It has been nine years since we first met the kids and we have some of the same traditions for Gotcha Day every year. Red, Yellow, and Blue juice. Red, Yellow, and Blue jello. Cake, presents, and an updated photo book. With COVID, we stayed home this year.
It has been a tough year so far schooling with Angie. Mom does a lot of the work! The end is in sight and the ultimate goal is to finish as soon as we can and get her a high school diploma. If it wasn't for the West MEC program, I would probably have her go get her GED and a job but I am trying to help her stay in the hair styling program as a high school student.
Meanwhile, the COVID Pandemic is getting worse and Ingrid and Juan are now schooling from home. It is quite stressful and emotions are quite high. Ingrid and Juan do not school well in this environment. Juan needs the accountability face to face and Ingrid needs the face to face assistance. The fact that Ingrid is now on medicine for her anxiety and other medical challenges has helped some but she is not interested in pursuing counseling.
I continued the traditional Easter baskets but we are attending church online now. It is a different way of life right now!
Christmas this year brings Luis and his parents from WI. Sandra is in her sophomore year at GCU. After Christmas, we are all going to Sedona. It is good to see Luis and nice to have all five kids together.
Angie sent me a surprise text this fall informing me that she no longer wished to continue her education at Odyssey, even though it was a her senior year. Angie always struggled with school, and I believe it was just too challenging. Unfortunately, in order to stay enrolled as a high school student at West MEC, she had to be in high school so dropping out was not a good option! After much research, I got her enrolled in Primavera online. It looks like I will be helping her finish her senior year but whatever it takes for her to graduate!
Juan played football and soccer at Canyon View and really liked it. Ingrid played soccer at Desert Edge this fall and winter and did really well. It is difficult to transition to a new team and coaches but the kids are happy at their new schools.
Ingrid had a rough first year of high school and her anxiety sky rocketed, despite our attempt at helping her with counseling. We finally had her tested with a private psychiatrist in the spring and uncovered mental challenges we did not know that existed. Odyssey is just not set up to give her the support she needs so we made the decision to transfer her to a public school. I spent all spring interviewing the principals of all the public high schools in our district and picked the school I felt would be best for Ingrid. I was blessed to get a variance for Ingrid to go there and got her set up with a 504 plan to help with her school day.
We made the decision before starting Juan in high school at Odyssey to also transfer him to a public high school. We picked a different one for him, and I think it will help to have Ingrid and Juan at separate schools. Unfortunately, it will be a lot harder on me getting two kids to two different schools!
Ingrid's school is called Desert Edge High School. Juan's school is called Canyon View High School.
Juan loves football and video games. We bought him a new monitor for his birthday, which he was very excited about. He was not interested in having anyone over this year for a party.
Lori's parents own a second home on the coast in Oregon so we decided to go and visit them. They live both in Arizona near us for six months of the year and in Oregon at the beach the rest of the time. We decided to leave the kids in Angie's care, who is 18 1/2 years old now. We have never left the kids so we will see how it goes.
Angie participated in SMI at our church for the second time again this year. SMI stands for Student Missionary Internship and takes a lot of time, work, and dedication. We are really proud of her for doing it again this year. The youth group is traveling to the Indian reservation in the White Mountains to host VBS for kids and help with other projects. She is looking forward to it, and we are glad she had this experience.
Sandra came back from GCU for the weekend to celebrate Easter with us. She seems to be doing well and it is much better this year than when she was living with us last year! The kids cooperated nicely for Easter pictures and everyone was in a good mood. I am very thankful for the good days that we have when everyone is happy!
