Last fall I departed from my weekly blog about pigs to share with readers the decision my wife and I were making regarding placement of Elizabeth in a group home. This week I want to depart once again to share with you how this process is coming along.

Liz has been living in a group home with 2 other girls for 4 weeks now, and appears to be adapting very well. So well in fact that when we return her to her residence after a visit to our home, she immediately tells us to leave.

The staff at the home have been very good in learning how to work with Liz, and in turn Liz has been very good at testing their patience and creativity. The staff are all relatively young females with lots of energy who don’t like to sit around, so they are always doing something with the girls that live in the home. In the 4 weeks that she has been in the home, Liz has gone clothes shopping, bowling, shopping, petting animals at Pet Expo, shopping at the mall, shopping at WalMart, etc. Needless to say Liz loves it.

What made me really realize how different our life has become without Liz in the home occurred this morning. When Liz was living with us, the school bus was at our door at 7:10 am. This meant I had to always have the driveway wheelchair clean by 7 am. At 3:30 pm another round of shoveling was necessary in order to get the wheel chair up the driveway and into the house when she returned home. While I still shoveled snow this morning prior to 7 am, it was with a different sense of urgency and attention to detail.

Jan and I want to thank all of you who have sent us notes, or otherwise communicated your cares, concerns and best wishes. So far it does appear that we have made the right decision regarding Liz’s future.