The Push Is On!

Well, a year has passed now since Mandy and the kids moved to Middletown and needless to say, it was a year of some very rude adjustments to my life! To say that I missed the kids -a major understatement there, for sure!

 For a while, I really felt totally lost without them being here every day. I didn't miss the daily fights that tended to erupt between the two of them for the most part, but yet -sometimes it was so quiet here, I probably would have welcomed that just for the company it meant was present in the house then.

 But I really was very much looking forward to the summer months and being able to have the kids here -either one at a time or even both of 'em together for a couple of weeks in a row. Things worked out -not quite the way we had initially figured but as best that could be done anyway.

In June, originally the plan was that I was to have both kids here together for two weeks but that got switched to only having them here together for one week and having Kurtis for alone for what was supposed to be the second week for both of them.

That got changed because Maya had to go home to be there over one weekend so she could attend a dance recital for Mandy's boyfriend's daughter, Cassidy. So, my older daughter took her to Middletown and brought her back up here and then, Mandy came up that weekend to take her home as she had to get ready to go to Bible Camp at some camp up in the Poconos some where. She and Cassidy were going to go to that together and would be there a full week!

 So Kurtis then was going to spend yet another week alone here with me but that got scotched when it turned out he to go home earlier than planned because he had to have an evaluation with the BSC in order to have all the paperwork completed so he could attend some special 5-week long program from the end of June through the end of July! I tried to convince Mandy to tell the BSC if he wanted to evaluate Kurt to come up here and do it and look at the big payoff he would get collecting on travel expenses for that but she decided that idea just wouldn't wash so back home Kurt went.

Then, I did get Maya for two weeks -last week and this week and this Sunday when they go home with their Mom, they will be back for one week -the first full week in August -but at least that means they will both be able to go to Bible School at our church here then anyway!

 One thing I don't miss though with the kids is how in school there usually comes a time when the music department does special tests on the kids to ascertain if any of them have any amount of musical talent laying dormant, waiting for the music department to convince the parents to invest in some kind of musical instrument and start the kid on the road to ensuring parents and grandparent do have a very good set of headphone to ward of ear damage from listening to the initial phases of learning to play an instrument. When my kids were in school and those days came along, it seemed every announcement they brought home as to purchasing an instrument of some type or other all came with a banner headline too announcing buy now! 

Almost as if one didn't purchase then, the instruments would never ever be available to anyone, ever again!

Unfortunately for my three kids, there was no way at all I could squeeze in another payment for anything much less a musical instrument though so I never took advantage of those sales. But it reminded me of when I was a kid and those tests were given then, I was deemed to have some degree of musical ability but fortunately for me, we already had a piano and an uncle of mine had an old violin he loaned me too. When about two years later the music teacher (and band director) insisted I learn how to play a French Horn so I could then qualify to be in the marching band) he, the teacher, found an old used -very used, I might add -French Horn for me to use to learn on! I'll save the story of what a debacle it was when he insisted I was ready to move on to the marching band for another day! LOL 

 So any way, Mandy's been getting some of these banners and bribes and such to purchase musical instruments for one, if not both kids, but she's in the same bind that I was, financially, plus we've already seen that Maya's interests in playing an instrument has taken an extreme backseat to her getting Mandy to allow her to take dance lessons!

At least that, she likes well enough that she practices -day in and day out! So that wasn't a wasted investment then after all, was it?