Reminiscing

Today I rifled through my box with gift bags to grab a couple of gift bags for a baby shower tonight for 2 friends. As I opened one of the bags I found this -- the program from Julianne's baptism. I had to close my eyes and think hard to remember her just like this.

The first day of school 2011

The day finally arrived and as if to remind us that our summer fun was over so did the rain and cool temperatures. All of my kids love going to school (even if they won't always admit it). They also get nervous. This morning was a fun combination of nerves and excitement and rain. Like in this first picture, Julianne is set to walk out to the bus and I wanted a picture of all the kids together. The problem was the drizzle. Even I didn't want to go out in the rain. So I stood on the top step and took this photo looking down on the girls (since even Adam wouldn't go out in the rain).  Each one of these outfits was hand picked.  The girls pore over their clothing decisions.  It drives me crazy. 

After the photo Catherine and Madelyn quickly went back in and I sucked it up and headed out in the drizzle to wait with Julianne.  It's not like you really needed an umbrella, but it wasn't dry either.  In case you were wondering-- there are no pictures of me because I was still in my pajamas.  That is the beauty of being the first stop on the bus route.  The only person that sees me is the bus driver and I have long gotten over my fear of walking out in pajamas.  The other nice thing about being the first stop is that there are no other kids on the bus whose presence might prevent hugging good-bye or kisses on the cheek.  I am certain that when I went to 6th grade (my mom drove me and a few others) that if she tried to give me a hug I responded with rolled eyes and a lecture about embarrasing me later that evening.  Julianne has never done such a thing and I am grateful.  She is growing up so fast, but I love that she doesn't want to get on the bus each morning without a hug and kiss. 

And don't let her shorts fool you.  It was 62 degrees this morning.  I was chilly.  But middle schoolers will be middle schoolers and fashion is no slave to weather. 

As I walked back to the house it felt like fall.  It was cool.  And the leaves have already started to turn colors and land on the driveway.  I was just starting to feel sad about fall's arrival when . . .

I came upon my dahlia's that were in full bloom as if to remind me that there are still hints of summer to be had. 


An hour later it was time for Catherine and Madelyn to head out.  You might notice that Catherine has changed shirts from the earlier picture.  I got a bunch of vague reasons for the switch -- the snoopy one matches her shoes, the striped one's sleeves were too puffy.  Catherine is my girl.  She is all about comfort and humor.  Madelyn is still all about dresses and fancy things.  She was at least the only one willing to recognize that you probably needed a sweat shirt this morning.  (of course she also probably needed rain boots, but she wasn't about to give up the black jeweled flats that went perfectly with her outfit!)










Madelyn quickly sat down and gave me the "it's time to go look".  But not before I heard another classmate tell her that she looked beautiful.  That compliment made her day. 



Here she is already at work on her "What did I do this summer essay?"




As you can see, Catherine is thrilled that I followed her into the classroom to take her picture.  She is trying hard not to show how excited she is to be sitting next to Frankie (or Francis) as she likes to tease him.  She and Frankie have similar senses of humor and she really likes him (as she says --not in the like like way, but just as a friend).

I loved hearing about their days around the dinner table as we did "happy, sad".  We do that each night and everyone has to tell us something happy about their day and something sad.  Then we played Farkle.  My kids love it -- more so because they like to joke that a farkle is a fart that sparkles!! 

My kids are sure silly, but I love them so much!

Labor Day, Missing Mom, Monday, etc. . .

It was a long hot night.
It was muggy and sticky in the house. I was sleeping on our bed with no covers. Our bedroom is on the second floor of the house and Trent gave it a fair chance and then decided he could not sleep in the heat so he headed down to the basement. I hadn't been asleep very long when I hear Trent come racing up the stairs, "The power is on!!!!" The room he was sleeping in has an overhead light and it had been left in the ON position so the minute we had electricity that light turned right on and woke him up. We quickly turned on the air conditioners, shut all the windows and doors, and within a few minutes were back in bed WITH covers on and a fan blowing overhead.

We were ridiculously happy all day long because we had electricity, but it did make for one heck of a labor day. 8 days of no power = lots and lots of laundry, sheets and towels to wash, clothes, etc. . . also lots of cleaning and vacuuming, it was a day full of labor but it was so nice to have power.

A few of you have asked how we managed? We have a very large generator that goes straight into our homes circuits. Theoretically as soon as power is off the generator is supposed to come on. (For some reason it didn't this time, but we were able to manually start it). The generator runs off of a large propane tank and it primarily serves to run our well pump. Because we have well water if we do not have electricity we do not have water. It also runs the heater, the water heater, and a select number of lights and outlets. We have gotten pretty saavy with our extension cords and whenever the generator is running we can run our modem and wireless (or we wouldn't have phone service either) and the cable box and TV. So I can't really complain-- there are many in our town without a generator and that meant no flushing toilets, no running water, and of course no lights or outlets.

This afternoon the kids and I went around the neighborhood. I pushed Owen in the stroller and the kids were on bikes. We made it about 300 yards when we had to go back and reshuffle things. Madelyn was hitting her knees on her handlebars and so was Catherine and Julianne. So Madelyn swtiched to Catherine's bike, Catherine switched to Julianne's bike, and Julianne switched to my bike. How did my kids get so big??? I'll admit choking back a few tears as I watched them ride up the street. My girls are growing up.

Tonight was a school night. After a couple practice "first day of school" eves, this one is the real thing. The kids are so excited and nervous. I loved the first day of school as a kid. We are headed to 2nd, 4th, and 6th grade this year. CRAZY????

Also tonight I was making an invitation on cocodot.com and was just finishing it up. The website has a dashboard where you can see all the cards you have not only sent, but also the cards you have recieved. I was flooded with emotion as I saw that the last card I recieved was from my mom. I had forgotten all about it. She sent it on Friday May 13th. I had just flown to Houston to surprise her for mother's day. I flew in on Friday, May 6. Shad picked me up from the airport and we got home just before my mom got home from her port insertion surgery. She rested and that next morning we got up and did the "Sprint for Life" 5K. If you haven't seen the video of that day here is a link -- at the end of the video you can see video footage of my mom crossing the finish line. She had been in so much pain and had had difficulty breathing but she made it through the whole 5k. She was admitted the next day for a collapsed lung. They had knicked her lung during the port insertion. She spent Sunday - Wednesday in the hospital and I flew home on Tuesday before she came home from the hospital. When I got home, the very next day I discovered lice in Catherine and Madelyn's hair and so spent the next week combing hair and doing laundry and going crazy. This is the card my mom sent me.

I sure miss my mom.  Who else do you call when you are combing nits out of your kids hair for hours on end?  Who else do you call just to see what they are making for dinner?  Who else do you coordinate your laundry folding times so that you can both just sit on the phone with your headsets on and chat while working as if you were in the same room? 

I have been reading C.S. Lewis' book "A Grief Observed".  I have always loved his books.  He just has such a nice way of putting into words the thoughts and feelings he had and as so many thoughts and feelings are universal, I always seem to relate to them so well.  Here is one of my favorite quotes from the book.  It perfectly describes how I feel all the time.  (I am going to substitute my mom's name for his wife's name.)

“I think I am beginning to understand why grief feels like suspense. It comes from the frustration of so many impulses that had become habitual. Thought after thought, feeling after feeling, action after action, had CANDY for their object. Now their target is gone. I kept on through habit fitting an arrow to the string, then I remember and have to lay the bow down. So many roads lead thought to CANDY.  I set out on one of them. But now there’s an impassable frontierpost across it. So many roads once; now so many culs de sac.” (47)

I am constantly wanting to reach for the phone, constantly starting down a road that would ordinarily lead to my mom only to find each road ending in a culs de sac.  I just love the imagery of roads and culs de sacs and of the bow and arrow. 

Here is another one of my favorite quotes.

• Something quite unexpected has happened. It came this morning early. For various reasons, not in themselves at all mysterious, my heart was lighter than it had been for many weeks. For one thing, I suppose I am recovering physically from a good deal of mere exhaustion. ... And suddenly, at the very moment when, so far, I mourned H. least, I remembered her best. Indeed, it was something (almost) better than memory; an instantaneous, unanswerable impression. To say it was like a meeting would be going too far. Yet there was that in it which tempts one to use those words. It was as if the lifting of the sorrow removed a barrier.
• Why has no one told me these things? How easily I might have misjudged another man in the same situation? I might have said, 'He's got over it. He's forgotten his wife,' when the truth was, 'He remembers her better because he has partly got over it.'
• Such was the fact. And I believe I can make sense of it. You can't see anything properly while your eyes are blurred with tears. You can't, in most things, get what you want if you want it too desperately: anyway, you can't get the best out of it. 'Now! Let's have a real good talk' reduces everyone to silence. 'I must get a good sleep tonight' ushers in hours of wakefulness. Delicious drinks are wasted on a really ravenous thirst. Is it similarly the very intensity of the longing that draws the iron curtain, that makes us feel we are staring into a vacuum when we think about our dead? 'Them as asks' (at any rate 'as asks too importunately') don't get. Perhaps can't.
• And so, perhaps, with God. I have gradually come to feel that the door is no longer shut and bolted. Was it my own frantic need that slammed it in my face? The time when there is nothing at all in your soul except a cry for help may be just the time when God can't give it: you are like the drowning man who can't be helped because he clutches and grabs. Perhaps your own reiterated cries deafen you to the voice you hoped to hear.
• On the other hand, 'Knock and it shall be opened.' But does knocking mean hammering and kicking the door like a maniac? And there's also 'To him that hath shall be given.' After all, you must have a capacity to receive, or even omnipotence can't give. Perhaps your own passion temporarily destroys the capacity.

I loved his realization that in moving on and returning to "normal" you actually allow yourself to feel the proximity of whomever is gone moreso than when you were in strong grieving mode.  I think of my mom whenever I am doing the most mundane little tasks -- laundry, dishes, reading to the kids, etc. . . 

And the last quote I will share for today.

•  Even the insane call, “Come back,” is all for my own sake. I never even raised the question whether such a return , if it were possible, would be good for her. I want her back as an ingredient in the restoration of my past. Could I have wished her anything worse? Having got once through death, to come back and then, at some later date, have all her dying to do over again? They call Stephen the first martyr. Hadn’t Lazarus the rawer deal?

I just loved how this changed my perspective of the Lazarus story so dramatically.  That perhaps he ends up with the rawest deal of them all never once entered my mind. 

I highly recommend "A Grief Observed" and I highly recommend "Shadowlands" which is a movie about C.S. Lewis and his wife as she battles cancer and loses to it. 

I need advice and the Nap

I took Owen to the dr again this morning. (finally on the 3rd visit and with some heavy pressuring on my part) I got him some antibiotics. Let me just say that this drives me crazy. Owen has been coughing for 21 days, had a fever of 102 or higher for 6 days and I had taken him to the doctor twice before today. In addition Adam has had pneumonia and been on zithromax and I have had strep throat and been on zithromax during the same time.

Again, our doctor said, I don't see any ear infections. His throat looks fine. His chest is congested but it is just bronchiolitis. She said she doesn't want to prescribe an antibiotic without knowing what she is treating? That is all well and good, but at what point are you making an 11 month old suffer for no good reason???? Why must it be so difficult to get treatment??? What would it hurt to try an antibiotic?

I gave Owen his first dose of Zithromax at 10:30 am. He then slept until 12:30 at which point when he woke up-- he has not run a fever, he has smiled for the first time in a week, he has eaten something other than just nursing, and he has crawled around like his old self (albeit a little slower than normal).

Clearly, he had a bacterial infection. I am so angry that I had to make 3 visits to the doctor to get him the help he needed.

Am I the only one with this problem??? I do not routinely go to the doctor. In fact with 5 kids I haven't been to the doctor with any of them (except for well visits) for over a year. This last two weeks I have been 4 times (once with Adam and he had double pneumonia) and 3 times with Owen who clearly had something.

Would you be looking for a new doctor if you were me???

We only had sacrament meeting.

We still don't have power -- although 2 crews were here and they have restrung the wires. Now apparently someone has to inspect the line and approve the turning on part. Just another step in the right direction --

In case you were wondering it has been an entire week without power.

Today was hot and humid-- 88 or 89 outside and the same in the house. At least outside we get a little breeze. So Trent and Owen enjoyed the outdoors and got in a cute little nap.

Notice the 2 leaves?? One on Owen's back and one by his feet??? Yes, those leaves just fell on him. I guess that means fall is coming.

Not sure I am ready for that, but oh well!!

Saturday's quick glimmer of hope --

We were so excited when we heard a large truck turn up the driveway!!

The kids all ran out to watch. This crew had come all the way from Kansas City.

I asked them, "Are you going to restore our electricity????"

"Nope, we are just a tree crew."

I was a little disappointed. I realize that their arrival meant we had not been entirely forgotten by CL&P, but I was really surprised that we even needed a tree crew. The town had already come by with a tractor and removed the tree that had fallen on the wires.

This crew set to work on the diagonal tree (you can see its trunk in the photo) that had branches that were way high above the power lines. That diagonal tree??? Nope it didn't fall during Irene. It had been like that for at least a year.

Had we notified CL&P of it? Yes, many, many times. In fact just 6 months ago our electric poles were replaced and all the wires were restrung and twice I went out and suggested to them that they trim back that tree, but they assured me that it wasn't going anywhere. (and it is not on our property so we can't touch it)

I sure find it interesting that they had no problem installing new poles and wires with that tree there, but they couldn't fix our wires in this emergency until that tree was cleared. Does that smell fishy to anyone???? I get the feeling they are using emergency funds and emergency resources to do their routine jobs that they have neglected for years. Perhaps that is why we had such power problems????


So while we may not have power (still), I am hoping this means we are one step closer.  I am just not sure how many steps there are. 

Tie Dye - a beginner's experience

Not having power causes one to be resourceful. I was trying to find something for the kids to do and had the following criteria

1. occupy a large chunk of time
2. not need electricity
3. not involve friends (since Owen is still feeling quite sick and under the weather)
4. would not evolve into a fight among the kids

And then I remembered these 2 craft kits for tie dying that the kids had gotten for their birthday and we had never used. I had "tucked them away for a rainy day". I realized that rainy day had arrived. I sent all the kids to find a white t-shirt that had a stain or two on it (I knew they all had one). We opened the box, rubberbanded and folded to our hearts content. We opted to use the dye's from only one of the kits -- in this one the dye is infused into string and you then wrap the string all over your shirt tucking it into your rubberbands to hold it.
here is a picture of the kit we used (the one with the strings)


Then all you do is fill a bowl with hot salt water and let them soak for 15 minutes.


The kids watched over the process VERY carefully.


We also got to review our primary and secondary colors as we watched the colors come alive and mix together. 



Here they are holding their finished products. 


Every kid's design and color scheme was unique to them and they had so much fun doing it.  The project wasn't messy at all and I loved that we found a fun way to use perfectly good t-shirts that they kids had gotten one little stain on. 


This is the other tie dye kit we have.  I just couldn't bring myself to use it.  This kit has the dye's in little squeeze bottles that you have to squirt all over the fabric.  I kept reading and re-reading the directions and this one looked MESSY to me.  Who knows???  Maybe we'll be without power long enough to tackle this kit as well. 

At 5:00, I took Owen to the dr.  Again they told me he didn't have anything except a virus.  I practically begged for antibiotics.  I have now taken him to the dr twice for this stupid illness both times to be told he just has a virus. 

Then we went to the town park where the town was providing dinner for all the residents again since we don't have electricity.  At least I didn't have to cook!!!!!

The random list of today

1. We still do not have electricity. (It went out Sunday at 6am). There is considerable debate in our town about how many days that means. To me this is my 5th day of no power.

Here is the opinion of the Office of Emergency Management in my town as posted on facebook.

"Just a reminder to those of you who are counting - today is DAY 4! The storm was Saturday and Sunday! Which means the count started Monday."

It is a little amazing that they are so worried about what day it is since the power went out. Too bad they aren't more worried about restoring the actual power, because that would be really helpful.

2. We were running out of propane to fuel the generator. If we don't have our generator we don't have things like -- WATER (since we are on a well and need a functioning well pump to have water), phone, internet, cable, TV, lights, etc. . . but here is my favorite photo of the day. I call it "FULL TANK"



3. I went to a friend's and did laundry. It sure feels good to have it done. Simple little luxuries that I am going with out.

4. The town provided dinner for all residents. It was really nice to not have to cook, hand wash pots and pans, hand wash dishes, and clean up. Thanks town -- now if you could just get the power on, you'd be great!!!!

5. Today, Sept 1st marks the kickoff of National Ovarian Cancer Awareness month. A year ago today, my mom was diagnosed with Stage 3c ovarian cancer. I wrote this blog post a year ago today. I was not expecting to drive into town today and find it all decked out in Teal ribbons. Given all that has been going on due to "IRENE", I (wrongly) assumed that those ribbons wouldn't be up . . .





Last year's photos were better, but hey given that school is not in session and power is not on and Owen is still not feeling good I am feeling pretty lucky to have snagged the photos on my phone!!!!

Lesson of the day : I'd give up all my electricity forever to have my mom back.