Well, ok!

I was going to have a post showing off my Halloween creations, but.....Hell with that!
I'm mad and seriously going through hell right now.

Remember Gabriel right? He's my son, a cute little boy that put light in my days.
I've written about him and how much I love him a least a million times in the pages of this blog. If you read my blog, you'll know that Gabriel was born with a light form of Autism. He's now 6, was diagnosed a year ago, tho we always knew deep inside. For years (and now still) I tortured myself thinking if I could have done anything different during his conception and the pregnancy to avoid all this. To this day, the doctors assured me that it's not my fault, or hubby's fault or nobody's fault for all that matter. I tried to make piece with that fact in my brain, but in my heart is a whole different story. But I tried, to hide the tears, to swallow my worries and looks for resources and things that could help him. And we found quite a few: some were really easy to get around, some weren't so much and some are completely out of our reach.

Gabriel was put in preschool in a special ed program, took summer school in the same program and we saw some results: He was drawing and talking a bit more.
After a scary spring where Gabriel stopped eating and growing, we started him on a gluten-free diet and off he went to Kindergarten where we amazingly saw some huge progresses.
Started him on physical activities, extra speech therapy, group therapy (you named it, we tried all!) and he started thriving again, gaining his wight, eating right, growing to fit his size clothes and smiling and talking and loving.

This school year started and off to 1st grade went, confident that every thing will be just a growing curve from here........boy was I wrong! His teacher retires, the assistant doesn't know what she's doing, he gets hurt on a daily basis and over all just regressing, but most important UNHAPPY.
So here I'm, once again, worrying, running around, asking here, demanding there, yelling, kicking, screaming.......I finally find a new school for him that can be just IT. Only trouble: we cannot afford it. But again: I won't stop. I ask for funds available, I file for scholarships, I demand from my insurance......NOTHING.

Gabriel is not going to get ANYTHING. His autism is not sever enough, his disability it's not obvious, overall HE'S DOING KINDA OF OK AND NEEDS TO HANG IN THERE.

I'm mad! My heart is dead. Nobody will help us and we are on our own.

I will give you a picture of my financial situation: my husband is the only one working at the moment. Well, I'm self employed but let's face it: can't afford to advertise my business, so I make a profit of $20/week when I'm lucky. I have a degree in biology that will allow me to get on a good job and resolve our troubles, BUT I will need to pay in order to have it convalidated here in the States (I took my degree in Italy) and sustain some college courses to make sure that I'm up to date. Too bad I don't have the money to do that either.
We don't own any properties: we're renting an house that is broken and falling in pieces and drive a car borrowed from relatives that is literally keeping up the pieces together with scotch tape. Don't believe me? I can show you a picture if you wish! It's humiliating, but I'll do it!
On top on that, gluten-free food is not cheap, you know?

How does that sound?

My son is coming home from a school he hates in less that 5 minutes. He's gonna ask me once again if he can go to another place where they are not mean to him. Again.

I don't know how can I look him in the eyes and tell him that it's not gonna happen.
I think my heart is going to brake in so many pieces.

I can't stand to watch myself in the mirror, I can't stand being ME right now.
I wish he wouldn't have to be a victim of the fact that we're poor. I wish I can just close my eyes and never leave this situation. I don't know how to go on with this, I don't know why I should go on.

What's next?
I'm trying to evaluate alternatives but I don't see a light.

What happened this week.

This is going to be a little of a personal post of what happened this week.
Let's see.....

In my personal life I made some changes.
I decided to enroll myself in Child Care Training for the state of Florida. I drop out from college 3 year ago and I always regretted. Plus, I really need a part-time job in order to afford a new car since our it's falling apart. And so I did it, I went back to school and feels awesome. Of course, studying in another language it's not the easiest thing ever, but I'm hanging there and taking little steps at the time and I'm proud to feed the "teachers starving" Florida state. I have a test in a month and we'll see how it goes,

My kids are always the biggest part of my life.
I'm potty training my 3 yo daughter Michelle and is going better than I expected. Michelle, baby, if you'll read this post when you're 30 something years old I want you to know I'm proud of you even if you're going to hate me for writing on the net that you're learning to use a toilet.
That's ok, you'll get over it!
I had a school meeting for my 5 yo son, Gabriel. Most of my readers know now that my son has some development delays and the school meeting today just verified that I did the right thing putting him in this new school. They're right on the problems and will help in any way. Gabriel, baby boy of mine, I love you so much and I will fight with all my soul to get you well. It's a promise. And if you'll read this when you're 30 something years old that means that I did something right :)

Ok, enough with the personal stuff and let's get serious on business that for the past week became a huge part of my life, or a least more than usual.

I'd like to thank my awesome costumer, Tommy, to design the cutest i-Phone holder that I could ever have made:

CUSTOM MADE Crocheted Tommy's i-phone cozy in ecru cotton, $25

And the fabulous Koko that gave me a new idea for my granny squares earrings with a simple question: can you make them bigger??? Of course!

Crocheted earrings granny square Corner style one colour primary cotton BIG, $10

One more thing before I leave you all celebrating the Memorial Day Weekend: don't forget to enter my cupcake giveaway!

Sad day :(

Do you remember my pet fish BOB?

Well, this morning I went to his tank to feed him and well...he was gone :(

We knew it will happen eventually, but he was with us since July and we were taking pretty good care of him and it was just.so.unexpected!

The kids were told, we showed them the "body". Gabriel wanted to know why and how. Michelle just started sobbing hard saying that it was her fault for not playing with Bob yesterday. She seems ok now and she agreed to have him buried tomorrow.

The funeral will be held tomorrow evening on our porch. We are going to gently put Bob in a tiny box and buried him in a pot with potty soil. We will plant wild flowers on it so when spring comes and the pretty flowers will bloom, we can look at them and remember our little friend.

Randomness Saturdays

Hi you'll! How everyone is doing? I'm doing ok here, except for my little Michelle that got a very bad ear infection and is in a lot of pain :(
Let's the random stuff start, shall we?

♥ I was working on some Easter bunny hats the other day and my daughter saw one that was incomplete, missing a ear of the bunny. She immediately picked it up, to bring it to my attention (I got side tracked doing something else). With a note of worry in her voice she told me: "Look mommy, the bunny is hurt!" I promptly assured her that the bunny was ok and I was going to fix it, picked up my crochet hook whipping up the missing ear and attaching it to the hat. She seems pleased with the result and wasn't worried any more. Few Night later, she woke up in the middle on the night with very acute pain in her left ear. Trying to calm her down, I sweetly whisper to her that mommy was going to fix her ear. At this point she stopped crying, crawled out of the bed and went to pick me up....well, you guessed a HOOK. I didn't know if I wanted to laugh or cry, trying to figure out how to tell her I couldn't fix her ear with a crochet hook.

♥ I was live with my cam on Thursday night: I was given a shop spotlight to promote my wares by the amazing site: Everyday Moms. Let me tell you.....was brutal being live, but was also fun! Hope you will join use next Thursday on Mingle Media TV at 8.30 pm Central Time. I also just accepted (kinda few minutes ago!) the offer to become admin of the site, so it's a good way if you'd like to connect with me more!

♥ More people to thank since they featured me:
- Lori, of the Handmade Highway, included me in our weekly newsletter.
- Shiela from the Antique Pocket Watches for featuring my other blog, Indie Discounts.

♥ Time for the recommended movie: The Bucket List. I love it every little bit of that movie and really help putting things in the right prospective.

♥ I'm leaving you my "stuck-in-the-head" song, hope you'll like it!

I'm ok!

I had the surgery Friday and it seems that all went well. I still have a puffy face and my jaw is swelling, so still not much talking and not much eating.
But I'm trying to take it easy and wait for it to pass.
Thank you so much for all the messages and the "get well" wishes, they warmth my heart and are keeping me company is these painful days.
Hopefully tomorrow I will start feeling even better!

What's going on?

For months now my posts have been very sporadic, impersonal and now come down to barely nothing.

I know you all that used to read me are wondering, what's going on and what happened to me, so today I'm gonna asnwer those questions.

A lot it's going on.

♥ Michelle started Kindergarten this year and I thought that would give me a lot of time for my self....Boy, was I wrong. Between meeting, field trips, school activities, homework and volunteer, sometimes I barely have time to breath.

♥ Gabriel is about to graduate from the Emerald Coast Autism Center. This coming December 15th to be exact. It's huge, it's all we ever wished for, that the therapies he was receiving there would work and make him better. They did. Along with this fantastic news, a fight started with the public school system that want for Gabriel to go back in the same school he was before, where he was mistreated, neglected and regressed so badly. All he wants is to walk to school with Michelle in the morning *sigh
This fight is literally consuming all my energy, I had to study countless law books, local laws, schools policies and county policies....well, you can imagine. The fight is not even half way over and I'm still in my position making phone calls, pleading his case, coordinating teachers, social workers and attorneys.....fun fun fun NOT!

♥ Thanksgiving is here. I don't know how that happened. Was Halloween just yesterday, no? I guess not. At least this year I have all my shopping done, all I have to think about is the cooking and today is the last day of the week of having any kind of obligations. Then I'm gonna hibernate in my kitchen and come out on Friday.

♥ My shops are doing ok but not as well as I wish they would. Normal consequence of being so all over the place lately and not being able to promote. But I'm still here, alive and crocheting.

Just wanted you all to know. Better things are coming :)

Well....

Tonight I'll be really brief since I went to the dentist this morning and I'm still in big pain.
I just wanted to name few blogs where I have the honor to be named this week.
First, was this amazing artist BluePumpkinCorsetry that is still waiting for her first sale on etsy and featured my cupcakes Christmas ornaments on her brand spanking new blog! I was very honored to be in her pick and to inaugurate the very first feature in her fresh blog and I think she has very interesting items

And then I want to thank Anne from Pattern And Such to post about Indie Discounts on her blog

I don't know how many of you know this, but I'm completely in charge of this new blog at the moment :)
Ok, I guess that's about it!
Oh, and don't forget to check my giveaway and my Christmas in July sale!

Goodbye

I had a fun and light little post planned for today, but truth is that it's a very sad day for me as I received a bad news from my family in Italy: my grandma (my dad's mom) died. 

You have to know that I'm the oldest of my siblings and I've been away from my birth family for over 5 years now and of course when I was told that my grandma was really sick with Alzheimer, the scenario of receiving this news crossed my mind several times and I told myself that I was old and strong enough to receive the news with grace and without too much emotions at least the time necessary to end the phone call with dignity. 

And I did. 

For about 2 nano seconds. 

Then tears, gulps and sigh took over and I had to tell my mom a very quick: "Can I call you later?". 

Without dignity. 

Of course, having hubby standing right behind me asking what the hell happened over and over, helped me to pull my self together. 

For about 2 more nano seconds. 

Just enough to give him the news than dive to cry on his shoulder. 

 I'm crying so much my head hurts. 

For my grandma, for my dad, for my aunts and uncles (my grandma had 8 awesome children, 4 males and 4 females). 

Because I'm 10K miles away and, for reason I don't care to explain publicly, I can't even make a quick run over there to see her one last time and give her a good bye. 

So, I'm crying some more. 

Then I picked myself up and thought to write about all this, as writing is therapeutic and always makes me feel better. I realized with the most hurt in my heart that I have nothing about the woman, not a picture to show, just old memories of my childhood closed up in my head....

except: MY NAME. 

Well, my maiden name anyway, it's the same as her married name as I was born in the core of the South of Italy where the tradition to name the first born after the dad parents is still going strong.

 You also have to know that growing up, every time I've heard of my friend's grandparents dieing, I always imagined the day my grandma would and in my preteens years I always thought that I wouldn't be able to attend the funeral as I would be creep out to see my name on the headstone. I remember vocalizing this concern to my parents and never in a million years I would have thought that I wouldn't be attending her funeral after all. 

Be careful what you wish for I guess. Meh. 

 Maybe it's better this way, it's better that I remember her still happy and busy in the kitchen, where she made the most delicious meals for whomever happened to show up at her door. Happy to open her door to children and grandchildren whatever we needed, happy to listen to us, to spoil us and every time we left just say: "The important thing is that you're ok". Never tired, always putting herself after everybody else, she lost that joy when my grandfather passed away more than 10 years ago. 

Now, at least, they are reunited for ever, while I cry for a little while longer....

Randomness Saturdays

Ok, I really don't have much to post, er- actually I have a little fan facts to share with you.
So I start personal and I will say that I was sick for the past 2 weeks and finally got better and got around to put away all the Christmas decorations that I had still around (I know it's the end of January right???) My kids didn't really like my "cleaning" and when I explained them that wasn't Christmas time any more they looked at me with their big eyes and said: "But we wanna Christmas presents!" Yeah, me too!

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Help Haiti! Let's share some love with the victims of the earthquake. Stop by HeartsforHaiti if you'd like to make a donation and help the DoctorsWithoutBorders.
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I got a feature on a beautiful site, the Gift Shop. I was delighted to be interviewed and very happy about the exposure.

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Our dear friend Michele got a flu, please pray with me for her to get well soon!

Featuring Risky Beads

Ok reader, as I pre announced in a previous post, I'm here to tell you about some nice trades that I worked out for Christmas gift. Here to you the first one: Risky beads.
I met Lori a while ago when I was looking for some inexpensive way to promote my shop and joined the Handmade Highway and thought I'm not really into jewelry I fell in love with her creations, specially her necklaces and pendants.

I LOVE the fact the every necklace has a name, the one above is "Eye of the Storm". Isn't it gorgeous with all those colors and the luxurious organza ribbons and leather cord??
Also, all the jewelry are extra unique because they come with a little poem, a specific story that is unique for every piece.

This one for instance is called "Mermaid autopsy" and the story behind recite: "Say what you want, but clearly she loved the sea more than the handsome prince. Just look at all that emotion for the ocean".
I don't know about you, but I found this little story very evocative, give me the impression to buy far more that a pendant!
Beside necklaces and pendants, Lori also sells gorgeous earrings (very reasonable priced), original nurse Purses, bracelets, bookmarks and key chains and her Etsy guide like this one:

I find it very useful and give me a little push for big decision that I took recently!(more on this topic soon!)
She's also destashing her supplies at Risky Stash and has a very interesting blog where My cupcakes were feature few days ago.
Well, I hope you enjoyed knowing Lori as much as I did!
And sty tuned for my next trade/feature :)

Gabriel's recap!

Some of you might remember, few weeks back I had a really bad melt down about not being able to put Gabriel in a better school.
If you don't remember, you can read all about it in here.

A lot has happened since that day, a real roller coasters of things going well and then go sour again and then ok for a little bit and so on...you know how it goes.

The school where Gabriel is going now finally hired a permanent teacher, we talked to her and she seems nice but unfortunately has no clue whatsoever on how to deal with kids with autism.
I tried to gently give suggestions and she graciously put them to work, but truth being said, I think the school should have its personal qualified for the job. It's not my duty to "train" a teacher to the wonders of autism and it's not Gabriel's to be an experiment in her failures.

So of course we found a better place, an Autism Center very close by, with an amazing program and lots of resources for Gabriel...... and a HUGE price tag.
Now understand: I will pay everything is the world to get Gabriel what he needs, but the reality is that I don't have much to begin with.

Obviously I wasn't happy or proud that I found all that awesome help and wasn't going to get it for him. I was actually kinda of depressed and sad.

But there is something I learned this week and that is help is given to the ones who ask for it. And so I asked.....insurances, grants, scholarship....anything and everything I could think of.

In the meanwhile, the director of the Autism Center called Gabriel in for an evaluation, to see what he will be needing and how they can provide it. She was really impressed by him and told me that she can make things work with the scholarship we'll get.
So that's it! She granted me my Christmas wish few days ago accepting Gabriel to her school!!!!

He will start in January (mind you, in time for his birthday) and he cannot wait. Couldn't stop jumping up and down for the joy when we told him.

So, this is our story, with a new chapter starting January 2011 that I'm sure will end with a fully recovered Gabriel, that one day will grow up and will be able to see that we did anything we could to help him out.

It's all I was asking for this year for Christmas: I got my miracle and I hope you'll get yours :)

Randomness Saturdays

Ok, just like the past Saturday, I really don't have a topic for a whole post, so I will just go ahead and post bits and bolts LOL

♥ Like always starting personal: I'm really excited because my youngest daughter, Michelle, will start school next Monday. Yup, she got in a pre-school program that will help her in the language and social area to get ready for kindergarten. She's really excited about it and she's running around the house with a back pack on her shoulders and big girl panties (she's not fully potty trained yet!) waiting for the school bus to come and pick her up!

♥ This also means that while I will have a crazy breakfast time, trying to get both of my kids ready for school, with lunches ready and waiting for 2 buses to come and pick them up, once they're gone I will have the house and me for myself....well at least for 2-3 hours. And while I think I will enjoy a little bit of freedom and will use that time wisely to take care on my business, I can't help thinking that I will also feel really lonely...will see!

♥ We also got really sloppy on Gabriel's diet for the last month and it shows: he got in trouble in school for acting in rage and he also lost all the 5 pounds that he gained in 3 months of diet. Major fail! We got back on track immediately and the gluten effect is slowly wearing off. Also, the doctor seems to think that Michelle could be intolerant to gluten too, so we definitely need to stock up on those gluten-free food. Gluten, can you please get out my life already?????

♥ Talking of business: I want to expand and try to wholesale. I think will be fun, tho very stressful, but I definitely wanna try. I already developed a line sheet and can't wait for orders to come in to see how will I do!

♥ My Etsy shop, Crocheted Little Thing, is currently featured on the Handmade Highway blog. I'm very honored that Lori posted my interview there.

♥ On a totally different note: if you're looking for some movies to enjoy during this weekend I want to share a couple of movies that I saw myself and I think they're pretty cool (thanks NetFlix!). The first movie I saw it about a month ago, it's called "Up", it's actually an animation movie and really made me think about the things that we put off daily waiting to do them one day....don't wanna tell you too much. The next movie is for the next Saturday ;)

There! I told you they were bits and bolts!