Sarah Rise Weekly Updates

Sarah started kindergarten! She loves it. She doesn’t want to leave when I pick her up in the afternoon. I love her situation so much that my heart is overflowing. To recap, the preschool assistant from last year is now the kindergarten teacher and there are 3 students total. It is half day. The other… Read more »

We have just arrived home after a truly wonderful night of camping and an afternoon at a lake beach. The weather was perfect, some friends had a campsite nearby so we got to see them a few times, we arrived with plenty of time for a relaxed time of setting up and dinner despite the… Read more »

Sarah and I had a great session early in the week. At one point she talked about eating ice cream. I pretended she was a giant ice cream cone and pretended to lick her. She said, “Ah! too much lick!” in a pretend complaining voice. It was adorable. We also had a fun time with… Read more »

This weekend we had a fabulous time at Bald Eagle State Park in PA. We were with Carl’s cousin and her family, all of us enjoying swimming in a lake, playing in the sand, playing on a playground, playing on bunk beds at the B&B, and then renting a pontoon boat. The weather was perfect… Read more »

Things have been mostly the same as the previous week with some good parts and some hard parts. Some highlights are when Sarah came down one morning and handed me a hair clip to put in her hair. This is not something that has occurred before or since, but it was a wonderful moment. Also,… Read more »

Last Sunday we went to Idlewild for the first time. If you have never been and if you live anywhere near Pittsburgh, I highly recommend going. It is the most wonderful and pleasant amusement park! There are so many trees that even on a very hot day it is still pleasant. They have tons of… Read more »

Sarah has been making amazing progress in the pool. She now loves walking all around in the area where the water just comes to her chin. She lets us pick her up, she lets me sometimes encourage her legs to be behind her. She is skilled at spitting out water accidentally ingested. Amy continues with… Read more »

Lately I have been feeling like a hypocrite. I have my team of amazing volunteers who come to my house to be loving and focused with Sarah, but I, myself, have been having a hard time feeling loving towards her. We have small nice moments, but my overall impression is of frustration, sternness, and yelling… Read more »

We generally have a rule that we can’t have two weekends in a row with either hosting company or being out of town. Sometimes there are important events that mean going against this rule and then I am reminded of why we have the rule (it just becomes too much). Two weekends ago I was… Read more »

The girls had their first ballet class on Tuesday and it went beautifully. It is a small class with only 5 or 6 students. Sometimes when I think about our efforts with Sarah I picture being up to bat and going for a home run. With the ballet class, it felt like a home run…. Read more »