Saturday Roundup - 12th January

This has not been a photo-worthy week, sorry.

The schools went back this week so, as well as teaching the 6th formers and enrolling over 90 new adult students, I have been making frantic phone calls and visits to sort out a secondary school place for R.

The majority of secondaries in my area are big (1000+ pupils) and the thought of R with his physical disability being pushed down stairs by hundreds of bigger children is, frankly, the stuff of my nightmares. He needs a small school who understands his needs, and I was lucky enough to have the perfect one within walking distance. Unfortunately, it is a Catholic school and we are not Catholic. So, last week I found out he had not been given a place for September 2013, despite the fact that when I made the application back in October 2012, all of the professionals who deal with R on a regular basis told me I would definitely get my first choice school because of his statement. If anyone had suggested this wouldn't happen I would have found a Plan B. Now I have to find one very urgently and am panicking.

On Monday I spent most of the day on the phone, making appointments with all the schools in the area, leaving messages at my first choice school and picking the brains of anyone I could think of. Tuesday I was told that he was "way down" on the waiting list for my first choice school and that I couldn't appeal. On Wednesday I was told I can appeal through the Special Needs appeal process, but there are no guarentees. On Tuesday I visited a totally unsuitable school and on Thursday my appointment was cancelled by another. On Friday, I visited my last option; a school some way away from where we live but where my eldest nephew is currently studying. I was very relieved to find it a small and very caring place. It is not glossy, it has pupils speaking over 40 different home languages and it is low down on the academic league tables, but I feel that R would be safe and looked after. He is not the most academic of boys, but he loves his drama and It and practical subjects and it is possible that the Catholic school would have been too ambitious for him to cope with.  I am trying hard to see this as a cloud with a silver lining (though it's difficult)

I will make a decision on whether or not to appeal when I have taken R to visit the second school. If he likes it, I will save myself the stress of an appeal which will probably fail.

We finished the week on a pleasant note as R, M and I all went to see Aladdin at Guildford with the Rainbows - a very traditional pantomime and a lot of fun.

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Saturday roundup 5th January

(Yes, I do know it's now Sunday, but I was waiting for Blogger to sort itself out and let me upload pictures. It still hasn't so I'll post without them. Is anyone else having trouble uploading photos? I don't have a box to browse my files.
Update - changed to Google Chrome from Internet Explorer and it's OK, so I'll put the pictures in now)

I know I wouldn't be able to cope with anything as full on as Project Life or 365 or anything daily, so I've more or less decided to continue with a month in Numbers, again using a Smash book, but also include ephemera and a monthly photo collage.

I'd like to record more of the everyday, though, than I did last year so I'll try to blog a weekly review on a Saturday as well, with any pictures I have taken. That means it doesn't need to be daily, but not only the big events.

So, 5 days into January and it has already been quite eventful.

P and our friend Jane. No one took any photos of me

We spent a fun New Year's Eve with friends. M stayed up until 10pm, R until 12.30 and P and I were still singing karaoke at 2.30am. My friend's birthday is on 1st Jan, so we stayed for that as well. Having an extra day made the 2 hour journey much more worthwhile and it was lovely to spent quality time with some one I see only rarely.

My favourite auntie, Jen came over for lunch  with her grandchildren and the first cousins once removed (we think) played happily with the hamster while the grownups ate pavlova and caught up. Jen is also keen on researching our family tree so we shared what we'd found out recently.

I got a phone call to say R has not been offered a secondary school place, despite the fact that every professional I deal with told me it was a foregone conclusion because of his Statement of Special Needs. It is agonising that I can't do anything about this until the schools go back on Monday.

R and M went to the pantomime with Nanny and Grandad.