and computers set aside. I want him to know he is worth my full attention. I want to compliment him more and criticize him less [ouch].  Marriage: "Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins." 1 Peter 4:8

Of course I want to focus on our growing family. Spending as much time with Sam one on one before Jovie gets here. I want to organize my life and house 😁 (with my mom's help). I want to get back in a workout routine so I am healthy and energized when baby number two gets here.... or now. I need the energy now chasing playing with Sam. But the three points I wrote about are my main focuses that I want to accomplish throughout the new year. Eliminating a lot of the social media time will help with focusing on ALL of the things; God and prayer, family and marriage, quiet times, and less chaotic mornings. 

2016, thanks for the memories. Thank you for showing me that parents will do anything and everything if it means the best for their children. Thank you for the overwhelming moments when we were able to rely on God and see His work first hand. Thank you for our testimony. Here's to 2017. Here's to new memories, new family members, and accomplishing our goals 💪 . Cheers!

Courtney 

Progress Noted

Progress noted. These two little words are what I love seeing on Sam's reports from his therapists weekly. Especially from his speech therapist.

My last post was telling all about our journey and how God opened and closed doors for us to be able to get Sam the best help possible. Now, I want to tell you how far we have come with speech. We are finally hearing his sweet voice use words and it makes our hearts melt every. single. time.


September 27, 2016: This is the day I took Sam for his speech evaluation at Brightsong. He was tested in four areas; gesture, play, language comprehension, and language expression. In the gesture area, Sam completed 2 out of 5 tasks. In the play subtest he completed 1 out of 3 tasks. He was able to stack and assemble toys, but could not follow commands to put the toys away or fix a broken toy. The language comprehension and expression is where I knew we would really have a hard time. On the language comprehension subtest Sam completed 0 out of 4 tasks. He could not choose one picture from a set of pictures when asked, follow novel commands, follow a two- step command, or understand new words rapidly. The language expression is where he scored 0 out of 8 tasks. We were NOT using two word phrases, 50 different words, using new words regularly, relating personal experience, using 3 word phrases, referring to self by name, or using early pronouns occasionally. Once the therapist sent us his report, his overall language was that of a 14 month old. When the test was given, Sam was 21 months old.

October 2016: As of early October, Sam still didn't have words he was using. When he did "talk" to you it was a throaty grunt kind of thing. Think about if you were humming and not opening your mouth. That's the kind of noises we got from him. There was an occasional outburst of some consonant sounds, but no words. He was signing for "more" when he wanted more drink or food and he signed "all done" when he was finished eating or wanted to move onto a new activity.

One thing that we did was always count for him to come give us a hug. "One, two, three!" and he would run and hug whoever counted for him. Eventually, Sam got to where he would say, "three," but still in his throat. Sort of humming it. His speech therapist worked on counting to three like we did and also worked on "ready, set, go!" to race cars. She noted how he was starting to say the words, "three and go" whenever she said them. This was progress!

November 2016: This is the month we saw so much progress with our speech and comprehension! Sam started waving and saying, "ai" for bye when someone was leaving. He would call for "dada" if he needed something. He started comprehending and following commands such as, "give me a high five, throw the trash away, pick up your toys." He would bring me or my mom to our pantries and force out the word "coo-kie" when he wanted a snack. Sometimes he would add a little drama to the word "coo-kie" and place his hands together like he was begging! Matt says he gets the dramatics from me... I don't know though 😉.

He stayed at a friend's house one evening in early November and he even said their little girl's name before we left! He had never said any one's name before!

Then, the best thing ever started happening... He was saying "mama." And he was saying it with meaning! He would come up to me, look me in the eyes, and say in his sweetest baby voice "mama." This is also the month where we heard "uh-oh" all the time. If something fell, "uh-oh." If a dog made a mess, "uh-oh." If Sam splashed water out of the bathtub, "uh-oh." Everyone was so excited every time a word would come out of his mouth that was understandable! Our baby was finally making the progress we ALL wanted to see!

Sam's vocabulary was exploding! He was saying (with meaning), "mama, dada, uh-oh, hi, bye, cookie, three, thank you, aight (for light) and thirteen!" There were more words, but these are the ones that we heard daily. Sam was also doing more pretend play. He learned the song, "The Wheels on the Bus" at school and can do every motion and sound that each character does on the bus. He pretends to be the mommy and "shhh" the babies with his little finger at his lips making the "shhh" sound. He cries like the babies with his hands by his eyes (or ears sometimes). He swishes his hands like the wipers on the bus. My favorite is when he gets to be the bus driver and says, "move on back." He doesn't say those words exactly, but it's close. He makes his voice go a little deeper and points his whole hand to tell everyone to move on back! Around Halloween time he would walk around with a bucket on his head and dance like a robot. He learned this from his show, WallyKazaam. We had many robot dance parties with him.

Sam was also going through the house wanting to turn off and on the "aights." This was something he worked with his therapists and we carried it over at the house. I cannot tell you how many times we have turned off and on the "aights" just to hear him say it again. 😍

On Thanksgiving is where Sam learned the word, "thirteen!" There is an exclamation mark at the end because he has to scream it every time he says it. My mom started a tradition with us last year called, "Dirty Turkey." Pretty much like "Dirty Santa" except she hides gift cards in a few of the little gifts so you may end up with extra gifts at the end and not know it. Anyways, all of the dirty turkey gifts were on her fireplace with Christmas lights around them. Sam immediately ran towards the lights and wanted to touch them. He started counting the lights with Toby. Toby was counting, "1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13." When Toby stopped at 13, Sam screamed, "13!" So of course we counted to 13 over and over and over that night at Honey and Papi's. And on the way home. And the next day. Every single time, he would wait patiently until you got to 12 and he would scream, "13!" This is also the night when he walked straight up to Toby and said just as clear in his sweet voice, "I lu you" and gave him the sweetest hug. I think we all had teary eyes after we heard it.

November was also the month that Sam started giving out sweet kisses. Matt and I (and everyone else) would give him kisses all the time. At night is when we routinely asked for a kiss and hug before bed. He didn't do it, but we modeled every night what to do. Our routine oriented baby would go into his room every night, turn on his night light and the sound machine, run to Matt to pick him up, turn off his "aights, " reach for me to get him, put his little hands together to pray, and we all pray as a family. Every night. Sometimes he will say, "Jesus" and wait for us to finish the prayer and then end it with, "ee-ee" for 'amen' and then laugh. "Amen" is a funny word to a toddler. Then, before we put him in his crib,  Matt would say, "Can mommy have a kiss?" One night our boy looked at me, stuck out his lips, and gave me the sweetest kiss on my lips! Kissy sound and all. The he hugged me with his little arms around my neck. Then, he did the same thing to Matt. He was showing his affection towards us. This was a huge thing! Sam gave hugs, but kisses were a new thing. My mom and I were talking about his hugs and affection one day and she was saying how she remembered that he would just stiff arm hug and squeeze real tight when he was first learning. Sometimes you would just get a little pat on the back. He wasn't quite sure what to do.

Sam wasn't overly affectionate at all. Sometimes, he still isn't which is ok. We do not force him to give kisses. Sometimes if you ask for a kiss and he doesn't want to kiss you he will turn so you can kiss his cheek or put his forehead down to kiss.  No one forces us to kiss random people (or even people we are related to). Why should we force him? We are learning to not make Sam do a lot of things if he doesn't want to. If he starts screaming during a picture we just let him go. If he starts screaming while being held we let him go.  I know some people will say that he's got to learn to take pictures with people or let others hold him, but not right now. Matt and I are all about Sam doing his own thing and not forcing anything on him. He's learning all these different emotions and we have to let him figure them out. We have to support that. Even though he's two he is a human with lots of emotion. He's learning what (and who) he wants and doesn't want. Anyways, moving on...

This is also when we started saying the word, "thank you." Sam is the most polite little boy when you give him something he wants. Without missing a beat he will look you in the eyes with his sweet baby voice and say, "thank you." I'm telling you, it's the sweetest 'thank you" you've ever heard! He thanks us for everything! Matt and I were just talking yesterday about how much we are going to miss hearing his sweet "thank you" one day like we miss his toothless baby grin.

We were also hearing new words like "bu-bbles" and "ball." I am telling you, we have worked on the word "ball" since before he was one. Sam used to be completely obsessed with a ball. I'm not even kidding when I say we had to keep a ball in the car, at both grandparents house, friends houses, and in our house. We had to make sure there was always a ball available for him to have.  It's sweet because Toby painted me a picture for my birthday this year and it was Sam outside with his ball. Our friend's little girl asks for "CoCo, Sam, and ball" to come over to play. Her older sister even made Sam a birthday card with her and Sam playing with a ball. It was like his signature thing to have. Sam never said "ball" or even signed for "ball" until the last week of November.

We also hear this baby jibberish now! I have no idea what Sam is saying, but he sure knows. He jibbers in whispers. He jibbers in the car. He jibbers playing with his toys. I think if he would have opened his mouth when he did all the "throat talking" it would have been all this jibberish we hear now. He also knows when to answer after a question is asked. He answers his shows when they ask a question. He answers Matt and I if we ask him something. He says, "yeah" a lot now. I know he doesn't understand what "yeah" means right now, but I know he knows that it's a good answer to give when someone asks you something.

Also, going back a little to his imaginative play, Sam learned a trick a few weeks ago when he was wearing pajamas that were too big for him. He was laying with me in bed and his sleeve covered his hand. As I was trying to roll up his sleeve to get his hand out I asked him, "Sam, where did your hand go? Oh, no? Where is it?" Then, I slid the sleeve up and showed him his hand and said, "there it is!" Well, Sam thought this was the best thing ever! He started pulling his hand inside all of his long sleeve shirts and saying "where'd my hand go?" Of course, he wasn't saying that full sentence, but his jibberish let you know that's what he was asking. Then he would slide his hand up really fast and wait for your reaction of, "there it is!" I got a note from his old school one day saying, "Sam showed us his hand trick today. We laughed so hard!" He also did this trick at his birthday party this past weekend for everyone! He thought it was great when everyone laughed at him.

Here's a little update on Sam's new school as well: 

December 2016: Sam started his new school after Thanksgiving Break. He went on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. On Tuesday and Thursday he was still at his old school. This is how it will be the rest of December.

On Monday Matt and I both took him. He was excited to see all of the new toys and play equipment they had! Once we started to leave though he was not very happy. Remember me telling you that our boy loves a routine? Well, at his old school, they came in and had snack first thing at their little table. At his new school, he had to go to the table to work on puzzles and motor skills. This was not what he was used to so that threw him off. One of his teachers held him as we left and I could hear his little cry. After we turned the corner I had Matt go back and check on him for me. My heart was breaking. Dropping Sam off was also something new for me. I was always at work and Matt was the one dropping him off at his old school. Matt came back and told me he had already stopped crying and was playing with the toys. I felt better, but I still cried a tiny bit in the car 😁. Oh, remember our tree guy from the last blog? Well, he saw us walking in that morning and couldn't believe it! He said that he immediately called his wife when he left to tell her Sam was in their little girl's class! Like I said, God had put such great people in our story and this couple is one of them.
Sam's teacher sent me a picture later that day telling me he was having so much fun! Seeing this picture made my mama heart so happy.

Wednesday he cried when I left as well. He still wasn't use to everything. One of the assistants held him and consoled him. Friday was a different story. Maybe because Friday was his birthday and he brought cupcakes to share with his class, but he went straight to that little table and started working on stringing animals on a string. He was perfect! I asked for a kiss, he gave me one, and I walked out. About an hour later his teacher sent me three pictures of him eating his cupcakes.

I also got a note that afternoon that Sam showed them his imaginative play and wore a bucket on his head like a hat. Remember those robot dance parties we had in October? Well, he had his own at school on Friday!


My mom and I moved ALL almost all the furniture in my house last week while Sam was at school. He came in the first day to a new living room layout and said, "uh-oh." He knew it was not like it used to be. One of the pictures that we had in our kitchen was sitting in the living room floor and he grabbed my mom's hand and pointed to the wall where it belonged. He wanted her to put it back! When we moved his room around he just wanted mom to pick him up as he pointed his little finger around at all the changes. He is a super observant child.

School was a success last week and we are so excited to see all the progress that Sam will continue to make on this journey. He still isn't where he should be developmentally, but we are seeing new things from him every single day! Progress is definitely noted.

Courtney and Matt

Stepping out on Faith

He just needs tubes. Developmental delay. Mixed receptive-expressive disorder. High- risk for autism. These are just a few things Matt and I have heard from various doctors and therapists over the past six months about our boy. Our boy who loves to wear shoes over his footed pajamas and is very routine oriented. Our boy who sticks his tongue out when he's concentrating and who sometimes walks on his tippy toes. Hard words to hear, but words that weren't too shocking to us. We knew Sam wasn't meeting milestones he should for toddlers his age. We were never in denial. We just wanted answers and more importantly, we wanted help for Sam.

I feel like  know God has given our family a beautiful story that will be a part of our testimony forever. I have cried countless times in my mom's kitchen. In my kitchen with Matt. I don't think the tears were from sadness, but from "what can I do to help my baby RIGHT NOW!" Please know that we have no diagnosis for Sam because he is still so young. All I know for certain is that God has laid it on my heart to share our story. It's going to be a lot [7 months worth of information so please bear with me] and I'm not the best with words, but there are so many details and people that make our story what it is so... let's rewind all the way back to May of 2016 when Sam was 17 months old.

May 2016: I picked Sam up from my mom's house like I did almost every day. This day, mom was telling me how vocal the kids in Sam's class were. They always came up and talked to her when she was picking him up from school. My mom mentioned how Sam was saying a a few words just months earlier, but now there was nothing. I don't think Matt and I realized that the words had stopped. He was saying words like, "up, da-da, ma, ya-ya."At this time, Sam had zero words. Actually, he didn't even make a lot of noise. He was quiet. Independent. He was content playing alone while the other kids played all around him. He didn't give a lot of affection. He was happy just being left alone.  Once my mom started talking about the speech regression, my heart did a flip in my chest. I don't know if it's because I am a special education teacher or because mommas know when something is wrong with their kids, but I had recently been looking up early signs for autism because of Sam's lack of social skills. Little did I know, my mom had been reading different things on it as well. Both of our momma hearts knew something wasn't quite right, but neither of us had said anything to each other before this day.  I left my mom's house that afternoon and called Matt to tell him we needed to get Sam into the pediatrician to see what he thought of Sam's speech regression.

Dr. Owen, our wonderful pediatrician, didn't really want to talk about the autism worry at the time. He found that Sam's ears were full of fluid and he needed to get tubes. He told us that he had seen so many kids get tubes and within a week they were saying words. This was good news. Once our baby got tubes, we would be right where we were supposed to be developmentally. Perfect! Dr. Owen also set us up with TEIS (Tennessee Early Intervention System) so that we could get speech therapy just in case.

May 18th Matt and I were sitting in the surgery center waiting for Sam to get back from having his tubes put in. Eight minutes later, we were holding him in our arms, giving him his PediaSure, and ready to head home to start our journey of talking. Other kids started talking as soon as they had tubes. Our Sam would be one of those kids. Why wouldn't he be?

June 2016: Once school was out for me we started working with TEIS. Sam had a wonderful developmental therapist (DT). Ms. Teresa would come to our house every other week and just watch him play and try to interact with him. Sam wanted nothing to do with her. Our case worker wanted us to start with DT then we would move onto speech if they saw it was needed. We still had zero words. Zero sounds. Zero social interaction. Speech was definitely needed in our opinion.

Matt and I kept Sam enrolled in summer school at his Mother's Day out for the month of June. We knew that he needed that interaction with kids his age and he needed to keep a routine. His summer school teacher would also be his teacher in the fall. I wanted him to be used to Ms. Alesia so going back to school in the fall would be an easy transition. [Side note: Ms. Alesia was also Toby's first teacher at our Mother's Day out program so she already knew our family.]

July & August 2016: These were pretty slow months for us. Ms. Teresa was still coming to our house to monitor Sam's progress. We asked for speech and occupational therapy (OT) to get started as soon as possible because we still had no growth in our language and speech. We thought maybe there could be a sensory issue that was slowing the speech process down. Sam also wasn't eating whole foods very well. PediaSure was a life saver to make sure his belly was full. Maybe the tubes were not going to be the miracle workers we thought they would be.

September 2016: This is really when things started picking up for us in our journey and testimony. Sam was in school three days a week. His teachers had noted that he was still not communicating like his classmates were. He would rather play alone than with friends. Getting Sam to eat was still a struggle.

We got a letter one day saying that there were some physical therapists from Matrix Rehab coming to his school to screen the kids. Of course we signed [it was a free screening!] and returned the form. The next week, we received a letter saying that Sam did not pass the appropriate gross motor milestones for toddler's his age. The therapists wrote down the different things they noticed while they gave him their screening; flat/pronated feet, not standing on one leg, not following simple commands, couldn't kick a ball, etc. Since Sam was 21 months at this time, he should have met most of these milestones. I called Morgan, the owner and one of the therapists, that screened Sam. We talked for almost an hour. She was so real with me on the phone that night. I talked to her about my concerns and she told me the concerns that she had as well [autism was mentioned]. She was one of the first people to suggest we see a neuro-psychologist to do some testing to pinpoint what was really going on with Sam.

This is how we got our wonderful physical therapist (PT), Ms. Lindsey. She has been working with Sam every Tuesday since September 13th at his school. Lindsey has been such a blessing to our family and Sam absolutely adores her! I get videos after every session of what they worked on that week so Matt and I know what to do at home to help. She sends us encouraging texts throughout the week to let us know of all the progress she has seen in Sam. Matt and I have prayed for therapists and teachers that want to help our baby grow. God handpicked Ms. Lindsey especially for us.

I also took Sam to do a speech evaluation at a private center called Brightsong in September [also suggested by our wonderful PT crew]. TEIS was taking way too long to find us a speech therapist. Matt and I were ready to pay out of pocket to receive speech as soon as possible. We always said, no matter what the cost, we were going to get Sam any help that he would need. Sam and I left Brightsong with a speech qualification and a new therapist that would come to his school to work with him. We also learned that Brightsong worked with TEIS so speech was going to be covered by the state. Another one of our MANY blessings we have received during our adventure.

October 2016: This was an extremely busy month for us and Sam. Our neuro -psychological appointment was scheduled for October 24th. The weeks leading up to this appointment we had to get other appointments checked off our list to make sure there weren't any other factors hindering his development. One week I took off to take Sam to get his hearing checked. The next week Matt took off to get his vision checked. Oh, did I mention that I was also taking off to go to my own doctor's appointments to check on our new baby we have coming in March [Jovie Michelle]? I also had PT twice a week for sciatica caused by our growing baby girl. I am not lying when I say October was busy for everyone! My mom helped tremendously with Sam when I had PT and Matt was still at work or teaching at church.

This is also the month Matt and I knew that I may not be able to continue working with all of the therapies and appointments that we were going to. I had already been praying about the work situation, but this is when the prayers really started. Talking about going down to one income is scary. Matt wasn't against the idea completely, but he was not ready to fully commit to it which was totally understandable. I wasn't ready either. I had talked to my mom about it and just asked her if I had to quit work how would I know when a good time to do it would be. She just looked at me and said, "Court, there will be no question. God will let you know exactly when you need to do it."

October 24, 2016: Our appointment with Dr. Jain had finally arrived. I think we were anxious/excited for this day to get here. This is a day we also got an interesting phone call from the guy who was going to cut down one of our trees [I'm telling you, God placed so many people to come along on our adventure. Our tree guy is one]. Aaron had come to our house that previous week to look at our trees. He had already cut trees at my parents house and his little boy is in Toby's class at school [where I also taught]. Once again, we were already intertwined with him and didn't know. This phone call though; Aaron had called Matt to talk about the pricing for the tree removal. Once business talk was over, Aaron asked Matt if our son had special needs. This question came from nowhere. Matt told him about Sam's speech delay and that we were actually headed to get psychological testing done that afternoon because Sam wasn't meeting other milestones. He proceeded to tell Matt about his little girl who has Down Syndrome that's Sam's age. The reason he was asking was because he and his wife wanted to minister to young parents who had children with special needs. After Matt called me and told me about this, I just assumed maybe my parents had mentioned something to him about Sam's struggles.  Nope... they NEVER said a word. This was a God thing. Tears flowed down my face and chills were all over my body after my mom said nothing had been said. Can I say it again? This was totally a God thing.

Moving on to our neuro appointment: Dr. Jain came and escorted the three of us upstairs to her office. She grabbed some Lego blocks and an activity cube for Sam to play with while she talked to Matt and I. She asked us all of our health history, about Sam's birth, and about our concerns. She then gave us "yes/no" checklist to answer about Sam's social skills, speech, communication, affection, etc. After she was finished talking with us she got down on the floor to play with Sam. She moved some of the beads on the activity cube that he was playing with at the time. Instead of pushing them back or pushing another row, he just moved over and started playing with the Lego blocks some more. He wanted nothing to do with her. She went back, sat in her chair, and said with a straight face, "I'm sure autism has been brought up to you two before." She told us that on her yes/no checklist that anyone who scored an eight was high-risk for autism. Sam scored a nine. She wasn't diagnosing him because he was still so young but suggested we do a full screening once he turned three. I just looked at Dr. Jain and asked her, "What do you suggest we do right now?" She suggested to enroll Sam into a developmental preschool where he could receive the intensive schooling he needed with peers developing on his level. We were given four different schools that she highly recommended. I left her office with a heavy heart. I cried on the way home while holding Matt's hand. I just looked at him and told him that I wasn't crying because of the high-risk for autism but crying because I wanted immediate help for Sam. I felt like there was so much that we needed to do for him, but it was all so overwhelming.

October 28, 2016: The whole week had been a hard week for me after leaving Dr. Jain's office. This Friday, I was on my way to pick Sam up from Ms. Dawn's house, his wonderful sitter. [Ms. Dawn has also been intertwined in our life for a very long time. My sister and Ms. Dawn's daughter were best friends and even lived together in college. Some of the teachers at school where I work used her to watch their boys.] Sam loved going to Ms. Dawn's house! She always told me of the progress that she was seeing with him and how great he was at her house. One day, she told me that as she was laying him down for his nap she kissed him and said, "I love you, Sam." She looked at me and said, "I know he said, "love you" back to me! She loves him so much and you can see it in everything she does for him and the other children she watches. After I picked him up we stopped to take pictures in a cotton field by her house. I posted this on my Instagram page; " This week has been overwhelming but it's ok because some weeks are like that. As I watched Sam run through the cotton today I was so thankful for this beautiful, healthy boy. I love his sense of wonder, his innocence, and his drive. He is everything Matt and I could have ever prayed for and more! God perfected this boy for us and I couldn't be any more thankful." My healthy boy was all we needed. God was hearing our prayers and healing our hearts.

November 2016: We set up a meeting with two of the schools that were suggested by Dr. Jain on November 7th. The first one was the school she highly recommended.  The director brought us into the classroom that Sam would be in so we could meet the teacher and assistants. When we walked in, Sam's speech therapist was there! And guess who she was working with... Our tree guy's daughter! My heart was doing flips again because I knew that this was another one of God's doings. We had no idea that this was the school his daughter attended! I told you, God brought so many people into our lives for a reason. Who knew that a tree guy would be a big part of our story? 

Before we left we turned in our application. We were told that it was a six month to a year wait list to get in. Matt and I knew that this was the type of school setting Sam needed so we were willing to wait. 

We left this school and went to the second one to tour. Our good friend's mom is actually one of the lead teachers at this school so we were very comfortable with Sam attending here if needed. We got to watch the children have snack and do circle time. Afterwards we were told by the director that if we wanted, Sam could start immediately in their school. We left with their application and was told to give them a call and let them know what we wanted to do. We knew Sam needed a special school, but my heart was not ready for him to leave the teachers he already had. We decided to go ahead and go with the second school, but we would start in January. I wanted Sam to finish out the semester with his teachers and friends at his school. 

Monday, November 14th: This is the best part of our story! Before I left for work, I put our application and check in the mail for the second school we visited. Matt and I decided that I should go ahead and resign as well so that I could take Sam to his new school and any extra therapies he would need. Since Sam was going to start in January I was going to finish out the semester at my school and just stay at home come January. On my break at work I went ahead and filled out the resignation paperwork online and submitted it. I am not kidding you when I say 30 seconds after I pressed "send" my phone starts ringing. I automatically think it's the school board calling me to ask more about the resignation. I answer and it's the director from school number one. "Mrs. McEwen, this never happens but we have an opening here where Sam can start on November 28th." [Remember: this was supposed to be a six month to a year wait! We waited a week!] I told her that I would have to call my husband and talk with him real quick and I would call her back. Of course I call Matt and start crying. I am so overwhelmed now that we have two options for school. It was an easy decision when I thought we would be waiting a year to hear from them. Matt was all in for school number one! "Call her back and accept the spot." After I got off the phone I texted my mom [mom's have all the answers]. I told her what was going on and she just texted back, "God would not have opened this door if that's not where he was supposed to be." That was all the confirmation I needed. I immediately began thanking God for opening this door that I thought would be closed for a while. I called the director back and accepted the spot for Sam to start November 28th. I texted Matt to run by the house and take our application and check out of the mail for the second school before the postman grabbed it!

Oh wait a second, my resignation didn't start until January. I emailed the board and told them what had just happened and that I needed to change the date. The lady that I was corresponding with just told me to write a statement and email it back to her and she would get it to who it needed to get to. At the end of her email she put, "I'm praying for your son's well being." You guys, this lady does not know me from Adam and she's praying for my son?! I emailed her back my statement and then I told her that I really appreciated all of her prayers. She emailed me back with, "GOD IS ABLE." I was crying again at this point. 

I put my resignation in on November 14th and November 22nd was my last day. My mom told me that I would know when the right time to quit would be and she was absolutely right! People who have heard about me resigning have said things like; "Oh, you guys must have more money than I thought." "Matt must have gotten a nice raise." "I wish I could stay at home with my babies, but we have to have the money." Let me tell you, none of these things are true. We have prayed and prayed about this situation. We took a step of faith. God has opened doors for us that we didn't even know needed to be opened. Leaving my job was one of them. I cannot tell you how peaceful I felt after putting in my resignation. My heart was so full of excitement of how everything had played out. God had his hand over this situation the whole entire time. 

Sam starts his new school on Monday. He will attend his MDO and the new school for all of December. January he will only go to his new school. I cannot wait to let you all know how his school goes and all of the progress we will continue to see. 

I don't know who needed to hear our story, but I know someone did. Don't stop praying over the things that you think may be little. Don't stop praying over the hurdles that life throws at you. God is listening. I promise. 

"Let your faith be bigger than your fear." 

Courtney and Matt