My cousin Amy has been doing a blog for 4 years now, she had a book with all her pictures and posts made into a hard bound book. So basically she will have a journal with pictures of all the cute things the kids have done. It’s a journal, scrapbook, family history and blog all in one. My sister in-law Alisa is also doing something similar. She has been writing a post every day for a year about what her day has been like with a picture to go with it. She is also going to have it made into a book or a photo journal. Great ideas. I’ve decided to steal their ideas!!!!

Because of this and what I plan to do with these entries, I want to be very specific. I’ve been realizing I haven’t posted really anything about Hailey’s school. I would feel ungrateful if I didn’t get this written down.

When we moved to Utah in August I was really nervous about how the transition would be for Hailey. We have felt so blessed through everything that happened when we made the move. Our first Sunday at church I talked to the Primary Presidency (not in front of the kids) about how normally, we have a helper at church with Hailey. I told them I would go in with her. I was trying to be proactive because our experience with moving into our last ward, ended up with Hailey escaping from primary and being lost with most of the ward looking for her for 20 minutes. I didn’t want this to happen so I was trying to explain without making Hailey sound too bad. That’s what is so hard. I feel like I want her to lead as normal a life as possible so we try not to make things a real big deal or make her look too different. Yet when I don’t explain good enough or people kind of take what I’m saying lightly like ” Oh she’s just an overly protective mom”. Then we have problems like loosing Hailey.

Any way, I told them and they were awesome. They showed us to Hailey’s class. Her two teachers walked out and I introduced us. One of them, Kim Weston said she already knew all about us. I was surprised. She said yea, I’m going to be Hailey’s resource teacher, I will be at the meeting at the school tomorrow. To say the least I was thrilled (my mother’s word). She came out and talked with me. She said to not worry that I didn’t need to come in she would handle everything. I was so relieved to think Hailey was in good hands at church with someone that really knew what she was doing. I didn’t have to explain anything. That was a definite tender mercy for us from our Heavenly Father.

Hailey is doing fantastic in school. I give credit to Mrs. Weston or Sister Weston on Sunday. She says it’s not her, but she has blessed our life so much. Just having an understanding teacher is amazing. She and I will throw ideas back and forth about anything to better Hailey’s educational experience or social/ emotional situations. It has been so rewarding and fulfilling to see the good changes that have come. Mrs. Weston treats Hailey cool, and normal yet understands everything she deals with and knows her limitations so she doesn’t push her to melt down mode. It’s really hard to think about moving on. We are renting this house from my cousin and he needs to sell it. We knew this was only temporary but everyone and all of this has really grown on us. We really need to pray to find out what to do next.

I have been researching 5 different school districts and found out what they offer. The Nebo School District offers a lot of important things. Highly trained Para-professionals (one on one aids) that have weekly training meetings under the direction of their Autism team. They provide ABA therapy (Applied Behavioral Analysis) something that I have studied and really believe in. So, for the future they are the school district that could promise the services for long term if Hailey continued to need them. Anyway I could explain way more but I’m tired. It comes down to- is it the right thing to do? Should we move to Springville Utah where the Nebo school district is? What if we end up with a power hungry Inclusion Specialist and have battles with Hailey again. Are we crazy to leave an area where things are going great now, but in the long run will not be able to continue to promise us an aid? The church will be moving all their IT guys to Riverton in June or July so that changes things too. I guess we’ll have to pray and have faith that we will buy a house in the right place for our family.