Well, the kids are home for the summer and I don’t know how I’m going to have time to wash their underwear let alone parent them. Those dollar store panties are looking pretty disposable right about now.

I haven’t had a moment or an inkling to write a darn word for over a month now. This is mostly due to the insanity that has become my life. I’ve started working for Inside Henderson in their marketing department selling advertising, while simultaneously planning my niece’s wedding. I’m either working on one or worrying on the other. And don’t even get me started on my food storage anxiety, I have become the spreadsheet queen of the universe. Everything has a spreadsheet except my bed because I never have time to make it anymore. All rumpled all the time.

Here’s what I’ve learned about sales so far.

1. Don’t ever approach someone who doesn’t know you with a sales proposition.

2. Don’t ever suggest they buy what you have to sell.

3. Try not to talk, period.

And don’t even get me started on the wasted hours of emailing potential customers. Ha, potential nothing. People hate emails. Maybe I’m just missing the boat in my subject box. Maybe I need catchier titles, like, “Roses are red, money is green, advertise with us and you will be seriously swarmed with new customers.”

And as for my food storage, it’s like this obnoxious itch that makes me crazy all day long. If I could just finish this project (we’ve been working on our long-term food storage since ’08) and wash my hands of all these blasted wheat kernels maybe I could sleep at night instead of worrying about how many #10 cans I can store under Georgia’s bed. The heat here has made our garage a no-go option so everything needs an inside home.

Would it be tacky to use #10 cans as step stools in the bathrooms? What about building book shelves with the boxes? End tables? I know, we could put them under our dining room table and make it counter height.  Classy.

I don’t care how I do it, by the end of June I will have my 900 lbs of recommended wheat stuffed into the cracks and crevices of this house, not to mention the lengthy list of edible counterparts we still need to purchase. So close I can taste it. I have to admit, it’s not as tasty as a Double Double from In-n-Out but it will do in a pinch.

Surgically speaking I’m doing swell–the swell part has nothing to do with swelling which is mostly gone and what’s left is frequently ignored. It’s swimsuit season and it makes me…uncomfortable. I don’t know, part of me feels like such a fake when I put on a swimsuit and it doesn’t look as terrible as it should. Like I didn’t do nearly enough crunches to get this nice flat stomach so it’s false advertising. Part of me feels like it’s only honest for me to wear a sign to the water park that says, “Need boobs? Call Dr. Peterson, he did mine.” I have a friend who did a similar mommy makeover tell me that it took her six to eight months to finally adjust to how she looked.

First world problems, I know.

Last weekend we went camping.

A word of advice, if you are only four weeks out from a major surgical procedure that involved just about every aspect of your torso, don’t go camping.

That aside, I love camping (not backpacking). This is probably because Jason is super organized and usually makes sure we have everything we need. I get to sit around and play my ukulele while he sets up and cooks dinner–it’s a perfect world. You can see why I thought it would be an easy weekend, how much work can it really be?

Thing is, it wasn’t the work as much as the lack of comfort and supplies and decent equipment. Oh my aching abdomen.

This brings me to a hard realization: we are not prepared for living in the wilderness.

If we learned anything this weekend it’s that Georgia pretty much hates nature. I hope that girl never gets caught in a natural disaster and has to use her 72 hour pack because she’ll be miserable. Better for her to get washed away in the flood.

A few days before we left we were riding in the car and Georgia says (insert lisp), “Mom, when the world endth Jethus comes are we gonna hafta live in the woodth?”

“Um…I don’t know baby, maybe?”

“Oh great. I HATE the woodth.”

She proved it last weekend.

Part of the problem with camping is the fact that we haven’t camped in four years (pre-Europe). That means we were only able to locate about half our camping stuff and we never did find our tents. Luckily Jason’s folks recently gave us some of their old tents and we packed them without actually checking to see what was inside the bags.

Imagine Jason’s surprise (delight?) when he unearthed his circa 1984 color block hikers tent that he got as as Boy Scout. The poles had to be duct taped to the stakes and once set up it looked like a really bad version of a wind breaker. But hey, it was shelter and Rex isn’t very picky.

We went with our good friends the Morris’ and drove over three hours to Horse Thief Gulch way in the Nevada nowhere. Gorgeous camp sites and crazy good fishing. Plus I had my Shannon there to entertain me and our kids all had friends. That part was really fun (and the new big rectangle marshmallows Jason found, they were a highlight).

The nights, however, were freeze-your-feet-off 40 degree weather for most of us–except Rex. Of course the ancient Boy Scout tent was the only shelter that actually kept anyone warm.

But man, our camping stuff is in seriously poor condition. Half the sleeping bags have sprung zippers, two of our three air mattresses were flat by morning (worst two nights of my life), our lantern didn’t make the move and we couldn’t find any of our Dutch Oven stuff. Honestly, without that duct tape and our super prepared friends we would have been up a gulch.

So this summer we are going to save up for some decent camping equipment…like a tent. Tents are good. And something to sleep on that won’t deflate if a thorn pricks it.

Someday I will grow up and be a real prepper but let’s be honest, I am really bad at this get-your-crap-together stuff. I keep trying to make lists to work on but it seems like so far the only things I’ve successfully added are duct tape and zip ties (and mascara which I picked up in bulk last week). And cold weather clothes. We finally have long underwear and waterproof pants squirreled away just in case.

But my list is wide and deep. Like hats. We don’t have beanies and I keep thinking I’ll make them…but who’s got time for that?

After this weekend hats and socks are top of my list. Give me two months and I will give you warm heads and toasty toes–that’s about how far my budget will get me.

I am pleased to report that we are officially prepped for almost any 72-hour disaster.

It only took me four months.

You’d think that putting together a few bug out bags would be a fairly simple, inexpensive procedure. How much do you really need? A little food, something to stay warm, a handful of candy…done. When I first started getting down to the nitty gritty I decided to begin with what we had on hand.

It didn’t get me very far.

Here’s your warning. If you haven’t started assembling individual kits for your family (and I’m not talking about an oversized can of vacuum packed food, I’m talking about a for real Runaway Bag) you’d better find a dedicated place to park them because this process is not fast. Unfortunately our current residence is the size of a postage stamp so my assembly area was right in the middle of the family room–for three months.

I did so much research and started out with a head full of too-much information. In order to simplify this for someone else, I’m going to itemize our Runaway Kid Bug-out Bags. The kid versions differ from mine and Super Dad’s, but I think we’ve mostly nailed them. My best advice? Keep it real and applicable to your own family.

Ours include: 1. Smallish backpack 2. Socks 3 pair 3. Undies 2 pair (because changing our underwear is obviously going to be a top priority) 4. Set of clothing  5. Sweatshirt 6. Hiking shoes tied to pack 7. Mylar sleeping bag and tent 8. Crayons and paper or playing cards (in Runaway Bin) 9. Life Straw (boys packs) 10. Water bottles 3 11. Food packet (just stuff my kids will eat) 12. Candy 13. Hand crank flash light 14. Whistle 15. Matches 16. Copy of passport and personal info 17. Full set of Scriptures (military size) 18. First Aid kit 19. Hygiene kit with hand warmers…

I ran out of space in the girls’ packs and still need to put their passport and personal info in plus life straws. Not putting in whistles or matches because I want them to survive in case something happens and 72 with a whistle…they might not make it.

I pulled part of June’s pack out as proof, pics. below. You can see how tiny the packs are…Harry’s is larger and I think I’m going to move Rex into a bigger shell as well.

In our Parent Packs we’ve included a small camping stove and a large water filter for the family plus a ton of Jason’s uber special survival gear he’s acquired over the years. His pack is insane. That’s a post in and of itself and I don’t think I’m even supposed to say what all he’s got in there.

My pack? Probably the most poorly put together. I haven’t even put any extra clothing in because I can’t decide what to wear. I’m trying to narrow down a shade of lipstick to put in my emergency makeup kit but it’s giving me anxiety. I wish they just made a “wilderness” lipstick, something along the lines of Beautiful Disaster. Waterproof mascara for sure, that’s a no-brainer. Oh, food and Excedrin.

The cool and irritating thing about this project is how many things we’ve come up with that don’t fit in our packs but would be seriously nice to have on hand. You give yourself a few months to think on it and let me tell you, stuff that you never thought you might need suddenly sounds so essential. I finally pulled out a big rubbermaid bin and started randomly dropping things into it, everything from rubber bands and zip ties to a ream of paper and extra crayons. Again, another post for another time.

Then one afternoon I started thinking about the weather, what if it’s crazy cold and we have to run away form Las Vegas in the middle of a snow storm? I immediately organized everyone’s cold weather gear into a large separate duffel to make sure no one dies of hypothermia.

This year our goal is to finish up our preparedness in case the dam quits working or Jason loses his job, or our neighborhood catches on fire and we have to evacuate, or maybe the zombies all wake up and man, no one wants that to happen.

But.

If it does, we will be prepared. We’re finishing up our year’s supply of food right now (all the wheat/rice/oats/beans are done) and then a few wish list items, then we can sit back and wait for a natural disaster to never, ever, EVER happen.

Because if I have to pick, I really hope all this stuff gets dusty and old and my kids grow up and prep out their own households because it’s what their parents taught them. Then their kids can learn and so on and so forth, so that someday when it all turns upside down my future babies and grand babies and greats will all know how to have a family evacuation plan and can grab their packs and their snow boots and do what they have to do.

It feels good to have it together.

One of the downsides (upsides?) of my surgical recovery is the massive amount of time I spend on Pinterest. I feel sorry for everyone who follows me because I’ve turned into an erratic researcher who flits between my Zombie Takeover Prep board and my Preschool Ideas like a thirsty mosquito.

The board that has probably seen the most attention is my food board. I’m not a dessert maker but I can’t seem to get away from anything and everything sweet.

My father-in-law retired on Friday after 40 or so years in the health care industry, finishing his last decade+ at Timpanogos Regional Hospital in Utah County as the hospital administrator. This is a major achievement and we’re all incredibly proud of him (but really just excited to have him around whenever we want).

They are coming this weekend to help out as Jason goes back to work tomorrow full time. I’m up way more and feeling good but oh, the swelling. The more I do the more I swell and it’s a painful irritant. I’d like to think I can do laundry and vacuum and reach way up high into the cupboard but that’s just stupid.

And so, what do you get when you combine mass Pinteresting + A Family Celebration + A Recovering Surgical Patient Who is Bored Out of Her Skull and Wants Something to do?

Tres Leches.

I decided last night that I was going to get off the couch and make Tres Leches. It’s one of my current Pinterest obsessions and a dessert my girls and Jason love (and I’m pretty sure my FIL does as well). My girl Shannon came over to assist (make sure I didn’t kill myself) and the process began.

Holy Tres Leches, this is not a simple cake.

We spent over half an hour MIXING the darn thing. We’re talking a four or five bowl process with lots of separated eggs and whippings and foldings and siftings and cursings. I never could have done it without someone there reading off instructions and fetching hard to reach bowls. Half way through the process my entire incision began to throb and I knew I was in it, but what do you do? You commit.

Finally the beautifully folded batter went into the buttered baking pan and I lovingly slid it through the oven door, starting the timer on the stove for 40 minutes.

And that was just round one. I still had to put together the milk mixture. Gah.

I finally bid my dear Shannon goodbye and went to FaceTime Geneva, my long lost friend from Germany.

You know when you haven’t talked to your old friend in like, forever, and you have so much to say and kids to want to look at the screen…

Long story short, the timer when off. I didn’t hear it because it only beeped once. While I was busily gabbing away Rex, my darling 9-year-old, obediently turned off the timer and went back to watching his movie.

And the cake baked.

And baked.

And I smelled it baking.

And I wondered how long it had been in that oven but didn’t worry because I HAD SET THE TIMER.

Finally I said goodbye and followed my nose into the kitchen, glancing at the clock and realizing it had been way more than 40 minutes…like nearly an hour.

Oh the cake. It was so burned it had literally pulled away more than half an inch from the edges all around and was sitting in the pan like a hardened lump of stale bread.

So I yelled (which hurt my stomach). I yelled at my boy Rex who had no idea what the timer was for and had only turned it off because it seemed like the right thing to do. I yelled at him for ruining my cake and ruining Grandpa’s retirement dinner and ruining all my hard work and you just get yourself right to bed, young man!

Rex (my lightly Autistic sweetheart), burst into tears and apologized then raced to his room to hide under his blankets.

In less than five minutes I knew I had just burned way more than the cake. My Rex is tender-hearted to the extreme, when his sister Georgia kicks and hits him and I tell her she’s going to go to jail for assault and battery, he’s the one who cries and tells me it’s okay, she’s just little, can’t I please forgive her?

I trudged up the stairs to Rex’s room and there he was, cocooned beneath all his blankets. I peeled the layers back and told him how sorry I was and how it wasn’t his fault, what a good kind boy he is, how I knew he was just trying to do the right thing.

“Well-well-well, Mom,” he sobbed trying to cover his sweet face, “Ya just-just-just…ya broke my heart! That’s all, my heart is broke!”

Worst thing a mother can hear. I hate it when I break his heart (it’s happened once or twice before) but I kissed him and gave him space to mend. Bad Mother of the Week right here, people.

A good night’s rest works wonders and apparently so does Tres Leches because today when Rex woke up, he forgave me and asked if we could make a new cake together, a vanilla one. And when I checked the burned out husk of my Tres Leches (which Jason insisted I finish just in case the milk was magical) what do you think I found? A deliciously soppy Mexican dessert fit for a king…a retired king at least.

Today I completely failed a child.

There is something to be said for moving. I’m not talking about the emotional weight of restarting your life, this is the literal disassembly and subsequent reassembly of your patterns and objects and routines. No two houses are alike and therefore trying to rebuild your life exactly as it was before is like trying to make chicken soup with shrimp. Shrimp is good but it doesn’t taste like chicken and no matter how you stir it, the flavor will never be the same.

With that in mind, it should come as no shock that sometimes important things are left unattended. Things like…toothbrushes.

This shouldn’t have happened because from the first week we landed here in Las Vegas Jason has been pestering me to find the kids a dentist. We take six month checkups seriously and haven’t missed one in years, especially where the kids are concerned. August was the six month mark and Jason did his best to shame me into finding a dentist.

Honestly, the first six months of this move was like trying to disassemble then reassemble a cooked casserole, there was always something on my worry list that trumped checkups. In the meantime we were rebuilding the morning and evening routines, shuffling bathrooms and bedrooms, starting school and dance and sports and trying to remember to pray…my kids teeth took a back seat.

In Germany June and Georgia shared my bathroom. This meant I was present and accounted for when it came to all brushing and all forgetting to brush. June’s teeth were part of my personal hygiene routine. With the boys, as long as I frequently threatened them with detailed accounts of needles jamming into their gums and the sound of the power drill, they were pretty good about brushing and flossing their own teeth.

In this house June and Rex share a bathroom. In fact I’ve made it my mission here, thanks to my dear friend Jeanie, to make my kids clean their bathrooms every morning after they brush their teeth. I’ve made such a big deal about this whole “keep your bathroom clean” business that it’s kind of replaced my old “brush till you bleed” mantra. I say, “Go brush your teeth and CLEAN YOUR BATHROOM!”

Assuming that I’ve obviously taught June how to brush and floss I have stupidly been sending my daughter to the bathroom and trusting that her teeth were being properly cared for–the back ones too. Pair this with the fact that we blew through our last six month check-up and it’s suddenly been a year since we’ve been to the dentist…

Epic. Mother. Failure.

My sweet girl has seven cavities and is going to need a crown. She was absolutely mortified yesterday when the dentist was looking at her teeth and showing us the x-rays. She’s naturally a responsible little thing who takes her personal grooming seriously and this, this was a devastating disaster.

For those of you looking at a move this next year or still recovering from a move from last year, a word to the wise. If you haven’t found them yet remember, you can never put your life back together the way it was and if you’re not careful, something will get neglected and you’ll end up finding cavities. Whether it’s your personal health, a kid’s grades, the state of your garage, scripture study, or remembering to brush your third child’s teeth, keep your eyes open.

Stupid sugar bugs.

My husband loves to play baseball. He’s a great player, he’s a good coach, and he loves to come home from work and throw the ball with Harrison.

But we’ve been overseas on a military base for the past three years. The translation? Coaches come and go from one season to the next, there is no established program for the kids to work through, and it’s been three years of going through the motions with very little skill growth. No batting cages, camps, and certainly no off-season playing. Harry was a good player in Germany. But that was Germany.

We move to Vegas and suddenly Harry is surrounded by 11 and 12-year-olds who have been playing club ball and travel ball, many of them do it nine or ten months out of the year. These kids are good, they’re competitive, and they’re part of very established programs. Nine and ten-year-olds who can pitch over 55 mph? It’s like watching a mini-spring training camp.

My kid still thinks baseball is a fun after school team activity where you get a treat after the games.

Last weekend we had tryouts for the local teams. Every kid gets placed but they have to go through a series of drills in order to see where they’re playing skills fall.

Jason worked with Harrison so much the weeks before, nights at the batting cages and afternoons at the park doing grounders and fly balls, Harrison does pretty well when it’s him and his dad.

But you put him on a field with kids his age and you’d think the boy had never worn a batting glove. Everything flies out the window. I asked him after tryouts, “So what goes through your mind when you step into the batters box?”

“Nothing,” he said.

“Nothing? Like what do you mean?”

“I mean my mind goes completely blank. I just…think nothing.”

And that was exactly how it looked. My poor kid, during the very first drill where they were fielding grounders he hurt his index finger on his right hand. When he tried to show Jason and me we told him to get his butt back out there. Harry is historically a total baby when it comes to sport injuries, at almost 12 he needs to learn to shake it off. (Unfortunately we discovered by the next morning his injury was legit and warranted a trip to quick care and a finger brace.)

The rest of the day was a colossal disaster. I’m serious, he was the only kid who couldn’t hit off the pitcher, even when the guy started lobbing baby pitches at him. He couldn’t field, he couldn’t run…I sat in the bleachers and felt like I might lose my lunch on his behalf. His shoulders continued to droop lower and lower and I could see what little 6th grade self-esteem he has managed to hold onto completely dissipate in the hot Las Vegas sun.

Jason was sick about it. “What happened to him?” he asked me that night in the car during our date. “When I play with him he does alright. He’s not a star athlete but we have fun and he’s can hit the ball and has a great arm. Out there…my son can’t play baseball.”

There is something to be said for the hopes of a father. Whatever they are, academic dreams or athletic hopes or musical genius…when you want to see your child succeed at something and they fail it’s so personal. It’s a natural response to feel like you must have failed them, not given enough or nurtured their ability along. Sure, we shouldn’t feel that way. Sure, we’re not supposed to put pressure on our kids to please us. Sure, kids need to find their own paths and not be parent puppets.

But letting go of that hope is a tangible thing and I feel for every parent out there who has had to make that shift. Bless his heart, my husband did it with love and only an evening’s worth of heartsick regret.

The next day the head of the baseball association called to say that Harry had been placed on a team in the league below him. They were worried about his safety and frankly, so were we. Harrison was willing to play, wanted to go through with it despite his horrific tryout experience.

But sometimes you have to show your kid that a shift is okay with you. It’s a lot of pressure on a child to tell their parent that all the hours and all the money they’ve put into a sport has been wasted because really, they just want to paint.

That afternoon Jason sat Harry down and put his arm around him. “So,” he said. “Mom and I have been talking and since baseball hasn’t started yet, we’re wondering if maybe you’d rather do golf this year? We found a really great program just up the road…” Five minutes is all it took.

Our boy needed to know it was okay, that he wasn’t letting his dad down. I could see it in his eyes, the worry that Jason would be disappointed or feel like he’d wasted his time with Harrison. He tried to say that no, he wanted to play baseball but it was so obvious that he was really just gauging his dad’s reaction, looking to see if that was the answer Jason wanted. What Harrison really needed was confirmation that it was really, honestly okay to let it go.

Jason gave Harry permission to not be a baseball player.

Best dad ever. They can’t wait for him to start golf tonight.

Allow me to take a moment and go all cliché on you: Valentine’s Day is my favorite holiday. There’s nothing I love more than Jason and an excuse to make out–Valentine’s Day offers both of those things and so much more.

And Boo to the nay sayers who claim that Valentine’s Day is not a big deal, that they can get flowers any day of the year. I believe in officially celebrating romantic love. I go in for the chocolate and the balloons and the sappy love letters Hallmark puts out and pink and red sprinkles on everything…love is one holiday worth making a big sugary deal over.

I hated being single on Valentine’s Day and I cherish my lover every year because of it.

Jason and I trade off in no particular fashion when it comes to Valentine’s Day. Historically speaking, February 14th always involves a surprise. Sometime’s it’s a mini-vacation, sometime’s it involves wigs and sneaky slutty behavior, and sometimes, when I’m really really lucky, it includes concert tickets.

This was a concert ticket year.

Not just any concert, The Concert. The one at the top of my please-let-me-see-him-live-before-he-dies-like-Michael-Jackson concert. This year for Valentine’s Day Jason took me to see…drum roll…

Engelbert Humperdink. Running nose to nose with Neil Diamond, one of my favorite singers from the 60’s, 70’s and 80’s, I am a third generation Englebert fan.

He’s almost 80 years old and can you believe he’s still touring? I was a little worried about going, you know how old people sometimes don’t know when to quit (I intend to be a no-quitting old person) and keep on trucking when really they’re more like an aged train wreck?

That is not Englebert.

Sure, his voice has lost it’s youth and a portion of it’s luster, but the man can still put on a fabulous show. And there’s something impressive about watching an almost 80-year-old cha cha across the stage to Quando Quando Quando.

When you’re as old as Engelbert you rely on the audience to do a lot of the singing for you, taking chorus breaks to catch your breath while the entire hall belts out, “I had the laaast waaaltz with yoooooou…” Jason loves him as much as I do and wasn’t afraid to sing with all the tone-deaf old people around us. You know you’re with an older generation when you can count on one hand how many cell phones you see turned on during the concert (we were up on the third level).

I confess, I might have cried through his entire performance of “After the Lovin’,” then once again when he sang my very favorite, “This Moment in Time.” I could almost feel my Grandma there with me a few times, it was really cool. She would have absolutely loved every second of it.

Jason my love, if you ever read my blog and see this post, thank you. I think you’re a rock star. Every night that I come home from work to find laundry folded and dishes done or the kitchen floor mopped, or homemade cookies cooling on the counter and leftovers waiting for me in the fridge, I have to shake my head in disbelief.  You probably should have been the wife.

Darling, I leave you with these words immortalized by EH.

“This moment in time, this right time of day. Oh, I love being with you and watching my life at play…And no matter what comes, I know the sun is gonna shine…

Because of you, and me, there’ll be this moment in time.”

I’ve been trying to figure out where in the world we’re going to put our plastic water containers. It gets so hot here in the summertime that they can’t stay in the garage or back yard, but my house has almost no available interior storage space so they can’t come inside. This is causing me a serious brain cramp, mental dehydration.

I was lamenting to my girlfriend this week about how freaked out I am about the Chinese invasion and its effect on the water situation here in the desert and how we’ll have to fill a few gallons before we hit the road (obviously I don’t have enough to worry about if I have this much time to focus on the maybe-evitable). Seriously though, there’s only like one road in and one road out of Vegas, we’re going to hit so much panic traffic we’ll all die of thirst before we even leave the desert.

“Um,” she said, “Don’t you have a pool in your backyard?”

Oh.

Maybe we’ll just stay here until the traffic clears out. Set up shop on the corner and sell filtered pool water to passersby. Take a swim, make some pina coladas, panic with style.

I have a pool. I’m such an idiot.

I am constantly plagued with a nagging pull to the back of my neck that whispers, “The zombies are coming, are you ready yet?”

Zombies, earthquakes, water shortages, whatever. In the case of an emergency our 72 hour packs would really help us–if we knew where they were. Jason and I both have super duper store bought survival kits we procured about ten years ago; we have yet to locate them with this move.

Every once in a while I think about my children and their need for survival in the event of a real catastrophe. I worry that our little kid 72 hour packs still sit limp and empty in the corner of the garage. This is enough motivation to at least collect inconspicuous handfuls of hard candy from doctor’s offices to drop in the empty front pouches. I guess that makes them five minute packs, only 71+ hours to go.

I planned an Emergency Evacuation drill last night for Family Home Evening. I put together a one page list for the back door with each family member’s name and their tasks in the event that we have to leave our house at a moment’s notice–like if the Chinese decide to invade Las Vegas or in case someone (probably the Chinese) accidentally pulls the plug on Lake Meade and our water stops.

This list is crazy simple. Jason and I each have about seven things to do, starting with “put shoes and coat on” and the kids each have four simple steps. Harrison’s list includes the dog but the little kids have it very cut and dry: 1. Put on shoes and warm coat, 2. Get blankie, 3. Get one stuffed animal or doll, 4. Get in car with seat belt.

Last night we sat around the table after watching the third installment in the family disaster/preparedness videos (my kids love them) and passed the family list. We each read our jobs aloud and Harry set the list down.

“Great,” I said, “Disaster just hit, ready GO!!! Five minutes to the car, move move MOVE!!!”

I might as well have used an electric shocker they flew out of their chairs like popcorn. The instant feeling of panic was surprisingly real and even my own adrenaline surged as I frantically tried to help kids find shoes, gather phones and chargers and passports and prescriptions, then ran to the car. Jason, who had treated the entire meeting like a slightly elevated joke, was suddenly the Drillmaster. He had the dog food in the car and his gun on his hip in like four minutes.

When Jason and I slammed the doors to the Excursion it had taken us just over six minutes. Sound impressive? It’s not.

The girls were sobbing uncontrollably, Rex was asking if we were ever going to come back to our house, no one had brought a blankie or remembered socks, and there were only two decent coats in the group. The two empty red backpacks that represented our sad attempt at 72 hour preparedness sat limply next to a half empty flat of bottled water.

But hey, we did it in six minutes.

We came in and worked on putting together personal hygiene and mini FirstAid kits for the kids’ bags. There is no food or water purification system yet (minus the hard candy), but at least we won’t be getting cavities.

This month’s goal: Find our big 72 hour kits and figure out a water strategy.

I just found a reason to live in Las Vegas.

Here’s the thing about having a kid with a late diagnosis of autism, I feel like I’m super behind on the parental education. Pair that with the fact that I’m seriously shallow when it comes to reading material and usually prefer mystery, vampires and anything dystopian over biography, self-help, or uplifting religious material (minus scriptures), and you get a highly uneducated parent.

(Btw, thank you to the person who sent me the anonymous book in the mail, and thank you to my friend Shirlene for her book recommendation, The Spark: A Mother’s Story of Nurturing, Genius, and Autism, which I am reading right now and really trying to get excited about even though there are no vampires and it’s not set 300 years in the future.)

But, to prove to myself that I’m not going to be a lame-o parent who ignores all the amazing material and programs out there for Rex because it means dealing with his diagnosis, I decided to hit up Google and Las Vegas and see what they have for kids on the spectrum.

And that’s how I found Sport-Social. The most amazing, coolest, funner-than-all-the-other-things-we’ve-tried-for-Rex, designed specifically for kids with autism, rec center. They coach kids like Rex on appropriate social behavior in one-on-one and group settings, using a step-by-step approach that gives them the opportunity to practice those skills with other kids, using games and sports. He goes for an hour and a half each week, they have bikes, ramps, scooters and skate boards, a small basketball court, an art room, a class room and all sorts of table games.

I’ve seen behavioral therapy for autistic kids and it is definitely helpful, but this takes it to a whole new level. Kids work in 1:1, 2:1, 4:1 and 6:1 groups depending on where they’re at socially and what they’re working on.

It’s crazy how much they breakdown the basic structure of socialization for these kids, but it makes a huge difference. For instance, when you or I shake someone’s hand, we only shake it for about three seconds before letting go. When Rex shakes hands with other kids like him, they just keep shaking until someone tells them to stop. You and I don’t need a three second rule, he does.

We took a tour of the center last night and I learned a few things.

First, I realized once again that my son really really has autism. When you live with it and there’s no diagnosis you don’t see your child’s little idiosyncrasies as anything but unique and quirky. “That’s just Rex,” is a common phrase in our family. And it is just Rex, it’s all the adorable things that make him so delightful to be around.

But it’s also autism.

“Hi,” the counselor said when he met us for our tour. He looked right at Rex, “I’m Andrew, what’s your name?”

“Oh, uh, hello, uh, my name is Rex…” They shook hands, Rex looked down at the floor the entire time in his usual shy manner.

“Rex, you have to look at my eyes when you talk to me, see? Try it again…” then he repeated the introduction and I watched Rex struggle to make and keep eye contact with Andrew. By the third try they were high-fiveing. “Awesome!” Andrew said, “Here’s a Cool Friend’s ticket, thanks for being a cool friend!”

And that’s how the entire tour went. Rex would interact with Andrew during the tour and I watched this guy work his magic, making Rex look at him, practice asking appropriate questions, and even introducing himself to another kid at the center. When Rex self-corrected or was willing to replay a scenario with proper social skills, he got a Cool Friend’s ticket. It’s like Chuck-E-Cheese, the kids earn tickets for good social skills then they can turn them in for prizes ranging from 5 to 600 tickets in value. Huge incentive.

I am telling you, this place is going to change his life.

This morning Jason and Rex were at the table eating breakfast together and Jason asked Rex about last night’s tour. Immediately I watched as Rex’s entire communication mode changed, he looked Jason right in the eye and told him about it, adopting all the things the counselor had worked on with him.

It. Was. Amazing. Even Jason (who is super skeptical of the unconventional and not sure about this place) was surprised at the immediate change he saw in Rex.

I don’t know how long we will be here, but this opportunity makes it so worth it.

(PS–This post is NOT a paid endorsement, just a mother’s notation. They have no idea I’m writing about them…)