Our basement - the Score(board) is UP! :)

I am so sorry that I haven't been posting as much lately.   I think I have been preoccupied with other things - more on that later..........

Rod and I finally got to work on our basement.  No, it is not completely finished, but our storage side of the basement is looking much better.  And that is because we are putting stuff from storage to the finished side.  Since we were doing that I figured it is time to go thru stuff and clean and purge. :)

My inlaws gave us this ping-pong table.  We had to dismantle it to get it down our stairs and it has been sitting in pieces for probably the last 2.5 years at least.  So Monday, I helped Rod move it to the finished side and he got it put together.   I am really not sure HOW we got it turned over - this thing is a beast!  I decided that the kids were going to play under it so I might as well maximize that for us.  So, on one side is Maggie's Polly Pockets and Barbies and on the other side is Jared's Rescue Heros and some other car type stuff.  They think it is so cool.  Which is so funny because I am just thinking of all the extra floor space we have now! :)

 Rod got these lights at the TV station he used to work at.  They were being thrown out.  So he finally put these back up.  The red side of the basement will be our TV room.  It is dark and will be great to watch movies at.  Right now the basement is still more of a kid place as you will see in the next photo.  But the studio lights kinda go with our "movie room".

Now, the piece de resistance....  how do you write that in French? :)

Here is the infamous Scoreboard.  It's dimensions are approximately 3ft by 8ft.  It sticks out about 6 inches from the wall and well, I was worried that kiddos would hit their head on it.  So I placed a lot of their toys etc against the wall right under it to try to prevent any majorly banged up noggins.  Rod reworked the board's lights to show his highschool sectional championship score.  On a side note, how come he can remember the score to a game that happened almost 20 years ago AND the time left in the game, but still struggle to remember what day in June we got married?

Oh, yes, my preoccupation.  Yes, I am preoccupied with hearing issues with Maggie.  I am much less stressing about it now.  I think that is for 2 reasons; 1)God reminding me that He is faithful and lots of prayer by me and others for me and 2)learning more about the subject matter.  I've been learning oodles about the Deaf and Hard of Hearing (DHH) world.  I am still no expert by any means but I know a lot more now that I did 6 weeks ago.

There is so much that a child learns thru hearing.  They often learn more thru hearing than many other sense.  From what I gather, DHH children will often get lost in the school system.  They will get behind educationally and/or appear to be uninterested in the classroom.  But wouldn't you be uninterested if you couldn't hear anything that was going on around you?

We are trying to teach Maggie to advocate for herself - which is not easy as she still doesn't want to be different from the other children. We are trying to make sure that fill in the gaps for her at school as much as possible.  We aren't sure what she isn't hearing and what she is hearing in the classroom - I don't think that Maggie even knows.

There are some concerns that we have that will be addressed at her IEP (Individual Education Plan) case conference next week.  We really like her teacher and are really glad for the set up she has in the room.  There are just some other issues that have us concerned as well as preparing for next year.

I just did a quick search and there are lots of verses on "hearing".  On God hearing us and on us hearing God.  It is such a good thing that God can "speak" to us in many different ways, isn't it? :)

Psalm 62:
¹¹ One thing God has spoken,
   two things I have heard:
“Power belongs to you, God,
 ¹² and with you, Lord, is unfailing love”;
and, “You reward everyone
   according to what they have done.”


God truly is powerFUL! 


Live BIG!