PROGRESS!!!

Dr. Curtis operating on Slava.

This post is part 2 for the week. So much is going on here that it just doesn't all fit into one blog post. Once again, Slava steals the show! He absolutely adores his older siblings, and they just eat him up. Here Curtis is operating on Slava which kept the little guy occupied for about an hour while I was busy putting together our monthly shopping list and dinner menu.
It looks like Dr. Curtis performed plastic surgery. Every time they came out to show me a new boo boo Slava would beg Curtis for "one more". He even insisted on going to bed that night with all his bandages on!
Notice the absence of Slava's eye glasses. I think children's glasses should be welded to their heads! It's a good thing that we have 2 pairs because one pair is always missing or broken. Last week he "lost" his blue glasses, and we couldn't find them anywhere. Finally I offered a $5 reward for whoever finds them. Within 15 minutes Andrii had located them. An hour later Slava took them off, put them on the floor (under a rug), and they were of course stepped on. They were better off lost!

I titled this post "Progress" because even with the lost/broken glasses I must say that tremendous progress has been made in the last 3 months. God is so good to us. He is so faithful. Last week I ran out to a hair appointment. On my way it dawned on me that I left Slava home with Sierra (14) and the rest of the kids. A month or so ago I could not have done that. Last Sunday we stayed after church for bagels and fellowship. Up until now we pretty much dashed out of church to buckle Slava into his car seat so we wouldn't have to chase him all over. Wayne has also taken him to archery the past 2 Saturdays because I've had women's meetings at church and with our home school group. Yesterday was a biggy. We went on a home school field trip to a butterfly conservatory in Massachusetts (we even hit up Yankee Candle on the way home)! Thankfully Papa was able to get away from work and go with us. Slava did pretty well on the 2 hour ride there though he got a little car sick on the ride back. Mainly he kept asking for food everywhere we went. Thankfully I packed snacks, but I forgot to bring some toys for entertainment which meant WE had to do the entertaining. Upon arriving home, Slava was bouncing off the walls. I think he was over-tired & over-stimulated. I put him to bed early, but it took him almost an hour to finally settle down and fall asleep. All in all it was a good trip though. Again something that would have been impossible just a couple months ago. I'm starting to believe that there is hope for us to be able to go to the annual home school convention that we attend every year in Rochester. Wayne & I have been going every year since we started home schooling 10 years ago. It refreshes us, sort of like a marriage/family/home school retreat. Slava has made so much progress in the past 3 months that when the convention rolls around in June (another 3 months) he should be adjusted well enough for us to go. Now I'll just have to round up some unsuspecting family members to "volunteer" for the job! I'm sure God will provide...He always does!