Finally, a slower paced month! We have been flying at breakneck speed the last few months  — honestly, the whole year so far — so it was great to have a little reprieve.

That’s not to say we were totally bored.

We celebrated Hina’s 11th birthday on the 1st.

We, of course, went to the Home Depot workshop and I bought another $60 worth of plants to finish my potting for the season.

On the 8th, we were able to witness the partial solar eclipse…sort of. I couldn’t find our glasses from last time, but it worked out as it was mostly cloudy and Little Man didn’t really have any interest in what I was trying to explain to him. We played on the saucer swing most of the afternoon, enjoying the weather before the rain rolled in.

Then we celebrated my 36th birthday on the 10th. It was a very low-key affair with dinner at Blackhorse Pub. The Mister did let me pick out a bunch of new books so I couldn’t be happier (I’m talking 16 new ones).

Little Man has been struggling with some allergies and ended up with a doctor’s appointment because we thought he might have gotten pink eye. Luckily, that was not the case. He just had some crusty, pollen-ridden eye gunk and a heinous faucet of a nose. He is absolutely fine now, so the hassle of getting squared away at the doctor was worth the headache for me.

The rest of the month was filled with watching our freshly potted plants go nuts and lots of sunny, nice days in the backyard (usually on the saucer swing).

At the end of the month, we said goodbye to Miss Alexis at speech. She is getting moved to the location in Pleasant View and we will be staying behind at the current location (45 minutes from our house to PV just isn’t in the cards twice a week). We met our new therapist who is also named Alexis. While Little Man is a bit sad, he seems to be getting along well with the change.

We forgot to take a photo when we gave her our thank you gift, which is a bummer. She loved the otter and Little Man recorded himself saying thank you to her (it was so sweet). Pretty sure she teared up, bless her heart.

We finished the month with rain, rain, amd more rain.

The Mister has had a tough few weeks with stress. His PTSD symptoms are flaring up big time. So much so that he actually went to Behavioral Health and started individual and group trauma therapy. His therapist referred him to an inpatient facility in Texas to get a  more personalized handle on his mental health. He hasn’t decided if he wants to go yet, but I think it would be in his best interest.  It is at least a month stay so we’d have to work out the logistics.

In the meantime, he is going to do some TBI (traumatic brain injury) testing since he’s been having some trouble with constant headaches the last couple of weeks. Since it’s fairly common to have undiagnosed TBIs in the field artillery world and he’s had 4 combat tours, we’re checking all the boxes before he decides to pursue the inpatient therapy. That will give him a little time to push the decision back, hopefully after our anniversary and Little Man’s birthday. Once again, we’ll see how things go.

May will see workshops on the same weekend, Free Comic Book Day, Mother’s Day, and our 11th anniversary. My Gramps will also be celebrating his 90th birthday and a friend of mine from high school will be playing a gig in Nashville. Little Man will finish his first year of preschool and he gets to attend another birthday party.

So the month will be a little “busy” but we have no real plans set in stone. As of right now, we have no plans to travel for our anniversary or Mother’s Day so we’ll play it by ear.

Until then,