Re-energized

We enjoyed a fun weekend and feel reenergized as parents. Ready to tackle anything :)

Friday night Colin, Nate and Hannah went to enjoy movies (I say plural because Hannah met a friend and went to a different movie than Colin and Nate). Fun was had by all. Tommy, Liam and I made homemade playdough and just hung out at home.

Saturday I had the opportunity to attend a supportive parent training sponsored by our county Parent 2 Parent. It's called "Helping Parent" support and offers newly diagnosed parents the ability to be matched with a parent who has personal experience with that particular diagnosis. The offer of someone to listen, to care, to not try to fix everything but rather be supportive and listen is wonderful!

But the best part of the weekend was Grandma Sue drove up and gave us the chance to get out together! She gave Tommy his g-tube feeding and I did his last nebulizer for the day and G'ma and the twins did fantastic. Colin and I had a hot date night. We went to the Temple Bar in B'ham and listened to fantastic live jazz, then walked on down to the Upfront Theatre which has live comedy improv and laughed our butts off..... and even topped the evening off with *trying* to watch a late night movie. We fell asleep about a quarter of the way into the movie. Too funny! Guess we need more practice at taking care of ourselves and date nights.... Thank you G'ma Sue!

Hope each person reading this takes time to take care of themselves. Even twenty minutes to just sit and relax in silence re-energizes our internal batteries. During the Helping Parent training some of the other parents had *fantastic* ways they take care of themselves. My friend Allison was there and she is one fantastic mom and shared so many ideas with me (baths, camping w/kids w/special needs, preschool, etc). I feel like I'm energized again and not in the pit of last week! Go ahead, turn the computer off and go take time for yourself!