What a day, it's only noon!

Got an unexpected call this morning from our friend Samantha-yes THE Sam from my book. She was in town and we went to the park to meet up with her. It has been a year since our last visit with her. The kids had a ball and as you can see there were plenty of people for Gage to converse with. I have to really watch him, here these ladies are complimenting him on his nice truck. He tells them it's for sale...$50.00, (at the time I had no idea what he was telling them, I was too far to hear). They came by to tell me "Wow, he's amazing! and to be only 8!" and I informed them, "Yea, he's completely deaf too, he's always talking people's ears off!" They were very surprised to say the least and I told them that all three of the kids there (Gage, Brook and Sam) were all deaf kids who hear with cochlear implants. I knew they could see his decorated ci's so I wanted them to know what they were for, and not think they were just ear decorations or something. One lady had some type of delay, she didn't say what but did note herself as having been special ed all her life. I told her he gets more "special" services because of his ADHD rather than deafness. Okay, on to Sam, she is amazing. Once again, I saw great improvement this time around and from what I hear, she's going to a mainstream school this year. She didn't even sign one bit this time, usually she teaches me a sign or two but she's even more accurate with her articulation this year than before. She's been working hard I can tell. She only has one ci and she noticed right away that Gage had two now. She's ten and going into the fourth grade but lives out of state, we rarely get to see her. While at the park, I get another unexpected call from our audiologist's office reminding me of our appt. in the morning. I had down Aug 7, but we are going to get to go in the morning instead since they accidentally had us down both days. So we'll get on the road by 6 am in the morning and get Gage MAPped (he needs it!!) and get B's audiogram. So that'll get that out of the way. As we were getting ready to leave the park, the thunder began to roll in as did the rain clouds. Brook had removed her ci's to go down the plastic slides and the tape was loosing its stick. She brought me back one that just wouldn't stick anymore, only......the battery was missing! That's the 200.00 rechargeable battery. All I could think of was Landry's mom who had posted on cicircle about losing a battery at the park, she took a picture and left a sign w/a reward for anyone who found it. Guess what? It was found by someone's grandson, so I had hope. So as my heart raced, my mind prayed the rain would hold off long enough for us to search the area and my eyes scanning in desperation, hoping I'd find the white battery in the white sand underneath those swings. After I decided that I may go to the police station (which was next door) to make a sign or ask for their help, I hear "Found it!" I broke into an high school cheerleader and clapped and jumped and cheered for Samantha who saved the day. She knew how I felt having lost a battery herself, that she never did find. Thank you. And we also had an additional treat at the park. The kids' PE teacher was there walking with her baby in stroller. We chatted for a while and I did inform her I should be on the sub list this year, and she asked if I would ever do PE. Would I do P.E.? I actually would love P.E. and prefer it since we stay outside all the time anyway. She said she's not out much but her little girl does wake with ear infections sometimes and I totally understand that so I told her, give me a call girl! I'd be happy to sub anytime. Whew, quite a day already and now it's storming.....and it's just noon. What could be in store for the remainder of the day? hmmmmmmm................?