Sweet Weekends

I started out with a sleep in Saturday, thank you Randy, and then a fun filled 1/2 hour of fun time in our bed with the kiddos and then we had to get down to business. We had errands to run, lunch to eat, trails to be walked, a yard to be picked up, a house to clean and naps to be taken. Well everything got done except for the naps :( We had a great day as a family, and ended the evening with a fire and roasting marshmellows for smores and cooking hotdogs, for the dog :) This is what I've been missing since Randy started his new job, Saturdays. I love the weekends when we get to spend time together, as a family, without therapies or nurses or doctor appointments. Just family and the whole day to do whatever our little hearts desire.

I thought I would post something written by Emily Pearl Kingsley called Welcome to Holland. It is a story about first finding out that you are having a baby with Down syndrome, and I remember reading this a day or two after Sophia was born.

"After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, "Welcome to Holland."

Welcome to Holland

"I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability, to try and help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It's like this....

When you're going to have a baby, it's like planning a fabulous vacation trip, to Italy. You buy a bunch of guide books and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. The Michelangelo. David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It's all very exciting.

"Holland?!?" you say, "What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy!! I'm supposed to be in Italy. All my life I've dreamed of going to Italy."

But there's been a change in the flight plan. They've landed in Holland and there you must stay. The important thing is that they haven't taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It's just a different place.

So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.

It's just a different place. It's slower paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you've been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around.... and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills.....Holland has tulips....Holland even has Rembrandts.

But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy...and they're all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there. And for the rest of your life, you will say "Yes that's where I was supposed to go. That's what I had planned. And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away.....because loss of that dream is a very, very significant loss.

But....if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn't get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things.....about Holland."

I can relate to this because my whole pregnancy, I never dreamed in a million years that I would land in "Holland." I had no reason at all to think that I would end up any where besides "Italy." But I can honestly say that I am so glad that I got the chance to see and be a part of the wonderful world of Holland. Before I had Sophia, Holland was a little scary for me. It was a place that I wasn't sure about, wasn't educated about, and I just didn't know how to act in a place like Holland. But Sophia opened my eyes to a part of the world, where I didn't think I would have the patience for. Where I didn't think I could handle the difficult days and the obstacles that sometimes surround Holland. But once I was aware that I was in Holland and not Italy, I embraced Holland as if that is where I was meant to go all along. I loved Holland and everything it had to offer. To me Holland was beautiful and perfect and it has made me learn about things I never would have learned about if I hadn't unexpectantly landed there. I wouldn't change my destination for anything! I am a better person for being able to experience Holland and I am going to fully embrace this wonderful place! Lets face it, I have lots of bad days in Italy too!