Play is important. It doesn't matter who you are or how old you are. Everyone likes to play and that looks different for everyone. Even though the kids are only in our room for about an hour and a half each week for just one day, it is important for them to spend a small portion of their time there just playing. It helps them learn how to share, develops their imagination, gets out their energy before lesson time, and is just plain fun. We try to have things in our room though that are both fun and functional/educational, meaning they serve some sort of purpose, hidden to the kids of course or they would never consider it fun! ;)

Dress-up clothes...one of history's oldest ways to have fun. Whether you put on your mom's high heels or tried on dad's suit jacket and tie, dressing up and playing make-believe that you were someone else for a time was fun and stoked your imagination. Our dress-up bin is in our storytime center so that, if we re-enact a Bible story, the kids can dress up as the characters to make it come to life for them. We have a knight's costume, a wig, some masks and glasses, a crown, and even a robe. Watch local thrift stores or discount stores after Halloween for these gems. Yard sales are great places to find often times once-worn costumes as well.

I wanted a light table in our room from the very beginning! They feed the senses and more than one child can sit around the table and play at the same time, creating with shapes and watching them come to life when the lights are turned on. But seriously, have you seen the prices on light tables? No matter where I looked, they were well out of our budget. Enter Pinterest! While there were many tutorials, I found the easiest one here. All you need is a clear under-the-bed storage box (Ikea's are the best), white tissue paper, clear tape, and lights. This post suggested I use holiday lights and run the cord via an extension cord if need be out from under the box lid or a previously drilled hole in the corner of the box. I went even simpler. I bought these lights, five of them to be exact, and used double-sided tape to stick them to the inside bottom of my box before putting the lid in place. No cords. And the lights are easy enough to pull up when the batteries need to be changed. You could probably use battery-operating Christmas strand lights as well, but then you would have to wind the strands evenly around the inside of the box and tack them in place to make sure the light is evenly distributed.

Once your box is assembled, you need the pieces for on top. I found these great colorful clear geometric shapes. There are also alphabet letters you can purchase as well.

This file folder storage pocket holds all of my file folder games. File folder games are file folders that, when opened contain an entire game board or activity inside. On the outside back, in a pocket made from an envelope, you store the game pieces. Once assembled, these make for easy transportable fun. Some of the games or activities are for one person and others are for two or more.

​There are folder games for Noah's Ark, matching and puzzles, creation and the cross, the Beatitudes, and I am sure you could find more. They are fun and easy games that help solidify facts and characters from the Bible.

One tip with file folder games. Once made, either cover them in clear contact paper or have them laminated for durability.

The play kitchen. Another one of those toys that has stood the test of time. Love this! And I have boys who love playing in this kitchen as much as some of the girls do. A friend donated her daughter's kitchen to us, but you can usually find them at any children's consignment shop or garage sale. I bought the colorful plastic cups, plates, bowls, and utensils. While I originally bought a pack of plastic pretend food for our kitchen, I added to it with some softer, easier-to-clean, and way too cute felt food. If you have Facebook, you can message a sweet and crafty gal named Madeline Holland who lives in Peoria, AZ and she can hook you up with her handmade felt goodies. Here is a peek at her most recent price sheet so you have an idea of what she charges. Very reasonable for the quality.

These peg boards with colorful pegs are great for making a picture in kids' imaginations come to life without paper and crayons. Those little pegs are great for working those fine motor skills muscles too!

What is playtime without blocks? We provide a variety. We have wooden blocks, Legos (check yard sales for batches or moms who are tired of stepping on them for donations), and bristle blocks. I recently saw these ones called Bunchems that are round spiky colorful balls you can stick together to make shapes. Keeping a watchful eye out for those as well.

Plastic or wooden tangram pieces are fun with printed puzzles to match the colorful shape blocks too. The kids can use the pre-printed puzzle ideas or create their own patterns with the blocks. Many sites offer free tangram pattern printables to download and print for your use. Dig deep enough and you'll even find some Christian-themed ones. As with the file folder games, laminate these for durability.

This I Spy game was inspired by this Pin. I used an empty glass Voss water bottle, soaked the label off, and filled it with birdseed and tiny objects, like the kind you might find in bubble gum machines. We actually have a vendor who sells these 10 for $1 twice a month at our local flea market. That's where and when I stock up. I took a picture of each item before putting it in the bottle and then added them to a Word document I printed in color and laminated.

We have a few Magna Doodle boards for the kids to draw on. We actually have one little girl who loves to play doctor and she uses these as her x-ray machines. Seriously. She pretends you have a broken hand or foot, places it on the board, and then draws around it with the pen to make the x-ray. She adds lines to show breaks or fractures! Imagination crazy!

These magnetic gears are very cool. They interlock and then all rotate in different directions when the one with the handle is turned. I currently have these on the freezer in our room, but if I did not have the freezer would have a designated magnet board just for them.

These magnetic faces are cool too. They come in many different skin tones and with different shaped eyes, noses, mouths, glasses, hair, facial hair, etc... You can make dozens of different combinations. It promotes acceptance of all of God's children and is a great social skill builder with the different facial expressions that can be made - angry, happy, sad, excited, etc...

I found this wooden castle on a marketplace site, gently used and with a few of the people still intact. It is the Melissa & Doug castle. I bought a tube of knights and dragons to go with it. For the boys, it is the equivalency of the play kitchen and they love it. And we encourage them to re-enact some of our Bible stories that involve kingdoms and towers, and fortress walls.

This finger puppet theater is in place of a real puppet theater I would love to have in our room, but lack the space for. I got these great Bible character finger puppets to go along with it. Again, great for re-telling our Bible stories.

I bought these aluminum pans at the Dollar Tree. Using craft foam shapes and self-adhesive magnets, I made magnet boards for the kids. The foam shapes come in every style, even animal shapes. I superglued a soda can tab to the backs so they could hang on the wall, but they can easily be taken down for the kids to play with them in their laps. One of them I made using a # from washi tape and then five foam footballs and five foam soccer balls to make the game pieces to tic tac toe. I got the idea for these cookie sheet magnetic boards here.

Ahhh, the pop-up tent. These never grow old with the kids. Some play pretend in them. Some seek to block out sensory overload inside them. When not in use, we store them between the wall and the supply cabinet because they fold completely flat.

This LED hula hoop is fun for the senses and for the wiggle bottoms we have in our room who need to be constantly moving.

I got this idea from a Pin on Pinterest as well. It is a sheet of vinyl siding cut to 6 feet. I used a few cans of black outdoor spray paint to paint both sides. Then I put a strip of road tape down the center of each "lane" and covered that with clear packaging tape for durability. Because it is vinyl, the edges are smooth and not sharp so no risk of a child cutting themselves. I bought some generic Matchbox-style cars from Dollar Tree and a bin to keep them in. I even got a few of those friction cars that wind up when you pull them back first and then take off when you let them go. The kids love racing the cars side-by-side on the track. They lay it flat on the floor or sometimes use a chair or one of the tables to prop it up on to make a ramp.

Last but not least, we have our quiet or busy bags. What are they? Quiet or busy bags are Ziploc bags or even pencil bags that have any variety of objects in them to keep little hands busy and to themselves and little bottoms in chairs when you need them to sit still. It could simply be a bag of yarn and straws cut to various lengths to thread. We have one that is a paper plate with hole punched around the edges and shoelaces to lace around the plate. We have a bag of popsicle sticks and plastic Dollar Tree farm animals so a pen could be built to house the animals. Silly straws and washers and beads with holes big enough to thread onto them, craft pom poms and Dixie cups, a magnet wand and colorful paper clips...seriously, the ideas for quiet or busy bags are only as limited as your imagination, but there are some excellent pins on Pinterest that can help you out if you are drawing a blank. Try this one, this one, this one, this one, this one, or even this one.

Once I assembled all of the bags, I labeled what was inside of each with a black Sharpie on the outside of the bags. Then I bought a collapsible cloth bin from Dollar Tree and put them all inside of it for storage.

And there you have it! That is a pretty comprehensive list of what we have in our ESE ministry classroom to play with. 

While I have seen many variations of furniture in ESE classrooms, when it comes to tables and chairs, we just have the basics. Why? Because unlike a school classroom where the kids are learning for up to six hours a day, we only have them for about an hour and a half. Our kids' ages also range from 4 to 11 and so purchasing those smaller, toddler-sized tables and chairs is not relevant for us. We simply have the sturdy plastic white tables that can be arranged any way we desire and can even be folded down easily and put away when we need more floor space for an activity, and some black folding chairs. The chairs are sturdy, but their seats and backs do have some give to them, which is great for the "bouncers" in our room. I like to arrange the tables so that kids and volunteers can sit on either side. Sometimes we add a third table and make a "U" where our teachers can stand in the middle and be seen by everyone during the lesson.

I did find these great sensory mats at Oriental Trading that we purchased for kids to place on the chairs to sit on if they need the extra sensory input to stay still. There are other fidget accessories to keep kids still during our lesson that we have in our sensory center and I will talk about those in the sensory post later.

One other way to modify a few of our chairs is with exercise resistance bands. We tie these around the legs of a chair and the kids can put their feet on the band and bounce their legs up and down. Great for the wiggle worms.

Over in Noah's Nook, we have several seating options. Here's where I have to be honest and admit that I have no idea where to purchase these. They were donated to our room in the beginning. The square foot stool type seat is hard and has no give, very solid and secure. The curvy one has a slight bounce to it yet is contoured to fit nicely to any child's bottom.

The bookshelf I purchased from a garage sale, but Amazon carries it as well. I like it because it arranges the books so that multiple can be seen at once. The books sit in these little colorful hammocks and they make it easy for little hands to retrieve and return the books.

In the Jesus Calms the Storm center are my faux fur saucer chairs. I love these! And we have one little girl in particular who goes to these every time she enters our room. She sits in them for the movie, the lesson, and during snack time. She pets the fur on them and rolls the hairs of the chair in between her thumb and forefinger and you can tell that, for her, it's just bliss!

This brings me to my favorite seating in our room...the bungee chairs. Just the name is fun! Who doesn't like the bungee and bouncing? I have kids who sit in these facing forward and they just bounce up and down with their bottom during the lesson. Then I have a few who sit facing the back of the chair, putting their feet through two of the larger holes, and they use their feet to bounce up and down like crazy! It's as fun to watch as it is to sit in these chairs.

Last but not least in the way of furniture is my supplies cabinet...if you lack a supplies closet in your room that is. I try to be as prepared for a lesson beforehand as possible, but there are times when I discover a missing craft supply or need extra paper or a stapler that works. I keep all of these things and so much more in my supply closet. Inside you will find:

• Class Treasure Box
• Cleaning Supplies
• First-Aid
• Bibles
• Extra Arts and Craft Supplies
• Snacks, Paper Plates, Cups
• Movies
• Extra Bubbles, Play Doh, Etc...
• Game Helps
• Large Lesson Puppets
• Ink Pens, Dry Erease Markers, Sharpies, Push Pins, Tape, Stapler and Staples, Etc...

I don't have a lock on my cabinet. I keep the cleaning supplies pushed towards the back on the top shelf where small curious hands cannot reach them. And of course, every shelf is labeled to keep my cabinet organized!

There you have it! Everything you need and a few things you may want to furnish your ESE ministry room with!

I started this series last week. It will have many parts to it in hopes to pull together everything I have learned about setting up an ESE classroom for our children's ministry at church. Last week was an overview. This week is about centers.

I love centers. I think every classroom needs them. They break up the monotony of the room and provide different areas for different activities as well as different kids. Obviously, being at church, I wanted my centers to be Bible themed. Here is what I came up with. Mind you, these are just my centers. In a future post, I will outline everything in those centers in greater detail.

Storytime with Sarah is our center where the kids can re-create  or retell our Bible story from the day with our felt boards, story sticks, dress-up clothes, blocks (for building tabernacles and cities), and our light table. It is also where our memory verse is kept visible, as well as the individual reward charts for the kids learning those verses. Our day's visual schedule is on this wall too since it is the first thing the kids see when they enter our classroom. I got the star cutouts for the wall here. Storytime with Sarah actually shares the wall with our next center.

Music with Martha & Mary is our music station. As you can see, because it shares a wall with Storytime with Sarah, the shelf hosts more felt boards and pieces, as well as provides a place for our dress-up clothes to be stored. But mostly, this is where we keep our CD player and a huge assortment of CD's (everything from previous year's VBS music to Scripture songs to good old-fashioned praise and worship). I printed out a picture of Psalm 105:2 and even put a bin of children's instruments for the kids to use to play their own music. I got those cute music note cutouts here.

Noah's Nook is a place for the kids to go and sit and look at books, all Bible story related. The rainbow is simply colored tablecloths from Dollar Tree cut into one-foot lengths and glued together. Glue did not like the material of the tablecloths so we had to use clear packaging tape on the seams on the reverse side as well. I have a table with a castle and a bucket of knights and dragons nearby so they can make their own stories. I also have a cute finger puppet theater and bin of Bible finger puppets here as well.

And what about those clouds? They are looking a little worse for wear after a year now, but considering they are in front of the air conditioner vent blowing on them constantly, they have withstood the test of time nonetheless. I found the tutorial here. It's basically paper lanterns with polyfill hot glued around the outside. Before the polyfill goes on though, thread clear glass crystal beads through fishing line and tie them to the shaping wire inside the lantern. Make sure the beads hang at different lengths to give the appearance of raindrops. You can use different sized paper lanterns for different sized clouds too.

Daniel's Drive-In is where our video time happens. I also scored a great big lot of Veggie Tales movies on eBay to add to our movie library! The idea for the lion's head came from this Pin. As with all of my large paper decorations, I use sheets of poster paper cut from rolls at our local teacher supply store.

Jesus Calms the Storm is a place with some soft fuzzy chairs for kids who need to just go and sit and diffuse. It has an Inside Out inspired feelings board to help them identify what they are feeling, why they are feeling that way, and how to handle those feelings in a positive way. I bought poster boards in various shades of blue and just cut wave shapes from them. Using brown and white poster board and a small dowel rod, I made a ship. With gray and silver poster boards, I made some clouds and lightning. The decorations were inspired by this Pin. John 14:27 is on this wall as well.

Caleb's Craft Crossing is where we keep our craft supplies, as well as a table for crafting if the kids would like. I got those cute red and blue bins for glue, crayons, markers, and pencils at Dollar Tree. I am a bit OCD and so I label absolutely everything, even the obvious. I figure it doesn't hurt to have those printed words associated with objects everywhere as some of our kids are not reading yet and so they will learn to match the written words with what they are seeing. Some of the labels I simply make in Word, print out, and tape in place. Others I actually use my labeler for. I'm in love with my labeler!

Again, a plastic tablecloth from Dollar Tree to add color to the table and protect it from the markers and glue. The Sterilite 3-drawer bin on wheels houses craft supplies and stickers, paper,  and coloring books.

The giant grapes on the wall were inspired by this Pin. It is basically green cardstock leaves, a twisted length of brown packaging paper, and purple paper plates from Dollar Tree.

Prayer is so important and, the earlier kids learn how to pray, the better. Paul's Prayer Place is all about prayer. The idea for the center came from some coloring sheets about Paul and Silas in prison. We have a prayer request bucket, which is really just a recycled large snack container. I keep a Dollar Tree basket of scraps of construction paper and a pen nearby. We discuss prayer requests before we pray and I write the requests on the slips of paper and put them in our container.

Every month, we take our prayer requests out, figure out which ones God has already answered, and then roll them up and put them into our toilet paper tube answered prayers cross inspired by this site.

I also have a Lego prayer board for the kids who are more tactile and like to "feel." They can press a Lego piece into the cross for each prayer requests they give me. I keep another of those Dollar Tree bins filled with different colored Lego bricks nearby for this. The idea came from this post. 

I also created a poster outlining the A.C.T.S. prayer for the kids (adoration, confession, thanksgiving, and supplication). I even assigned a different colored Lego brick to each piece of the prayer so the kids can use the Lego cross to help them to remember to pray every aspect of the A.C.T.S. prayer.

Philippians 4:6 is printed out on our prayer wall too!

Solomon's Sensory Center is all about those sensory-seekers, be they for touch, hearing, or sight. I will have a whole blog post on sensory items in the classroom since this is such a biggie. Suffice it to say, it gets its own dedicated center.

Peter's Play Patch is the last of our centers. The idea for Peter's fishing boat was inspired by this Pin. I will detail what exactly is in Peter's Play Patch in a future post on toys, but I will tell you that our toys have to serve some greater purpose to be in the classroom. They are fun, but they have to teach a life skill or work on fine motor skills or social skills. And yes, that is a large freezer you see in the picture. We currently share a part of our classroom with our women's resource center and so we have a fridge and freezer in our room. But as you can see, I just incorporated them into our classroom and gave them their own purpose and function.

​And there you have it! That's post #2 in this series and it's all about centers. Be creative and come up with ideas of your own or feel free to use mine. We're all in this together and I am more than happy to share.

In 6 days I will officially be at my job for one year. And I have the best job, next to being a mom that is. I spend every Sunday morning teaching ESE kids all about Jesus, how much He loves them, what He did for them, and how they can glorify Him with their lives. Love, love, love my job. The other six days of my week are brainstorming ways to do it better, learning behavior management techniques for in a classroom setting, and lesson planning that uses all of the different learning styles...because if there is one thing I know for certain it is that, if you have met one special needs child, you have met one special needs child. They are ALL different. They learn differently and should each be taught in the way that they will learn the information best. 

It has been a long, but exciting and ever-changing year in our church's new ministry. Before this year, they had no designated children's church for ESE. So there have been lots of learning curves, groundbreaking, start-from-scratch, going-back-to-the-drawing-board moments. Especially at our first ever ESE VBS this past summer. But we have survived. And we have grown. We consistently have 4-5 kids now every Sunday and more in preschool on the way up.

The best compliment came when a dad brought his daughter a few weeks back and said, "We were going to stay home this morning because our oldest daughter is sick, but this one insisted on coming and not missing church." Praise God! Of course that came on the heels of another parent telling us we had not seen her child in a while because she had been traumatized when another child pulled her hair a few weeks prior. Oh but God is good. He balances our failures with His blessings and reminds us weekly that us being there and teaching those kids has nothing to do with us at all. It's all Him. And I say us because not one lesson I plan or craft I prepare would ever amount to a hill of beans were it not for the amazing volunteers I work with. Some of them come every single week to love on our ESE kids just because that is their heart. 

Anyway, in my 365 days of building an ESE classroom from the ground up, I have learned a ton. And I won't pretend to take any of the credit. I believe Pinterest is God-ordained like manna from heaven! I am beyond thankful for the artsy craftsy, creative, and imaginative pinners I follow who make me look like I am not just faking it week in and week out. All along the way though, I promised myself that, once my classroom felt complete (though I am sure it will evolve over time), I would do a series of posts, all on one blog to detail everything we did to make it a safe and fun learning environment for our kids. My prayer is that it may save someone else in the position I was in a year ago the countless hours of web-browsing, Internet-searching, eighteen-new-window-tabs-open-at-a-time pinning madness that I endured! Not that I didn't thoroughly enjoy much of the research, but for the sake of time, it would have been nice to find it one-stop-shop style.

So this is my first post about my classroom and it's more really of a teaser. I am simply going to give you the overall view, the pictures of my room from every angle. In my next few posts I will break down the ideas and reasons behind such things as the furniture, the centers, the toys and games, the behavior management tools, and even the safety objects we have in place. Most importantly, I will do my very best to provide you with a link to where each of the ideas/items came from and the glorious directions on how to do it yourself. Ready, set, go!

Ok, so you are probably thinking it's some state-of-the-art techy calculator, or maybe a durable pair of sneakers. Nope. Brace yourselves. It's a lunchbox. Say what? Not just any lunchbox mind you. But let me start with why a lunchbox is so important in our house.

Jeremiah suffers from hangry often. He is triggered by hunger and thirst in ways that make Dracula look like an innocent bystander at an all-you-can-drink blood bank. Seriously. Before anyone knows why he is behaving the way he is, he has lost his gold star day and temper and then it's all downhill from there. I wish I was exaggerating. And he eats a lot! This is a good thing considering two years ago he was 60 pounds and not eating at all with a G-tube, so hear me when I say that I am not complaining. But let's face it, six hours is a long time to be away from a refrigerator or pantry when you are a teenage boy.

So a lunchbox is supremely important in our house. And I believe we have found the best one on the market for the money. And there were tons out there to sift through too. Dear Lord, just search lunchbox on Amazon and be prepared to scroll for thrity minutes or more. Michaela agreed with our choice and bought herself one when she graduated college and started working 10-hour shifts.

What's so great about it? Well, besides the fact that it's under $20, it's a rectangle! What's with most lunch bags with the oval bottom. Tupperware is square people! Leftovers don't fit in the bottoms of those bags without turning them sideways and risking them spilling, or worse yet, risking your peas running into your chicken and your green beans touching your mashed potatoes. Heavens no! LOL!

Second, it has a secret insulated compartment in the lid, a pouch on the front, and a netting pouch on the back...lots of room. And you can use the adjustable strap (that's not made for only vertically challenged people), or you can remove the strap and carry it by the handle on top.

Then there is this zippered pouch between the top and bottom compartments that holds the ice packs so your napkin or sandwich doesn't get soggy.

But the best part is how big the bag itself is without Jerry looking like he is carrying travel luggage to school. Here are the before and after pictures of packing his lunch inside.

If you can't tell how much I packed in there, here is what all is inside.

And if we hadn't been out of mini cans of soda, cheese sticks, and yogurts, those would be in there too! LOL! By the way, I know this looks like a lot of food, but Jerry doesn't eat breakfast before he leaves in the morning and so they let him snack when he gets hungry around 10 am. Then lunch is at noon and more snacking usually happens around 1:30! And he gets so thirsty! I pack him a mini can of soda, a 16-ounce bottle of Crystal Light, a 12-ounce greet tea, and a Capri Sun (or two). And it all fits in this bag with his lunch and snacks!

Best of all (I know I said that before), it's washable. I probably washed this bag every other week last school year. Jerry just throws his dirty utensils back in the bag when he is done or doesn't close his half-eaten bag of chips before throwing them inside and zipping the bag shut. It's always an adventure cleaning out his lunchbag after school (queue Psycho movie music).

It was the perfect bag for him starting high school. While he is not opposed to character lunchboxes and still likes Paw Patrol and Scooby Doo, this lunch bag is for big kids. It also comes in 8 different colors. Micky got a purple one.

​Anyway, that's my idea of the best back-to-school supply this year.

Today is day three of the new school year and, so far, we are off to a great start. His first two days were gold star days. 

We had an awesome summer, probably the best we've had since Jeremiah was very little. Usually, the countdown to summer vacation is a tearful, anxiety-filled one, wondering how I will get through 80-something days in a row of 24/7 behavior issues. But not this summer. We went to Adventure Island swimming, we went to the movies, we did some gardening, played some games, had a bunch of lazy days at home, and I have to say, I was genuinely sad to see him go back that first day. I missed him!

He was ready though. By August 1st, he was obsessing over the countdown of days until open house, pacing the house and talking to himself about who his teacher might be, who would be in his class, what I would pack him for lunch, if quiet time would still be a thing this year, etc...

On our part, there was some apprehension for another reason. I can't lie. We were praying and hoping that Jeremiah would be accepted into another school, for various reasons. We applied for a different school back in April and even toured the new school, John and I at least. We were thrilled. They were more like a real school, with classroom transitions, real textbooks assigned to each student, testing to see where they are at academically and track their progress, teachers with Bachelor's or Masters in education, an actual lunchroom that makes and serves hot lunches daily, a library, a computer lab, tons of school clubs covering a wide array of student interests, a sports program, and PE, art, and music, all of which he currently does not have unless a volunteer just happens to come in and teach it to the kids sporadically. It's just more well-rounded. They also go year-round with only about 6 weeks of summer, understanding the importance of continuity and routine for special needs kids. And during that six weeks of summer they have a half-day camp-style program for the kids that keeps them learning while they have fun and is taught by newly graduated education majors at out local university. To make up for the rest of the summer, they have a fall break, two weeks at spring break, and three weeks at Christmas.

And did I mention that it is FREE?! Jeremiah's current tuition is a whopping $17,000 a year! That's more than a calendar year's tuition at the University of South Florida for perspective. 

Most importantly, this other school has a transition program that far exceeds the one where he is now. At age 18, Jeremiah will begin transitioning from school into a real-life job skill training phase that will last until he is 22. At the school he is currently at, the adult students remain in the same academic classroom learning the same curriculum as their younger school-aged peers for the entire school day. Once a month or so, they are taken on random field trips to our local Publix to bag groceries for an hour or two or to a locally-owned restaurant to learn how to serve customers and bus tables. 

At the school we tried to get Jeremiah into, they have a transition program that starts before the kids even turn 18. We saw their job skills classroom and it was amazing. They have a full-service coffee-shop where the students learn to barista and the teachers and other school personnel can place orders to be filled. The kids even learn to work the cash register and credit card machine as the school employees pay for their drinks. They also have their own eBay store and they teach the kids how to list things for sale or auction and then how to mail the items once they have sold. They have a sewing center for kids who like to sew to learn how to make garments or repair them. This is all in addition to a completely separate culinary classroom where kids interested in cooking can go and learn that skill as well.

And the students don't sit in a typical classroom after they turn 18 and graduate high school either. They have a transition building where the students spend half of every school day. There they learn job etiquette, basic job skills, social skills, financial independence skills, and so much more. Notice I said they spend only half the day in that classroom. That's because they spend the second half of every single school day at an actual job site working supervised. And the school is paired with the sheriff's department, Moffitt Hospital, a local coffee shop, and more so that the kids have options. Now can you see why we were so stoked?!

But alas, we are not the only ones who know this school is a Godsend. There is an insane waiting list to get in. Jeremiah was in the lottery for two of their three campuses in May, but he did not get selected. He is now on the waiting list and, whenever a spot opens in his grade level, another lottery will be held for those students waiting to get into that grade level. So we wait and take it one day at a time until then, knowing that, for whatever reason, God has chosen not to open that door yet. The fact that we could even consider this new school is a miracle in and of itself really. Years ago, before we considered Jerry's current school, we looked into this other one. But Jeremiah's behavior was so out-of-control and unpredictable, we feared it would not be a good fit for him. Now, that is not the case at all. Praise God!

Here's the bottom line. No one, absolutely no one can be responsible for your child's education other than you...the parent...whether they are typical or special needs. You are their best educator and their best advocate. Period. So what to do? Well, we are working on that. I can live knowing that he does not have routine lessons in art, music, or PE, but I feel obligated to do something about where he will be and what he will be learning after he turns 18. I want him to be as independent as he possibly can be and teach him skills for life that will set him up for success in the future long after John and I have passed. Again, we are working on that very proactively right now and have some great ideas in mind and will reveal them when we are further along in the planning process.

For now, we are past the disappointment that he is at the same school this year and resigned to it being God's will for such a time as this. Instead, we will make the most of it, help his teachers anyway we can, support the school through our volunteer hours, and by golly, have a good attitude doing it (most days). LOL! God's still working on me with that!

We were thrilled to know that his teacher this year is Mr. Edward, the para in his room from last year. Mr. Edward is the uncle to one of Michaela's friends that she was homeschooled with and who was in several plays with through our local homeschool co-op. He has a great plan for this year, has a child with special needs himself, will challenge Jeremiah and expect more from him than Jeremiah thinks he is capable of, understands that they are entering young adulthood, and most importantly, he is a CHRISTIAN. God is good. Here are some pictures of Jerry's new classroom and with Mr. Edward and his para Ms. Ashley.

​

Been a while. I know I say that at the start of most of my blog posts. I think it is a case of things going so well right now that I just don't know what to blog about. The struggles are far and few in between at this moment. At this moment. I am all too aware that could change in a nanosecond. I have learned that the hard way time and again. But honestly, since December or so, things have been very different. Different in a good way.

The cursing has stopped. The physical aggression is gone. There have been no hallucinations or delusions since January 26th. He is talking again, to us and about everything. He is talking about past events and things he remembers. He is singing along to the radio in the van. He can't stop talking about VBC in a few weeks. He smiles a lot, sleeps less during the day, and has been so compliant we even have him doing chores and some summer school. He may verbalize that he doesn't want to do it, but as he says that, he is doing whatever we asked him to do. He is looking forward to Monster Jam in August and has even showed interest in some hobbies he has liked in the past. 

It has been a new normal for us, a nice new normal. He has been on the same medication combination for months now and holding steady. His psychiatrist is confident in this treatment plan and believes we will only need to adjust dosages as he grows. 

I feel like I have been holding my breath for the past six months waiting for it all to fall apart and things to go back to the way they had been for so many years and I am just now slowly beginning to exhale. Relief. There is no other way to explain the feeling. It has made me want to do absolutely nothing but sleep...not to escape anymore, but because I don't think I ever realized just how exhausted I was from the past few years of circumstances with him. 

I remember back when things were at their worst with Jerry behaviorally, physically, and emotionally. Really, in the big scheme of things, it was not all that long ago. But I remember people looking at our lives and commenting, "I just don't know how you guys do it." I thought that so absurd, like we had a choice. We were not doing anything extraordinary. We were merely surviving. Now, in this season of being able to breathe and reflect, and rest, I look back and wonder, how did we do it? How did we persevere? How did we survive? How did we make it through each day, each episode, each battle...walking through the minefield of meltdowns and always on the brink of the unknown, flinching every time he raised his voice or fist? Each day definitely holding enough troubles of its own. 

Grace. That's my only answer. Unmerited, undeserved, unwarranted...minute by minute, day by day. 

I remember the devastation of Jerry's new diagnosis of schizophrenia last summer. I remember thinking, really God? This too? Why? But looking back I realize that, had we never received that blow, we never would have discovered this treatment that has brought us to where he is now. He is on the exact same medications that have worked for family members suffering from similar diagnoses. Only makes sense that it would work for him. Can't help but wonder, if he had been diagnosed with the schizophrenia earlier, how much of the past few years could we have avoided. And then I remember that God is sovereign and so the answer to that is, "none." while there are things that have happened over the last few years that I in no way understand or can see the reason behind, ultimately I don't need to. I just need to trust that it's all been for our good and God's glory, somehow, some way. And that's that really. 

So no what? Well, the rebuilding begins. I see new signs of life in the relationships between him and his siblings. I see trust being rebuilt, hearts being mended, scars fading, and lessons being learned. We are witnessing the Lord restore to us the years the locusts have eaten.

We even planned a family cruise vacation in December! In a million years I never would have even entertained the idea of quarantining myself on a floating vessel with no way to escape except by flailing overboard! Instead, we are looking forward to it, all of us. 

And I am not saying that we do not still have moments and are not still enduring struggles with our gift from God. We are. They just don't take our breath away as often and our joy is not as easily diminished by them as it used to be.

We are still working on self-care skills that I worry he will never master sometimes...wiping, teeth-brushing, putting his clothes on right side out and not backwards. And puberty? While I have been assured that exceptional needs girls and menstrual cycles are far worse, exceptional needs boys and the body parts that seem to have a mind all their own are not much fun either. I assure you. And poor Jerry really has no idea what is happening to his body. Some of it "tickles" and some of it is downright irritating...like body hair. We have been told that "it itches." Ben came downstairs the other morning to Jerry on the couch, pants down, scissors in hand. He was giving himself a "haircut" in hopes that it wouldn't bother him anymore. Poor Ben! Oh the things he will never be able to unsee! Jerry manscaping! We reiterated how dangerous it is to have scissors that close to certain body parts and assured him that, if he cuts all of the hair off, it will itch even more! True story. You can't make this stuff up. Tim Hawkins material.

Remember when your parents used to say that to you? Well, Jerry's been hearing an awful lot of that as of late.

We are not sure if it is the medication or just the nature of the schizophrenia, but Jerry has lost all interest in "things," all things. He could care less anymore about monster trucks or Monster Jam. He doesn't bug to plant in our garden anymore. Remember his dinosaur phase? We ran out of Pinterest dinosaur activity/game/craft ideas! Ninja Warrior, obstacle courses, Legos, board games, books...you name it. He could care less. We bought him some of his favorite things for Christmas and guess what? He unwrapped the paper from them and they are still in their store packaging under his bed! He has never even opened them! And before Christmas, we took him to Toys 'R Us and told him to pick out whatever he wanted for his gifts. He picked NOTHING! Everything we bought him was simply based on what he USED to like and obsess over.

His psychiatrist says it is a natural part of schizophrenia, the lack of interest. I see posts on my Facebook parents' group all the time of kids diagnosed with the same disorder sleeping on the couch, on their electronics, disinterested in and diengaged from the world around them. 

Well, I have officially had enough. I think the breaking point was when he lost interest last season in Buddy Baseball. He played for more than 10 seasons and loved every minute of it. He would drive us batty (no pun intended) between seasons and over the summer, ready to go back. You can see how much he enjoyed it in the first picture above. Look at that smile! The picture below  that first one is the first game of this season. He's a benchwarming spectator people! He is watching his friends play, his old buddy Jen be a buddy to someone else for the first time ever, and his brother coach and sister be a buddy as well. Breaks my heart! But it started last season when he wouldn't stay on the field or in the dugout for more than 15 minutes of any game. He would just walk off field and say, "I'm done." And no amount of threatening or cajoling or bribing could get him back out there. Believe me, we tried.

I refuse to let this be the rest of his life. Sometimes, you just gotta do what you've gotta do! And you may not always want to, like it, or be happy about it. But it is what it is. Suck it up buttercup. Harsh, I know. But I miss my engaging and over-the-top-excited-about-stuff son!

We have a new routine we're working on. Besides taking care of his own physical needs like teeth-brushing, butt-wiping, and showering...and doing some household chores like sweeping the stairs and taking the garbages out...,when he gets home from school and on his days off, he has to somehow engage with us. Pick a game to play, go grab a coloring book, get the Legos, get a book we can read together...you get the idea. It's not, "Do you want to...?" It's not optional. Forced fun? Maybe. But we see it as necessary to not lose him any further into the abyss of aloofness. Crazy isn't it...having to make your child have fun? Ugh!

Not forcing Buddy Baseball however. There is the rest of the team to consider at this point. The commissioner of the league said that Jerry could go out on the field anytime he wanted to to take part in all of part of a game. We have put his old team shirt on him the last two weeks, but so far, he has not been interested. We'll see what the rest of the season brings.

I have to share what I really feel like God has been clearly teaching me the last week or so. I will start with the Refocus Retreat I went on with my church last weekend.

The retreat was open to anyone and even couples could go. I really wanted John to go with me, but one of us always has to be with Jerry, at least when we are talking about being gone for more than a few hours. He went on the men's retreat in October to the Keys and so I guess this was my turn so to speak. 

Our church family is still relatively new to us, even though we have been attending services there for nearly three years now. We have plugged in and serve in different places so that we are connecting and meeting new believers in our new family regularly. Our church is bigger than the last one we attended and so we can go every week and meet someone new it seems!

I am not much of an extrovert, not like John. He has an easy personality about him. He can just meet someone, strike up  converstaion with them, and they are instantly friends. Me, not so much. Meeting new people can give me anxiety. I am always a little more than awkward during first introductions and those early get-to-know-you-better conversations. 

It's not surprising then that, the week leading up to the retreat, I wavered between, "I can't wait for this weekend!" and "Why did I sign up for this? Is it too late to back out?" But God knew my heart and He got me there. He reminded me that I was new at my previous church once too, albeit decades ago. He also reminded me that He led us to this church for a reason and we have a purpose there as we worship beside His other children. Then, because I was still not convinced (I am really stubborn like that!), God gave me a practical "help" for the weekend. The day before I was to leave, one of the ladies' I had gotten to know only recently through a mutual Bible study we were doing, texted to ask if she could ride with me because her friend's plans had changed.

Needless to say, the drive was relaxing, it was fun to get to know her better, we stopped for lunch, and overall just had a great time of fellowship for the hour and a half it took to get to the retreat center. Without her along, I probably would have spent that time in dread over the event...picturing myself eating alone, sitting by myself, and feeling like an outsider overall. Totally the enemy, but my mind would have inevitably gone there just the same. I disclosed some of my anxieties about the weekend to my car companion. She, by the way, is an extrovert. Thanks to her, I was introduced to many wonderful new people all weekend long and always had a friend to sit/hang out with. God is good and my fears were totally unfounded.

But that was just a prelude to the meaning behind this post. Friday night at the retreat, I was back in my room settling in and I texted John to see how everyone was doing. He told me that Jerry had spent the better part of the evening paranoid and scared and talking to people not there. We had not seen an episode since the beginning of January. It was the longest stretch between episodes and I was beginning to relax, thinking the medication concoction and dosage was finally the one he needed to be on to "stay with us," at least until his next growth spurt.

I let myself get discouraged. I started questioning God. I got a little angry and a lot sad. Here we go again.

The next morning, our first session at the retreat was on a Bible study method dating back to 30 A.D. and taught by a very sweet man who was a pastoral care missionary all over the world next to his wife for 35 years. And here is the passage he chose for us to breakdown and study that morning:

The Faith of a Canaanite Woman (Matthew 15)
21 And Jesus went away from there and withdrew to the district of Tyre and Sidon. 22 And behold, a Canaanite woman from that region came out and was crying, “Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David; my daughter is severely oppressed by a demon.” 23 But he did not answer her a word. And his disciples came and begged him, saying, “Send her away, for she is crying out after us.” 24 He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” 25 But she came and knelt before him, saying, “Lord, help me.” 26 And he answered, “It is not right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs.” 27 She said, “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters' table.” 28 Then Jesus answered her, “O woman, great is your faith! Be it done for you as you desire.” And her daughter was healed instantly.

Seriously. Of all passages.

Naturally, I did what anyone desiring to blend in with the paint on the walls would do when amidst a room full of people she was just meeting and getting to know...I cried! Ugh! My small group leader was very sweet. She could tell that I was not ready to share what was on my heart and let me just sit and listen to everyone else as we went through the study.

But God was working on me. Oh, that I could have the faith of that Canaanite woman...who didn't just ask once for her daughter's deliverance and healing (even after the dsciples asked to have her sent away). No. She stayed and she pleaded, she begged. She admitted her underserving status to even have Jesus acknowledge her, let alone grant her request, but she knew by faith that He alone could grant it and so she persisted.

Have I given up? Have I accepted the doctors' diagnosis that schizophrenia is irreversible, not curable, progressively debilitating? Have I put my faith in them and their prescriptions over my God who, with and through Him, all things are posible? Ouch. 

I had to be back at church Sunday morning to teach and so I missed the last breakout session at the retreat, but God had His hand in that as well. I made it back in time to attend the first service before I had to teach during the second. Pastor Mark spoke on Nehemiah 4:1-14, where the Jews were so fearful of Sanballat and his threats to destroy them in the process of their rebuilding the Jerusalem wall, that they were ready to lay down their tools, throw the towel in, and retreat.

Pastor Mark reminded us that fear keeps us from God's best. We need to pray...hard, be prepared for the doubts that will creep in, put a plan of protection in place, and post the power of God at the front of our fight.

I will admit that I am fearful for Jeremiah's future with his diagnosis. I think any momma would be. But I can never stop praying. The doubts will come. Undoubtedly, so will the set backs. It has always been three steps forward and two steps back with my sweet boy. But my plan of protection has to be staying grounded in God's Word, not forsaking my quiet time with Him, and learning the true discipline of praying without ceasing...no matter the answer or outcome...no matter how long it takes...even if my heart's desire for Jeremiah is never realized this side of heaven.

​This is not my fight. It is God's. I am just along for the ride and have to continually open myself to all He wants to teach me and how He wants to grow me through it...remembering always one very important truth. It is ALL for His glory. I may not always understand the how's and why's of that statement, but I don't need to. I just need to believe it, to have faith that it is true.