Memorial Day

On this Memorial Day I offer my intentions for a time when veterans can look back on only peaceful service, for the fast and fair resolution of conflicts small and large, and for the safety of those offering their service now. Thank you Auntie Chris and Cousin Caroline! Thank you Dave!

And for all those -- so many, and now more every day -- who have died in conflict and in service, I pray for rest for their souls and comfort for their families.

What are you doing to bring a little peace into your life today?

Liam is much better today and after helping with the flag came inside and then had waffle, strawberry and half an oreo for breakfast. (I was eating a leftover to-die-for cookie bar with my coffee and it's hard to lay down the law about no cookies for breakfast when, well, you're eating one. I went with: "this is a special treat; not for every day." I use this a lot.)

Sick day

Sick day for the baby boy. He was up all night with a high fever and stuffy nose. All night. Awake and crying for about 15 minutes; then half awake and tossing and turning and whining for another 20; then about 30 minutes or 40 of sleep; then do it over, and over, and over. There's nothing like biting your tongue to keep from giving in to an almost overwhelming urge to tell your child to "stop whining!" at 3:40 in the morning. (I didn't; I was patient.)

Then he went sound to sleep around 5 am and slept pretty much through until 9. So, his day was all screwed up. At 9 we came downstairs to take care of the dog and make a little nest on the sofa, from which we watched Wonder Pets over and over and rested. Sucky (usually limited to only upstairs and only at sleeping time) makes an appearance as do Otter and blue blanket. All the sleepy-time things. He's still stuffy, and has a cruddy cough, but the fever stayed away for most of the afternoon, and he was remarkably cooperative on a trip to the grocery store, and so excited to see Grandma and Grandpa and GG for Sunday dinner. Now asleep again, hopefully for the night. I'm soon to follow.

Thanks everyone for being so sweet about my whining. . .I try to keep it out of this space.

Catch up

I'm sorry to say that I just haven't felt like doing this lately. Things at work are stressful; things at home are pretty unrelenting in a chronic-illness-sucks kind of way; it absolutely will not stop raining outside for love or money and the tomato transplants huddle on the porch and make my idea of a neighborhood tomato tasting party in July seem pretty far fetched, the garden is a disaster; I feel bad about not taking better care of the dog; Liam has yet another cold which makes me worry; it's going to cost about 3x what I thought to paint the house, that is, if we can even find a painter to do it, and the house absolutely must be painted this year; etc.; etc.. It's just a grind and often hard to find anything to notice or enjoy or look forward to most days, or the motivation to look, since, of course those things are out there every day.

So our days go by and like everyone's they are a mix of things, including stolen moments or whole afternoons of peace.

Like the day a week or so ago when Liam started to learn about car engines. He has been asking and asking about them and one Sunday dinner night I finally remembered to suggest that he and both Grandpas and Daddy might like to go out after dinner and see about the engines in the cars. Now we have to discuss where the engine on every car or truck we see. So it goes.

Things to remember

Liam is doing two things I especially want to remember these days. Of course, he's doing about 100,000 things I want to remember, but these two stand out.

First, he confuses "we're" (As in, "We're going to grandma's house, please get your shoes.") and "our" (As in, "Mollie is our dog; it's our job to feed her every day.") So, at least once a day we arrive at "we're house" or it is pointed out to me that "This is we're car!" Sometimes I correct it ("That's right! This is our car!") but mostly I don't. He'll stop on his own and when he does, I'll miss it.

The second thing is, I think, sweet beyond words and also interesting. He confuses, or conflates maybe, "pretend" and "remember." Both things that he knows occur in his head, I guess. So, he will say to me "I want to remember that this is the big ship, Mommy" or "I want to remember that I am the kitty." Pretend/remember took me a few tries to figure out, but now that I've got it, I just love it. He only has this word confusion when he's hunting for a verb; never when he's using an adjective. We always have "pretend medicine" when he insists that knit kitty or otter have a sickness and need to see the doctor; never "remember medicine."

I'm in Wenatchee, again. At home they are being blown away by a big, freak, spring wind storm. I moved the tomatoes onto the porch right up next to the house and if this weather kills them anyway I'll be annoyed in the extreme. Hoping the power won't go out and mess with the O2 concentrator (although there are spare O2 tanks staged in most every room so even if the power does go out, things should be fine). Will is stable at home except he has shingles, from whence that came, we have no idea. He reports that it's not that bad, and his doctors say that because he is immune suppressed (to maintain his transplant) he hopefully/probably will not suffer as much as most shingles cases.

Congratulations to beautiful Sara who does not blog any more, but delivered her twin girls today. I met Sara online because both our husbands have CF and we both were going through IVF to try to start a family. Sara suffered many losses along the way which makes this all the sweeter. Love to you Sara.

Photo: from a week or so ago, chopsticks; he likes them a lot, although is prone to the stabbing method still.

Captain, my captain

We are all fine. It has been a long week and busy, but the weather has been getting better and the sunshine helps. More this weekend on our garden and how Will has been doing (fine, basically).

After our after dinner walk (which included climbing on the enormous pile of wood chips, more on this later with photos), Liam came inside and wanted to talk about captains and where they live. Ideas included the Savanna, the Circus Ship, and the zoo among other places. We had the following conversation while he ate his yogurt:

Grandpas

Liam is lucky to have two grandpas right here in town. Nothing could really be better. Tonight after dinner they took him walking to see his two favorite neighborhood features. (1) The "big stump down by the busy road" which is exactly what it sounds like, from a big, big old maple tree that came mostly down in the wind a month or so ago and blocked the busy road for a while until the city got it all sorted out. Liam is captivated by it. (2) The kitty around the corner who is confusingly named Bunny. (Discussed previously here and here and probably some other places too. Bunny is a big part of our lives.) Just about the friendliest cat in the whole wide world. Seriously. He runs out to see Liam, Liam runs towards him, and they snuggle. What other cat doesn't run at the site of a 3-year old (almost) running towards it? A few days ago Liam saw Bunny eating grass, so now he picks grass to give Bunny and. . .Bunny eats it, right from Liam's hand.

Bunny was inside or off doing kitty things tonight, but they still had a great time on their walk. And then fed the worms in the worm bin when they got home. All that on top of cookies and ice cream for dessert makes for a pretty good evening when you're almost three. My sister is visiting this weekend; Will had a good day and sat outside in the sun for a while; nasturtiums were planted; and Liam got a walk with two grandpas after dinner. A good day.