Bullet points

I'm finally taking a minute to catch up!

- Oksana is doing well.  Yesterday was her last day at her behavior school.  Next month she will start at her home school where Anya goes.  Her urologist couldn't find a reason for her incontinence.  They were shocked and really thought she had neurogenic bladder.  They are trying a medication that should help her hold her urine longer and empty more completely when she goes to the bathroom.  Bowel issue remain the same.  She only goes with an enema.  She had a MRI and spinal tap last week.  So far nothing out of the ordinary on those.  There are no answers.  It's incredibly frustrating.  Luckily she is pretty stable right now physically.  Emotionally she is having ups and downs but still manageable. 

- Summer school ended for both girls on Friday.  This means that we have 3 1/2 weeks to survive!  So far this summer has gone really well.  Oksana goes to camp Monday-Wednesday-Friday for the next two weeks.  Tuesdays and Thursdays she gets to sleep in and rest.  Camp is long and fun and exhausting!  After that she only has 1 1/2 weeks left with no school or camps.  Anya isn't doing any camps so we will just have to keep her entertained for a few weeks.  Easier said than done!

- Clayton is going to start his third week of musical theatre class next week.  At the end of the week they will do 2 performances of Peter Pan.  He is a pirate and loving getting to sword fight and die!  After this week he gets to just relax for the rest of his summer.  The boys don't start school until after Labor Day so they still have a good solid 5 weeks.

- Evan did a camp at the barn last week.  This one wasn't one he was working at.  It was an advanced camp learning more about different types of riding including dressage, cross country, 3 day event, and endurance trail riding.  This week he will be a camp counselor again at a camp for beginners.  After that I think he will have the summer free too!

- I think the biggest new thing in our family right now is that I got a job.  I think last time I updated on my job situation I had left the school in search of something I could do from home because managing work outside of the home with the girls various issues was becoming incredibly challenging.  Originally I had planned to take classes to become certified as a medical coder.  My friend is a coder and works from home.  She loves her job.  Back when she was certified there was an abundance of jobs available.  I took an anatomy class and a medical terminology class.  The next step was to sign up for the coding classes which would cost over $2000.  We knew this going in and we were more than willing to do it for the benefits knowing we could pay it off when I got a job.  About a week before that I got a text from my friend saying that jobs like I was looking for weren't coming around as much and I might have to wait to find a job.  I was willing to wait but I decided to do some research before I signed up for more classes.  What I found is that there is very little out there part time from home.  I knew going in I would have no experience which would also be a huge disadvantage. 

We decided to pray about it before we moved forward.  In the meantime I have another friend who works from home.  It is a position with a major corporation so I had no worries about it being legit.  She had been working for them for a number of years and she loves her job!  It just so happened that a few weeks earlier she had told me they had an opening.  I had not been interested because I was working toward coding certification.  I decided to send her a quick text and see if they were still hiring.  She said they were and sent me the description.  There were pros and cons.  It was an at home job but first I would have to do about 3 months of in office training.  It paid less money but it would be an immediate job with no wait and instead of putting thousands into training they would pay me to train.  It is 29 hours a week and I really wanted more like 20 but that wasn't a deal breaker considering it was from home and I could work any time I wanted to.  After talking it over with Larry we decided to start the process of applying and just see what happened.  It all happened fairly quickly after that.  In 2 weeks time I had a phone interview, an in person interview, a screening process to make sure I could work fast and accurately, reference were checked, and I was offered the job! 

I've been in training now for 2 weeks.  It's kind of hard to explain what I do.  The very simple description is that we manage freight invoicing for major corporations when they ship their products.  Believe me when I say it is WAY more complicated than that! 

It's been extremely challenging managing child care schedules during the summer but we have a good plan in place.  Thankfully Larry has a job willing to be flexible during this time and allow him to work from home when needed, and we have a respite worker who is also on summer break that is stepping in a ton for us.  I work 9-2 so once school starts it will be far less challenging.  The work itself is also challenging but in a good way!  It's a lot to learn, but every day I get better and learn more.  I am working on getting everything set up in my home so that when I finish training I am ready to go.

- Larry and I went through marriage mentor training a few months ago but decided not to mentor at that time because of everything going on with Oksana.  We recently learned that they have a bunch of couples waiting to be mentored and they need some help so we are seriously considering stepping in.  It seems a crazy thing to do right now but it is only a 6 week commitment.  We shall see.

I think that pretty much sums up the last month or so!