Our Trip to Puerto Rico with Ema and Papa Holding down the Fort in PA

Samantha: 103 Months, Week 4
Aedan: 70 Months, Week 2
Owen: 27 Months, Week 4


This week started off with just a few days before our trip to Puerto Rico for Ben's conference/vacation that I was accompanying him on. Other than coming out to Pennsylvania a couple times last spring to look at and make offers on houses, Ben and I hadn't been gone overnight without any kids since before Owen was born. I was looking forward to it immensely and was counting down the days until Tuesday when Ema and Papa would arrive, and Ben and I would take off for the rest of the week.

After being out late at the hockey game on Saturday night, no one really slept in as much as they should have that morning, making everyone a bit tired that Sunday morning. When Ben went into the kitchen that morning he noticed that we caught two mice in the sticky traps we placed out the night before, one next to the oven and one by the toaster. It was so gross to think about mice walking around on our counters, and I was just hoping that they weren't going anywhere else in our house. I also hoped there weren't too many more where they came from, but I was glad that we at least caught some, too.

That morning we went to church, all seven of us, and the little girl did really well, thankfully. I think it helped that Alysse, the lady who babysat them the night before, was the teacher in her classroom, so maybe it helped her to see a familiar face. I kept looking over my shoulder, expecting someone to have to come upstairs to get us to come be with her, but no one ever came, which I was grateful for. After picking her up from her classroom after church, we made a big deal about how proud we were of her listening to her teachers and not trying to run away.

In preparation for Ema and Papa coming to watch all five of our kids, I wanted to type up some general directions, our schedule, important addresses and phone numbers, as well as how to manage our two new little ones. I was hoping that by leaving these directions they might have a more successful time caring for everyone. I felt pretty guilty about leaving them all five kids, especially when the little girl can be a handful sometimes. I definitely felt nervous about, and if we hadn't just used respite care while we were out of town over Christmas, I probably would have considered asking for respite for these days as well.

Anyways, as I was working on typing up the directions, I kept getting interrupted every five minutes, making it really hard to get anything done. I have found myself being really annoyed and short lately. All the toys everywhere from all five kids have been bothering me, and no one is cleaning things up properly or putting things back where they should be so then things are getting lost. There is just constant noise, and I don't know why things are annoying me so much lately. Sometimes I feel like I do not have as much fun at home or with the kids or with Ben as I used to, that all the chaos of five kids with extra mess, extra laundry, and extra tasks, is just stealing the joy of being a mom and watching my kids grow and learn, and being able to play with them, be silly with them, and really engage and connect with them. I really feel like that has been lacking lately, and I don't like it.

I'm sure it also doesn't help that I'm tired from going to bed too late and being woken up by Owen every night, but I stay up late because I feel like I need that time to just relax, decompress, get things done, work on my blog, watch TV, and just spend time actually connecting with Ben instead of just being passing ships that are checking off tasks on our endless to-do list that comes with taking care of five kids. The two hour window of time from when all the kids are in bed around 8:00 to when we should be heading to bed around 10:00 goes awfully fast, and most nights it just doesn't allow me enough time. Time is something I am constantly grasping for these days and can never seem to find enough of. Sometimes I just want to simplify our lives somehow so that I can have more margin for really investing into the relationships around me in my family, in trying to make friends in an area where we know no one, as well as my relationship with God which I often push to the wayside or leave at the bottom of my priority list.

It snowed overnight Sunday into Monday, and Ben took these pictures of what it looked like outside that morning. The kids all had a two hour delay, and it kind of made us laugh that this little amount of snow caused a delay. With Ben not starting his semester yet, he offered to stay home and get the big kids off on the school vans while I took the two little boys out to Walmart to pick up our grocery order. It was nice to be able to get done what I needed to do without having to drag all five kids along with me.

While I was gone at the store, Ben was able to take the pipes under the sink apart and figure out the source of the blockage that was causing our sink to stop up. It had been draining slower and slower over a few days and even putting Draino in it didn't seem to do any good. Eventually, Aedan finally confessed that he dropped something down the drain, and then he explained what happened. It was a monkey sponge toy that you are supposed to put in a bowl of water and over several days it absorbs the water and expands, getting quite large. Well, this monkey was expanding in our pipe with every time we turned on the faucet. We were glad he finally confessed to what happened, and we weren't upset, we just wish he would have told us sooner so we could have gotten the monkey out before it got so big. I took a picture of it stuck right in the curve of the pipe. Ben had to use a coat hanger to push it out. It kind of made us laugh, though.

Here is some work Aedan brought home from school that afternoon. He is working on simple addition and the letter Ff. His coloring on these pictures is very nice!

Ben and I had certain plans of how we thought Tuesday was going to go with doing laundry, packing, and getting ready for our trip, but our plans were hijacked that morning as we woke up to discover that apparently the little girl threw up in her bed overnight at some point and never told us. We have a monitor in their room and never noticed anything, so we weren't sure when it happened. Ben got her out of her bed that morning for school (but didn't notice the terrible smell in their room somehow), and we didn't discover what had happened until she left for school and her little brother woke up a little while later. The little girl never told us anything had happened, so we were none the wiser and sent her off to school like normal. I just could not understand how you could go back to sleep with vomit all over your bed and breathe in that horrible smell all night long. And her poor little brother, too, it didn't seem to phase him at all. On Monday night she mentioned that her tummy hurt, but then she was running around and playing and said she felt fine. Then, she wouldn't eat her dinner but when we asked her if she felt sick, she said no. She is just so hard to communicate with. We can't ever get a straight story that makes any sense. I sent an email to her teacher to let her know in case she acted sick at school, but she said she seemed fine.

Aedan and Owen had been dealing with diarrhea the last few days, but they were back to normal on Tuesday. Owen ended up taking a three hour nap on Monday afternoon. We had to wake him up so that he wouldn't sleep too long, but I think that nap helped him to kick whatever it was that was bothering him.

Anyways, so instead of doing our laundry and getting all packed and ready to go, Ben and I spent the morning cleaning and sanitizing their room and all the bedding on her bed, which took lots of stain spray and two heavy duty wash cycles. Ben is much better with dealing with vomit than I am because I have such a strong gag reflex that I almost can't even smell vomit without getting sick myself. Still the room smelled terrible and once the door was open, it permeated the whole upstairs. I had a diffuser going with Purification oil in it, and I even ended up opening their window to get some fresh air going; it was so bad. I felt queasy all morning, and into the afternoon I was feeling worse. I was hoping it was just in my imagination and that I wasn't catching something from the kids. I feel like I always get everything from them. And of course all this was happening right before we go out of town. I was hoping that no one else would get sick because I didn't want Ema and Papa to have to deal with sickness on top of just the daily care of five kids.

That day we found out about a last minute med-check appointment for the little girl, and Ben and I both decided to go so we could hear what the doctor had to say. (I didn't feel great at home, hardly ate anything for lunch, just as a precaution, and certainly didn't feel good riding in the car.) The appointment was fine. We got to meet another woman who will be assisting us in making sure that we get what we need, particularly in the realm of medication and other special services. The doctor commented that this was the most calm he had ever seen her in his office, that she is normally trying to open the office door and bolt down the hallway or climb up the shelves or get into things. We talked to the doctor about how well she had been doing sleeping at night and that we didn't think the Benadryl was necessary anymore. He agreed that taking that is not a long term solution, and he suggested that we cut out the Benadryl but keep giving her the other medicine because that would need to be cut back slowly. Surprisingly, he also decided to cut her dose of Ritalin by 75%, telling us to only give her half a pill in the morning and then cut her afternoon dose completely, which we didn't quite understand. Looking back, we probably should have spoken up about that more because we were purely talking about her sleep medicine, and that cut in Ritalin seemed pretty extreme, but we didn't know where our boundaries were with that because we have only had her for a month and a half, and he has been seeing her for awhile.

On the way back home, I was just feeling worse and worse, and very close to feeling like I might get sick myself, so when we got back home, I went into our bedroom to lay down and close my eyes, hoping the feeling would just pass. Ben and I had so much to do still with getting the kids fed, and we still hadn't even begun to pack for our trip. We were planning on leaving after the kids were in bed to drive to the hotel near the airport in New York, since our flight left early the next day. It had been a really stressful day with cleaning up after the little girl and then the additional appointment that we weren't expecting, and with me not feeling well on top of it, it was not how we wanted this day or the start of our time away to go.

After taking a little nap, I decided to get up and try to move around and start packing. We were able to get all the kids to bed, finish talking to Ema and Papa about last minute directions, and then were on our way. I remembered that I still had some Zofran that dissolves on your tongue from when I went to the hospital for fluids the last time I had the stomach flu, so I took one of those and it didn't take very long before I started feeling better. I was more lifelike, was able to talk to Ben more, and riding in the car wasn't making me feel sick like it was earlier.

I have never been to New York City before, so it was interesting driving around there to get to our hotel, even though it was nighttime. It was amazing how busy it was and how many bridges we had to cross. Saying it is the city that never sleeps is no joke. We got our hotel on Hotwire for pretty cheap, and it was okay since we only needed it for sleeping, but it was a little sketchy. I'm pretty sure we smelled people smoking interesting things around us, and people were incredibly loud through most of the night with talking in the hallway, playing TVs very loudly, and letting doors slam. We ended up turning on some white noise on our phone to block out some noise and help us sleep. We got some sleep, but it definitely wasn't a very restful night.

Wednesday morning we were up bright and early to catch our plane from New York City to San Juan. We were pretty tired that morning, but I was just glad that I was feeling better and never actually got sick. I basically just didn't eat anything after breakfast the day before, giving my stomach a break, and taking the Zofran really helped to take the queasiness away. I was so grateful to be feeling better, especially because I didn't want to be sick on this trip I had been looking forward to for so long. Ben and I had a few ideas of what we wanted to do in Puerto Rico, but we were mostly looking forward to just being able to relax, sleep in, not be woken up at night, do some sight-seeing, enjoy the warm weather and sunshine, and be able to follow our own schedule to eat when we want and not have clean up after anyone or get anyone ready to go but ourselves. This was a much needed vacation for me, and I'm so glad that the earthquake didn't impact where we would be in San Juan. The city was mostly running on generators, but that wasn't a big deal to us, and we were so excited to be on this trip together. It was going to be so good to have this time to reconnect and remember how much we love being with each other, traveling together, and sharing in experiences together.

We were a bit tired when we first got the San Juan, but we took a taxi from the airport to our Airbnb, got checked in and situated, and then decided we would get some lunch at an area near where we stayed that had lots of different choices. After each lunch, we requested an Uber and walked around Old San Juan for a little while.

Here's a view of the lagoon that was right outside our Airbnb. We stayed on the third floor in the building on the left in this picture, so we had a beautiful view off the balcony of our room.

As we walked around Old San Juan, we went into the San Juan Bautista Cathedral which opened in 1540. We enjoyed looking at the architecture, the statues, and the Christmas decorations that they still had up. It also is the burial place of Ponce de Leon, which is kind of interesting.

From there we walked around a little bit more, stopped at a store to get sunglasses for me and shorts for Ben. (We both forgot those items at home in the rush to get packed up.) We walked up to one of the forts to look around and enjoy the view before sitting down on the grass to call the kids, check on how everyone was doing, and say hello.

At that point we were getting pretty tired from having woken up so early to get our flight, so we found this little coffee shop that we went to last time we were here and liked quite a bit to get a small sandwich and coffee for dinner. We weren't too hungry since we ate a larger, later lunch, so it was perfect for what we needed. Then, we walked down by the cruise ships, just because they are interesting to look at, before getting an Uber back to our Airbnb, enjoying time in the hot tub, and just relaxing in our room for the rest of the night.

One of our goals on this trip was to sleep in as long as we wanted to since we didn't have kids to get up with or a certain schedule to keep. I think I slept in until 8:30 Thursday morning, and it was glorious to get up, drink a cup of coffee, and just get ready for the day in a relaxed manner. Here's a picture Ben took from the balcony of our Airbnb.

Our plans for the day were to take an Uber to a rental car place near the airport, and then rent a car for the day. We decided to spend the day at El Yunque National Rainforest, which was something we didn't see last time we went to Puerto Rico. You could pay for expensive tour groups that went to the rainforest, but we decided it would be much more enjoyable to do it on our own, at our own pace, and for a much cheaper cost. It only took about forty-five minutes to drive to the rainforest. We stopped at a visitor's center, took a picture of the trail map, and then drove into the park. It rained as we were driving in, but it was just beautiful. The lush greenery all around us and the views as we drove up the mountain were breathtaking. Here are some pictures from our day at El Yunque. It was so beautiful there that the pictures don't really do it justice.

These next pictures were taken at the top of the round tower that is in the last picture. We walked up the steps to the top and were amazed at this panoramic view of the island, the mountains, the rainforest, and the ocean. 

Here are my attempts at using the panoramic function on my phone. The first one is better than the second one, but it gives you the scope and scale of what we saw. We stood at the top of this tower and looked around at God's beautiful creation for quite awhile.

Here's what the outside of the tower looked like.

On the map it talked about a natural spring pool that you could swim in, so we decided to go check it out before potentially getting our bathing suits on. It was a very pretty little waterfall, but the spring didn't seem big enough or deep enough to warrant getting our bathing suits on to swim. (Plus, there were enough ladies there posing for pictures in the waterfall and all that nonsense.)

We decided to do one trail up to a lookout tower. It was this pretty narrow path through the rainforest, and it was beautiful to do this hike, being surrounded by plants and trees we would never see normally. We even got rained on as we walked, which seemed fitting considering where we were. The hike was pretty much uphill the whole time, but it was definitely worth it, and it was fun doing it with my husband and best friend. Here are some pictures and videos of our hike through the rainforest.

Once we got to the top of the trail and climbed to the top of the lookout tower, it was like we were inside the clouds. It was super windy and cloudy, blocking out any view we might have had, which was a little disappointing, but it was cool to just stand at the top and see the clouds whipping around the mountaintops.

After a few minutes we made our way back down again. You can see the tower that we climbed up to in the distance in the third picture. As we were going back down and looked back, I couldn't believe that we actually climbed up that high because it really didn't feel like it. It was a beautiful hike, it was the perfect length for us, and it was a wonderful way to spend the afternoon.

On our way back down the mountain, we stopped at this dam area with a pathway around the water. Apparently it was used as a swimming area in the past, which seems like a beautiful place to be able to swim.

When you eat breakfast at 9:30-10:00, it's perfectly okay to eat lunch at 2:30-3:00. We stopped at this hip vegan restaurant with outdoor seating because they boasted smoothies and smoothie bowls, and something healthy and refreshing sounded good to me. We got a mango smoothie bowl with lots of yummy tropical fruit blended together for the base. It had granola on top, and we chose blueberries and kiwi as our extra fruit toppings. It even had bee pollen sprinkled on top! Definitely never tried that before! We also got a cocoa-peanut butter-banana smoothie, along with a veggie burger. Ben and I split all of it, and it was very delicious and fresh. In fact, I still think back to that lunch and wish there was a restaurant like that where we live now.

After eating lunch, since we still had the rental car and our bathing suits packed, we decided to stop at a local beach to go swimming in the ocean. You could tell the place used to be very well kept and frequented by visitors, but some of the facilities left much to be desired. In fact, the bathrooms were so disgusting that I couldn't even bring myself to change in them. I just went back to the car and changed. However, despite that, walking along the beach and swimming with Ben in the ocean as the sun set was a perfect way to end our wonderful day out together.

Once the clouds started covering the sun, we decided to get out, change, drop the car back off at the rental car place, take an Uber back to our Airbnb, shower, talk to the kids on the phone, and then find somewhere to eat dinner. We wanted to go to a local Italian place that had good reviews, but it was one of the few places that was closed due to a lack of power. We were able to find another restaurant that was decent, but it was a little loud and slow, and Ben and I were tired, wanting to just get back and relax.

Here are some more pictures Ben took of the view outside our room on Friday morning. It was going to be a warmer day that day as you can tell by the look of the sky that morning.

This picture is not a very flattering one of me, but Ben and I decided to take an Uber to Old San Juan and eat breakfast at a placed called "Chocobar." Everything on the menu had a chocolate theme, and this place had great reviews. We had decadent mochas, and even though our food seemed more like dessert, it was very delicious and definitely a worthwhile place to eat breakfast.

From there we went on to visit the two forts on the island. It was fun to walk around and explore, and read the signs about the history of the forts that were started in 1539. I love imagining what it would have been like for the people that lived and worked there hundreds of years ago, and the views of the ocean from the forts were magnificent. I enjoyed reading and learning with Ben as he was able to explain some things to me about history that I didn't know. He has a wealth of knowledge that I often forget about in day-to-day life, and it was fun to learn from him. Here are pictures from the first fort we visited that you can see across the large lawn space.

After we saw that fort, we tried to find the pathway that would lead down to the the sidewalk along the water, but it was blocked off for some reason, so we had to walk a little ways away to find another entrance that was open. This sidewalk along the water gives you another beautiful, yet different view of the forts and the ocean. Plus, there are interesting animals to see like wild cats and iguanas. I took some pictures of them because I figured the kids would find that interesting to see.

It was pretty hot walking in the sun down on the path, and we had already done quite a lot of walking day, so we decided to eat lunch at a Puerto Rican restaurant where we could get mofongos, a traditional dish. Then, we walked through Old San Juan to the other fort since we could get into both forts with our payment. Here's a picture of a street in Old San Juan because it gives you a good picture of what it looked like there with the narrow, brick streets, and colorful, stucco buildings.

We were getting a little tired by the time we got to the other fort, and a lot of the historical information was the same, so I don't have quite as many pictures. I included this one below, even though it's blurry, because it is ships drawn on the wall of the dungeon of the fort. It was covered by protective glass, but I thought it was interesting thinking about a prisoner in the dungeon drawing pictures of what the ships would have looked like during that time.

Here are some other cool pictures and videos of the fort. It was really windy at the top, but it gave you great views of the city behind you and the ocean beyond you.

After a lot of walking around and being tourists on Friday, we decided to head back to our Airbnb, pick up a pizza, sit in the hot tub, and just relax in our room. Ben had some work to do to get ready for his conference panels on Saturday, but it was fine because we had already had a pretty full day.

Saturday was a little different because Ben would be busy most of the day with his conference panels. However, we couldn't really complain because he hadn't done any work thus far. We ate breakfast at the the little market place across from our Airbnb, and as we were sitting down eating breakfast, the floor started moving, almost like there were waves under the floor. Everyone was looking around with a strange look on their face, even the locals, and we realized that we just experienced our first earthquake, or at least the aftershock of one. For the past week or so the south of the island had been experiencing pretty severe earthquakes, and I was amazed that we were able to feel it where we were in San Juan.

After Ben went off to his panel, I went back to our room to just hang out for a little while before going back to the conference hotel to see if I could go swimming while waiting for Ben to be done. However, I discovered that they were keeping people off the beach and out of the pool because of the strong waves and high tide, which was sad because I really enjoyed sitting out on the beach in a hammock reading a book the last time we were here. That's where I was planning on spending my day while Ben was working, so I had to come up with a new plan. (Here are some parrots that the hotel had in the lobby.)

While I was back at our room, I sat on the patio and noticed some movement in the water. It was like a little nostril kept poking up out of the water every few minutes. I got a few videos of it, but none of them are very clear. I decided that it was probably a manatee, but I wasn't sure.

Between Ben's panels, we were able to get lunch together, and then I decided to head to a beach on the other side of the lagoon. I could see people swimming, so I knew it was open, plus I discovered it was a public beach, which was perfect. I got my bathing suit on, packed a water bottle, towel, and my book, and I was off to spend the afternoon at the beach. I'm not normally a beach person, as far as just sitting out in the sun. But laying in the sand in the warm sun reading a book? That was just heavenly. I don't remember the last time I've enjoyed being by myself that much. It was so relaxing to hear the waves lapping the beach, the seagulls squawking, and people enjoying their time outside on this beautiful day. I did end up getting in the water to swim towards the end of my time there. I'm so glad I was able to find a beach to read at and water to swim in. It was perfectly relaxing and rejuvenating.

Once the sun started going down and it was getting closer to when Ben would be done, I walked back to the hotel and got showered and ready for dinner. We debated where to go for a long time and ultimately ended up back at "Chocobar." It was just too good to pass up for our last meal together in San Juan. Here I am thoroughly enjoying my chocolate grilled cheese. :)

After eating dinner we walked around Old San Juan for a little while before taking an Uber back to our Airbnb. We had to get packed up and get to bed early, as we were going to be picked up early Sunday morning to get the airport on time. I was sad that our trip was ending, and I didn't want to go. We had such a blast together, and it helped me remember why we fell in love with each other to begin with. Ben is intelligent and fun to learn new things from. We love to travel and experience new places and new food together. He is caring and thoughtful, and he is my best friend, the only person I would want to spend this much time with. This trip was a well-needed time for us to reconnect with each other, and I was so grateful for it.

To end my blog, I will include the words written by Ema and Papa, and the pictures that they took while they were taking care of our kids. I'm grateful that they are willing to do this for me so I can include their voice in my blog as well.

"We arrived on Tuesday while the little boys were napping and the big kids were still in school. Since Ben and Jenny had an after school appointment with the therapist for the little girl, we were to get Aedan and Samantha form the school van. Bill stayed home with the sleeping boys while I walked to the van stop. The kids were glad to see me and talked to me non-stop while we walked back to the house. Samantha had a pre-test in math about fractions and was appalled that she had only scored 47% on it. I reminded her that she was not expected to know how to do any of that since it was only a pre-test. We helped Samantha and Aedan with their homework and after the meal, observed and slightly assisted with the process of bathing five kids and getting them ready for bed. It is quite a process but it all flowed rather smoothly. Ben and Jenny left for NYC as soon as the children were in bed. The evening and overnight went well and the only noise we heard from the children was Owen crying two different times before 11:30. I got him back to sleep, and he did well for the rest of the evening. The weather turned snowy so I was expecting a school delay for Wednesday. I did not sleep well since I was so worried especially about whether the little girl would stay in bed and Bill was awake coughing quite a bit of the night."

"When we got up, indeed there was a two-hour school delay. That did not surprise us since the roads were snow covered. Before too long school was cancelled for all the school kids. Aedan, Owen, and Samantha wanted to go out and play in the snow so about 10:00 they started getting ready. Ben suggested that we didn't let the little girl go out since the last time she did not keep her gloves on and she did not want to stay in the yard. I talked to the little girl about that and made her promise to obey, stay in the yard, and keep her gloves on. We were out for about an hour and she did quite well for me. The kids played for the remainder of the day. AWANA was cancelled so we were able to get them all in bed at the normal time."

"On Thursday we had some trouble getting the little girl out the door to her school van. She chose to tell me that Aedan's backpack was hers and also had a fit that I wouldn't let her take a bracelet to school. After Bill drove Aedan and Samantha to the school van, we cleaned up breakfast dishes, got the little boys around for the day, and played with the little boys. The new little two year old boy fell down the stairs and had a rough morning because of that. Thankfully, he was not hurt but since he really prefers men, Bill needed to hold him for the rest of the morning. After the little girl came home from school, Bill helped her with her homework, and I went to get Aedan and Samantha from their school van. They had homework also to do, so before playing, they all sat at the table to do their homework. At mealtime the problems really started with the little girl. She left the table, refused to come back or listen to us, and went to hide. Bill tried to get her under control while I finished up the meal with the other children. We knew it was bath night so we started the process first with Samantha in the shower downstairs and Aedan and Owen in the bathtub upstairs. Because the little girl was throwing such a fit, Bill was pretty well occupied with her, and I was trying to help the other kids. I needed to check Samantha's hair while she was showering, as well as cleaning up the boys. On top of our stressful evening, Owen pooped in the bathtub. So there I am cleaning out the bathtub while Samantha was waiting on me. By the time the boys got back in the bathtub, the hot water was all gone, and there were still two kids that did not have their baths. We tried to give the little girl her medicine, and she fought that process. So after we got the medicine in her, we got her ready for bed along with the little boy and got them down. They didn't get their baths, but I don't think we could have managed that due to the behavior of the little girl. The remaining three went to bed well for us and Owen slept until about 5:00 a.m. but we were able to get him back to sleep. We had a much better sleep than we did the previous night."

"On Friday morning we had trouble getting the little girl ready for school but with a little psychology mixed in, we managed it. That morning I had time to spend some one-on-one time playing with Owen. We had read him many books while we had been there, but I had not played that much with him. He was at his table cutting his toy fruit that is connected together by Velcro. His cutting tool was a wooden toy knife. After he cut a piece of fruit, he said ouch since the wooden knife also hit him slightly. I told him to pretend I was a doctor and he should come and let me see him. He did, and I pretended to fix his hand and then he ran to get a book so I read it to him. Then he repeated the whole process of pretending to hurt his hand, visiting the doctor, and having me read him a book. I figured that for Owen, visiting the doctor must be associated with reading a book."

"At 1:00 the social worker came to get the little boy since he and his sister had a home visit on Saturday and Sunday. That gave us a break from the two extras and allowed us to have some time with our three grands. On Friday evening Samantha had a pizza and game night with her AWANA group, so after we dropped her off, Bill and I took Aedan and Owen out to Wendy's. It felt good to get out although it was a dark and rainy evening."

(This is Jenny writing again.) I just want to insert a few comments of my own about Ema and Papa having to deal with our two new little ones while we were gone. After hearing about how hard of a time the little girl gave Ema and Papa, I felt really bad. I was afraid that this would happen because it seemed like she only behaved and listened to Ben and me, for some reason. We hoped that she would just continue in how we did things because she was still in our house, but that unfortunately was not the case. However, I am really glad that we requested the weekend overnight from Friday into Sunday. The little boy was picked up at 1:00, and the little girl went straight from school. Samantha told us that Ema and Papa literally sang "Hallelujah!" when she got on the school van that morning. She was just not listening, running away from them, making bad choices after just having a time out, fighting them about not being able to wear certain clothes, not wanting to leave the house for the van in the morning, and not getting ready for bed. I felt bad that they were having such a hard time. It wasn't fun for them trying to deal with her behavior as she can definitely be a bit of a handful. She definitely tests us sometimes, and every once in awhile she will have a harder night, but not as bad as they described to us. It is common for her to get one or two time outs pretty much every night with us still, but she usually improves after we give her a time out and reinforce the  good behavior that we want to see in her. It sounded a lot like she was behaving more like how she was when she first came to our house in November. I was very glad we arranged the weekend overnight visit so that they didn't have to continue with battling with her at home over the weekend, too. Plus, they got to spend special time with our three kids, which I'm sure they soaked up. They love when Ema and Papa come to visit, and they have their undivided attention.

"On Saturday, Samantha had play practice in the morning. The boys played in the morning while Bill and I got some cleaning and laundry done. I had completed the laundry for the two new little ones but wanted to do the bedding on the other beds on Saturday."

(This is Jenny writing again.) I heard the story about this picture later after I found the paper on the counter. Apparently Aedan said the word "heck" because he heard it in a song and thought it was okay to say it himself. However, Samantha came down and told on him, telling Ema that he said a bad word, so after talking to him about it, she had him write that he was sorry several times on the back of this paper. Hearing about it kind of made me chuckle. I'm glad they think a word like that is a bad word. 

"On Saturday afternoon, Aedan and I baked a cherry cake with chocolate icing for dessert. Owen said the cake was like a donut since it was baked in a bundt pan. That evening for supper we had chili soup, which apparently Owen did not want. He shoved his chili soup out of the way and patiently sat there with his fork on his plate. Although no words came out of his mouth, it was very evident that he was only sitting at the table and waiting for a piece of cake. No amount of bribing convinced him to eat a few bites of chili soup. He only wanted cake."

"I was able to help Samantha with her embroidery kit that she got for Christmas. She picked up some of the basics about embroidery very quickly. Saturday evening bath night went much smoother than Thursday."

"On Sunday we went to church, had leftovers for lunch, and allowed all three of the kids to play outside. It was a balmy day for January so they were glad to get out and explore. Ben and Jenny arrived home about 2:30 and were greeted with a piece of cherry cake by Aedan and Samantha."

"Our time with our grands is so precious, and we love to do life with them. They each have their own unique personality that we adore. We were blessed to be able to spend this time with them and hopefully give Ben and Jenny a small vacation. It is apparent that their hands are full with the two extras, but they are doing a wonderful job trying to make a better situation, although temporary, for the two new little ones."

(Blog about January 5-11, 2020)