For or Four?

This weekend, Don and I were on Retreat. This is a Retreat that we attend annually, usually in the mountains but, this year, the Retreat was held in our town. On Wednesday before the Friday beginning of the Retreat, I found out that the friend that I thought was going to keep our children was unable. Apparently, she had called and left a message with Deanna, who had forgotten to tell me.

So, Thursday morning, I was scurrying around, trying to find someone I trusted to devote their entire weekend to our children. Don suggested a particular friend on his way out the door Thursday morning. I called her and asked if there was ANY block of time during the weekend that she might be able to watch our children so Don and I could attend at least one session together. She quickly remarked that she would keep them for the whole weekend. I was floored. It was amazingly gracious of this woman to agree, at the last minute, to give up her weekend to keep my children.

But Don and I were very uncertain what to do about church on Sunday. We would be attending church at the Retreat, but I wasn't sure Daelyn would be able to handle sitting through a service with someone else at their church. Our pediatrician has recommended we not put our children in any nurseries because Dane always seems to get sick after any of them have paid a visit to a nursery. He has asthma and is very susceptible to everything.

Don and I were still trying to come up with a solution on Saturday night when an announcement was maid that we could bring our children with us to church and the closing talk on Sunday.

We had to be at church, with the kids in tow, all the way across town (a 20-min. drive for us) by 8:30 Sunday morning. The final session ended at 1:00 p.m. The children were exhausted, as were Don and I. It had been a very busy, long weekend. We took off for home to eat lunch and get everyone bedded down for a good nap to try and recondition them before school Monday morning.

Our city was planning a Life Chain to visibly stand against abortion and show our support for Life. In the past, we've always attended these. But, under the circumstances, Don and I could just NOT see our way clear to add another thing onto the children's calendar.

I was talking with a girlfriend of mine last night at a funeral home during the visitation for the family of an old friend. My friend has several older children, as well as a daughter Deanna's age and a 4 1/2 year old son. She told me that her family had been able to attend the Life Chain.

Her 4 1/2 year old was holding a sign that said, "Abortion kills babies." A Catholic priest was walking by and saw this very young man holding this big sign and stopped.

"Do you know what that sign says," he asked little Jimmy.

"It says that abortion kills people," Jimmy responded, according to his mother. "And it's wrong!"

"So, Jimmy, are you for or against abortion?" the Priest asked, trying to help Jimmy better understand his purpose for being at the Life Chain.

"I'm four and a half."

Thanks, Judy, for the great story.

And may the soul of Helen Scholly rest in peace.

An Apology to All my Readers

It seems my family has begun to use my Blog as our own private family Chatroom, only not so private.

Deanna's birthday is Saturday, and we're trying to plan a Family Function to celebrate. It all started when I asked her what she wanted for dinner Saturday night. After some thought and concern that "we can't possibly afford to eat out - you just threw a party for Daddy", I finally convinced her that it was not her decision whether or not we could afford to eat out. She's a sensitive child and has a fair understanding of what things cost. And we almost never eat out, so she has this idea that it's horribly expensive. We don't eat out because my husband's a home-body and hates the hustle and bustle of restaurants. He wants to be able to sit when he wants, eat what he wants, leave when he wants, and not have to pay for the pleasure. So my children all labor under the thought that we almost never can afford to eat out.

Don, of course, fuels this fire. He loves that the children think this way - it's his easy way out. He can smile and say, "Yes, it's expensive. We better stay home."

Once I convinced Deanna that it wasn't her concern, she QUICKLY responded that she wanted to go to Veracruz for dinner. Veracruz is our local hole-in-the-wall Mexican restuarant where nobody speaks English and ordering requires much pointing, grunting, and smiling. But the food's great, the restaurant is clean, the fare is cheap, and the help attempts to be very accomodating. Not to mention the sombrero you get to wear and the song they sing to you on your birthday.

I asked if she wanted to invite her aunts, cousins, and grandparents, and she said, "Of course." So I started the calls. The first family member contacted asked what time we would be eating. Knowing that my father prefers to eat early, by about 5:30 because of stomach problems, and keeping in mind that my children have church the next morning and need to be in bed early, I decided we'd shoot for 5:30.

Herein lies the problem. GA is playing a "very important game" Saturday and it doesn't start until 3:30. One of my nephews is a UGA Grad, another is still in school there, and my niece is a huge follower of the Bulldogs. My father, also, watches every GA game and won't be pulled away from the TV for such an important game. Thus all the comments back and forth.

To complicate things a little more, my nephew from Alabama is supposed to be coming for a visit. Up till now, we've only seen him when he came with his parents for Christmas, but is now on his own and is planning a trip to see his cousins and grandparents. We don't know for sure when he'll arrive, but everyone wants to be sure we plan our day so as to include him. In addition, my sister, Toni (the fast, fun and friendly one), is working on Saturday, which is opening day for Target. Her schedule says she works from 4 - 11, so dinner for her would be out of the question, but Target is notorious for changing her schedule at the last minute, and I would hate to plan dinner at lunchtime so she can be there only to have them switch her hours to 8 - 3 and have her miss after all.

We also have the little issue of the fact that we were planning Deanna's birthday dinner for our family and, somehow, this has snowballed into everyone throwing in their bid for what time suits them best. I'm afraid, before long, the family will have changed the location, also, and we'll all be going to lunch at Sconyers, the local barbecue restaurant, for Deanna's Mexican birthday dinner. Maybe that would be better. Then we could take her to Veracruz for dinner and the entire problem would be solved.

Or, better yet, maybe we should plan two separate meals - lunch and dinner at different restaurants, and family members can choose which one suits them the best.

Ah, the joys of a large, close-knit family.

Revisiting an old topic

Saturday night, Don and I were coming home fairly late from a Retreat we were attending across town. We were on the Interstate loop when a stray dog ran across the highway. Don had to brake pretty fast to keep from hitting it. It was black and blended into the darkness, making it impossible to see until we were practically on top of it.

Don instinctively yelled, "Out of the way, you black alley dog. I almost hit you!"

At least I think it was instinctively.

A Cow isn't Really Such a Bad Thing

Yesterday, I wrote about Don giving me a pig and a cow pancake shape. I'm seriously hoping the pig was because ham is my favorite meat, BLT's my favorite sandwich, and I really like almost every other form of pork.

But, truthfully, there IS a story behind the cow. You see, I've been nursing for almost 9 years now - not all the same child, but I've worked through the ranks, weening one in time for the next to be born. In the case of Deanna and Dane, I actually nursed both of them at the same time. I didn't want Deanna to be jealous of Dane because her new baby took her place in Mommy's lap, so I decided to nurse them both for a time. I'd stack them in my lap - Deanna on the bottom and the new baby in HER lap. I really believe this is part of the reason they have such a close bond. From the moment we brought Dane home from the hospital, he and Deanna have shared everything, even nursing. You also have to figure in that Deanna was standing right outside of the Operating Room door when I had my emergency C-section with Dane, and she heard his first cry and got to see him moments after birth. She watched as they bathed him for the first time and cooed about how sweet her baby was.

Back to business. When Deanna was about 6 months old, I remarked to Don that I felt like the cow tethered in the backyard. It felt like my sole purpose in life was to provide milk for my growing family. If I had beans, broccoli or onions, Deanna got gas. If I had caffeine, she couldn't sleep. If I had wine, she could get drunk or damage brain cells. If I had spicy foods, she's get stomach cramps, rich foods would give her a tummy ache. Suddenly, everything I did - including eating and drinking - was about providing nutritious meals via my body for this little being who felt more like a part of my body than a separate entity.

I had to think constantly about what I was doing, including taking medicines, be certain I stayed hydrated, so I barely had time to think because I spent my whole life either nursing, getting ready to nurse, or cleaning up after nursing. I smelled like spoiled milk ALL the time and all my shirts had milk stains on the front that just doesn't come out in the wash. I would complain to Don about my frustrations and he would say, "Being the family cow isn't such a bad thing. You're providing for our children from your own body." At one point, he even took a picture of me nursing (that the photo shop refused to develop) because he thought I was the most beautiful ever when I was nursing our children. His feelings were really genuine, even if mine were a little more negative. He tried to encourage and, sometimes, succeeded. But, mainly, he learned to turn my frustration into humor by mooing at me whenever I was struggling.

One Sunday morning, while in church, Daelyn was sitting in my lap. He was over-tired, needed a nap, and just wanted to snuggle. He reached up and pinched me and in a rather loud voice, during an amazingly quiet moment during the service, said, "Mommy, NURSE ME. I need NURSIES." Embarrassed beyond belief, I sat there in shock while everyone within 3 pews of me turned around and smiled at me. Don, attempting to alleviate my humiliation with laughter, leaned over and moo-ed at me. He was trying to be quiet and only reach my ears, but missing by a longshot, and the same three rows in every direction HEARD!! Laughter indeed broke out. My face resembled a tomato more than a cow. But I knew, although Don had been a little louder than he intended, it was done in love. He really sees my ability to nurse our children as a tremendous gift so, for him, thinking of me as a cow is a bit of a compliment.

I try really hard to remember each time he moos at me or I spot my cow pancake form in the bottom drawer in my kitchen that it's a symbol of his love and respect for me. So I guess a cow shape isn't such a bad thing, after all.

More fun Breakfasts

A few years ago, I decided to attempt an old trick my mother used to do. She would make animal-shaped pancakes. She had this wonderful old electric griddle that you could put 6 pancakes on at a time. The shape of the pancakes were indelibly etched into the griddle.

Every now and then, not so often as to spoil us, on a Saturday, Mom would make animal shapes out of pancake batter. She’s always been great at drawing bunnies and cows, foxes and goats, and she’d use that same talent to form pancakes into these creative shapes. Us kids LOVED it. We would beg her to make animal shapes every time we had pancakes.

I decided that if she could do it, I ought to be able to. So, one day, I tried it. Just like I remembered, my children loved it. Although the shapes were a little rough (I’m not the artist my mother is), you generally could tell what the animals were and the kids thought it was great fun, putting in their bid for this kind of animal or that kind.

Over a couple of years time, this became a fairly frequent activity. One year, around Christmas, I split the batter into two batches and added food coloring to them - one red, the other green. I made Christmas trees and ornaments to hang on the tree, and I even let the children have M&M’s and red hot’s to decorate their trees. I tried chocolate chips in some and sprinkled nuts in others. I made stockings, stars, a Santa hat, and attempted a train. We had a wonderful time.

We had such a fun time, in fact, that Don got involved. He wouldn’t make any, but he stood over me giving suggestions and critiquing my artistry.

That year, for Christmas, each of us had a similar shaped package under the tree from Don. He buys his own presents every year for the children. We discuss and decide what to get them, I buy it and wrap it from us, and then he goes out and buys his own gifts - just from Dad. He refuses to tell me what the gifts are or give me any hints at all, so it’s always a surprise for me, too, when the children open their presents from Daddy. The children have grown to love this tradition and really appreciate that Daddy chooses gifts for them JUST from him.

So, we all had these odd-shaped packages. I believe Deanna was the first to open hers. She had these wonderful metal pancake shapes with a little wooden handle to lift the shape once the pancake’s ready. Don had given her a little girl shape and a heart. She hugged and kissed her Daddy, then held the heart close to her and smiled over at me. I knew the heart meant something very special to her. She understood it meant that Daddy was telling her she was HIS heart.

Next came Daelyn. He got a dinosaur shape (he LOVES dinosaurs) and a teddy bear - he’s Daddy’s snuggly bear. I just couldn’t believe what a good job Don had done picking out the perfect shapes for each of the children.

After seeing sissy and brother’s shapes, Dane decided he wanted to open his. He got a little boy shape and, his special one from Daddy, a star. You don’t have to think very hard to figure out what this meant. Neither did Dane. He instantly knew that Daddy was telling him he was a star. He hugged Don’s neck excitedly and started babbling about making pancakes for breakfast.

“But Mommy hasn’t opened hers yet,” Don said. “Go ahead, Mommy, open yours.” The kids began chanting “Open yours, Mom, open yours,” so I decided I better get right to that present. I tore off the paper, unraveled the tissue, and what did I find?

A pig and a cow.

Don swears mine had absolutely no meaning - that he bought an 8-pack and carefully chose the ones he wanted to give to the children and gave me the leftovers.

Needless to say, we seldom eat pig- and cow-shaped pancakes. The stars, teddy bears and hearts are sufficient and don’t require that Daddy sleep on the couch.

Fun Breakfasts

My children love fun breakfasts. It really is their favorite meal of the day, and I've always worked to make it enjoyable for them, rather than just slapping a box of cereal in front of them. Monkey bread, sweet rolls, homemade doughnuts out of biscuits are all typical fare. When Deanna started school, we started buying pop-tarts, thinking they would be fun for the kids. They liked them for a couple of years, until they discovered Toaster Streudel. Who wants dry old pop-tarts when you can have toaster streudel?

Toaster streudel comes with an individual little packet of frosting for each piece. While the streudel is warm from the toaster, you're supposed to add the frosting. Of course, all the pictures on the commercials and the package show these beautiful rows of frosting. My children, on the other hand, like pictures on their toaster treat.

You have to understand, I don't have an artistic bone in my body. My house is all painted plain Creamy White, the only variation being that the kitchen and bathrooms have semi-gloss and the rest of the house has flat paint. I did get a little adventurous with my bedroom and chose a taupe color that I really love with my oriental comforter. But much of the house has no pictures or any adornment up on the walls, and there's no cute "theme" running through my house (other than "children live here - can ya tell?").

Don comes from a long line of artistic talent. His mother is a concert violist, his father had a career as a Chemist but, on the side, did nature printing. He developed his own technique for printing items from nature and is known as the Thomas Edison of Nature Printing. Two pieces of his work were featured in the Smithsonian Institute (and this is just a hobby that he does in his spare time). My in-laws have a man-made stream and pond in their backyard and a greenhouse. They both can put together in minutes some of the most beautiful, creative arrangements you could ever want to see with fresh flowers from their greenhouse.

Don's paternal grandmother was a painter and the few adornments we do have in our house are mostly oils or watercolors she painted. My mother-in-law's home is full of paintings from her father-in-law and mother-in-law. I believe she also has artists in her family, but I can't remember who.

Don is musically-talented. In addition to directing and writing music for the Handbell Choir, he plays the bass guitar, the piano, the recorder, and played the clarinet in the Symphony Orchestra with his mother and sister while in High School. He has talents I haven't even discovered yet.

The children inherited all this amazing talent (we DO have talent on my side of the family, as well, in my mother and sisters who have a wide-range of impressive talents) and the one member of the family that seems to have missed out on it all is me. I even have trouble getting the Creamy White up on the walls. Artistic, I am not.

So, the children, who have these eyes for great art, would request pictures on their Toaster Streudel. At first, it started with houses with smoke coming out of the chimney. There were pictures of Shrek and renditions of their daddy and I. I wrote their names in cursive on their breakfast. Before long, they wanted more and more ornate decorations and, soon, the half an hour we have for breakfast on school days was entirely taken up with me putting frosting pictures on their toaster streudel.

I knew it was entirely out of hand when Dane asked me one morning for a picture of him surfing in the ocean with the sun setting behind him, a few clouds in the sky, Daelyn sitting on the beach building a sand-castle, and Deanna and I in a sailboat further out on the water waving to him as he surfed. In blue frosting. On a 4 x 2 inch pastry. By a mother who can only draw stick people. In the 5 minutes I had before he had to eat so he wouldn't be late for school.

I managed to accomplish it that one time, purely by the Grace of God, but put an end to the frosting pictures. Now they have wavy, not-so-neat lines going up and down, in an attempt to re-create the inviting picture on the box.

Breakfast lost a little interest for a time, but they still had animal shape pancakes, which I'll tell you about tomorrow.

Love means Limits

Daelyn, glancing sideways at me in a booth at Arby's while chewing on a chicken finger:
"I love you, Mommy. And when you spank me, I know YOU love me. You're my best Mommy."

Could it be that he's getting it? Hard to imagine in a 3-yr. old, but maybe it's true. His capacity for love and affection certainly has deepened recently.

Last week, I was with Deanna and someone was talking about how they spanked their children out of love. I caught Deanna's eye and she was smiling at me. "Do you get that, little girl?" I asked.

"Yes, Mama, I really do," she replied. "I know that it's parents that don't care about their children that don't discipline them. It's like the Bible talks about, 'the Lord disciplines those whom He loves'." She smiled again, quite proud that she understood discipline to be a loving thing to prepare her for the hard world, not torture.

I smiled, too, remembering how hard it was to spank her when she was little. She was so-o-o-o sweet and loving and joyful. Her daddy went to our bedroom, laid on the bed, and cried the first time he had to spank her. But she was always happier after a spanking, knowing where her limits were. And even Daddy could see that.

I pray often that the fruit of our discipline will be happy, contented children that understand the limits society, prudence, kindness, and God put on them and easily live within those limits. It seems we might be getting somewhere.

He's there in the busyness

Last night, I went to a meeting that I was dreading. It's not really that I didn't want to go the meeting, it was that I didn't want to "go", period. Life is so busy and, with Don's party last week and his family coming in, I worked double-time all last week to clean and prepare. I had several 1:30 a.m. mornings which, to some people, may be a regular routine (like Jan at "The Joy of the Lord is my Strength"), but I'm one of those people that require 9 hours of sleep a night to be able to function. For several weeks, I've been going to bed around 9:30 p.m. and rising at 6:30 a.m. and have been feeling the most rested I've felt in years. I've been happier, less irritated with the children, and don't "have to have a nap" in the mid-afternoon, struggling to push through without one.

In addition to very late nights, I've been going non-stop. Dane has Cub Scouts on Monday evening twice a month now, I have a meeting every Tuesday night, we have to be at Church by 6:00 p.m. on Wednesdays for Deanna's choir practice and Don's, Dane's and my Handbell Choir Practice, we attend a prayer meeting on Thursday nights, and we absolutely collapse on Friday. Dane also has soccer practice on Friday afternoons from 4 - 5 p.m. and games on Tuesday afternoons from 4 - 5, and Deanna has her Girl's Group (like Brownies, but called "Little Sisters") two Wednesdays a month from 3:15 to 4:45, which I lead.

My sister posted yesterday about choosing a quiet, still life to be able to focus on the Lord. That's a joke for me. But I take comfort in the words of Javier Abad and Eugenio Fenoy in their book, "Marriage: A Path to Sanctity". In their chapter on "The Sanctification of Matrimony", they state

"In the first place, Christian couples should live a spirituality which is eminently lay and secular. It would be wrong for them to adopt a spirituality proper to priests and religious....
It is this condition that determines the spirituality proper to Christian couples. It leads them not to withdraw from the world like the religious, but to devote themselves to enthroning Christ at the summit of all human activities, of all the family, social, and professional responsibilities they have...In the case of married couples, this means finding Christ in and through the fulfillment of family duties; it means showing their love for God in the effort to face the difficulties of married life with a generous heart and a spirit of self-abnegation."

Despite our busyness, Christ WILL be present to me in meeting the needs of my family, my daily chores, and my part in the education on my children. I will see HIS hand in the way I respond to fighting siblings. I will hear HIS voice whispering direction in my ear when I'm confused or uncertain. I will feel HIS hand guiding me through my work, and I will feel HIS presence always beside me as I meet the needs of this very active family He's entrusted to me.

There is great hope even in busyness. God sends us His mercy, falling like raindrops.

P.S. I thoroughly enjoyed the meeting last night. I got some prayers and had a wonderful time of worship and fellowship with dear friends. I'm very glad I went.

Alley-cat-itis

We live one house from a corner in our neighborhood. So we have neighbors not only to the right and left and across the street, but kitty-corner there are 3 houses and people behind us, as well. One of the corner families have a lot of pets, including several cats who have become several more cats until the place is crawling with CATS. This woman doesn't seem to appreciate the thought of indoor pets. Her cats roam the entire neighborhood and love our yard and deck.

Somewhere along the line, my sister, Toni, showed the Disney movie "Aristocats" to my kids. I don't know if they just like the term "alley cat" or if they think any cat found outside a house is an alley cat, but they use it in reference to the ones roamin' in our yard.

I've tried repeatedly to explain (being the English major that I am) that these cats are not alley cats. They have an owner (even if she doesn't take good care of them or contain them), they don't live in the city, and we have NO ALLEYs in our neighborhood. Regardless of my reasoning, Daelyn still calls them alley cats. Often.

A couple of days ago, we were eating dinner at the kitchen table which is surrounded by windows on two sides. (Come to think of it, we never had this problem with alley cats until we built our breakfast nook.) A stray dog ran through our backyard. Daelyn spotted it and yelled, "Look, mommy, a black alley dog!"

This "alley"-thing is absolutely out of control. I determined to redouble my efforts to convince the children that there are no alley-anythings running through our yard, because THERE ARE NO ALLEYS. I've really stayed on top of the kids and corrected them every time they use "alley" in a sentence. I figure they'll get so tired of hearing me correct them, they'll stop saying that. I was pretty sure it was working. Either that or no cats had run through our yard lately - until last night.

We're sitting at the dinner table, eating Don's birthday dinner. Daelyn glances out the window and ...

Daelyn: "Mommy, there's a black alley cat in our yard."
Deanna: "It's not black, baby. It was a different color. What is that color, Mama?"
Me: "It's a tabby cat, like our Frolic used to be, only a different color. And it's not an alley cat. There are NO alleys in our neighborhood."
Don: "It's not black, it's not an alley, and it's not a cat."
Dane: Staring blankly. I don't think he got it.
Deanna (giggling): "Daddy, I'm quite sure it was a cat."

Don stood up, reached over, and began closing the Roman shades on the windows. Aha! Thank God he thinks differently from me, or we'd all be checking into Sunnybrook Farms babbling about cats, dogs, and alleys after I drove the entire family nutso explaining the non-existence of alleys in our neighborhood for the millionth time.

Why didn't I think of that? If the blinds are closed, the children will never see the stray cats or the "alley dogs".

More often than I care to admit, God's mercy for me is named Don.

He's already missed 3 days of school

I don't know what to do about Dane. Friday morning, before anyone's alarms went off, he came and crawled into bed with me. He coughed almost continuously and seemed to be having trouble breathing. It was a foggy morning and sticky with humidity, so I decided before 7:00 that this was a day to stay home from school. Our school is not air-conditioned. It's old and brick and someday I'm sure we'll have a fund-raiser for air conditioning, but until then, hot humid days are very difficult, especially for the children that suffer from asthma. One of the boys in Dane's class that has a more severe case was out all last week.

The school has a policy that if the temperature plus heat index reaches a certain point, school dismisses. They have a special little meter that's used for sporting events that accurately measures all that stuff. On days that the forcast appears that it will reach that high, they cancel or dismiss at lunchtime, so they can take advantage of the cooler mornings. They dismissed at noon the previous Friday because of the forecast, but every day is pretty hot and they have to have school sometime.

Each morning, when we've arrived at school well before starting time, they've had all the hallway doors propped open with huge box fans in them, the windows of every classroom open, and fans going in every room, attempting to cool them down before the heat of the day. By the end of the school day, you're hot, sticky, and need a cool shower (Deanna pretty much heads straight for the bathroom when she gets home), but it's bearable - at least for those without respiratory problems.

So, I called Dane's teacher (who lives across the street from us and is a close family friend) and told her I wasn't going to send him. She said she had been out walking at 5:30 and it was so foggy and sticky, she was having trouble breathing. She much preferred that I keep him home so she wouldn't have to be concerned about monitoring his breathing while she was trying to teach.

We gave him a few puffs off his rescue inhaler and kept him in the air conditioning most of the day. He seemed to do just fine. We had a good but very busy weekend and the children got very little sleep. Now we get to the problem part.

Last night, he couldn't get to sleep. He complained that he was having trouble breathing, that his chest hurt... His daddy finally put him in our bed about 10:00 and gave him a jet nebulizer treatment. He fell asleep and slept pretty soundly except when I woke him up to move him into his bunkbed. But it's hot again today, and I'm worried. I walked the kids to school and he seemed to be breathing just fine, but I was sweaty and sticky by the time I got home, and I was able to come into the air conditioning to cool down. He's stuck in the humidity for the rest of the day.

When we gave his teacher his rescue inhaler, she was a little overwhelmed and asked how she would know when to use it, so I asked his allergist, who gave me an excellent list of symptoms for her to watch for - things like inability to complete a full sentence without taking a breath, coughing a lot ... I'll sit by the phone today and hope I don't get a call, but you can bet I'm not going to get very far from the ringtone.

Maybe I can start a fundraising effort to get room sized air conditioning units.

So much for Cracker Barrel

Well, we pulled it off - barely and certainly not without incident. I had a surprise 40th birthday party for Don last night. His birthday is tomorrow, but his parents were driving down from West Virginia and his sister was flying over from Colorado, so it necessitated the party being on Saturday night.

Even though all the children knew about it (it was impossible to not have them in the loop - they were helping me with the shopping, overhearing phone calls, assisting with the guest list...), not a one of them slipped - or so I thought. Come to find out, after the fact, Daelyn has been secretly feeding Daddy information. Don has been eating Low-Carb for about a year and a half, so I made a special ice cream cake for him with sugar-free ice cream. I put some of his carb free bars in the food processor, crumbled them, and sprinkled the crumbs between the layers of ice cream. Then I softened cream cheese, added Splenda, lemon extract, and coloring, and used it to decorate the top of the cake. I was really excited and new Don would be pleased that I had gone to so much effort to make a cake he could eat. Last night he said, "You know, Daelyn told me about the cake. He said, 'Mommy put cookie crumbs on your ice cream cake.'"
He further told me that I had replaced the ice cream I used in his cake with the wrong stuff. Apparently, he had bought butter almond, which I had used in his cake. But I didn't pay close enough attention to the carton and replaced it with butter pecan. It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out I had made him an ice cream cake.

There were lots of other slips, as well, and more lying than I care to admit to keep it a surprise and get Don out of the house so we could decorate. However, all-in-all, it was a fun party and everyone in attendance seemed to really enjoy themselves.

Don's sister hadn't seen Dane since he had just turned one, Deanna since she was three, and had never met Daelyn. She was only here for 2 1/2 hours, but she didn't have to leave for the airport until 10:00 this morning, so Don's parents decided to meet her for breakfast. We were trying to figure out the best place for them to meet and I suggested Cracker Barrel. Daelyn ran to me screaming and yelled, "Not Cracker Barrel - Waffle Barrel, that's where we need to go."

We decided to join them, as well, to give Don and the kids a little more time with their Auntie that they barely know. We arrived about 5 minutes late at Cracker Barrel. As we were trying to get settled, Daelyn ran to my elbow. "Mama, Mama," she yelled in my ear, then grabbed my chin and turned it towards his face. "This IS Waffle Barrel. Look! There's a reindeer over there."

I had absolutely no idea what he was talking about. I thought, perhaps, he had seen some Santa item in the gift shop. But he kept pointing towards the fireplace. I looked long and hard and finally saw the deer head mounted above the fireplace. Ah! A reindeer head - must be Waffle Barrel, after all.

Sweet as Sugar

When Deanna was born, she was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. I know most people feel that way about their new babies, but I had always thought newborns weren't real great-looking - pointy heads, spastic movements, flat noses, wrinkly skin...

Deanna was born at 39 weeks, 5 days by C-Section. Her skin was smooth and pink (at least after 24 hours - for the first 24 she was as red as a fire engine), she had soft, curly light brown hair, her eyes were huge and beautiful blue, she had long, thick dark eyelashes and a lovely little bow mouth. She was petite and amazing and, when she nursed, she crossed her little legs at the ankles - so feminine. She was an extremely alert baby who would look directly in your eyes and smile - no spastic movements for her. I had only seen one other baby in my life as beautiful as her and that was my niece, Alicia. Alicia wasn't but 6 pounds, was jaundiced so she was bronzy-yellow, had thin dark hair and was the most stunning thing I had ever seen - before Deanna.

When I would take Deanna out in public, people would always try and take her out of my arms. Literally, everyone that saw her told me that she was the most beautiful baby they had ever seen. One woman approached me in Wal-Mart one day, holding her own baby, and gushed over Deanna, following me around the store telling me how beautiful she was. My friend, Jane, told me that I should take advantage of her beauty while she was small and get her into modeling, make a ton of money, and then pull her out when she hit about 5. Somehow, I was never willing to put Deanna through the rigors of modeling.

When Dane was born, I was, of course, expecting another beauty. After all, Don had proven that he made pretty babies. Dane was 4 weeks early; I went into labor at 36 weeks. I had a C-Section with him, also, and the first time I saw him, I was shocked. He had no eyebrows or eyelashes, his eyes were oval-shaped, he had no hair on the top of his head, and when he opened his eyes, they were jet black. His face was inverted pear-shaped. He was sort of cute in an awkward way when his eyes were closed but, when he opened his eyes - - - ALIEN FROM THE X-FILES. Honest to goodness, he looked exactly like those green alien pictures. I kept telling Don who would fuss at me for talking that way. But, like I said, I'm not one to think ALL newborns are beautiful. We just got off to a great start with Deanna.

I even went so far as to tell Don that no one was going to try and take him from me when I took him out in public. He was a very strange-looking baby. But, before I knew it, Dane came into his own. Don's genes took over and he grew eyebrows and eyelashes, his eyes turned the most shocking shade of clear blue, and he grew some hair. Then his sweetness began to come out. Oh, my gosh!! Could any other child possibly be as sweet? And, sure enough, before he was a year old, people were trying to take him from me everywhere I went. One day, I was in Wal-Mart with Dane in the seat of the buggy. Deanna was walking next to me. A woman came over on the other side of me, spotted Dane, and said, "That's the most beautiful baby I have ever seen." Deanna peeked shyly from around the other side of my legs and smiled at the woman. "Except for that baby," she added.

And Dane is sweet - pure sugar sweet. It's hard to imagine a child more gentle, kind, and loving than Dane. He is a big block of sweetness in a beautiful package.

Marry into good genes, my friends. Not only will you get amazingly attractive children, but the sweetest imaginable, as well.

It has to stay clean!

Deanna's in the kitchen studying Social Studies with her Grandpa. She has a test on her first unit on Tuesday. Dane stayed home from school today because his asthma kicked in this morning and I was afraid it would be too hot in the classroom for him. He just woke up from a long nap and is snuggling his daddy on the loveseat. Daelyn has just managed to single-handedly destroy the den once again, and grandma is chilling in the recliner.

My in-laws arrived this morning from West Virginia. They came for the weekend since Don's birthday is Monday. I furiously cleaned yesterday, staying up until 1:00 a.m. Although I only put a dent in the messes, the dining room is clean and neat and I got all the kitchen counters cleaned off. Most of the living room is clean and everything was picked up off the den floor.

I've been busy all day. I started out the day with a trip to the Allergist for my weekly shots and returned to find Grandma and Grandpa here. We visited for a while, then I decided I better get started on dinner. As I began dinner preparations, I realized it was lunchtime, so I needed to pull that together. After lunch, I had to get Daelyn down for his nap and then Grandma and I ran to the grocery store. I did some cleaning in the kitchen and it was time to pick up Deanna from school. Now I'm trying to convince Don to take the kids to the hotel where G & G are staying for a nice swim in the pool. I figure while he's gone, I can get a little more cleaning done.

I love it when my in-laws visit. Not only are they wonderful people who love and appreciate Don and me and our children, but it also is a great way to ensure my house gets cleaned every now and then. Unfortunately, they don't visit near often enough.

Don and I have been asked to put together a Colonial American booth for a local Christmas Festival. We will need to prepare costumes for all the people working in the booth, make and sell authentic period crafts, make and sell authentic period baked goods, make and sell a dinner meal that meets the same criteria, decorate, arrange for some type of authentic entertainment - skit, play or activity - to be performed hourly during the 4-5 hour festival, and prepare vignettes that display life activities during that time period. We have two months to pull this together.

Obviously, I'm like a crazy person. We seriously considered whether or not we would be able to pull this off and still manage Christmas for our own family, but Don felt like I had a vision for it and I had already done a pile of research about crafts, customs, dress and food in Colonial Virginia, not to mention that we've visited Colonial Williamsburg as a family and I've been there several times by myself.

We are just on the brink of embarking in a huge task and are praying we won't drown in the task before us. I told Don to enjoy the house being clean and neat - it may be the last time it is until after Christmas!!

Just how old IS Daelyn

I know this is highly unusual for me, writing twice in one day. But my in-laws will be here tomorrow morning to celebrate Don's 40th birthday, my house is an absolute wreck, so I seem to be in that "final exam tomorrow, what else can I do to procrastinate" mode. Besides, Daelyn said something today that was so cute, I had to write about it.

One of his best friends, Kolbe, turned 4 today. His mama, Kelly, usually keeps birthdays low-key and has a small special dinner with just the family, sometimes inviting godparents. For this one, however, she decided to go all-out. She had a Pirate Party. She sent us invitations that were absolutely darling that she made herself. They said, "Ahoy, Matey, come to a Pirate Party" or something similar.

The party was to start at 12:00 and run to 2:00. Moms were invited (it's hard to keep 3 & 4 year olds under control without a lot of moms to help run the show) and she was serving Papa John's pizza. When we arrived, the Pirate theme was in full force. A couple of the boys were bedecked in pirate paraphenalia. Each boy had a treat bag on the table with their name and a mylar birthday balloon attached. In the center of the table was a huge, gold treasure chest that I later found out was a pinata. The boys rushed to open their bags, each containing a pirate's eye patch, a blow-up Spanish-looking sword/scabbard, several plastic gold or silver coins, a single gold dangly earring, and a kerchief head covering.

My, were those boys in Heaven. They had a wonderful time. They all put on their stuff, then ran outside to play in the yard. Later, we had pizza, hit the pinata in the yard (which was full of more coins and candy), then opened gifts and had a marvelous chocolate torte Kelly had made with chocolate ice cream on the side. It was an absolute blast. One of Kolbe and Daelyn's friends, who plays often with the boys, was a little mopey while Kolbe opened his presents. We asked him what was wrong. "I don't get to open anything," he fussed. We elbowed each other, smiled, and said, "Oh, yes, you did. You got to open your treat bag. Wasn't that fun?" Aunt Kelly thought of everything.

As the smoke began to clear and we began repacking each boy's treat bags with their "stuff", Daelyn came over to me and wrapped his arms around my leg. "Did you have fun, son?" I asked. He smiled. "Do you know how old Kolbe is today," I continued, a little uncertain if Daelyn realized Kolbe was turning 4 ahead of him and his friends. "Four," Daelyn responded and held up four fingers.

"Great, son," I responded, pleased he understood. "And how old will you be on your next birthday?"

"I'm thwee now," he said, thoughtfully, "and on my birthday, I'll be 10."

Daelyn wakes up talking

Don returned last night from a four-day business trip. It wouldn't have been so bad except that he was just out of town last week for 3 days at the funeral of his grandmother. I didn't miss him near as much as I thought I would this trip - I was just plain too busy. Where it did hit me, though, was the nightime. I didn't sleep at all while he was gone.

I'm not quite as eloquent as my friend, Jan, whose husband was on a business trip this week, also. She has had a tough week, which seems to be typical of her husband's business trips. Jan experiences physical attacks (flooded basement, freezer breaking, sickness) while her husband is gone. I seem to experience spiritual attacks. Mine all seem to be relationship-oriented - fights with the children, seemingly unsurmoutable problems in assignments I've been given, etc.

But Don is home now, and the world seems brighter, somehow sunnier, with his presence. When he returned from Colorado, he brought presents for all the children - thank goodness for gift shops in airports. This time he prepared the children and told them not to expect presents. He told them that he would be working and there would not be anyplace for him to buy presents for them. Last night, they knew he was due home any minute, so everyone was listening attentively, while doing their nightime chores, for the sound of the door opening. When he arrived, he was greeted with much screaming and hugging, then he began unloading. In came, despite what he had told the children, GIFTS. Deanna got a heart necklace that lights up bright blue and a glow-in-the-dark dinosaur puzzle. Daelyn got a little airplane that shoots off a spring with a trigger and a Mega Blocks car. Dane got a net for a soccer ball that's on a long cord and attached to a holster that wraps around his waist. That way, the ball never gets away from you and you can learn to control the ball while running. He thanked his daddy profusely and then commented that he didn't have a soccer ball. Don asked me about it and I told him that Deanna owned the only soccer ball in the family. I asked Deanna to run and get her soccer ball so Dane could try out his net. Don disappeared and reappeared with a brand new yellow soccer ball for Dane.

It took a while to get the kids settled down to bed. They were all pretty excited. Daelyn was the hardest, talking his daddy's ear off. Don even heard about the new drinks I bought for the kids' lunchboxes. Don and I finally hit the bed at about 10:00.

At 5:12 a.m., Deanna appeared at the side of my bed, fully dressed and fussing at me because I was late. "Late?" I asked. "Late for what?"

"School," she responded. "You didn't get me up on time."

"Deanna, it's 5:12 in the morning. My alarm doesn't even go off for over another hour, and I don't get you up until 7:00. GO BACK TO BED!"

"Oh," she commented softly. "I guess I misread my clock."

About the time I got to sleep again, I was awakened by Daelyn's high-pitched, squeeky voice talking, yet again, to Don. Talk, talk, talk, talk, front door opening and shutting, silence. Footsteps coming down the hallway and - pounce - Daelyn climbs up on top of me.

Finally accepting that there was no hope of further sleep, despite the fact that this was the first good night's sleep I've had in several, I rolled to my back and smiled at Daelyn.

"So, you were talking to Daddy again this morning, huh?" I asked him. He responded affirmatively. "What were you talking about?"

"I had lots of important sings to discuss with him," he said, quite matter-of-fact and adult-sounding.

I grinned. I could just imagine what "important sings" he had to talk with Daddy about.

"I had to tell him all about the Hedawinds house. They almost have the roof done and they're putting bwick up. It's weally coming along."

The Hedawinds, Hedlunds to the rest of us, are the family that Don lived with before we married. They used to live in a neighboring town across the river but have sold their home and are building just down the road from us. We walk by their house on the way to school each day. The contractor is working on the exterior brick and the house really is coming along. It's exciting to see. We've been watching since the lot was cleared and there's been much accomplished since then. Obviously, Daelyn's been watching as well.

Most of us require some time to wake up in the morning. Not Daelyn. He wakes up talking and he had important things to discuss with Daddy. Deanna was confused about the time, and Mommy, yet again, didn't get much sleep. Don just called a few minutes ago and laughingly greeted me with, "Good morning, for the third or fourth time." It's good to have him home. Maybe tonight we'll get back to normal, but I'm not counting on it.

It's my hair, not my skin

I ran into a friend yesterday at Dane's soccer game that I hadn't seen since the Spring. She said, "Wow, you really have a good tan!" Do I, I wondered. Such a small little comment to take up so much mind time.

I really did think I had a good tan during the summer. Not that I was trying, but we joined a pool this year and between that and the week at the beach, I bronzed nicely. I was quite proud until I made some comment about it and Deanna ran over and laid her arm next to mine. She was several shades darker than me and made me look quite pale by contrast.

She has Don's skin and seems to absorb the sun. While I turn red to tan, she turns beautiful brown and keeps her tan practically till the beginning of the next summer. She got so dark this summer, we jokingly told her she looked like she had changed races and was Indian instead of Caucasian.

So, I continue to wonder. Do I really have that great a tan, which has already faded tremendously, or do I just look tanned now that my hair is so much lighter?

Sunday, we dressed for church, and I wore a dress a bought a few years ago for Mother's Day. It's periwinkle blue. As we were walking out the door, Deanna said, "Mom, THAT hair color looks great with that dress." Then she went on to explain that she couldn't call it "my" hair, because it wasn't.

The funny thing is, this is the color my hair was my whole childhood. This is the way I remember myself and I am never surprised when I catch sight of myself in a mirror with this hair color. In the past, when my hair began to darken so much, I found that it often was a stranger looking back at me in the mirror. The eyes and shape of the face were right, but the hair - something was wrong.

I don't know if it's really my skin shade or my hair, but in either case, I'm thrilled I looked tanned and I choose to take this as a huge compliment.

Bad things happen

Several comments on my Post from yesterday prompted today's. Talli and Colette, I hope both of you get a chance to read this. It might spark some interesting comments.

Several years ago, more than 10 anyway, my father went blind. It started with one eye and then, about 5 years later, began affecting the other eye. His blindness is caused by hardening of the arteries. The eye doctors refer to it as a rare form of glaucoma, but the truth is, it's caused by the arteries in the eyes hardening until the blood cannot flow through them to feed the eye. The blood vessels in his eyes began to burst as the blood built up on one side of the blockage. He endured a few very painful surgeries in which the blood vessels were cleared via lasers, but the damage was, eventually, unstoppable, and his eye died. The second eye still has some vision. He can see shadows, mostly, but can read some things with the help of equipment that blows his newspaper and correspondence up very large.

My father is one of the kindest, funniest, strongest, wisest men you could ever want to meet. He grew up in the northwoods of Canada in an area where very few white men lived. His hometown is now part of a Cree Indian Reservation. His father, uncle and aunts and grandparents founded the town where he grew up and were the first white settlers in that part of Canada. He lived in a log cabin built by my grandfather with a large wood-burning stove in the middle of the living room for heat. It was his responsibility, as the oldest son, to keep it stoked and fueled during the night. The floors were covered by bear-skins and there was no inside plumbing or electricity. My grandfather was a hunter and trapper and worked during the summer months for the forestry. My father worked alongside of him. As a young boy (preteen), when he chopped his thumb off splitting firewood, he traveled by himself by hiking through the woods for over a day until he reached the traintracks, then caught a train to the nearest large town, checked himself into a hospital, had his thumb amputated, recovered for several weeks, and then made his way back home again by the same route. He grew up hard and tough, just like the land and people around him.

Later, he joined the American Army and, after being busted down to Private twice and thrown in the Stockade, finally put his hand to the plough and decided to make the Army his life. He rose to the rank of CW4, Chief Warrant Officer, an enlistedman whose rank is so high, he's considered an officer. He was one of a handfull of men approved by Congress to stay in past the mandatory retirement age because of his expertise.

Upon his retirement, he went to Seminary (not an easy job for a man of his advanced age), and was ordained a Methodist Minister. He served many churches until his blindness forced his retirement from the ministry.

He was a combat veteran who served two tours in Vietnam and speaks multiple languages, including French, Cree Indian, Vietnamese, . . .

When my father lost his first eye, I grieved. When he began to go blind in his other, I got angry. I screamed at God, begged for healing for my Daddy, and spent untold hours on my knees crying out to God for an explanation of why He could allow such a terrible thing to happen to such a just, honorable, and godly man. My rationalization was something like, "If you treat those who love you like this, no wonder you don't have many friends." Although I had a deep faith, it was shaken to its core. I just couldn't believe that God wouldn't choose to heal my father, His beloved servant, who had such a marvelous ministry.

God never did heal my Daddy. On my wedding day, he was unable to see me as he walked me up the aisle. I'm tearing up now as I write these words. I wanted so desperately for him to be able to see my children - their beautiful faces, recognize the resemblance between my babies and their family members. But he doesn't see them well enough to distinguish features.

What God did do, though, is give my father an even greater ministry that he would never have had without his blindness. My father became a missionary. Last year, he went to Africa for a month - by himself. My mother wasn't able to go with him, so he made the decision to go by himself. He had never been on a mission lasting over two weeks before and he always had help with his medicines, getting around, etc. We were all very worried, but he was sure God had spoken clearly to him and promised to protect him.

In the part of Africa where my father went, there were 13 unreached tribes. They fear white men and, thus, had never been brought the Gospel. My little, sweet, white-haired, blind Daddy was accepted by and able to reach 9 of these 13 tribes. He brought the Gospel to people who had never before allowed this type of contact. But this little blind old man was NO THREAT to these aboriginies. When he appeared with his safari vest and white walking cane, they embraced him and even allowed pictures to be taken of him with them, previously an absolute no-no.

My father has returned 3 or 4 times to Vietnam. He has a great love for the Vietnamese people. During the war, he worked as an advisor to the South Vietnamese Infantry and lived with them, eating their food and dressing the way they dressed. On these return trips, he toured areas where he had been stationed during the War and believes he met some men who had been young boys in the village where he worked during his first tour. They remembered things about him that he had not shared with them. The Vietnamese people have a huge respect for the elderly, mainly because their people seldom live to old age. So, to see this OLD man, who's blind, coming to their country blesses them hugely.

Over the years since he went blind, I've begun to understand a little better why God allowed his blindness. I've developed a personal theology about bad things happening to good people that goes something like this:

God created the earth and life to function a certain way. Creation, or nature, has certain rules that God established at the dawn of time. Human life has built-in safeguards and risks. In order to ensure successful procreation, God created our bodies to dispel life that would not live outside the womb. He did not create illness, but it is a natural part of life (or, as my Catholic friends would say, a result of original sin and the Fall of Man). God created all these things to function a certain way, and He seldom interferes in His creation. Many godly people suffer and die from cancer and heart attacks. God almost never chooses to miraculously save these people. Parents who have tried repeatedly to conceive sometimes will lose the cherished baby they worked so hard to bring into existence. Could God save that baby? Yes, of course, but He seldom chooses to. He allows nature to function the way it was created. My father went blind because of hardening of the arteries. Could God have stopped the process. Even now, could God heal him? Certainly!!! But, as yet, God has not chosen to do that.

In my father's case, God had a better plan for him. He allowed my father's blindness to bring about a greater work. We never could have seen that on the other side of his blindness. It's only as a result of my Daddy embracing blindness and choosing to live life to the fullest in his current condition that the Lord has been able to use him so mightily.

I lost two, and possibly three, babies along the way to birthing the 3 I have. While I grieve for them, I don't ask God why He took them. I don't believe He took them. I believe it was a normal consequence of life, the way God created my body to function, and those babies are waiting in Heaven for me. One day, I will hold them in my arms. Perhaps God allowed their souls to come to Heaven so they could plead to The Father for me and my earthly children.

Hurricanes happen. They're a natural consequence of God's creation. I don't expect God to stop them. I do, however, hope that we humans can turn even the sorrowful things in our lives into joy. Perhaps, in 10 years, some of the victims of Katrina will rejoice at how God has allowed them to rebuild in a way they never could have before and we will see New Orleans and Biloxi as much more beautiful than pre-Katrina. God doesn't stop nature, but He definately blesses the consequences of it.

Hurricane Goldenrod or Alpha?

Don's worried about all the hurricanes. He has a hurricane tracking map icon on the desktop of our computer. He checks it frequently. Last night, he chased me off the computer to check one last time and see if the newest storm had yet been named. It had. Rita is now threatening the southern coast of Florida.

But Don's biggest concern is, what will happen if we have more than four more hurricanes this year? We only have four names left, so we'll run out of assigned names for this year. What then? Hmh.

Apparently, not all letters are chosen for names. Don has a list printed with the names for 2005 through 2009. We noticed that my father's name, Wilfred, is a planned name for 2007. I'd hate to think that we'll have enough hurricanes to reach the W's but, even worse, what if Hurricane Wilfred causes real damage, like Katrina? His name will forever be infamous.

I have a good friend who has a lovely daughter, a Kindergartener this year, whose name is Katrina. She's lovely, full of energy and laughter. She's a precious gift from God and we are all thankful to know her. I was disheartened when Hurricane Katrina hit. I didn't want such an ugly thing associated with this beautiful, sweet child. But, of course, no one who knows Katrina could ever associate her with such a terrible thing. Then, I read someone's blog who wrote about the Hurricane. There was a comment on the Post by someone talking about what a stupid name Katrina was. It was beautiful before the Hurricane was named after it.

So Don frets over the short supply of names left and I fret over 2007's schedule. At least his has a solution. At one of the web sites he went to yesterday, he found a note buried near the bottom of several pages that said if all names have been used for any particular year, and there are additional hurricanes, the National Weather Service will use Greek letters to name the extras, starting with Alpha.

Why do we use real names for Hurricanes, anyway? Why can't we designate them like license plates - CPI -712; or use pet names like Fido or Feefee; what about plant names - Goldenrod or Periwinkle? It seems to me that all those would be less offensive than using the names of REAL people. Unfortunately, the National Weather Service never asked me for my opinion.

We run short on names this year, Don worries about what name will come after Alpha, I worry that 2007 may bring a hurricane named after my father, and the residents of Florida, Mississippi, Alabama, and Louisianna try to recover their lives. At least the name Katrina conjures up more than just ugly thoughts for me. I pray the same for the victims left in it's path.

Handbell Choir

The Handbell Choir played for the first time this year at Church today. Don is directing again this year. The more I see him working, the more impressed I am with his musical talent. He writes warm-up exercises, chooses music appropriate to the number of members and the experience represented, and many times has re-written music (or re-arranged it) to gear it to the needs of the current choir. And every year he has a different group of people and starts the training process all over again. Sometimes, we'll have a piece prepared for a Sunday performance and, at the final practice, someone will either not show or announce that they won't be there on Sunday. There have been several times that Don has had to take on someone else's handbells at the last practice before a performance and play while directing on Sunday with little or no rehearsal. He's very encouraging and great to work with.

This year, at our first rehearsal, we discovered that we had lost 4 members from the previous season. At two notes per player, that means that we lost more than an octave of bells. It was quite a challenge for Don to re-assign the players who were left and try and find music that could be played with so few hands.

Don decided to put out a general call for volunteers. The following Sunday, he put an octave of bells out on a table in the Fellowship Hall after Church and was available to answer questions and let people try them out. Within ten minutes, the table was surrounded by children. Even if adults had been interested, there was no chance of getting anywhere near the bells. However, one young mother told me she was interested and asked what time rehearsals were held. A couple of children expressed a sincere interest in trying. One was a young pre-teen and another was a family friend of hers, a 16-yr. old. In addition, our son, Dane, asked if he could play. Last year, he sang in the Children's Choir, which rehearsed from 6 - 7 p.m. Handbells practiced until 7:30, so he would join us and stand beside me at my table, asking constant questions and itching to get his hand on a bell.

So, we got four new musicians this year, ranging in age from 6 to the mid-20's. We played a simple song today that we've only been working on for two weeks, a bell version of "Fairest Lord Jesus". Dane nailed every note. I was very proud of him.

If Don's not careful, he's in danger of forcing out the older folks or having to start a children's bell choir. But it was beautiful today and a lot of fun for all involved. There's nothing like having one of your children performing alongside of you.

What's an Ebenezer?

I'm reading a book on prayer this month, and it commented briefly about raising an Ebenezer. The Scripture reference for this is from I Samuel 7 and says, "Then Samuel took a stone and set it up between Mizpah and Jeshanah, and named it Ebenezer; for he said, 'Thus far the LORD has helped us.' So the Philistines were subdued and did not again enter the territory of Israel; the hand of the LORD was against the Philistines all the days of Samuel. The towns that the Philistines had taken from Israel were restored to Israel, from Ekron to Gath; and Israel recovered their territory from the hand of the Philistines. There was peace also between Israel and the Amorites." (1 Samuel 7:12-14 NRSV)

As near as I can tell, an Ebenezer, in a theological sense, is an spiritual or emotional symbol of God's protection and provision for us. "Raising an Ebenezer", as it talks about in the VERY old song ("Here I raise my Ebenezer, quickly by thy help I come"), must be marking or specifying a symbol of God's presence in our lives.

Maybe a family cross hanging on the wall? Any other ideas out there? I'd love to raise an Ebenezer, if I could just figure out what one is. It would be a great tangible reminder for Don and I as well as the children of how God has always protected and cared for us and is ever-present to us.

So all of you out there who have raised Ebenezer's - give me some ideas, please.

Come on, Christmas!

We've finally reached the end of the second week of school. I'm already counting the days to Christmas break. I think I'm in trouble. I sure get more stuff done during the school year, but the price I pay is extremely high. I feel like I walk a tightrope, carefully balancing the needs of the children, school, Don, grandparents ... while still trying to maintain sanity.

Let's just take today, for instance. At 5:30 a.m., Daelyn was in my room to wake me up. We snuggled for a while and I finally convinced him to let Mommy get a little more sleep before the alarm went off. When it did go off at 6:25, I got up and started my chores - personal hygiene, neatening the bathroom, sorting laundry, and starting the first load. I got the other two children up and started them dressing, then moved to the kitchen to start kitchen chores.

I am a list person. I have chore lists, menus a month at a time, a grocery list that hangs on the front of the fridge, lists, lists, lists. One of them is a schedule for breakfasts. I decided to try this last year in January. Each day of the week, I play to have certain items for breakfast. For example, Wednesdays is hot cereal (oatmeal, grits, cream of wheat), Fridays is eggs and sausage (scrambled, omelets, or fried on toast). So the children still have some choices but it's a little more uniform and easier for me to pull off because I can prepare the night before.

Last night, Don encouraged me to switch Monday's and Friday's so he could put out the cold cereal for the kids on Friday morning, since he's home, allowing me to get a little more sleep or tend to other emergencies. So I laid out the cereal bowls, napkins and spoons, and then went to put the milk on the table - all 2 inches of it. When I realized we were that low, I had to switch back again to eggs. I cleared the table again, reset it, got out sausage to warm up in the microwave, and started the eggs, deciding on scrambled for everyone. Dane walked in, dressed for school, so I had him sit down and begin a practice spelling test while I was making the eggs. He has a test today and we've been practicing the words all week long. He nails them every time. He knows exactly how to spell them. The problem is, yesterday we tried writing them. He may know how to spell them, but he doesn't know how to write the letters. Every "b" and "d" was reversed. I got a little panicky. Last night, before bed, I made him sit down and write several lines of "b", hoping that if he could get those right, the "d" would be easy. So, now he was in the hot seat. I silently prayed he'd write his b's correctly. While we were in the middle of his test, Deanna came in. I told her to get out her Science book and begin working on Page 12. She was out of school for 2 days with strept throat and had a pile of make-up work. We got most of it done last night, but she still had one page of Science left.

I finished Dane's spelling test, put eggs on everyone's plates, and checked his work. ALL THE B's and D's were right. However, the "p" was backwards. I hate for this little guy to get words wrong that he knows how to spell so well just because he's out of practice at writing. I assigned him two lines of p's to write and went to mix up Deanna's drink medicine which has to be mixed into milk. HA! We have no milk. I pulled down the stool, while giving verbal directions to Dane and answers to Deanna, and climbed up into the pantry looking for the powdered milk. I found it and began mixing it with the dab of real milk we had left. The front door opened and in walked Uncle Ken to get his allergy shots. I finished mixing the powdered milk, got Deanna's drink made, delivered it to her, then started on antibiotics - Deanna's first, then Dane's. That done, I got Deanna's stomach medicine capsule out, mixed it into a teaspoon of applesause, and gave that to her. The children complained about the powdered milk. I got out Uncle Ken's serum, washed my hands, and began to prepare his injections. That finished, I realized lunches needed to be made, all the while directing and responding to the children. I got lunches made and lunchboxes and water bottles put in backpacks. I prompted Deanna to finish her Science and work on breakfast. Then I left Don to supervise the children so I could dress. I threw on shorts, socks and shoes, switched laundry loads, and ran back into the kitchen, brush and hairclip in hand. I quickly pulled my hair back, then called Deanna to me to pull her hair up. Grandpa was already there, ready to head out the door. I told Daelyn to run and get his shoes on, and grabbed the stroller out of the closet. I kissed Don goodbye and headed out the door with Grandpa and the kids, bound for school.

Upon my return, there was more laundry to be done, I needed to eat breakfast, the beds must be made, the kitchen straightened, dinner started in the crockpot, and this Post to get done. Lots more chores waiting for me, but I might get a breather this afternoon.

I will pick the kids up at school at 3:00 and a friend has invited us over to swim. I'm going to try and fit that in - there aren't too many days of swimming left this year. Dane has soccer at 4:00, I have a commitment at 5:00, and we're having a dinner guest at 6:30.

Come on, Christmas. I maybe can hold out a little longer, but the tightrope is beginning to sway in the breeze and I'm fearful of falling off. Precious Lord, take my hand. It's time for more of those Mercy Drops Falling Like Rain. Send in the Clouds.

Just Call Her Dynamo

My sister's came to visit us while we were on vacation at the beach - two of them, anyway. I have another sister who lives in Southern California who we don't get to see very often.

My sister, Toni, was a stay-at-home mom when her children were little. She was always the one volunteering at the school and was Room Mother more times than I can remember. Her youngest is now a Junior at the University of Georgia. They don't use Room Mothers real often and it's awful far to drive to throw a party, so she's a little out of her element.

Toni is one of those people who's good at anything she undertakes. Over the years, she's had various jobs, sometimes helping out friends who were business owners in need or working full-time before marriage. Since the children have been gone, she's had a couple of different jobs. Every place she works, she becomes a favorite employee. She's one of those people with a great work ethic - she works hard and until the job's done. She doesn't dilly-dally and doesn't use work time for personal reasons, like making phone calls or visiting with friends. She's a dynamo, full of energy, and respectful - an employer's dream.

Toni recently accepted a job at a new Target Store that's opening near her home. They had all the new employees training prior to the store's opening. They learned about the basics of working at Target, the company's motto, and what's expected of employees.

While at the beach, Toni told us that she's "fast, fun, and friendly". Apparently, this is Target's motto. It's one thing for a store to be fast, fun, and friendly - it's something different entirely for a person, especially MY SISTER, to be fast, fun, and friendly.

The truth is, Toni IS fast, fun, and friendly. She's the epitomy of those words and could easily replace the white mutt Target uses as it's mascot. But I'm not sure I want people knowing she's these things, and I particularly don't want it said about her. Taken out of context, those words take on a very different meaning.

The next time you're at Target, if you see a fireball run by, smiling and asking if she can help you, it's probably my sister, Toni. Say hello for me. Just don't call her "fast, fun, and friendly."

Just one more

I realize I'm in danger of pushing all my readers over the edge here, but I can't resist just one more story.

My sister, Trina (who signs her blog as Collette), called me yesterday afternoon after reading Parts I & II and told me she was concerned that I might be picked up by Sunnybrook Home for the Criminally Insane. She said my story was a little unbelievable and I sounded like I had definately dropped off the edge of sanity. She's afraid that I've given enough personal information in my blog over time that one of my readers is going to turn me in and I'll either receive a visit from Family and Children's Services or the men in little white coats.

The children are all sitting on the floor in the den watching "The Santa Clause" as I type this. It's not just me - this is rampant in my family. Trina may not admit it but her two college-age children who still live at home get presents every year from Santa. They still open one gift each year on Christmas Eve. And, when her children were young, she and my sister, Toni, would both take their children to the Mall the night Santa arrived and cry with excitement. So, Trina, accept responsibility for your own insanity instead of focusing on mine.

But I promised one more story - and I'm not one to break my promises. When I was single, which was a very long time since I didn't marry until I was 34, my sisters would invite me to spend Christmas Eve with their families every year. That way, I'd be there on Christmas morning when the children woke. I got to be a part of the excitement and fun, which was non-existent at my house. I traded off each year - one year, I'd spend the night with Toni's family, the next with Trina's.

One year, while at Trina's, we stayed up real late. I took a bottle of Irish Whiskey with me and my brother-in-law, Russell, and I made Irish Coffee's and sipped them while listening to Christmas music and playing with the toys under the tree as we finished the last-minute preparations for Christmas morning. Trina had put her son, Russy, to bed on the floor in Amanda's (Meme) room so I could have Russy's room to myself. After a lot of coffee's and a very fun, very late night, I finally went to bed. I was sound asleep when a noise woke me. I lay, still half-asleep, listening. The noise sounded like bells. Suddenly, I jumped up, wide awake. "Santa," I thought. "It must be Santa on the roof!!" I stood there listening for several minutes before I came to my senses and realized that it was pretty doubtful I was hearing Santa's sleighbells on Trina's roof.

The point to this story is that Santa is so deeply imbedded in my spirit that, even deep asleep, my heart rules over my head and I revert back to my childhood.

Don't judge me too harshly. I'm just a child at heart who loves Santa and the joy and anticipation that comes along with him. And I hope the instill this same sense of excitement in my children so they, too, will still believe in Santa when they're 44.

Is that Santa real? - Part II

As confused as Daelyn is about Santa, his brother and sister are just that sure about the big guy. Several years ago, while driving to Kroger in October, I was stopped at a light and glanced in the rearview mirror. In the vehicle directly behind me was a man with a huge white beard and white hair. I shouted to the kids to turn around and look and commented that the man looked just like Santa. We pulled into the parking lot and I noticed he pulled in, as well. As we were getting out of the van, I saw him jump out of his vehicle which I had not gotten a good look at through the mirror. He was driving a small red pick-up truck. The children quickly noticed he was wearing a red thermal shirt under blue denim overalls. By the time we all had seatbelts undone and the children were deposited in a double buggy, he was nowhere to be seen. Deanna and Dane had both decided they were going to ask him if he was the real Santa if we saw him in the store.

We entered Kroger and I headed for the Produce Department. The kids almost fell out of the buggy craning their necks to look for the white-bearded man, so I decided we better find him before trying to shop. We went up and down the aisles looking and ran into a friend of ours from church. I told her what we were doing and she said she’d help us look. We headed down two more aisles and spotted him at the Bank. He was sitting at a window with personal items spread out in front of him, talking with a bank employee. I hesitated. He was obviously busy. My friend patted my arm and told me to stay with the kids while she went over to talk to him.

Several minutes later, he approached us. The children gawked. He smiled and said, “Was there something you’d like to ask me?” Deanna, who never runs out of things to say, sat speechless (a real Christmas miracle). Dane, my quiet shy child, finally spoke up and asked the man, “Are you the REAL Santa?”

“Yes, I am,” the man responded. “This is what I wear when I’m working. Now, tell me what you’d like for Christmas.” Deanna’s mouth dropped open even more and there was now no hope at all of getting anything out of her. Dane chimed in with his list. I kept prompting Deanna and, finally, she blurted out an item she’d like from Santa. He responded, smiled at the children, I thanked him, and he went back to the bank desk. I pushed the buggy a little ways away and started to cry.

You see, I believe in Santa. Santa gives gifts simply to bring joy to others, never really expecting a thank-you. It is enough to know the joy that his gift-giving brings. He is unconditional love and a personification of my Lord. My children have developed their own theology about Santa. They have decided he was appointed by God to do His work on earth - sort of a special earthly angel, with powers given by God which allow him to finish his tasks every year before Christmas morning. After all, only God could do that, right? So God must help Santa.

Last year, my oldest nephew (the first grandchild) was being married in southern California. Don and I decided to attend the wedding. We traded our time-share in Hilton Head for a place in Anaheim the week after the wedding. We were able to get First Class tickets for the two older children and he and I with frequent flyer miles, so the whole family flew for free.

The resort we were staying at in Anaheim offered breakfast poolside each morning. One morning, I was looking out our living room window to see how crowded the pool area was. I saw a hefty man with white hair and a full beard, wearing red bermuda shorts and a red Hawaiian shirt, walk around the pool and up to a little girl. He pulled something out of a breast pocket and began writing. I stood gasping. I yelled to the children and my sister and niece, who were staying with us, that Santa was at the pool. They ran to the window and spotted him (not too difficult to pick out of a crowd). The children asked me what he was doing and I excitedly told them about what I thought must be his “list”. I saw him pull something out of his pocket and write on it while talking with the little girl. What else could it be?

We quickly donned shoes and headed for the pool. Through the doors to the Activity Building, where breakfast was being served, we could see him and an older, gray-haired woman eating. We walked in but, once again, the children lost their nerve. They hid behind my legs like toddlers and refused to approach him. He spotted them and called them to him. He asked them what they wanted for Christmas, chatted with us, then pulled a picture of him and Mrs. Claus from his breast pocket and autographed one for each of the children. The kids grabbed muffins and juice and headed out to the pool with my sister. I sat down with Santa and Mrs.

I was attempting to explain some of the things the children had said, and I told them that we had run into Santa 1 1/2 years earlier in a Grocery Store. He smiled and said, “Yes. Kroger.” I looked puzzled and said, “How did you know that?” trying to recall if one of the children had mentioned Kroger. He said, “What city was this in?” “Augusta, Georgia,” I responded. “Why?” He smiled at me and said, “That was me!”

No way. Can’t be. Augusta, Georgia to Anaheim, California. Just not possible. “Were you driving a red truck?” I asked skeptically. “I did drive a red truck when I was in Augusta,” he said.

I sat staring at him, silent myself for a change. He smiled.

“You see,” he said, “the Mrs. and I recently moved from Augusta to New York. I’ve been hired by one of the big stores on 5th Avenue. They pick me up in a limo each morning and bring me home by limo at night. I work from Thanksgiving through Christmas and make enough that I don’t have to work the rest of the year. But we’re worn out by the New Year so we always take a 3-month vacation after the season. We love coming to California - not tropical but warm and there’s always lots to do here.”

When I finally recovered my voice, we had a lovely chat. In the back of my mind was the Santa Clause 2 video Don bought the kids the previous Christmas. At the end of the movie, Tim Allen (who plays Santa) has just married and is flying off to deliver presents. He tells his new wife to pack because as soon as he returns, they’ll be going on a 3-month vacation. He says, “Someplace warm, but nothing tropical. You don’t want to see this (pointing at belly) in a Speedo.” No, just red bermudas and a red Hawaiian shirt.

The next day, Don, the kids, and I were driving into L.A. While Don negotiated the carpool lane at 80 mph (you have no idea how unusual this is for Don, who refuses to even go 56 mph at home), I was chatting about places we should go and see.

“Santa said we should try and fit in the Crystal Palace. He said it’s beautiful, all glass, and a real functioning church. They have services on Sunday and the church has big glass doors to the side of the altar that open into the parking lot that they prop open during the service, so people can drive up and don’t even have to get out of their cars. They’re trying to reach even people afraid to step foot into a church by providing sort of a drive-in service. He said we really should try and see it while we’re here - it’s a beautiful testament to the Lord and Missions.”

“The Crystal Palace, hmh?” Don responded. “Sounds interesting. Wait just a minute. You and WHO were talking about this? WHO told you about the Crystal Palace?”

“Santa,” I replied, smugly. “Not only are we on a first-name basis, we also have begun exchanging vacation tips.”

When other children try to tell Deanna there’s no Santa, she just smiles and nods. She knows him personally.

Is that Santa real?

I walked the children to school again this morning. I've done this every morning since school started last week, except for Friday when I had my doctor's appointment (which actually means I only did it for 3 days, since school started on Tuesday). So I picked them up after school on Friday and we walked home. Daelyn loves getting out in the morning and having a nice, brisk (walk - are you kidding?) ride in his stroller. We tried it with him walking the first day - he barely made it there and then was too tired to walk home again. Thus, the stroller. I'm hoping the daily exercise (not to mention pushing the stroller uphill) will help me with my weight.

I always walk the children right up to their lines, pray over them, and kiss them goodbye. Then Daelyn and I start for home. Today, on our way home, we were walking past the office and saw Santa through the window in the door. It was one of those ones that Wal-Mart had for sale last Christmas. He stands on a pedestal and dances with an Elvis-wiggle while he sings Christmas tunes. He's motion-activated or you can push the big red button on the pedestal to see him perform. I pointed him out to Daelyn and we had to go into the office and push the button several times. As we were leaving, another parent walked by and Daelyn announced, "Santa's in there. But he's not weal."

It reminded me of last Christmas. Daelyn and I were doing some Christmas shopping while the other two children were in school. We were at Wal-mart, of course (not that I buy that many presents al Wal-Mart, I just always seem to have to go there for something). Daelyn spotted a pair of cowboy boots on an end-cap and went crazy. He talked and talked about those boots. Will you buy them for me? Are you going to get them? Mom, can you get me those boots? I really like those cowboy boots. Can you buy them for me? On and on and on and ... Finally, in an effort to once and for all change the subject, I suggested that Daelyn ask Santa for them for Christmas.

Daelyn: "Okay. Let's go tell Santa wight now, Mom."
Me: "Daelyn, Santa's not here at this store right now. We can't tell him. We'll have to go home and write him a letter and tell him that you want cowboy boots."
Daelyn: "There's a Santa at the front door. He sang to us when we came in."
Me: "Son, he's not real. He's just a pretend Santa - a decoration."
Daelyn: "That's alwight. He'll do."

This morning, I was amazed to hear him acknowledge that the "Dancing Santa" wasn't "weal". After last year's incident, I was a little afraid he was VERY confused about this Santa-thing (any old one will do, even if it's fake). As if Santa's not already confusing enough.

As I was pushing the stroller home, Daelyn was thoughtful for a few minutes, which means quiet. This is a very rare thing, so I enjoy it when pensive moods hit him. Finally he said, "Mom, can I get on Santa's web site when we get home." Sure, my baby. Anything to add to the confusion.

Lonely without Dad

Don left directly from church today for the airport. He's flying to Colorado for his grandmother's funeral tomorrow. He'll be home Tuesday night. Deanna sang in church today - a special for 9/11, and Don wanted to hear her before he left. Right after we returned to our pew from Communion, he kissed me and the boys, and snuck out.

You would think we'd be used to being away from each other after ten years of marriage and my hospital stays with my pregnancies. But, no. We're both miserable apart from each other. Neither one of us sleep. The last time we spent a night away from each other, Don was attending a Handbell Conference in Atlanta. He called me the first morning, complaining that he didn't sleep a wink without me bouncing around on the other side of the bed. He had to take three days to recover from two nights in a hotel. In the meantime, I was miserable at home. I drank a half a bottle of wine, stayed up until 1:00 a.m. watching Chic Flic's, and still couldn't sleep.

A week before he left, we were talking at the dinner table about how hard it would be for me to sleep. I jokingly commented that I would have to go down to the corner and hire a man to sleep in the bed next to me. Daelyn laughed and said, "Yeah! A-man-da." My niece's name is Amanda, although we always call her Meme. He was quick enough to know the only "man" mommy would have in her bed other than Daddy was Amanda.

So we have to get through two nights without our love. I'm making Shrimp Scampi for Dane for dinner tomorrow night - his favorite. Don's allergic to fish, so this is a rare opportunity to have seafood at home. I'm armed with two bottles of White Zinfandel. I've got gobs of work to do and, as a last resort, Don mentioned that I can always put one of the kids in bed with me.

I hope he has a good trip. He'll get to see his sister for the first time in 4 years and his Aunts, Uncles, and Cousins. Funerals are never a happy occasion, but at least he'll get to say goodbye to his grandmother. And we'll be waiting for him when he gets home, anxious to see our Daddy and get caught up on our much-needed sleep.

The Trials of First Grade

Saturday!! I can't imagine being so thankful for a Saturday. It's been a long, hard week at school and Dane is really struggling with being there from 8:30 to 3:00. Wednesday at bedtime, he asked me how many more days of school he had. I laughed. It was only the second day of school. Then he asked how many more weeks there were until summer and I realized something was wrong. He started crying and got more and more upset. He was crying so hard, he couldn't even tell me what was wrong. Finally, between sobs, he eeked out the words, "I don't think I can do it. I can't be away from you so long."

How do you console a child when you're near tears yourself because of the same reason. Thankfully, he had an appointment with the Allergist on Thursday at 11:00 so I was taking him out to lunch afterwards. I was able to dangle that in front of him to calm him down. Then I snuggled him in his bed for a little while.

When I returned him to school on Thursday, my heart broke a little. He's so little, so sweet, and still so needy of Mommy. Deanna was very different. She's such a Type-A personality, she couldn't wait to tackle school and spend the day with her friends. When I picked him up at 3:00, he said he thought he was finally getting used to school. I thought we were making progress. Then, at bedtime Thursday, he had another meltdown. He asked if I was going to pick him up for lunch on Friday, too. My tender-hearted little boy is really struggling with the lack of time with me.

Last year, in Kindergarten, he got off at 1:00. Daelyn was napping and Deanna was still in school, so we had from 1-3 to ourselves every day. We'd read books together, do his homework, talk about his day (uninterrupted), and sometimes watch a movie together while munching on popcorn - good times with MOM. This year, he comes home with Sissy. She is very adept at controlling the conversation and making sure it's always about HER day. So Dane sits quietly, waiting for his turn, which never comes. Then it's snacktime and we go straight to homework. By the time I finish working with both the children on their homework, it's time to start dinner. We eat, clean up, get baths, and it's bedtime - no special time for Dane to spend with Mom. I understand why he's having a tough time. Then you add to that the results of his doctor's visit - sinus infection and rattling in his chest that she believes to be the beginnings of bronchitis. Dane is sick and hasn't had near enough sleep this week - he's tired, grumpy, and having difficulty dealing. So would I.

While Don took Deanna and Daelyn to a family meal at my mother's last night (my 23 yr. old nephew is visiting from North Carolina), I took Dane out to dinner at the restaurant of his choice for a little extra Mommy-time. He chose Golden Corral. I paid $3.19 plus tax for him to eat 5 shrimp and 2 sprigs of broccoli (literally). But he was thrilled to be alone with me, and that was worth way more than $3.19. Then we went to Blockbuster and I let him pick out a movie of his own (Batman, of course, one of the old animated ones), we came home and got on jammies, snuggled in my bed for a few minutes and chatted, and then I got him settled in bed - by 8:15.

He has two days of rest and T.V. to recuperate, not to mention a Batman video that doesn't have to be returned until Wednesday. I'm praying for my little guy that he adjusts, so I can begin to adjust. I'm seriously re-thinking the possiblity of home-schooling.

Meet my Gastroenterologist

Witty reparte - not my gift. Some people can banter back and forth with wittiness and I love listening to it, either in personal conversations between two people, in movies, or on T.V. I've always wished I had this gift, but I just don't think fast enough on my feet.

Today, I had a visit to a much-loved doctor that I haven't seen since I was pregnant with Daelyn. Dr. Schwartz, my gastroenterologist (or stomach doctor for those of you who don't speak Latin), is short, hairy, smiles and laughs often, has a memory that's one for the Guinness Book of World Records, talks fast, and always has one foot out the door while he's asking you if there's anything else you need to talk with him about. Although he's only a little older than me, he's an old-fashioned doctor who always returns his own phone calls. He's very funny and seems to be able to pull every little ounce of wittiness out of me.

I get extremely ill when pregnant. One of my doctors once described it as an allergic reaction to pregnancy hormone. I can't hold anything down, including water. I vomit constantly for my whole pregnancy and have to have I.V.'s to feed the baby. I take anti-nausea medicine that was developed for cancer patients who are undergoing chemotherapy and it only moderately works. During my first pregnancy, I also developed pancreatitis and had my gall bladder removed during my second trimester. There is only a 2-week window in pregnancy when this surgery can be performed. You have to be far enough along that the anesthesia won't damage the baby but early enough that your uterus hasn't grown so large as to block the gall bladder. Then, you have to be well enough that they can actually operate. They won't do the surgery if your liver enzymes fall within certain levels. Dr. Schwartz came to see me every day for the 6 months I was in the hospital, except for one day when he was out of town at a conference. He told me about it in advance and arranged for an associate of his to check on me. I have very good reason to think a lot of this doctor.

When I got pregnant with Daelyn (keep in mind I had Dane inbetween), I got a serious blood infection from my I.V. - strep. I kept telling the nurses and doctors, both in my OB/GYN's office and the emergency room which I visited several times, that there was something seriously wrong, but everyone said it was just the flu exacerbated by my pregnancy. It wasn't until 10 days after I had started feeling really sick that the blood culture turned up positive. By that time, infection was rampant in my body, affecting every system. I was very near death. They stopped all medications I had been taking and started me on one of the only two antibiotics for this type infection that can be used during pregnancy. After two days without my stomach medicine, I was in rough shape and asked my doctor to please call in Dr. Schwartz. That afternoon I heard my door open and saw a hairy arm from around the curtain. I knew he had arrived.

After exchanging pleasantries (how pleasant can you be when you're as sick as I was?) he told me that my OB had called and asked him if he remembered a patient by the name of Patti Doughty. "Do I remember George Washington? Do I remember Abraham Lincoln?" he asked. "Of course I remember Patti. She's not pregnant again, is she?" He told me this story, leaving out the last part. But when my OB came by later, she gave me the whole scoop.

He immediately started me on stronger I.V. stomach medicines and scheduled some tests. Gastroendoscopy is not much fun when you're pregnant. He also did a sonogram of my pancreas to be sure I wasn't having another bout with pancreatitis. He came in to check on me after the sonogram and the nurse was taking my vital signs. He quickly realized I couldn't answer him with a thermometer in my mouth, so he gleefully began asking me questions and laughing at my frustration with my inability to answer. Then he commented to my mother, who was with me at the time, that he had finally discovered a way to get me to stop talking!!

The next morning when my OB stopped by to check on me, she said she had seen Dr. Schwartz, briefly. She was standing in front of the elevators at another hospital going down when the one in front of her opened, going up. Dr. Schwartz was inside. He saw her and, before the elevator doors had closed, had given her a full report on the results of my sonogram. She laughed telling me this story. She was even surprised at how fast he talked and moved.

Today, his first questions on entering the treatment room was, "You're not pregnant, are you?" Later, as I was leaving, he reminded me that I could call him with any problems, then quickly added, "Unless, of course, you're pregnant again. Then I'm moving to Argentina." I told him that, just to see him sweat some day, I was going to call him and tell him I was pregnant. "If you do," he responded, "I'll tape it and play it for your husband."

Never knew "collision" could be so much fun

Deanna started Third Grade on Tuesday. This is such a transitional year, with homework every night and lots of studying. As if to prove that point, she had to learn three pages of vocabulary words Tuesday night. She didn't have to know how to spell every word, just how to pronounce it when seeing it and understand what it meant.

One of the words was "collision". She had no idea what collision meant. I told her that a collision is when two things run into each other, like her and Dane. I told her that some garages are called Collision Centers because they repair cars that were in collisions. Then I remembered a special I had seen on TV during our vacation. It was about the Douglas family and had interviewed Michael Douglas and his brother, Kirk Douglas, and Katherine Zeta-Jones. They covered lots of various topics, including how Kirk felt about Michael's Hollywood rise, Kirk and Anne's 50th Wedding Anniversary (including a video of the event), and Michael and Katherine's courtship.

One of the topics they covered in the special was a serious accident involving Kirk. He had been taking off from the airport in a helicopter when it "collided" with a light plane, crashing back to the tarmac. Both the passengers in the plane were killed, the helicopter pilot was killed, and Kirk was believed to be dead. They showed pictures of the wreckage - it was hard to believe anyone could survive. Anne, Kirk's wife, had called her son and told him his daddy was dead. Then they discovered he still had a pulse and rushed him to the hospital on life-support. Michael commented that any other man would not have made it. It was only because his beloved father is so strong that Kirk survived and has fought to recover.

I seem to be unable to answer a question without giving a story to help explain. Once again, I fell into my story mold. It occurred to me that this would be a great one to tell Deanna. It was very vivid and, everytime she saw the word collision, she could remember this story. We also had recently seen the movie "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea", starring Kirk Douglas, and I often sing to her a catchy little tune he sang in the movie, "A Whale of a Tale". She knows who Kirk Douglas is, making the helicopter crash story all the more interesting.

I told her about it at the table. All the children sat listening, wide-eyed and quiet. Deanna didn't have anymore difficulty with the word "collision".

Last year, in Kindergarten, the children were graded on knowing their name and the names of their parents, their address, and phone number. I decided that, even though Daelyn still has 2 years before Kindergarten, all of that is very useful information and he ought to be learning it now. So, everyday at nap time, I quizz him.

Me: "What's your name, little boy?"
Daelyn: "Daelyn Doughty."
Me: "What's your Daddy's name?"
Daelyn: "Don Doughty."
Me: "What's your Mother's name?"
Daelyn: "Mommy Doughty."
Me: "Where do you live?"
Daelyn: "Wuby Dwive" (code for Ruby Drive).

Then I ask him his phone number, which he's very close to learning. Wednesday, at naptime, I decided to add another questions.

Me: "Daelyn, do you have any brothers or sister?"
Daelyn, after a very long, thoughtful silence: "Yes, I have one. His name is Kirk Douglas."

Peels of laughter. I bet he's one of the few 3-yr. olds who knows what "collision" means.