It's been a busy couple of weeks full of a dizzying array of activities and troubling revelations. We started our local area autism support group this past weekend with a small but passionate group of parents. We are confident our numbers will grow as word spreads and families become more aware of the support we hope to offer.

One of the passionate parents that did attend is mom to one of the students in the school system that I spoke of in my previous post. I've been talking with this mom a bit and it has been revealed to her that her son was harmed by a para educator in his classroom at school. That in and of itself is bad enough, but the even more disconcerting part of the story is that the school district has tried to cover this up. Had another para that witnessed the altercation not written this family an anonymous letter, this might never have come to light. Fortunately that para had the courage to write this letter and others have had the courage to contact local and state news organizations. So the story is getting coming to light and the school district is feeling the pressure to come clean. What exactly the district will do is yet to be seen. Unfortunately we are not hopeful that they will be completely forthright. Our suspicion is that they will do all they can to cover their proverbial back end.

In the age we live in, in which all school and therapy staff are required to go through mandatory reporter training this situation is particularly troubling to me. Is this training only to turn parents in when there are questions about abuse? Does this not protect our children in whatever setting they are in? This situation has only added fuel to the fire for me in my feelings toward our local school district and has completely confirmed my decision to homeschool my son with autism.

Aside from autism issues, which seem to consume our lives at times, we have been busy with kiddos, work and ministry. Kiddo 1 & Kiddo 2 are having a great year at school, although Kiddo 2 is getting a bit of spring fever. He's excited that baseball will begin soon. My part-time job as a musician at the Iowa Veteran's Home is a nice outlet for me to bless others with the gift of music that God has given me. Hubby's job has been pretty calm lately, with no travel since January - yippee! Hubby & I head up our worship ministry at our church. We have been excited to have a good number of new musicians join our body of believers lately. We are looking forward to incorporating them into our worship teams and getting to know each of them better.