Advent

           Last year when Advent started, I was struggling to finish up a semester of school.  And after that I was exhausted.  We sponsored an Angel Tree child and we lit Advent candles sporadically, but I can say for certain that Advent was not all it should have been for our family.  The pace of this year is different.  We have four children, so we will always be busy, but we are much LESS busy this year.  I put some thought into what I would like Advent to be like this year, and it is now underway.

             Several weeks ago, I made the very odd request that my family save empty toilet paper rolls for a project I was working on.  With some Pinterest inspiration, I made an Advent calendar.  Starting on November 30^th and counting down to December 24^th, there are daily treats and activities for our family to do.  Instead of just a daily treat for the kids, I wanted to use this opportunity for our family to be more reflective, more connected, and more charitable.  In my first draft, I was ambitious.  As the beginning of the season approached, I realized that I had taken an already busy time of year and made it even more stressful for me.  That was really the opposite of my intent.  Making and decorating sugar cookies with the kids is great, but I don’t really want to make a “job” out of it.   I went back and simplified, and I carefully arranged activities considering my work schedule.  There are a few bigger things like making personal hygiene bags for the homeless shelter and donating food to the Samaritan House, but mostly it’s smaller things like leaving quarters on machines at the laundromat and decorating our home for Christmas. 

           The decorating is being done little by little.  This is both to make it easier and to make each thing more special.  Our activity for the first day was setting out the Advent candles.  The second day we put out the nativity set, and the third day we hung the garland on the porch.  I know that we are only in the first week of Advent, but so far, it is going exactly as I hoped.  The kids are playing along nicely.

           I am very excited because we got new garland this year.  Our old garland was so ragged!  This is so nice.  Hopefully it will last ten years like the old stuff did.  It's pretty expensive.  Once the garland was up, I realized that the old bows looked horrible, too.  I had trouble finding the size and color I wanted, soooooo……………. Drum roll here ………………….. I MADE them!  Me!  I made bows!  If you know me at all, you know I don’t have a single trait in common with Martha Stewart.  Well maybe we both have blue eyes, but that really isn't what I was getting at.  I'm saying I'm not crafty.   I had to watch the YouTube video about a dozen times while verbally berating myself for being so inept, but I finally got the hang of it.  My kitchen is covered in red glitter, and I have 12 beautiful bows for my garland!

           I worked Thanksgiving night, and I have been off since then.  I have tried to be productive.  I got a big hunk of our Christmas shopping done.  I still have a good bit to do, but I feel like I’ve made a dent in it.  The Angel Tree gifts are due this weekend.  We only get one name, and we always try to be as generous as possible.  We managed to get our boy everything on his list, and it is now wrapped and ready to go.  And I made bows.  Did I mention making bows?

           I needed to stay up late tonight so I can sleep late tomorrow, and I do believe I’ve accomplished my goal.  3:30am, and I’m off to bed.   Photos:

Oh the lusciousness of new garland!

Advent calendar

Bows!

Lots and lots of bows!

Angel Tree kid stuff

 

Wrapped up and ready to go!

November Rain

          November is gone.  A birthday was had.  It was quite possibly the most uneventful birthday ever.  I got my feelings hurt.  Matt had asked me what I wanted several times over the weeks leading up to my birthday, and I had told him several things, but then he didn’t get me anything.  He moped around all morning on my birthday and said he felt like he dropped the ball.  He did drop the ball.  I am the easiest person in the whole world to please.  Flowers, candy, good smelling things, a dinner date – any of these would have been wonderful.  A card with a heartfelt, handwritten message would have been great.  Just acknowledge it.  If your life partner doesn’t, then who does?  I am an adult, and birthdays shouldn’t be a big deal.  I never try to make it a big deal.  But it did hurt my feelings.  I ended up buying myself some really cute boots.  They made me feel better.
   

           Thanksgiving happened.  I ate FIVE Thanksgiving dinners this year.  FIVE!  Bonnie and Will’s church youth group served Thanksgiving dinner to the kids at the Open Door Home in Rome on the 11th.  ODH is a semi-permanent residence for children who have been difficult to place in foster homes.  We made broccoli casserole and Rice Krispie treats to take, and Will, Rosemary, and I took them and ate dinner with the residents.  It was a wonderful way to kick off a season of gratitude.  We went around the room naming something we were grateful for.  It is very moving to see kids who have been through some horrific situations remember that there is always something to be grateful for.  Some kids were grateful for having a roof over their heads, for knowing they are safe, and for having the encouragement and support of the ODH staff and residents.  My heart hurts when I contemplate not having a family or a home.  I'm glad they have a wonderful, caring place to live.  I knew a young woman once who had "aged out" of the foster care system.  She wanted a home so badly that she married a man who treated her like dirt. 

          On Friday the 15^th my mother’s brother and some of his family were in town, so we ate turkey and dressing and all the fixin’s at my Granny Ponder’s house.  I made the colossal mistake of thinking that dinner was “Thanksgiving dinner” at my Granny’s, so I obligated us to go to Matt’s family’s dinner on Thanksgiving Day.  Well it turns out, that was just “a special Thanksgiving dinner in honor of Uncle Randy being in town”, and my Granny was very upset that we were not going back on Thanksgiving Day for “the real Thanksgiving dinner”.  My family is complicated.  I’ve known them for 39 years and I still get confused.

            The boys are still in Boy Scouts, and on the 22nd, Luke's Webelo troop went hiking.  The hike was to the House of Dreams at Berry College.  I had never been, and I've always wanted to go, so Matt, Rosemary, and I tagged along.  It was beautiful.  We hiked up the mountain and ate a picnic lunch at the top.  Apparently we went up the back way, which is a good bit longer than the front way, so the hike was about 8 miles round trip.  I handled it just fine physically, but there were a few Boy Scouts I was happy to be away from when it was over. 

   Dinner #3 was the annual Friends’ Thanksgiving dinner hosted by my lovely friend, Dana, at her home in Dallas.  It was well-attended this year, and there were lots of kids there.  Matt and I went and took all our kids except Bonnie.  Bonnie refused to go, and I refused to force her to go because I knew she had the power to ruin the evening for me, so she stayed with my parents.  The other kids all had a great time.  The next Thanksgiving meal was on Thanksgiving Day at Matt’s parents’ house.  His Dad’s family all comes.  It was nice.  This post will serve as a reminder to myself that we went to Matt’s family this year, so we need to go to my grandmother’s next year.  ;-)  Meal #5 was at work.  I had to go into work at 7:00pm on Thanksgiving Day, and we all brought food.  We had a feast.  

          November ends as it always does by celebrating my third-born child.  Luke turned 11 on Sunday.  We ate dinner after church with Matt’s family, and Grandma made Luke's favorite dessert for him.  That evening we went to my parents’ house and had dinner and ice cream cake.  Between the money Luke got for his birthday and what he had already saved, he had enough to buy an iPad mini.  It should be here any day now.  He is so excited.

          Oh yeah… and there was a rainbow.  It was awesome.  It rained all day the Sunday before last, and then it cleared up just before sunset.  It was the most vibrant rainbow I have ever seen, and it was a double rainbow. The photos don't even come close to doing it justice.   Just breathtaking!  I hope I never lose the ability to appreciate the beauty of nature.  Here are some photos of our activities. 

They healed my pain

  

Will making broccoli casserole for the ODH dinner

Hiking to the House of Dreams 11-22-14

The House of Dreams at Berry College

Chillin' at the top of the mountain

 

Annual Friends Thanksgiving  -  2014

Kids at Friends' Thanksgiving

Ingram and Dempsey kids - Thanksgiving 2014

 

October

Fall is now upon us, and we have managed to pack a lot of activities in this year.  It is only the beginning of November, and I’m already exhausted.

A month or so ago, we moved our fire pit closer to the house, and we have been able to enjoy it more.  I have the mandatory mums on my front and back porches.  In August, I helped with a yard sale for my cousin-friend, Cristine, she had some homemade Halloween lanterns that didn’t sell.  Instead of taking them to the Goodwill, I kept them, and I have enjoyed them immensely while hanging out in my front porch swing these last few weeks.

Will had a birthday on September 26.  He turned twelve.  On his birthday, he wanted nothing more than for me to make some apple brickle dip and have his cousins come over for a campfire, so that is what we did.  Matt and Luke were gone to Weebalo Weekend with the Boy Scouts.  My Dad had a birthday on October 6.  That same weekend, we threw a bridal shower for Matt’s cousin who is getting married in November. 

Luke in his Weebalos uniform with his dog, Sailor

Papa's birthday

Happy 12th birthday Will!

Matt and I often take a short trip to the mountains in the fall.  We didn’t go last year, and it almost looked like we weren’t going to get to go this year, but we managed to find the time.  My Dad took Will, Luke, and Rosemary to the Wings over North Georgia air show while we were gone, and my Mom took Bonnie shopping for “band merch”.  Matt and I rented a huge cabin on Lake Nantahala, close to Andrews, NC.  We got there on Friday evening and did not do anything at all between that time and when we left on Sunday morning.  We left the cabin for a while on Saturday, but we just drove around aimlessly.  We went back to the cabin to watch the Georgia game.  We grilled steaks, drank alcohol, and enjoyed the hot tub.  Our neighbors were a few dozen frat boys on a “brotherhood weekend”.  They would have really annoyed me except that two really nice guys came over to our cabin when we were arriving on Friday and explained the situation and asked us to yell at them or come knock on the door if they got too loud instead of calling the cops.  It’s like they were apologizing in advance for their terrible friends.  They really weren’t too bad though. 

Lake Nantahala

So on Sunday afternoon, we got home and picked up our kids from Matt’s parents.  We normally eat with my parents on Sunday evening.  Matt was tired, so he stayed home, but I took the kids over and we enjoyed their company until 7:30 or so.  I was exhausted because Matt and I had stayed up until 3:00 in the morning, and we had to get up by 8:00 AM to be out of the cabin by 10:00.   On the way up the driveway I declared that I was going to bed at 9:00.  We got in the house, and I flipped on my iPod to check messages.  I had a message from a coworker that read, “Where are you??? You are supposed to be at work!”  That was the abrupt end of my relaxing weekend!!!  It was 7:45 when I got that message.  I called to let them know I was on my way while I was throwing my scrubs on.  I made it to work at 8:30, and I hit the ground running.  It was a ROUGH night.  I stayed incredibly busy until about 3:00 AM, and then once I settled down and started charting, I could hardly keep my eyes open.  My head pounded all night.  I have never been so ready to crawl into my soft, warm bed and go to sleep!

Since the schedule started that Sunday night and did not get put out until Friday, I was operating under the assumption that a mistake had been made.  I would have never signed up to work that night knowing I was going out of town.  None of my coworkers had their pencil copy to look at.  I was really angry about it, but I didn’t want to ask my supervisor on the outside chance that I really had signed up to work.  Later in the week, someone working did have their pencil copy, and it turns out that I really did sign up to work.  Dumb ole me!  I guess since it was a fresh schedule, I just didn’t connect that weekend with the one I had scheduled our trip for.  At the last minute, I had added some overtime days, and that was one of them.  It sure made for a rough week!

I finally got to catch up on my sleep on Thursday.  On Friday I had a class in the morning.  I had won some Lake WinnepaSPOOKah tickets on the radio, so I took the kids while Matt entertained Rosemary.  Bonnie has helped Lisa set up for Chiaha, so we picked her up on the way.  As usual, we had a blast.  Everything was decorated.  Halloween music was playing.  I painted my hair purple and wore sparkly fake eyelashes.  The kids experienced their first haunted house.  We stayed until closing time.  Perfect.

Eyelashes are fun

This is my obilgatory "arrival pic".  I take it so that if any of my kids go missing, I can pull out my iPod and show someone what they looked like, clothes and all.  My kids HATE it. It takes 20 seconds of time off their fun.

 And this weekend was Halloween.  Will, Luke, and Rosemary were all zombies.  Bonnie painted a nose and whiskers on her face and went along for the ride.  We stopped by all the grandparents’ houses and ended the night at Jonathan and Lisa’s.  It was relaxing and fun.  Halloween is usually so busy.

So now for November… more birthdays, Thanksgiving, and the start of Christmas shopping!!!

On the way to my Granny's, we saw Carey, Cristine, ans C.O. in the driveway, so we stopped to say hello. 

ending the evening at Jonathan and Lisa's.  These were the dressed up people, minus Will, who was in the bathroom.. 

People I Love are in Pain

        My heart is heavy from carrying burdens of the people I love.  People are constantly asking for prayers, and if I say I am praying for you, I really do.  I pray for you.  I think about you. I love you. I want to help you.  These situations are swirling in my head, so here we go.

         Matt’s cousin, Denise, was diagnosed with gastric cancer last November.  She was told that only 10 percent of people diagnosed with gastric cancer survive for one year.  Instead of despairing, she thought “That’s one in ten. That’s ten in one hundred.  Why not me?”  She wasn’t ready to die.  She underwent surgery and chemotherapy.  Her post-treatment scans were clear.  She was able to take a family trip to Disney World with her children and grandchildren, visit  family members and friends, and celebrate her 50th birthday.  Last month, she discovered that her cancer had returned and it had spread to her liver and other organs.  She went on hospice and was at home with her family during her final days.  On Sunday morning, sweet Denise went home to be with her Lord.  She leaves behind a mother, a husband, two daughters and sons-in-law, 3 young grandchildren, a brother, and lots of other family and friends.  Her funeral is tomorrow evening.  She was a fabulous lady, and she will be missed.

         When I was 16 years old, I went to work at Six Flags.  I worked in the parking lot and drove the trams.  Every time we passed the toll plaza, this one blonde headed girl would smile a bright, beautiful smile and wave like crazy.  I knew immediately that I wanted to be friends with her.  We became best buds.  Tiffany’s home was like a second home to me.  Her dad looked after me.  After I got married and had kids, we lost touch for a while.  About five years ago, we found each other again.  She has a son who is Rosemary’s age and a ten month-old daughter named Ava.  A few weeks ago, Tiffany noticed Ava tilting her head to one side.  She initially thought it was an earache or pain from cutting teeth.  After several calls and trips to the pediatrician, her daughter was admitted to CHOA at Scottish Rite on Thursday.  On Friday, an MRI revealed a brain tumor and a spot on her spinal cord.  She had surgery to remove it this morning (Monday), and it was determined to be cancerous.  They were unable to remove the spot on her spinal cord without compromising her ability to walk, so chemo is the next step.  Tiffany is devastated.  Her dad died from lung cancer when she was pregnant with Ava, so hearing the word “cancer” brings back a flood of heartache and she still has the difficult job of explaining this to her 7 year-old son.  I went to see her this evening, and she seemed to be doing well.  I think she is still in a state of shock.  I will update about this situation as it unfolds.

          I have a coworker who has a 10 year-old daughter who was born very premature.  She had respiratory failure and several strokes, which left her mostly paralyzed.  She has a trach and is largely ventilator dependant.  This little girl has been loved to pieces and very well cared for.  The time has now come that my coworker always knew would come.  The little girl is dying.  Her temperature is going from very high to very low and her heart rate is all over the place as well.   It is neurological, so there is nothing that can be done.  She spent one night with us this weekend in ICU, and went home on hospice the next day.  I know her mother’s heart is breaking.  The girl also has an 11 year-old sister.  We took up a collection for her at work to get gift cards to local restaurants so she won’t have to cook.  The day that they went home, someone posted a photo of her and her daughter cuddled up in bed together fast asleep.  I know she wants to hold on to these precious moments as long as she can.

         The next sick child on my heart is 14 years old – the same age as Bonnie.  When Bonnie first started online school, we found another local family in the school directory.  They also had a child in Bonnie’s grade, so we started getting together every week for science lessons, and Bonnie and Camron became good friends.  They spent the night together often.  The other family went back to traditional public school and then they moved to the next town over, and the girls eventually lost touch.  I remained friends with Camron’s mom on Facebook.  She has divorced and remarried and just had a new baby.  Just a few days after the baby was born, it was discovered that Camron had a tumor in her abdomen.  It originated from her ovary and wrapped around her colon.  They got most of it, and she is currently undergoing chemotherapy.  Her mother sometimes posts status updates asking for prayers in the middle of the night when Camron is up vomiting from chemo.  Her cancer might not fit neatly into the “childhood cancer” category, but I know that 14 is way too young to have to deal with such an adult issue.  It makes me want to squeeze Bonnie tight every time I pass her in the hall. 

         Is that all?  I guess that’s it with the cancer patients.  I also have several people on my heart who are in the midst of separations and divorces.  Men have used them.  Men have abused them. Men have gone crazy.  Men have cheated.  All different situations with these women, but there is one thing they all have in common.  They have all been models of grace and dignity while going through hell. 

         And then there is Matt.  This seems almost trivial with all the aforementioned situations, but Matt broke his hand yesterday.  He was punching Luke’s dog in the head to try to make him stop biting a baby goat with its head stuck in a fence.  The type of break is called a “boxer’s break”, and you get it from punching stuff.  The good news is that he will not need surgery, just a brace for 4 to 6 weeks and a follow-up x-ray.   It’s just a painful, expensive inconvenience.

         Sometimes I feel so incredibly blessed that all my babies are healthy.  It is easy to think that having a sick child is something that you “could never do”.  It is not anything that anyone would volunteer for.  You just step up and deal with whatever life throws your way.  And if you are lucky, you have people who love you who are there to love you, pray for you, and help carry your burden.

Locks of Love

                  It has been a while since Matt and I have been out.  Life gets busy, and we always mean to go, but we never do.  Rome has a trail system downtown that I like to run on after work in the mornings.  I love being down by the river.  It is so peaceful.  Every time I run, I make a mental note that on our next date night, I want to get some iced coffee and walk along the river together. 

                I arranged for my parents my keep the kids last night, and Matt and I went out.  We tried a new Mexican restaurant in Rome called La Parilla.  It was excellent.  Yummy fish tacos, chunky guacamole prepared at the table, and their signature margarita that has a little orange liquor in it. 

                 I had won movie passes on the radio a few weeks ago and they expire at the end of the month, so we decided to see a movie.  There was really nothing playing that we wanted to see.  There never is.  Our taste in movies is so different that we rarely go see movies together.  To make my point, the last time we saw a movie together, we saw The Odd Life of Timothy Green, which came out in 2012.  And that was probably also from tickets I had won.  Between the movies Tammy and Deliver Us From Evil, we flipped a coin, and heads was Tammy.  It wasn’t great, but it entertained us to the point that it didn’t feel like a wasted two hours. 

               In between the meal and the movie, we had some time to kill and I had drank a margarita, so I asked Matt to take a walk with me.  And there was one other thing I wanted to do.  There is a footbridge in the park that was converted from a rail bridge a few years ago.  Several months ago, a couple placed locks on the bridge like they do on the Pont des Arts in Paris, and they posted a picture to Facebook.  The City quickly sent a worker to remove the locks.  More locks kept appearing and being removed, and finally the City decided to let the locks remain.   Matt and I ran to Home Depot for padlocks, engraved our initials on them with his pocketknife, locked them on the bridge together, and threw the keys into the river.  Oh the sweetness!  I’m sure he thought it was dumb, but it sure made me happy.  Now every time I run across the bridge, I'll see our locks along with the others.

                We walked along the river for a while, and then we went to the movie.  After the movie, we came home and shared a big bottle of wine while we watched four episodes of the Walking Dead.  It was a perfect evening.

Here's all it takes to make me happy:

Yummy!  This is not my actual food.  I don't do that in restaurants.  ;-)

Pont des Arts over the River Seine in Paris, France

The Robert Redden footbridge over the Oostanaula River in Rome, Georgia

Goodbye, Sweet Summerime

This summer has flown by like none I can ever remember.  I can’t believe we are almost to the end!  Here is a quick rundown of the fun we’ve had.

-          To celebrate the end of the school year, Matt and I took the kids to Lake Winnepesaukah in Chattanooga.  It is a great little family friendly amusement park.  It has the kind of rides I love most, the Tilt-a-Whirl, Spider, Scrambler… you know, all the rides that spin you around and make you feel drunk.  They remind me of going to the fair when I was a kid.  Bonnie, Will, Luke, and I rode together all day, but Rosemary went a different speed.  She was tall enough for almost everything, but she didn’t like anything but the kiddie coaster and the bumper cars.  I won some tickets from the radio station, so I am going to take the big three kids again on Wednesday while my mom takes Roey out to eat and to do some shopping.  
 

-          Matt went out of town with some buddies in mid-June.  There was a door in the kids’ bathroom between the vanity and the room with the toilet and tub that has never closed.  It bumped into the toilet because the toilet was installed too close to the door.  The last thing you do when you build a house is hang the doors, so by the time we discovered the problem, the plumbing was done and the tile floors were finished.  It would have required a lot of time and work to fix it, and we were just ready to move in.  So the non-closing door has remained.  While Matt was gone, we decided to take down the door and place bets on how long it would take him to realize it after he returned home.  Somehow that little sneaky project turned into a full-blown bathroom redo. They decided the fish theme was too babyish for them.  We painted the walls and bought a new shower curtain and rug, so now they have a more mature bathroom.  Obviously, Matt noticed pretty fast!
 

 

 -          The week of July 4^th, we had lots of family in town that we only get to see once a year.  We celebrated my Granny Ponder’s 88^th birthday at her house.  It was supposed to be at my parents’ house, but a spur-of-the-moment trip to Las Vegas left my mom with a horrible stomach virus, and she ended up missing all the festivities.  Still, it was wonderful seeing my cousins and their children.  There were also cousins on Matt’s side of the family in town later in the week, so we kept the party going.  On the evening of July 4^th, we went to a party at the home of some friends. We had a great time, and their lovely outdoor space inspired me to tackle my next home project, refinishing our deck.  I think I’ll do a separate post for that when it is complete.   It is going very slowly thanks to pop-up summer storms, but it will get done eventually.

-          And speaking of summer storms, we have gotten some beautiful produce from our garden this year.  We have never grown eggplant before, so we gave it a try.  One night, Matt made ratatouille.  I had heard of it, but I didn’t exactly know what it was.  It has eggplant, zucchini, onions, bell peppers, tomatoes, and mushrooms.  The only thing we had a buy was the mushrooms, and the meal was delicious!

 

 -          Bonnie is now a full-fledged teenager.  She had a boyfriend.  Now I’m pretty sure she doesn’t have a boyfriend.  She no longer talks to me.  She spends all her time in her room or with her head phones on.  I remember being a lot like that when I was her age, but up until now, Bonnie has always been very open with me.  I was kinda hoping that we would skip the brooding phase.  I just don’t know how to parent a teenager.  I feel lost.  In retrospect, I think changing diapers might have been the easy part of parenting.  :-(

That's all I've got.  I hope you enjoy the last sweet summer days!