Splendid Mayhem: House Update

Welcome To Holland

I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability - to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It's like this......
When you're going to have a baby, it's like planning a fabulous vacation trip - to Italy. You buy a bunch of guide books and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. The Michelangelo David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It's all very exciting.
After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, "Welcome to Holland."
"Holland?!?" you say. "What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy! I'm supposed to be in Italy. All my life I've dreamed of going to Italy."
But there's been a change in the flight plan. They've landed in Holland and there you must stay.
The important thing is that they haven't taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It's just a different place.
So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.
It's just a different place. It's slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you've been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around.... and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills....and Holland has tulips. Holland even has Rembrandts.
But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy... and they're all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there. And for the rest of your life, you will say "Yes, that's where I was supposed to go. That's what I had planned."
And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away... because the loss of that dream is a very very significant loss.
But... if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn't get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things ... about Holland.

Thursday, July 17, 2008

House Update

The house is a mess! The garage has been runout with TOYS! We had to take just about EVERYTHING out of the boys rooms and put it in there. Friday the water restoration guys came in and cut a few holes in the wall to get to the pipe and to beable to ventilate the place. Logen's room got to fans and Parker's room got 2 fans and a super big dehumidifier. The bathroom between their rooms got to house the hosing to the dehumid and the plug to one fan. They tore out the rest of the carpet that we had left in the boys rooms. They were there daily to check the 'wetness' level and were able to pull the noisy things out Monday. The plumber came on Monday and fixed the pipe.
*** The problem ~ The outside spicket froze over the winter and split, causing the water to flow back into the house ***
The water works great now. We have no flooring, well we have concrete in the boys rooms. We are waiting to hear what insurance says the carpeting in their rooms is valued at so we can go floor shopping. I think we will install it ourselves and try to match it to the wood in the living room and halls. It can't be the exact same b/c they re-designed that style shortly after we bought it.
I feel as though I'm living in a contruction zone and it's just caos!