Skip to main content

Day Six: Regrouping

Day Five: Speaker Phone Prayers

"Mmm. You look nice," Stuart said into my neck this evening.

" A little sleep, some makeup, and a change of clothes will do that for a girl."

Stuart stayed at the hospital with Charlie last night and I came home to get some rest and spend some time with the other kids today. I should have gone right to bed but instead, I stayed up into the wee hours of the morning updating the blog. Then I climbed in my big comfy bed with my big comfy comforter (ahhh!) and watched the end of Return to Me.

Woke up at quarter of eleven, visited with our next-door neighbor, made lemon-raspberry muffins, did a little laundry, trimmed my hair and gave my son, Absalom, a full fledged haircut. Comforted Claire. This separation has been the hardest on her. The kids snacked this morning and we finally sat down to eat breakfast at three this afternoon! This confused the kids. They didn't know whether to do their after-breakfast chores or after-lunch chores. I put an end to the rollicking argument and then showered and after that we went grocery shopping. We were down to a half a roll of toilet paper!

Dropped doughnuts off at church for tomorrow (Hope they don't mind that they won't be Krispy Kreme fresh) and arrived at the hospital in the early evening hours. Brought Charlie some applesauce and cheese sticks and new socks and stumpy Star Wars figures. He said, "Tomorrow I want crackers with Cheez-Whiz." He's been really been into the idea of Cheez-Whiz ever since he saw an picture of it on the back of a cracker box. He thinks Cheez-Whiz on a banana might be a good idea. Tomorrow I'll bring him some but I'm not letting him eat it on anything but crackers!

Stuart was red-eyed and unshaven. The fold-out sleeper chair is not so comfy as our bed and Charlie's needs preempted a shower and a shave. I bathed Charlie while Stuart attended to his own needs and the kids crammed together in the tiny room and watched Mulan.

Then it was time to go. Charlie wanted me to stay. "You take more better care of me!" Ha! Stuart came equipped with the Game Cube and his laptop. He and Charlie played Lego Star Wars. He hooked his computer up to the television and managed to play lullabies through the speakers of Charlie's bed. All he got when I was there was Mama singing Aiken Drum in a very sleepy voice.

Tomorrow, the changing of the guard takes place in the afternoon and it will be my turn to go back to bed head and a big flannel shirt and wool socks. Hope Stuart remembers that I looked nice today when he shows up after work on Monday.

Day Eight: High Five

Comments

tammi said…
Glad to hear the mood is lightening! Careful, you might start liking "bed head and a big flannel shirt!" That describes me on almost any given day!! ;)
The more I get to know you, the more I think we would be fast friends in real life. Return to Me and Krispy Kreme doughnuts are on my top 10 list, as well as my low tech approach to parenting! Treovr's the go to guy when the game/computer/electronic item has a bug, and I'm the one called for when there is a scratchy throat/song to be sung/book to be read.

Sounds like Charlie is feeling better. Have they said when they will be able to discharge him?

Xandra
Sarah said…
Hi Kate,
I'm glad Charlie is feeling better. I told him to start pushing for some ice cream to supplement the popsicles! We are keeping you guys in our prayers.

sem

Popular posts from this blog

4-H Exhibits-Updated

Update: Blue ribbons all around! 4 of our projects will go onto the state fair. John's headboard exceeds size limitations and so we will lug it home tomorrow. We are relieved. That thing is heavy! ************* For the past few weeks we have been busy sewing, sawing, quilling and painting 4-H projects. The kids have been in 4-H for about a month and they started with a bang. The annual 4-H fair is tomorrow. So this morning we loaded these projects and four kids wearing slippers into the car. The fifth one had sense enough to wear flip-flops. (The other four complained as we pulled out of the driveway that their feet were sweating.) John reclining against the headboard that he built with Stuart. He wrote the 10 Commandments of Table Saw Safety to accompany this project. Claire's quilling project. Lauren modeling the apron that she sewed. Lauren and the dog painting she has been working on in art class for the past few months. Faith and her quilling project. So now...

Finding Rest: Part Two (Scroll down three posts to read this story from the beginning)

Why share such a personal story ? I share it because I have talked to enough women to know that underneath the makeup and the matching outfits and the small talk that make up our exteriors, we are a broken people. To pretend otherwise creates isolation. Thoughtful honesty creates closer relationships and greater understanding. When we share the way God works in the difficult things of life it encourages first oneself and then others. For some of us, the pieces have been patched and restored and there is wholeness where there was none before. But some of us are walking wounded, barely hanging on and wondering if there is hope. We have a choice. We can either be completely shattered by bitterness, depression and anger or we can lay the fragments before the One who can take the sharp slivers and jagged pieces and create a beautiful, productive life. Here is the conclusion to John's story. When John was ten, he was sullen and moody and difficult and so was I. But I was no longer proud....

Aviary Amphitheater (Wordless? Wednesday)

We're slow starters in the morning. The children lie on the sofas and read. Charlie sits and eats a graham cracker and a bowl of yogurt at the table before breakfast. Lauren and I take turn cooking oatmeal, or muffins, or scones... We eat somewhere between ten and eleven. Today, in the midst of all this leisure, the house became exceptionally quiet and I went to figure out why because "too quiet" is never a good thing. Except that it was today. I peeked out the living room window into the backyard and found five chairs and five children lined up on the patio. I opened the door and everybody shushed me. "Hush, Mama. We're watching the birds. Come sit with us" Six or seven hummingbirds were zipping around the feeder, frantic to fill their little gas tanks before they migrate. The children were silent, heads tipped up, eyes squinting against the morning light. I went in to get the camera. I took a few pictures of the children but could not capture the hyperacti...