OH MY GOSH A WII!!!

Last week, I took all the girls and Michael to the live broadcast of "stories of light," a local make-a-wish fundraiser. The stories were from wish kids who went on air with FM100 and told about their make-a-wish, of course, in hopes to motivate people to call in and donate toward next year's wish kids' fulfillment. Rachael was scheduled to go on air around 9:30 or so. To be perfectly honest, they solicited us to do this, and we did it ONLY BECAUSE THE WISH KIDS WERE ENTERED INTO A DRAWING TO WIN A WII SYSTEM. I might as well admit my (our) selfishness. Okay, once we got there, of course it was great, and we saw all our make-a-wish coordiators and friends from 2 yrs. ago. It was great! They spoil and pamper the kids and parents totally, and just gush love on you. Going there is like getting hugged, but you don't know why you're getting hugged, you just sorta enjoy it till it's all over. Anyway, I choked at the end of the interview, with a rush of emotion that comes up and visits me frequently when I access those memories. Well, the D.J.s cried, the volunteers choked up and teared up, and I just couldn't get any more words out. I'm sure it generated thousands of dollars in donations..... :-) Once I got my voice back I apologized for my loss of control, and Rachael goes, "Mommy, you always cry when you talk about my cancer." Too true. Okay, well, yesterday afternoon they called us to tell us that RACHAEL WON THE WII!!! What a thrill for her and ALL my kids! It came with guitar hero, (the new one) and "wii play." I'm not sure what that one is, but the kids are psyched!!!! Bret said he thinks God let us win it so we could have lots of fun times with all of our family that's coming to town next week. :-) I guess God knows! Update on Gramp: all is well, he seems to be staying up later at night, no more fainting spells, and eating like a big piggy! I know he's been snacking because I can follow the trail of raisin bran crumbs (he eats them dry like a snack) through the house...hey, it helps me find him!

Fiber

Michael is into lots of things. Totally orally fixated, which is normal, I know. This was him as we were putting up our tree. Surely can't hurt him if he doesn't actually get any bark down, right? Then there's Gramp's oral fixation...let me define. Pipe smoking, (but only once since he's been here, cause he can't get outside without a little help) and denture cleaning. The girls stare at him fixated whenever he pops his dentures out to lick 'em clean of any food debris. They're horrified, but can't look away. I can't help but laugh...Emily turned and slowly put her yogurt back in the fridge after one such episode...I was dying. She said, "I just don't think I can eat right now.." Too funny. Well, Christmas is getting closer and closer! I haven't sent cards yet; heck I haven't even begun to get the pic processed yet! I'm tempted to do the whole ecard option. It's probably a greener option anyway... The days are SO busy lately, it's like the energy level is ramping up, and then Chrismas week it all settles down, thank God! Maybe I'll be able to drag my kids over to my poxxy friend Kim's by then, if they're all "pox free." We've all had it, but not Michael, and I'm selfishly trying to avoid poxxy baby at Christmas. Plus, I'm pretty sure it would be bad for Gramp...although, he is ONE TOUGH COOKIE. He fell over into the bathtub the other night. Yes, from standing upright to falling over; right into the bathtub. The leaning tower of Gramp. Broken bones? Bruises? No. Nothing. Like he's made out of petrified rock or something. What is it that makes him so well-preserved??? Milk? (always drinks it) Sardines (either he really loves them, or he just ate them to gross out my Gram) Smoking a pipe for 50+ years??? Who knows! It's amazing. Although, he is losing some of his sharpness, and maybe it's from those "fainting spells" he was having at my house a couple of weeks ago...can't remember which siblings are still alive or not (none), where his money is (my dad's running that ship), or how he ended up in Memphis of all places! He's given me the address of the funeral home back home several times, in case I should forget. "One of these days you'll have to put a tag on my toe and ship me home to CT!" Grim. Yes, but he says it to make me laugh, so I do. "Which toe Gramp?" lol.

Who needs amusment parks?

Not me! This is one of those blog entries that you'll probably figure I'm drunk or hormonal when I write it. I just want to ooze my gratitude for my friends here. Who needs a thrilling roller coaster ride when I can just go out to our fav. corner hang-out and spend a "mom's night out" with the girls and run the full gammit of conversation?? Or in someone's living room, dining room, or kitchen? We can go from one end of the spectrum to another within 2 seconds. And everyone hangs on and can ride with it...we can be splurting out our drinks with laughter in one breath, and delving into depths of consciousness and faith in another. My SIL once said that we spend so much time "finding our people" during life, well, I've found mine. All the filters are off with them. So many of our criterion are the same.. and the raw experience of life is exposed. We don't need to spend time figuring out how each other feels about this or that. We already know. So then we can jump into the nuances of our daily struggles with zeal and understanding, and curiosity, and appreciation like I've found with no other groups of people. Maybe a handful of people in life can get that moment of commonality, but here, we're all onboard. It's times like this that I'm so grateful for these friends. After laughing till my cheeks hurt, and contemplating life in new ways, I leave SO fulfilled and grateful!!! AND, I'm sure we'll all be financially stable from the proceeds of our BOOK once it's published. Thanks to each of you who I treasure! I LOVE this roller coaster ride!!

Christmas tree hunt

We spent yesterday afternoon out cutting down our Christmas tree. This has been a tradition in our family forever (before I was married even!) and now it's part of our family's fun. Nothing better than to get the kids all psyched up to race through the fields of trees, then have to drive an hour to get there.."are we there YET?" Then get 6 people to agree on which one's the best, only to walk away for a minute and when you come back, someone else has cut it!! AAAHHH! In the end, we got a great one, that's waiting to be part of our Christmas celebrating. Gramp is home now, he got checked out well and his meds have been changed, so maybe he won't be so sleepy all the time.

Give thanks

I haven't blogged in a while, because last time it took hours to keep trying and re-trying to get a new post to work. I guess I figured that if I left it alone for a while, the little mouse that works in my computer would get it all straightened out for me! So, all goes well here. My parents came last week for a visit with Gramp, and we had our Thanksgiving dinner a week early; we had the whole big meal. Of course Michael got sick in the middle of it with a fever and wicked crankiness (translation: I ONLY want mommy to hold me, and then I'll just moan and writhe around). It was fun anyway, and I know Gramp was really glad to see dad. The kids are loving the massive leaf pile we have at the end of our driveway. They can literally jump into it and they disappear and have to crawl their way out. It's totally a hoot to watch. Like a swimming pool of leaves. I have an account on facebook now and have found so many old friends from high school, etc. It's really weird to just be able to go online and see what's up in their day now. Kinda like a freaky time warp, but fun, and train-wreck-like...you just gotta go and have a look at what they're all doing!

Gramp likes PIZZA!

Haven't updated this week. Let's just say my stress level was up too high. Things are a little more stable right now, so I'll give you a peek into today. Gramp loves pizza. Pepperoni. He had it last night for dinner and today for lunch. He had me go and get some last week as well. Who knew? He's been awake for a majority of yesterday and today, which is new. Friday he had a fall off the bed (he says he just slid off of it) which shook him up a bit, but now he seems fine. Michael is pulling up to stand on everything, but I think mostly my legs. Then there's the constant imminent fall, of course. Little Bret plays his first basketball game tonight, and we've spent today tackling the enormous amount of leaves that our forest-like yard produces. AND we left most of them in place!!! We only cleared the back patio and walkways! Anyway that's that. Tonight I have a thick and garlicy smelling beef stew in the crock pot to combat the chilly air outside, and the girls all had hot chocolate this afternoon after an hour of using a push-broom to "sweep" leaves down the driveway at breakneck speed.

Cracker Barrel

We took Gramp to Cracker Barrel and Shelby Farms yesterday. He had bkfst., and read the paper while the kids and I ran around the playground. All went well, but today he's sleeping it off for the most part. Otherwise, nothing too wild to report here. School as usual, kids all doing well. Rachael and I worked and worked at "getting" the concept of rounding numbers. Just when you think she has it, she doesn't. So, we did some creative stuff that involved drawing various shoe styles on the number's "feet" and personifying the number, and VOILA! She gets it! I love homeschooling! The muppets should do homeschooling videos for various subjects; don't you think Cari?? OH! I forgot to mention the MOUNTAINS of leaves we have amassing at the bottom of our driveway, from the friendly neighbor with a leaf blower. I'll try and have pictures one day. Just picture the girls running from the top of the driveway to the leaf pile at full speed, and barely denting the pile!!!

first time out

Last night we went out to dinner with Michael's godparents. Without Michael. It was really a fun time; we had such a good laugh! But, the poor babysitter who kept Michael didn't have as much fun. My friend Kim's daughter Sebrina (along with Emily and the girls) listened to Michael scream for the better part of 2 hours. I'm sure they were miserable. The poor girls, and poor Michael! I hate those first few times you have a sitter for your baby. Both mom and baby are miserable (even though mommy is laughing on the outside...inside she knows what's going on at home!) But he finally wore himself out and passed out. Whew! Today we're hanging out at home rearranging stuff and catching up on laundry. Gramp is doing better the last 2 days, not sleeping quite as much, and more interested in his developing room as I try and re-create his old apt. He really loves Michael and even reached out not only to grab his chub hand today, but to actually hold him. Cool!

Fall leaves and Gramp's hats

No words needed! We had a fun fall day!

Being prepared

Gramp's furniture arrived today, and I rearranged his room to accommodate it all. He was actually asleep on the couch as it all arrived and I set it up, so I thought it would be a GREAT surprise for him to walk in and see all of his dear things in place and pictures on the walls! Well, he went in, said that he remembered all those things, rolled back out and started reading the paper. Hmmmm......Okay then! Clearly not the excited homey memories I had anticipated! I think all that stuff being here is pretty final for him, so maybe he's more sad that he's not going back to his safe little apt. again. Great! All my efforts for naught! :-) Oh well, he'll get used to it. Back to the food game. I also had my good friend, Fr. Bauer come out to meet Gramp today, and he was able to give him Communion and Annointing of the Sick. Hey, as long as he's on MY watch, he's not going anywhere without being ready to go! So I'm really relieved about that being accomplished. He actually wants him to come back and bring Communion again! So, that is great. On a lighter note, literally, Bret shaved the Canadian lumberjack beard off this morning, but the hair's still here. One thing at a time. And, Michael is making TRACKS all around the place! He's getting so interactive and funny. Every couple of days I'll say to the kids, "his brain grew again!" Which I really believe!

Not the Waltons

Although I may envision our house as the warm, stable, welcoming place, neat and tidy and predictable...somehow that's not exactly what happens. Our weekend summary: Bret finally made it home!!! The kids were thrilled when they were woken at 6:30 in the morning to see his tired, travel-weary face. Well, that and the werewolf beard and hair. To which Emily said. "Daddy, that's got to go." (My sister Shannon saw Bret before he left FL. She said, "He looks like he was left in a forest...and then found as a lone survivor..." )He's been asleep for the better part of his time here...I'm sure trying to catch up and get used to sleeping, rather than working, at night. Then he jumped on his Harley to do errands. (Did Mr. Walton have a Harley?) Also, in my eager efforts to keep up this wknd, I washed Gramp's clothes. All of them. Including the billfold and the HEARING AID. Yes. The hearing aid. It's not designed for Maytag rides. Luckily, my sister has cable. And infomercials. She had ordered, and then mailed to me the "as seen on t.v." "LISTEN UP," a personal amplifier thingy. It works. And he's using it. I'll try not to wash it. We also had our annual "all saints day party" with the homeschoolers. It's adorable. The kids all dress up as their fav. saint and get to tell about their lives and what made them holy. (and play games for candy) We always love to dress up for it. Except this year. It was all I could do to prepare for Halloween, AND our history group. The kids went as "all-Saint's-Day-observers" this year. BUT, we also ran the "save the shroud from the convent fire" booth. Which is fun because there's fire, and squirtguns. It's a recipe for fun!! I picked a room to set up that had no fire sprinklers. ('cause you KNOW we'd get hosed !) So anyway, on Sunday when Bret walked by Gramp's room and his bed was covered with cash bills spread out on newspaper, he wondered what the heck??? I simply explained that we'd been laundering money.

Trick or treat!

Here's some pics from the big night! We stormed into our new neighborhood in style this year! Michael rode in the wagon, and on the long stretches between houses, Sophie (and sometimes Rachael) jumped in too. After a long night of candy-collecting, we went back to our friends, the Hardy's house for chilli and sausages, and of course, for candy- sorting and counting! It's so nice to have some nice friends in the new neighborhood to hang out with! Thanks Hardys! Michael even got his hands on a lollipop and was MORE than pleased with it. Gramp has had a couple of days feeling a little weak, but I got him his wheelchair today, and now he's like a speedster through the house. He loved it! Now he rolls up to the bkfst counter and is ready for tea or dinner, or whatever I can give him. Thanks so much to my friend Michele who has taken on watching over Gramp for us on Fridays. No drama, remember Michele, no drama. I came home to a sparkling kitchen and all was well. HUGE feeling of relief!! You know Michele, you have been around me for many of my big life changes here in TN, so, I hope you plan to stick around! Who knows what's next!

Jen weilds a knife

We had a totally spectacular afternoon today. Thankfully we had finished school, and the girls and I went out to crank up the fire-pit and work on some pumpkin carving. My parents had come for one evening as they were speeding through the work of emptying out Gramp's apt. in CT, and then delivering some of the smaller more valuable items here. The rest of the loot (cases full of cash and collectible gold and silver items....) are on a truck headed this way. So, unfortunately they missed the pretty day and the smokey fire; sorry guys! You were missed too. Bret called during school and talked to all the girls, making everyone more anxious about his returning sometime in the next several days. (Maybe then the burgers on the grill will come out less..."blackened" looking). So, the pumpkins are carved, the burgers are burned, Gramp is eating well, and all is looking good as we wrap up October

The strategy of food

So Gramp just MIGHT be "getting it." Tiny specks of reality and acceptance are creeping in. (that he's here to stay, that is) I don't know what else to do to get to him, and help him make the transition....except....the old standby...food! I put on my "gram memories" and start making some of the foods I remember her cooking for him. Potatoe pancakes. Keilbasa. Oatmeal. Tea. Ham sandwich, don't forget the mustard. Corned beef hash. There's some stuffed cabbage and stuffed peppers on the horizon. I need to get some dark bread too. The kids are less excited than Gramp is about it, to say the least. But Emily and the girls made pizza tonight and he was quite entertained to watch them work. And he even ate some! 3 meals in a day! The man might just get fat!! Bret went to hang out and shoot some hoops at a friend's house today. When he got home there was a story that involved several other kids in the neighborhood, a "stolen" golf cart, an airsoft gun, a kid hanging off the back of said golf cart, and pulling an Indiana Jones to make it to the front, and a locked house, but a garage door that could be "rolled under" to get in. I really didn't want to hear the rest did I???? Again, no police. All good. Now that everyone is asleep, I'm going to try to vacuum a little. Michael is practically crawling, and has that advanced dexterity that allows him to scoot from crumb to crumb, or dried leaf, or stringy thing and pick it up in his curious little fat fingers and eat it. So, prevention time! Oh yeah, tooth #2 is here!

Fat and happy

Gramp continues to do well, and is eating more and more! I guess eating, sleeping, and pooping are my normal indices of how the kids are doing, so why not impose the same things on Gramp? So far so good! In other news, Emily is camping with the girl scouts this wknd., and Bret slept over at a friend's place with about 4 or 5 other boys his age, and the police were NOT called, so it's all good. Rachael, Sophie and I, along with Michael were able to go to the neighborhood costume party last night. Emily designed everyone's costumes this year, and they came out so cute. Rachael was Mulan, and Sophie was a cowgirl (but she also has a robot costume ready if she wants to swap next week). To my husband Bret, who is, as he put it, "in purgatory," I want you to know how much we appreciate the discomfort/irritation/loss of recreation, etc. you are going through. We are all just hanging on until you get home. We love you and cannot wait for you to get back, because we all miss you.

Settling in...

Well, after a little anxiety and some disorientation last night, we are doing much better today. Gramp seems very relaxed, took some naps, read some papers, and is getting his bearings around the house. We are getting his services all in place. He had a couple bites to eat, but really doesn't have any desire to eat much...but then again I NEVER remember him eating too much of anything, so, it's pretty normal. I'm just giving him the reins to eat and do what he wants, when he wants, in the hopes that he acclimates and claims the place as home better if I'm not pushy. Thanks so much to Ellen and Steve who talked me down last night when the reality hit me. The kids are just following business as usual, except they now have the added issue of a blasting t.v. on btwn. Gramp's naps....:-).

Holy Hell!

So I found out today that my 98 yr. old grandfather is coming to live with us.... tomorrow. Yes tomorrow. I have less than 24 hours to get ready. I said he could come and live with us instead of the crappy nursing home he was destined for, and surprisingly enough he agreed! NO ONE in my family anticipated his EVER leaving his home in CT, but he is! We're all a little apprehensive, but excited to have the opportunity to spend a little time with him in his waning years. I'm sure it'll be an education for everyone involved. And I have to give a HUGE thanks to my husband for not freaking out, and agreeing to let him come here. Thank you Bret! I think you could tell how much this meant to me to help him out. Anyway, today I transformed the room that is supposed to be for Michael (someday) and was also a catch-all room since we moved in, into a little bdrm/apt for Gramp.

Pumpkin hunt

The girls and I did the big October deal today, minus Bret (who's at boyscout camp). This one pumpkin patch has a whole hayride/playground/photo op/etc. deal. It's really a family's backyard and land, so they're very enterprising. There were a ton of people there today because it was so pretty out. Enjoy!

Milky milk

Cari, this is just to make you drool: observe, from left to right, butter (freshly churned), cream, milk.

Keeping up with the culture...

This post is purely to get a chuckle out of my mom and her cluelessness about current use of computers. Listening to her reading something on line today, I hear her read, in the text, (insert a sing-song melody here) "lalala." And I'm going, mom, did you just read "l-o-l?" "Yeah." MOM!!! Do you not know what LOL is? "What, lalala?" I can imagine all the emails I've sent with an lol stuck in there, and my mom is thinking I just sit around singing lalalala while at the computer. Okay, well she's on the phone with me as I type this and is saying something about the fourth commandment.....okay, mom, say it with me now, LOL! NO SINGING or HUMMING allowed!!! Also, Michael really cut his first tooth yesterday!!! A bottom one! Yay! Bring on the steak!

MMMOOOO!

Today we went to Mr. Peter's farm! He is a sweet old man who came to live here from Germany many years ago and loves dairy farming. He says he has never had a bad day at work! The girls got the "talking tour" of how to milk a cow, and life on the dairy farm. I was ashamed to say that the first thing out of Mr. Peter's mouth when he met the girls was, "looks like they need to get out in the sun some!" They met the goats, the cows, the dogs, the kittens and the calves. We brought home 5 gallons of fresh milk, and next we'll make some butter from the milk fat. So fun. We're such city people, we've lost so much knowledge! Anyway, enjoy the pics!