Busy Week, Good Week

Well, everyone in our house has recovered from last week's illness. And just in time too. We've been quite busy this week.

Tuesday we met with the bank to see about buying the house we are living in now. I've probably got you all confused now, right? Well, the reason we were going to fix the block house and move in there was that we didn't have the money to buy this place. With no income at the time, getting a loan was not going to happen. So, we had to make alternate plans. In the last month our situation has changed dramatically. Teagan was approved for his long-term disability and just yesterday was approved by Social Security! You read that right... no lawyers, no advocates, no appeals, he was approved just like that! Praise be to God!! Needless to say, all of that improves our overall outlook and changes plans. In addition, with Teagan quitting his job, we have gotten the disbursements from profit sharing and 401k. Then I did our taxes and our refund was more than double what I was expecting. Put it all together and we have more than 20% downpayment to buy this house! And our mortgage payment would be 2/3 of our current rent. I say all this not to brag, but to give glory to the LORD for it is only Him providing this for us. Only He could have worked out all these details to come together at the perfect time, just a month before our lease runs out.

Anyway, back to the bank. Our chances look pretty good. Our credit scores were better than expected, and the lady working with us was pretty confident that it could be worked out. We are about to start haggling with our landlords to bring the purchase price down. They said our rent would go to lower the purchase price, but 2 years later they stated the price as the same amount we started with. We didn't get it in writing (our mistake) but we are hoping to bring them down. All in writing of course. Learn from your mistakes!

Yesterday I had Jade's IEP meeting and 3-year review at school. It took 2 1/2 hours! But we got a lot accomplished. Her evaluation gave us an age equivalent in all different areas of development. She ranges everywhere from 1 yr 10 mo to 7 yr 7 mo! Average is around 2 1/2 - 3 years. Her strengths are in fine motor skills. No suprise there. If you've seen her drawings, they are amazing! Reading is a strength as well. Her sight word reading is in the K-1st grade range. But communication is still so hard for her. Anyway, she goes on to Kindergarten in the fall. She will be with her same age peers most of the day, and will have a full-time aide. All in all, the meeting went well. We really have a good team working with her at school. I am confident that they will do all they can to help her succeed.

Tomorrow Teagan & I leave for a weekend ALONE! It's been 6 years since we've gotten away. The kids are going to Noni's house, and all of us are super excited about it. Kordell packed last night. He's ready! LOL