A Guilt Post (So All My Long Distance Readers Don't Think I'm Dead)

1. We are in the IEP time corridor. Miranda's IEP meeting was last Monday morning and Alex's is this coming Monday afternoon. This is usually a very tough week for me since the whole process requires you to look at every flaw and developmental delay and behavioral quirk in your child, in the face and stare at it closely. It all needs to be acknowledged and and written down in black and white so that during the coming school year, when those problems surface, a solution has been anticipated.

Miranda will be transitioning to our sending school for the first time so she will only be 1.5 miles away from home, which will be nice for a change. But her processing delay remains, her inability to follow complex directions has not improved and she's starting to look like an ADD diagnosis is imminent. None of this is a surprise, but it's hard to look at it all at once. Hard enough that on Tuesday, I chose to resort the books on my shelves rather than go see Iron Man 3 with my mom. Not usual behavior for me.

2. Speaking of books, it's 22 shelves of books that I sorted through. So now all the books by the same authors are together, all my literature text books are in the right order, and it's generally sorted by genre. I have long shelves full of Rick Riordan and Julia Quinn, which makes me happy.

What's funny is that I put all the juvenile fiction together and so, essentially, I was able to corral my childhood onto two shelves:

L.M. Montgomery, Laura Ingalls Wilder, Janette Oke, David Eddings, John White, all together. (All that's missing is The Chronicles of Narnia but that's because it's over with the rest of Lewis' works sitting next to his friends, Dorothy Sayers and T.S. Eliot and above J.R.R. Tolkien.) Also on the shelf are Heidi, The Secret Garden, The Last of the Really Great Whangdoodles and Bunnicula.

Of course, I've saved all these books for my children to read, even though that's looking less likely. My niece and nephew are big fans of Harry Potter and Percy Jackson, of course. Several years ago, I bought my niece a full set of Anne of Green Gables but I've no idea if she's ever read them. But I have no regrets.

3. My irises started opening last week and are starting to look gorgeous:

I have a broom shrub planted next to them that has really outgrown it's locale so I'll be digging that up and moving it elsewhere soon. I think I'm going to add some more irises in it's place, of the orange variety.

4. Pepper the pup has come to stay with us for a week while my cousins are on the West coast on vacation. Here she is last night with Alex

and this morning with Miranda

We are looking forward to a week of lots of playtime and snuggles.

5. Last Friday, I finally tackled the front yard, which hadn't yet been mowed in 2013. Here are your before and after pictures:

6. So as not to break our "sick every two weeks since Christmas" record, Miranda started running a fever yesterday. Since she hasn't been willing to eat much, I'm taking her to the pediatrician later, just in case it's strep. If it wasn't Friday, I might let her go another day and see how she feels then, but not with the weekend starting tomorrow.

7. Also, tomorrow, my aunt and uncle and grandmother arrive from San Diego for a week-long visit. We hope to spend lots of time with them, as long as we all are well.

And I'd like to see a few movies this week. Iron Man 3. Star Trek: Into Darkness. Sigh.

Here's Jen.