LaSt WeEk Of SuMmEr...

This has been quite a stressful week. Summer is a really hard time for our family. I think this has been one of the most difficult and challenging summer yet. Many things have taken place, including parents needing extra help, our sweet kitty being sick all summer and needing extra care, our sweet niece and her car accident, puberty, extra kids here nearly every day, my own health. It is on a good day, just a struggle to fit everything in, but as exhausted as I am, I am lucky to get half of what needs to be completed. The girls start Monday for school and they are MORE than excited. Bethanie has a new teacher to the school this year. It is a man teacher and she is quite upset and nervous because she doesn't KNOW him. Plus, she will have a different PE teacher and Music teacher (they come from the middle school to help ease their transition next school year). NONE of her friends will be in her class. SHE is upset about that, I am not. She is the kid who will make one really great friend and it will continue on for a long time. She will be a Peer Mediator this year which only a handful of 4th graders are selected to do this. I am so proud of her wanting to step up and help other children who are younger, and have needs. She will be great at it! Madison is MORE than excited. I don't even know how to describe it. She was lucky and saw her teacher over the summer a LOT. We saw her everywhere. But Madison is really looking forward to seeing really just one person.....COBY. Her boy friend. :P Even though she has married him many times this summer in play, she will probably just ignore him. LOL!

I am planning on a good two-three weeks of getting the girls on a good solid schedule before I introduce Matthew to his school work. I honestly think *I* need the time to recover from a very difficult summer.

Carlisle has been feeling better the past couple days. On Sunday, we had to call the vet to come to the house. He took his temperature and it was 104. It really shouldn't go higher than 102.5 at the highest. At some point during his illness, it was 105. WAY too high. So he gave him an injection, and the next day he came back and re-tested him for Feline Leukemia. It was also positive. We will lose him eventually. We just don't know when. :( What a sad heart break. I love this cat so much! Not to mention, the kids. I don't look forward to when that happens, but we are just trying to have as much fun and interaction as we can with him, help him to have fun and give him a full life while he can. We wont allow him to suffering. Feeling unwell doesn't = suffering. But there will come a point where the meds we are giving him will stop working. :(

I am working on stocking hats-as many as I can for Fall-Fest. It is in just a month, and I really want to have at least 50= hats to have for sale. 100% of the profits go directly toward our Autism Foundation. Speaking of that, we had a WONDERFUL $200 donation the other day. Our first monies allocated for our foundation! This will allow us to purchase some advertising materials like a banner with our foundation name on it. We plan to sell lemonade/hot chocolate, cookies, cupcakes and hats. There might be a few more things, depending on how much I can get done for it. ALL profits will be donated back into our foundation. I am so excited to see it finally getting lifted off the ground and so thankful for that donation! ! ! ! ! ! !

Its 1:30 am. I really need to go to bed now....