School Prep and James Update

We are working a bit at a time to making the transition to going to school smooth and easy.

I went through all their CLOTHES and replaced the too small items. We organized James' drawers into school clothes and play clothes and church clothes. For Missy I simplified it even more. I only left pjs and play clothes for her and one church dress in the closet. The School Clothes are all paired up and hung as sets in MY closet. I will hand her an outfit every school day.

We shopped for LUNCH foods and then cleaned the small pantry and organized our lunch things. Next we plan on making patties and cookies and various healthy foods to freeze in small portions for the lunch kits. We hope to get started on that today.

We bought new SHOES for both kids and have their BACKPACKS all ready to go. This morning Missy cleaned out the bench of work gloves, junk, dog leashes, zip line harnesses and winter hats. She wiped it down and I labeled the two sections. One is for James and the other for Missy. Their school shoes, backpacks, library books, light jacket and extra school supplies fit comfortably in their sections. This is right by the front door and hopefully they will learn to put their things right in the bench when they get home and won't need to search for everything every morning!!

We trimmed hair and clipped Nails.

School only starts Wednesday.... we aren't excited or anything...

They can't wait to ride the bus. It is the "short bus", thankfully. It will pick them up about a quarter of a mile from home and not a mile away as the regular bus would have. They will learn to be on time. The plan if they miss the bus is to WALK the 3.5 miles to school.  This should ensure that we are only late a couple of times, as apposed to me driving them to school late every other day :-) We can always pray that they learn, anyway.

*****

Since the stone throwing episode on Thursday James has been avoiding his dad. He knew he was responsible to tell him that he had thrown rocks at the van. He knew he needed to apologize for attempting to damage his Dad's property.

ONLY he didn't want to fess up.

I had him on tight restriction. Friday you wouldn't believe how helpful and responsive the kiddo was. He was at my right hand offering to help always.... It was a tad over the top, but I didn't blink an eye. I'm not the brightest.... it didn't dawn on me why, until Dad came home and the kid wouldn't greet him, or acknowledge him in the least. And I went "OH! That's what that was about."

I didn't push him. He wasn't ready, but obviously, his guilty conscience was at work.

Sabbath morning he was crazy. We couldn't trust him for a second. He had to stay with dad and miss his own class... I didn't feel safe allowing the little ones near him.  At lunch when I was serving Bri's great, gluten free apple pie, I reminded him that he was on restriction until he cleared things up with his dad and he realized I wasn't going to forget.

We had an wonderful hike in the mountains with friends all afternoon. I think the hiking was good for his brain, if not for my feet :-P.

It wasn't until this morning during our family worship where the lesson came close to home that James showed signs that he was really feeling uncomfortable with that load on his heart. After dismissing the rest of the family we continued to talk with him. He told Steve everything. I was very impressed with his clarity of detail starting with what day of the week it happened and everything. You cannot know how these signs of thinking and ability to express himself means to us...  He did have to have the consequence that Steve had laid out for him a few weeks earlier about throwing stones to destroy or hurt. BUT he feels so free and is happy again.

As much as we would have liked him to clear things up immediately, it may have been a priceless lesson worth even more to feel the weight on his heart and how uncomfortable that was.  He knows how much better he feels and it may have impressed a wee bit more that the responsibility of his actions rests with him.