OUR LAST 2 WEEKS

a little trip, a little bit about attachment, and homeschool conference

that's what you're gonna get with this post. :)

I think most of y'all know I'm a flight attendant but I'm SO fortunate and I really only have to fly 1 trip a month. That means I'm away from home for 2.5 days and 2 nights.

We've noticed that Elizabeth tends to have set backs in her attachment when I fly....which has put us in a bit of a pickle. We can make ends meet without me working....but right now we're trying to save up some money for another adoption not to mention the fact we're having to pay out of pocket for Elizabeth's attachment therapy. Don't get me wrong -I'm not complaining about insurance not helping out -we will GLADLY foot this therapy bill in order to help us help Elizabeth. BUT, it IS expensive. no doubt about it.

anyway-we were really debating what I should do for July...work a trip- or just suck it up, tighten our belts even more and just have me stay home for the month.

Well, God surprised me! There was a trip someone was giving away that had an overnight in a city about 90 minutes from our house! And to make it even sweeter, that overnight was in a hotel that gives us suites AND the overnight was over 20 hours AND it was on a day John had off.......sooooooo, I picked up the trip and last Friday around noon, John and the kids met me on my overnight and got to stay in the hotel with me.

This was SUCH a blessing from God because it still allowed me to work and earn a little extra $$, but I was only away from Elizabeth a day. It was good for all 3 kids, but especially Elizabeth, to meet up with me while I was on a trip.

John and the kids pulled up to the hotel around 1pm last Friday and it didn't take us long to get in our suits and go for about an hour long swim.

While we were just taking it easy in the room and getting ready to go to dinner, we noticed Elizabeth had dozed off.

and not long after, she looked like this. :)

the hotel gives us suites -so there was a TV in the bedroom and 1 in the living room. Becca claimed the bedroom one as hers and pretty much parked herself by "her own TV" :)

We are still in the midst of attachment issues with Elizabeth. They don't just go away over night...BUT we are definitely seeing marked improvement. and not in just the few areas we're working on....it seems to be spilling over to the areas that we knew were attachment related but weren't specifically targetting just yet.

I know several people have asked "what are you doing?!" -the above video is just a short snippet of something we do with Elizabeth. what's funny is we've done this all along with her and just never knew it would help her attachment!! but now we are doing much more often and more purposefully.

what it is is just having her look at my face and copying what I'm doing. it's to help encourage eye contact. If you notice, she is looking right at my eyes almost the entire time...which is really great. The more eye contact you can foster, the better.

You'll also hear me asking her how much I love her. This is another aspect we're working on...her understanding we love her regardless of what she does. It's more than just saying "I love you Elizabeth"...I'm trying to be purposeful sometimes, especially when she's disobeyed, and making sure she understands I still love her. I often ask her, after she's been disobedient, "does mommy still love you Elizabeth?" and often times she'll answer "no". Now, I'm not sure if she completely understands what I'm asking her, but I ALWAYS reiterate "of course I do!....even when you disobey, I STILL love you. When you are good I love you, when you are naughty I love you." This usually turns her sad little face to one of, not only happiness, but there is even a sense of relief.

lastly -John and I just spent Friday and Saturday at our state's homeschool conference. Oh Man!! what a time of amazing teaching. Voddie Baucham was the head speaker and folks, I'm hear to tell you, if you haven't heard this man speak -you need to go to his website and start looking for some of his sermons!!! His main focus is family discipleship -and boy oh boy! He knows his Scripture and John and I were definitely convicted on a few things this weekend...things we didn't even think related to homeschooling!!!! Here is a link to his blog Voddie's blog . Whether you are a homeschooling parent or not -it doesn't matter. God is using this man in BIG ways....just poke around his blog and you will be blessed immeasurably.

I know this is long winded..sorry! so much to pass along to y'all. :) Hopefully you stuck with me the entire time. :)

We've hardly taken any pics this month, so I'll try to get a post full of pics here in the near future -so you don't have to read as much!