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September 24th, Matthew was born.
September 25th, Matthew lived.
September 26th, Matthew went home.

Imagine the roller coaster of emotion we were on.  We had gone from finding out our son had Trisomy 13 and learning he wouldn't have much time with us, if any at all.  To hearing the positive news at our Care Conference that, for a baby with Trisomy 13, Matthew had relatively few life threatening issues and he had every chance of going home with us.  To going into labor a month early and not knowing if having him early would put him at higher risk.  To giving birth to a rolly polly, 6lb 3oz, rosy pink, healthy little guy.  Healthy except for the occasional failure to remember to breathe.

This is the part of the story that is hardest for me to share.  Not because it's sad.  It has it's sad moments.  But more than that it is precious.  It's the part of the story I treasure the most.  Because it's the story of our private moments with Matthew.  It's the part of the story that only we know.  And as hard as those moments were, they were also my favorite moments with him.  Because it was in those moments that I felt closest to him.  And in those moments I was surrounded by saints and angels.  Those were the moments when all the prayers, the hundreds if not thousands of people praying for our Matthew, those prayers surrounded us and held us.  They carried us through.

But if I really want to tell his story, I have to share these moments with you.  Because the story is not complete without them.  I want you to know my son as I knew him.  And without the chance to introduce him to you in person, this is the next best thing.

Yesterday morning I woke up at 7:30am to the frantic cries of the Princess.  ...have to go potty!!!  I struggled to drag myself out of bed.  My husband rolled over and muttered something about waking him up after she was done.

Mother's Day had begun.

We got to the bathroom and my daughter kept walking past it.  "I thought you had to go potty."  I yawned.  "No, my brother has to go potty."

We went into the bedroom and found him wiggling in the bed, still half asleep.  I roused him and he staggered out of bed and made his way to the bathroom.

"Thank you for telling me he had to go potty.  You can go back to bed now."

"But it's good mornin time.  The sun is awake.  I hungwy.  I want bweakfast."

It was worth a try.

We made our way into the kitchen, Zombie Mom style, and I put some waffles in the toaster.

At this point the baby was apparently squeezing my bladder with a vice so I went to check on the Peanut.  As it turns out, he had long finished and was checking out his handsome self in the mirror.

Our conversation awoke my husband who told me to go back to bed and he would take over.

A couple of hours later my husband woke me up to tell me he had gotten breakfast.  "Come eat before it gets cold."

Refreshed after my nice sleep in, I made my way into the living room.

As I rounded the corner, I was greeted with one of the sweetest sights I have ever seen.

The Princess is a Mama's Girl.  She will jump up in my arms and smother me with kisses and cuddles.  Especially if Dada asks her for a kiss.

It's a bit hard on him.  He craves her love and she turns her back on him and runs to me.

I try to tell him not to worry.  One day she will realize the power she wields over him and the tables will turn.

I warn him that she is actually practicing her flirting skills and has it down cold.  The more she runs from him the more he chases after her.  It's all part of her strategy.  She may seem innocent.  But that little brain is scheming.

And now she has started to realize her power.

It was Thursday.

My mom-in-law was coming out on Saturday to celebrate her birthday.

This gave me two full days to paint the homeschool room and clean up the mess.

Thursday to paint.

Friday to clean.

Fool proof plan.

So, I pulled all the furniture away from the walls, pulled out my painting supplies and got started.

 I started with primer.
 Giving the walls a nice, consistent, even coat.
 With several breaks to kiss owies, serve emergency (I'm starving) snacks, and take the princess to the potty.
 As you can see, I consider it of utmost importance, to keep the primer coat from looking sp lo tc hy .

 At this point, I received a call from my husband, informing me he was on his way home from work.

5:00 already!?

That's ok.  I have all evening to finish painting and then all day tomorrow to clean up.

Him:  "Did you take the trash out this morning?"  (I had forgotten to take the trash out on Tuesday)

Me:  "No, today isn't trash day."

Him:  "You're kidding right?  Today is trash day."

Me:  (laughing to myself and speaking in an ever so slightly condescending voice) "No, honey.  Trash day is Friday not Thursday.  Sometimes I get confused too."

Him:  "What day do you think it is?"

Me:  "It's Thursday."

Him:  "It's Friday."

Me:  "No, it can't be Friday because you didn't do your podcast last night."

Him:  "It was cancelled this week.  Today is Friday."

Me:  "Please tell me you are kidding!"

Him:  "Nope."

I then turned around and took one look at my house.

Usually I try to stay away from controversial topics.  Both in my blog and in my "real life" conversations.  I don't like to upset people.  I tend to be overly sensitive so I try not to say anything that might hurt someone else's feelings.  Until I feel really strongly about something.  Then I get on my soapbox.  I still try not to hurt any feelings but I just can't seem to swallow my disagreement.

Last year I avoided this topic because I know it will put me in the unpopular crowd.  This is a topic that seems to send people into a fury and I am vastly outnumbered.  I have been avoiding my blog because this has been weighing heavily on my mind and I know I can't write about anything else.

Finally here today I will break my silence.

First, though, a spoiler warning.  If you have any young children you might want to stop reading this out loud.  Turn your monitor.  Protect them from the horror I am about to reveal.

Are they gone yet?

Ok, consider yourself warned.

Here it goes.

A couple of weeks ago, bright and early on a Saturday morning, my husband and I packed the kids up in the car and drove the hour drive to his mother's house.  After dropping off my husband, the kids and I then drove an hour and a half back, past our house, to a birthday party for one of my son's best buddies.  (My son was rather dismayed that for some reason it took 2 1/2 hours to drive to the birthday party!)  While we were having fun splashing and eating cupcakes, my husband and his mother were in her van, driving the five hours to my parent's house.  They stayed for a few hours and then turned right around and drove back.

At around 1am I got a call from my brother asking me if my husband had arrived home yet.  I looked outside to check and discovered, to my surprise, a vehicle in the driveway containing my brother and sister-in-law!

At around 2am my husband arrived home.  He had dropped his mom off at her house and we would be taking her van back the next afternoon.

Why?

This year my son is officially starting Preschool.  Because his birthday falls in October he is one year behind all his friends who started Kindergarten yesterday.  Now rather than sending my little guy off to school, wearing a backpack that is bigger than him, taking tons of pictures, and crying all the way home, (cause you know I would) I'm cheating and keeping him home with me.  HA!  Yes, I am homeschooling.

Now, technically I homeschooled him last year too.  We did nursery school.  But that was mostly fun stuff and I made sure never to burn him out.  So if he got tired of something or didn't want to do it that day we didn't.    He really already knew the things he was supposed to learn anyway but I didn't want to push him and make him hate the whole idea of school.  I figured I would just use that year as a sort of practice year to get him used to the idea.  Some days we worked for five or ten minutes.  Some days he wanted to "work" all day.  And some days we didn't crack a book though we usually at least watched an educational video and read a book.  And whenever he sat down with a book to practice drawing his letters or numbers or puzzles or whatnot my daughter would sit down with him and draw or color.  Most days he would ask to "do school" so I consider the year a success.

This year is "for real."  Not that I plan on pushing him to the point of hating or disliking school.  The curriculum only calls for about 45 minutes a day 4 days a week.  I will probably add some fun supplemental stuff too.  If something is not clicking with him we will find another way of doing it or revisit it when he is ready.  I have already had him look through his preschool reading curriculum and it looks like he is actually ready for the kindergarten so I think we will just breeze through that and move on.

We will officially start the day after Labor Day because I have this firm belief that school shouldn't start until September.  Maybe because school started in September when I was a child or possibly because my birthday month is August.  Regardless, I refuse to start school in August!

Of course, as I am getting "prepared" (and by getting prepared I really mean thinking about and planning on getting prepared) I have been obsessively stalking Pinterest and anything and everything that will help me organize and set up my Homeschool Room.

A tiny box.  No decoration.  No markings.  Simple.  Ordinary.  Unremarkable.

But inside that box.

A treasure.

I open the box.  A flood of memories.

Memories tucked away, deep in my heart, but never forgotten.

Memories, not shared, but not secret.

An entire existence.  Held in this tiny box.
I remember.

Yesterday my family and I attended the Dallas Comic Con.

Kids, have I ever told you how I met your father?

It was the winter of 2002.  I was working as a "Customer Service Rep." in a call center.  A friend and former roommate of mine, who worked in the same building, but different department, stopped by my desk to chat.  Let's call her Leeny. ;)

Little did I know a co-worker of hers had passed by and noticed us talking.  He had taken special note of my name plate on my desk.

Later he would play a little prank on her.  "How do you know Rachael?" he asked.  She, surprised that he somehow knew me, started chattering away about going to college together, being close friends, living together with 5 other girls in a rental house after graduating . . . "How do you know Rachael?! she asked.

"I don't!  I never said I did.  I just asked how you knew her."  He laughed.  She rolled her eyes.

But that was enough.  Enough for Leeny to begin to tell him little things about her friend Rachael.  And one very important detail.  The detail that created the first spark.  The detail that gave him his in . . .

This past weekend my husband, kids and I all traveled by car 4 hours to spend the weekend in Oklahoma attending a wedding of one of my college roomates.  I spent the weekend involved in various wedding preparations and other bridesmaid attendant duties.  I will tell you more about that as soon as I get all the pictures scanned into the computer.  (Requires me to go all the way upstairs to use the scanner.  I actually wrote the post on Monday but have been procrastinating on the picture part all week.)

Let me tell you how my husband spent his weekend.