Our Wonderful Crazy Weekend

Well, we made it through the weekend without childbirth and all the children got to all the activities planned. Friday morning was a lot of fun. We were able to go to our riding lesson but we were short a couple of our volunteers so our instructor decided to have the kids vault. They haven't done it in a long time and I don't think David or JM had ever tried it before. Too bad the camera was packed in my hospital bag because David was loads of fun to watch. He got up on that big tall horse in a frog and flapped his little butterfly wings and laid all the way back across his horse. It was great. The rest of them did really well too but it was especially fun to see David really trying all the tricks for the first time.

Friday night was the premiere performance of Grease for which JT ran the light board. That's a particularly neat thing for Tad and I since our courtship happened within the world of Bucknell technical theater. We have many, many memories of light hangs, scene constructions, headset chatter, crewing shows, strikes (where Tad really learned what I'm made of!) and now we have Ben with a passion to act and JT quickly falling in love with the technical aspects of theater. Tad and Ben were able to see the play on Friday night and I got a chance to go to it on Sunday afternoon. We all thought JT did a stellar job (I've never before seen an 11 yo who could run a light board of any size) and the play turned out quite good as well in spite of the length and breadth of the project.

Saturday morning Ben and Tad got up for Ben's 3rd Baseball tournament game. The Yankees have had a fantastic season, losing only 2 games (and in their defense they were down to 6 players for one of those losses..). They are doing quite well so far in the tournament also with 2 wins and 1 loss. Ben is really beginning to look like a seasoned player. He is fun to watch because he loves to play the game. He's not at all interested in pro ball, following player stats or even watching a game. He just loves the feel of a bat in his hand and the excitement of being on the field. He's become quite a dependable batter and he stays awake in the outfield. His skill this season won him a slot in the All Star game for his league - quite an honor since he was voted there by his peers and their parents.

The afternoon brought the Great Lego Boat Race. Our local lego guru, homeschooling dad and coach of several award winning competitive lego teams, Marco hosts a lego boat race each year in his swimming pool. Last year was the first time entering for JT and Ben and this year they talked their friends Patrick and Emory into joining them in the fun. JT and Emory are the mechanical-minded ones of the bunch and they worked for an afternoon coming up with their boat, which had to be made out of legos, had to mobilize itself across the pool and could not have any non-lego parts above the water.

Being the more artistic of the bunch, Ben knew he and Patrick would not do well with the logistics of getting a boat to move so he decided to put a different lego skill into play in the competition. They created a stop motion animation film of a lego boat swimming merrily across a lego pool with a little lego Mr. Marco cheering them on and announcing them the winners. They knew it would probably disqualify them from the contest but it was worth the laugh for them and much more fun to do than figure out the physics involved.JT was disappointed that their boat capsized in the water before it could really take off. He had spent a long time trying to get it balanced just right but he and Emory did take home a certificate for Best Looking Boat. It turned out Marco was quite impressed with Ben's and Patrick's project and allowed them to enter the movie as a "digital entry". He did ask Ben to put the model boat in the pool just to be part of the crowd. He was so impressed that he dedicated a page of his website to the movie which you can watch ( a bit pixillated) by going here. They earned a certificate for the Lightest Boat and a participation certificate. There are more pictures of the event here.

While it would have been nice to stay and picnic, the crew was on to the next thing for the evening immediately after the judging of the boats. JT went off for the 2nd performance of Grease while the rest of us grabbed our bag of peanuts and headed to the local community college to watch Ben play in the All Star game. That was great fun as the college has a nice facility complete with electronic scoreboard, sound system, real dug outs and LIGHTS. Ben was playing on the American League team and his team was the first to line up on the field. Ben got to run out with his teammates, onto the lighted field, while the announcer called his name over the loudspeaker. He did manage an at-bat with a single to first and on to home before the game was called due to lightning. The American League was ahead 2-1 as we all headed home, hoping for a rain check on the evening's game.

Sunday was supposed to be the day for Ruth and Betsy to have a tball game but due to the heat index that was canceled. That's probably a good thing since Ruth wouldn't have been able to play anyway - heat and sickle cell disease are not a good pairing. That freed me up to see Grease and Tad to have a little time to chill out after running hither and yon up to that point. It was a great weekend and I'm sort of glad Tali decided to hold off her delivery so I could enjoy at least some of the children's accomplishments as well.

Happy Meatloaf Day!

It's June 6th and around here that means meatloaf and mac and cheese. We celebrated God's grace poured out on us three years ago today with that meal. It was three years ago that lightning struck our house and burned us out of our home for the next year. Having left the raw meatloaf in the oven to cook while we went to the library, we arrived home to see smoke rising from our roof and the only prayer I could pray was "Please Lord don't let it be the meatloaf." It wasn't my fault and it was only by the grace of God we were all out of the house when the lightning struck. Not a hair on any of our heads was harmed, we learned a lot from our experience in another neighborhood, grew closer as a family and gained a lot more space in our newly refurbished home where we returned to a bigger kitchen and dining room and a completely redone everything else.

Honestly, I was sort of glad Tali decided not to show up today. I mean, we just *have* to have meatloaf and mac and cheese on June 6th and the poor girl would never be able to pick her own birthday dinner...what fun would that be? On the other hand, she will never be part of that story. It seems funny that the family goes on, more are born and something as monumental in our lives as that fire won't be part of her own life story. At least Nathan can say he was conceived while we were waiting for the rebuilding to happen (although somehow I doubt he'll take a whole lot of ownership in that little fact...).

June 6th also happens to be the birthday of the baby we lost when an adoption disrupted many years ago. When Ben was 10 months old we brought an adorable little baby into our home for adoption. We named him Jacob Matthew. We had him for 3 months when the week before Christmas his birthfather showed up out of prison and decided he wanted to be a dad. We had no choice but to return him to the agency and to his birthfamily. They named him Jamil but he will always be our Jacob. He's celebrating his 10th birthday today. His dad is back in jail - he'll be out about the time Jacob turns 16 or 17...sad....We miss you Jake.

It was a good Meatloaf Day today, though. We had a good riding lesson this morning. We were short volunteers so we did some vaulting for the first time in a long time. David tried it for the first time and was a regular little gymnast on top of his horse. The camera is packed in my hospital bag and ready for tons of pics of Tali so I didn't have it along but I sure wish I did!

JT and Ben had a couple of friends over this afternoon preparing for the great Lego Boat Race tomorrow afternoon. The rest of the brood decided to play in the sprinkler in the driveway when the mailman pulled up. He handed Adora the mail then parked his truck in the street, got out and stood smack in the middle of the waterfall with a big ol' grin on his face. He was good and wet when he returned to his truck and we were glad to let him cool off with us!

Then tonight was opening night for Grease for which JT was running the light board. The show went off ok - Tad and Ben represented the family - and Tad said JT was spot on with his cues. That's our boy!

Dum de doo de dum...

I'm at that point in pregnancy where it becomes a waiting and second-guessing game. I was sure Tali was going to make a grand entrance yesterday. All afternoon on Tuesday I had constant contractions and then all through the night they began to get stronger and stronger until about 4:00 am when I finally got up and started emailing everyone and their mother in order to make arrangements for the big day and to be sure all the offspring would still get to all their activities in our absence. Tad took the day off work (he was planning to take a half day anyway) and then around 7:00 am all womb-related activity suddenly ceased...stopped...nada....and has yet to resume in any significant fashion.

When I went to the midwife last week she found it difficult to discern head from tail and so I was treated to another sonogram. This one showed Tali definitely buns up (a good thing) but her head was a bit wonky to the side of my pubic bone. So the whole time I was having these wonderful contractions I was picturing the poor dear banging her head repeatedly against my pubic bone in lemmingesque fashion.

I returned to the midwife today who asked if I wanted to check the baby. I figured I wasn't doing much by way of dilation but I did want to see if poor Tali was going to come out a little squished to the left side of the cranium. She wasn't able to really feel the head well as Tali kept bounding out of her way at each attempt (it took a long try to get the heartbeat on the little monitor for the same reason) so it was back to the sonogram machine we went. This time we found Tali floating perfectly head down exactly where she belongs except there was a broad halo of fluid around the top of her skull. This explains all the floating about she's been doing and doesn't really indicate anything except that the breaking of my water is likely to more closely resemble the opening of a dam. Fortunately, never once has this happened on its own. In fact, with Nathan I was 10 cm dilated and nearly ready to push when the midwife had to break the membrane for me.

And so we wait...and wait....and wonder....and hope that somehow over the course of the weekend life will be able to go on, all will have a riding lesson, the friends will make it over to plan for the competition, Ben will get to his play-off and his All Star games, the boys will make it to the lego boat competition, JT will get to his play for which he is running the light board and the girls will make it to their t-ball game. All in the life of a large family....

Frugality

Tad took Ben to the barber on Saturday for a hair cut whilst I stayed home and gave the remaining offspring home-cut doos. Ben is very particular and it's just not worth the fight but Tad came home remarking that it cost him $35 to get just two hair cuts. I was busy working on about hair cut number 4 or 5 and made the observation then about just how much money I was saving the family. Unfortunately, at about that same moment I knicked JT in the back of the neck with the scissors. Two haircuts later, I did a real number on David's ear, removing a nice chunk of skin from the tip of it and causing a great amount of bleeding (Major Bad Mommy moment here). It was about this point, that Tad commented, "Let's see, honey, 2 ER co-pays at $15 each...I'm not sure how much money you really are saving us...Please be careful with those last couple of cuts...."

Sigh...try to be frugal and this is the thanks I get. Fortunately, David finds his band-aid quite stylish.

Sibling Confusion

Betsy and Ruth have made some nice friends on their t-ball team. One of them is a real chatterbox and came home chatting away with her mom about the team and various aspects of t-ball. She embarked upon a soliloquy one day about the girls' shirts that went something like this, "And we all have shirts that are the same except they have our names on the back, not the first names, just the last names which is ok except for Betsy and Ruth who have their first initial and their last name on their shirts which is a really good thing because if they didn't have that I don't think I would be able to tell them apart."

Hmmmm....me either...maybe I should put first initials on all the kids' clothing so I can tell who's who...whatd'ya think?

First Ride

Today was a momentous riding lesson. Nehemiah had his first lesson and has already far surpassed Nathan's progress. Nathan's lessons have consisted of petting the horse, sitting in my arms while I try to toss him in the saddle and then grabbing on to me with a death grip. He will pat the horse one more time and then it's on to the next customer. Not Nehemiah...His first time at the barn for an official lesson he was all over his pony. He sat right up in the saddle, walked around and around the ring and then didn't want to get off. He spent the remainder of the lesson after his turn trying to crawl under the fence for seconds. Meanwhile, Nathan watched safely from the ramp. And that, folks, is the difference between Nate and Miah in a nutshell.

John Michael has been progressing nicely in the use of his reigns. A bit more practice and he'll be able to move off the lead rope (we're talking maybe another year here). He looked great up there today and so pleased with himself...Miriam took a gander at a little jump - something she's only done a handful of times before. I thought she looked good going over this jump with her prissy little pony. This was the only jump we could get out of her, though. I suppose gravitational insecurity took over.
Philip, however, was all over the jumping thing as soon as he realized the camera was rolling. He'll do anything to get his mug on a screen. I actually got a bit of video of one of his jumps:
And JT is now an experienced jumper. He ran through a whole course but I was only able to get video of the last two jumps. His jumps are quite a bit higher than what Philip and Miriam are managing. Even on the back of a horse, his natural athleticism shines. I love to watch him ride.
Betsy and Ruth had a bit of action themselves. Ruth's pony got a bit spooked by the wind and tossed Ruth to the ground which spooked Betsy's pony who then took off at a fast trot while Betsy tried to cling for dear life. She finally succumbed and fell to the ground also where her pony did his darnedest to step around her but still knocked her a bit in the ribs. That's the part of the lessons about which I am not so crazy but both girls climbed back on their ponies and kissed and made up. That's an important life lesson I'm very glad they're learning.

Run, Don't Walk...

to any TheatreWorks/USA production you can find in your area! Every year this touring children's rep company brings their delightful (ugh! Did I just use that word?! Well, they are!) productions to a local college where we find we must get our fix at least 2 or 3 times in a season. Monday we took John Michael and David to their production of Max and Ruby

If you've never encountered either the children's board books or the animated Max and Ruby movies, you might consider yourself lucky. We knew TheatreWorks is good but we were truly impressed when they were able to bring life, humor and great art into this rather pithy favorite of our 3 and 4 year old boys. As usual, the set was light-weight and portable (2 key words for traveling rep companies) and yet very clever and engaging, almost becoming a character unto itself. The cast of 5 or 6 was rather large considering the original stories usually don't have many more than 4 characters at a time but they found a way to make characterizations in the most entertaining ways - such as creating life-sized singing and tap-dancing toys who loudly entertained younger brother Max much to the chagrin of his serious-minded older sister Ruby.

I just can't say enough about this company. They tour all over the US and have a wide range of performances for audiences of all ages. Each year we order our tickets in August for the entire year through our local homeschool co-op coordinator. Go ahead, order your tickets and prepare to have a quality theatrical experience!

Doing the Hokey Pokey...

She put her right foot down and her left foot down and she turned herself around...(Sing it with me!). I think Tali has completely flipped 3 full times now since I posted the last post on her breech position. At this point, I no longer have any idea if she is upside down or downside up but I am certain that she feels perfectly content to just drift around at will within this vast stretched out uterus of mine. She seems to prefer to make her major movements at about 5:00am. So just as I'm finally getting back to sleep after my 3rd trip to the bathroom for the night I have a sudden eruption of motion under the bulge of skin dominating my torso. In my half-asleep stupor I have attempted to grab hold of her and hold her in place but by the time I get there, I'm just not sure where she's gone and I don't want to keep her from flipping in the right direction. Good grief, she's not even out of the womb yet and I'm already conflicted about how to parent her...

I have decided, however, that any attempt to turn her- whether it be chiropractics, doctorly versions or grasping a flashlight between my knees - will simply be ignored by my little flibberty gibbit and no doubt in short order she'll be undoing whatever process was done to get her where she belongs. So for now I'm just praying that before labor begins in earnest she'll put her right foot up and her left foot up and turn herself around....That's what it's all about!

Meet Fred

JT and Ben finished up their Biology lessons with a dissection project. Tad ordered them a fetal pig dissection kit and they eagerly dove into the joys of disassembling a once living thing which Ben duly named Fred.

They pulled Fred out of his vaccuum sealed plastic casing and spread him out on a cookie tray on the dining room table. (Somehow homeschooling takes on a whole new twist for projects like this - no personal space or kitchen utensil is safe from its grasp.)Here they are getting their first taste of touching Fred and getting accustomed to the sights, smells and feel of dead fetal pig. This is about when I left them to their own devices and explorations.I returned some time later after they had thoroughly examined Fred's innards and were obviously feeling quite a bit more comfortable with the project - enough to rather enthusiastically give me a tour. Here is the spot from whence Ben wrenched out the intestines. You can see them laying on the cookie sheet to the right of Fred's prone body:This is Fred's heart. I tried to get a picture of it opened as well but it turned out too blurry. They were able to clearly identify the four chambers.

And this was the most enthusiastic show and tell - Fred's brain.
The big mystery of this project was the missing spleen. JT and Ben seemed to get a kick out their dissection and Tad was happy to wrap up his year's science lesson by earning some Really Cool Dad points.

When Right Side Up is Up Side Down

I had a visit with my midwife this evening and we thought the heartbeat seemed suspiciously high in the fundus compared to where we've found it in past weeks. So she sent me off to get a sonogram which confirmed my suspicions - little Tali is currently standing on her feet rather than floating about on her head - in other words, she's breech. She has a few weeks left to flip on her own and I'm contemplating keeping my chiropractic appt for tomorrow morning for an application of the Webster's technique. Thanks to the wonders of the internet and two groups of ladies whom I love and trust I am not so crazy about the idea of an external version, although I would very much like to avoid a c-section. This body was made for birthing babies and I'd like to give it another chance. On the other hand, maybe Tali has good reason for standing up at attention and this is God's way of protecting her from some danger. Or perhaps she just wants a bit of a change in perspective and plans to go flipsy whoozies again soon all on her own....decisions, decisions....And now I think I'll go get on all fours with my rear in the air, a flashlight between my knees, frozen peas on my fundus and headphones on my belly while I try to decide.

Pan-Orthodox Camping Trip

Tad took JT, Ben and Betsy on a camping trip this weekend with a bunch of other Orthodox parishes. The trip is for children and they have spent the weekend experiencing several of the cultures in which Orthodoxy has deep roots. I was blessed to get a whole bunch of recipes of the various foods they are eating so that I could alter them to fit JT's diet. I spent Thursday and Friday in the kitchen preparing tabouleh and hummus and pastistio and Greek honey cake. I made enough for the rest of us to try while the lucky ones were away and we had a little cultural feast for lunch today.

Tad has been texting me as the day progressed. I know that last night the camp directress entertained everyone with her accordian playing followed by an ice cream social (with Breyer's - Yeah!). Today JT did some Greek dancing, Betsy accumulated an entourage of new friends and Tad tried his hand at pysanky. Ben was enjoying the scavenger hunt which somehow used the Greek alphabet for clues and all sat down, eating with their right hand only, a feast of Arabic finger foods for dinner (unfortunately the lamb had been marinated in wine so none for JT).

I have to admit to being quite jealous that Tad got to go whilst Adora and (Tali and) I stayed with the ding-bats and the midgits. I did talk Adora into staying home rather than making her usual weekend trip to DC and I've been glad for her company and assistance. But next year I think I'll make a pitch to be the parent who gets to go - even if I do have to sleep in a bunk bed with a dozen little girls....

Second Chance

For the first time in my life, I got a second chance to do a bad day over again - the right way. Yesterday I headed toward my friend's house to meet up with her for a conference, missed my turn and got whacked in the rear endy trying to turn around and get my bearings. This morning I headed out at exactly the same time, drove towards my friend's house and made the right turn. It was a beautiful thing. I parked my car in her driveway, hopped into her van and had a wonderful day shopping for curriculum at the homeschool conference. It was such a neat chance to do take a bad day and do it all over again. How many times have I thought to myself, "If I could do that over again I would...."? Well, today I had my chance. Thanks, Lord, for your small mercies!

Accidents Happen

Apparently even when you're pregnant and even when you have other plans. I was merrily chugging along this morning in Clifford, our big, red 15 passenger van to meet my friend Christine and drive together to a homeschool conference. I missed my turn, stopped to turn into a parking lot and the next thing I knew a guy flew up behind me and rear-ended me. Fortunately for me, the damage to the Big Red Dog was fairly minimal but I was pretty shaken up, had some minor back pain and mostly concerned about the baby. I am comforted by the limited damage to myself and the van - I had no seat belt bruising, no air bag deployed and really little comparative damage to the van itself. It does make me feel a little safer whilst toting the children, knowing that the thing is rather like a tank. On the other hand, the driver of the pick up truck walked out of his truck just fine but the truck did not survive.

I was convinced by the EMT's to take my free ride to the hospital and check out the baby and then spent the next 7 hours at our local hospital, most of them attached to fetal monitors with my faithful friend by my side all day. Tali spent lots of time tossing and turning and maintaining a steady, healthy heartbeat. The contractions were coming constantly but not strong enough to put me into actual labor and Tad arrived from a frustrating day at work just in time to take me back to the scene and retrieve the van. We're hoping to make it to the conference tomorrow anyway...we shall see. Thanks for all those who were alerted to pray and a special thanks to Christine who sat by my side all day and forsook her day at the conference.

Great With Child

By my calculations I have about 5 more weeks to go. Yeah, I know the ticker at the bottom of my blog page begs to differ but I'm not budging. Every single pregnancy I get two different dates based on two different sonograms. Every single time the OB People say they trust the first date I'm given more and every single time I think, "Yeah but I know more about the conception of this one than you do..." Every single time I get to be about 26 weeks and the OB People start hemming and hawing over their tape measure and saying things like, "Well, you're measuring big..." Yeah, no kidding. If I have one more person look at me bug-eyed and say, "You're really BIG - you got twins in there?!" I think I'm going to have to plead temporary hormonal insanity and deck them good. That look on my face in this picture has good reason for being there... I so hate this part of pregnancy.

I had a dream the other night that I missed my labor. I dreamed that I was scheduled for a c-section so they anesthetized me and then decided I didn't need one after all. They brought me out of the anesthesia just in time to push once and out came Tali - all of about 13 pounds of her (hopefully the whole thing was nothing more than a *dream*!) That was a real bummer because what I do LOVE is labor and delivery! I love the feelings of those contractions rolling over my belly and feeling the baby drop more and more - knowing that there is a perfect symbiosis between baby, mommy and uterine muscles that only God could have designed. That, and the knowledge that within a few hours I will be able to retrieve the brain cells that seem to have taken up residence in the bottom of my uterus for the past nine months and replace them in the cranium where they belong...

So, in answer to the question I get a bazillion times a day - How Are You? I am tired, cranky, fat and useless to the entire rest of the universe except this little one nestling here in my HUGE womb. Thanks so much for asking...

Travel to Viet Nam with me

My friend Elizabeth left this morning for Viet Nam to pick up their adoptive son!! I'll be following their trip on her blog and I'm inviting all those reading along here to join us for the ride!

Noteworthy Spring Choir Concert

The Big Six were part of yet another wonderful Homeschool Choir concert (you can see in the picture how thrilled JT was to be singing with the choir this semester). This Spring Concert featured songs from Broadway - including solos by Ruth, Philip (whose video I cannot get on here for anything - Drat!)
and Ben! The choir was divided up with the Harmony choir having a few more complex pieces with more harmonies and the younger ones added in to fill out the choir with some simpler melodies. I must say that Ruth and Philip really shine at this choir thing. Ok, so Philip sounds like English is his second language but his pitch is great and he has come a loong way. This time around we were trying to get him to open up his mouth and round out his sounds which he was able to do quite a bit. If we can train him up a bit more in his singing ability, I think his speech is really going to improve as well.

It was really another wonderful concert - Miss Catherine sure knows how to pull it all together!!

This Woman Cracks Me Up

Luci's Mom from Add One Chinese Sister posted this on the Feingold Members' Board. I just had to share. She was describing her eldest son's Homeschool Prom:

Bryan will wear his good jeans.

Dad and Mom and little Brother and Sister sitting on the couch playing "hip tunes" on kazoos.

Chips and Dips served for snacks.

If he does really well in school we might let him invite a girl.

Pascha - Something Old, Something New

Yesterday the Eastern Orthodox celebrated Great and Holy Pascha. We made it through the late, late night service which I described on my other blog and then came home and took a nice, long nap. When we woke up we decided to keep the tradition of hiding baskets for the kids. The baskets held treats that were in scarce supply throughout Great Lent as well as a small toy for each child. The hunt was great fun. Of course, Nathan was the first to find his basket and the others followed behind. Tad and JT decided to give their new gps unit a workout and geocached each other's Easter surprises. Tad hid JT's basket up a tree and JT hid Tad's container of beef jerkey in our neighbor, Mr. Frank's yard. Mr. Frank wasn't home to ask if this was ok so JT hid it under a tree and hoped for the best, trusting in Mr. Frank's friendliness to smooth over any troubles. It took JT a while to get the hang of following the gps directions and he discovered his basket long after the others used the more traditional method, they looked UP. Tad's was bit harder. He tracked his jerkey down to a particular corner and tramped into Mr. Frank's yard with his entourage following closely behind. They all arrived at the tree where the booty was stashed but...no booty!! This was followed by a trip to Mr. Frank's front door where he greeted our crew with a very apologetic look. He had found the stash and assumed some neighbor kids had tossed it there. Not knowing what it was, he stowed it away in his garage. It was duly returned to the intended recipient and JT learned a gentle lesson in geocaching without the permission of the property owner!

The rest of the day was spent feasting out of our Pascha baskets on every sort of meat that sparked their desires - beef jerkey, ham and fried chicken, along with breads and chocolate and cheese cake. It was a wonderfully lazy, content day!

Opening Day

Today was opening day for our local baseball little league. I'm not one to try to navigate such activities whilst pregnant so Tad had the 3 baseball players, David and the camera while I sat on the sidelines of JT's lacrosse game. JT's team won a close game and he played quite well, with a couple of assists and coming up with his first win at a face-off.Betsy and Ruth are members of the Diamondbacks team and Ben (much to his chagrin) is a local Yankee. The opening day festivities included 2 inning exhibition games, a parade and lots of other food and fun. The coach of the Diamondbacks gave each of his girls (the only all-girl team in the league) flashing "diamond" rings to sport during the parade which made it all worth it for them. Nobody is too sure who won their game since, as Tad reported, it's not whether you win or lose, but how your hair looks when you pick up the bat (or perhaps how high you jump when you reach home plate).I think Ben and the older boys were hoping for some real action but they did get their first taste at a game with a team they are slotted to play for "real" on Tuesday evening.

Little Miss Muffet...

Sat on her tuffet
Eating her curds and whey



















Along came a spider
Who sat down beside her
And frightened Miss Muffet away...

We tried our hand at cheese-making today and had a great time with this poem.

No Chance for Good-Bye

We've had some devastating news over the past couple of days but it's all part and parcel of opening our home and our hearts to adoption. Noah's grandmother took Noah with her for what was to be a weekend visit and then called us last night to say that she would not be bringing him back. She has decided to try to parent him again. He's been living with us for 8 months - since last August - and had been treated as a son and a brother. Before you get up in arms, I have to admit that we have known this could happen, although I truly did not expect it. We had no legal rights to have him here, it was simply a gentlemen's agreement between us and his grandmother. We were treating it as a foster to adopt situation and allowed ourselves to get completely immersed in growing to love him and in treating him just like one of the gang. Unfortunately, she was well within her rights to decide to terminate that agreement.

We don't agree with her decision and we especially feel cheated and manipulated in the way in which she worked it out and our struggle now is not allowing that root of bitterness to work its way into our hearts. I had no chance to say good-bye to him and my heart is breaking into a thousand pieces. I know all the pat answers to why God allows this but it is so painful to see the generations of dysfunction continue and continue when we had the opportunity to perhaps break the cycle with Noah. This is the Eastern Orthodox holy week - we will celebrate Easter this Sunday. It is a fitting time to go through this loss and suffering - this is what made our Lord weep in the garden over the suffering in the world. Sunday we will celebrate Resurrection and Redemption...

JMOD

Today's is a John Michaelism instead of a Davidism, thus the JMOD title. He came up to me at the girls tball practice and declared, "Mom my eyes are in charge of dreams. Because when I close my eyes, the dreams come behind them."