Atticus Writes Stuff

Atticus compulsively writes and draws (and reads). He brings home drawings and notes he did at school (while not doing his actual classwork) and writes notes all evening and weekend long. He writes in church. Our neighbor Gigi Deems is also a drawer and writer of stories. Atticus made this for her the night they were supposed to have a drawing date and she got sick again and couldn't come. She was so sad. A half hour after Atticus ran this down to her house, she ran back with a story she had made for him.

 

He often learns rhymes or poems or songs at school and makes these for me (instead of doing his actual assignments - sigh.).

A cyclops vampire.

A recent reoccurring motif -- the underground tunnels at his school -- really? He says, yes.

This one needs some explaining. I found this in Atticus' backback. I knew that Samir was a new friend of his from school. But I had no idea who Nancy Stoner was. I asked Atticus. He said, "Oh, Nancy Stoner is Samir's worst arch enemy." I said, "Who is she?" Atticus said, "She's Samir's worst arch enemy." "But who is she -- a student, a teacher?" Atticus: "I don't know." "Oh," I say. As I type this Atticus is reading over my shoulder. He has just informed me that he now knows who Nancy Stoner is -- a lunchroom teacher. Hm.

"Once upon a time there was a kid named C.J. And he was light-skinned. One day he decided to take a walk by himself. (And he got lost.) He found a phone..."

"...He called 911 and a police car pulled up and a police got out. And the police said, 'What is your name?' 'My name is C.J.,' said C.J. 'What's your address?,' said the police. 'It is 782 616 717.' The end."

Jail with a buried bone.

I found this one on a clipboard on my desk. He was playing school with his brothers.

"Oh yah!!!!! Dietrich is stupendous at drawing pictures of people (like normal people like me). (I am Native American.)" This was during a unit at school where they were studying Native Americans and he found out that he is a little bit Cherokee (My great grandmother was full-blooded Cherokee.)

This is all kinds of random. It says, " Pupcake. Cupcake. Calvin [Miller] is stupendous!!!! I see you have boom-boom sticks. [a line from the Muppet Treasure Island movie -- thanks, Dad (-:]"

Skeleton embellishment.

Homework that Atticus made for his dad. My favorite are the encouragements after the answers.

"Ding Ding Ding" with music

Back of drawing

 

Front of drawing

Die Another Day or The Quantum of Solace

Like so many of our friends' families, we spent the holidays with sickness. It's been okay, but it is still part of the story, so... Over Christmas I was pretty sick with a sinus cold that, as usual, drifted down into my chest. I wasn't resting because I had a project-commitment that I was determined to fulfill. So I pressed on through, and it would have been fine, except that the day after Christmas at the end of a day of working, I stopped in at Walgreens to get cold medicine. I was really miserable at that point but knew that Brad and I had a date planned with my mother- and father-in-law able and willing to watch the kids for the night (we were in Des Moines for a week over Christmas). I started to pick up Tylenol Cold but decided to ask the pharmacist who suggested the Walgreen-brand Musinex. I headed on back to my in-laws. Brad and I went on a short coffee-house date and then came back for bed. I took some of the medicine and tried to go to sleep. I was having trouble breathing when suddenly my legs started to go numb. I was a little concerned when the chest pain I had been experiencing through-out the week returned and then my hands blanched white and started shaking. When the left side of my face started to go numb, I started to get scared. I told Brad I needed to go to the e.r. (it was 2 am). Brad woke his dad up to find out where to take me. We got in the car and took off. As we got onto the freeway to Des Moines I started losing feeling in all my extremities and entire face...my chest was like an ironband and also like fire...I could barely breathe. Soon I could barely see anything...I thought I was going to pass out and probably not wake up. My first thought was "I am so glad You [God] are with me here and that I am going right to you." Second thought was utter sorrow for missing the rest of my children's lives and how not having a mother would shape their lives. Third thought came exactly at the same time of simultaneously grieving over missing the rest of this life with Bradley and, honestly, sheer terror for him trying to figure out how to parent these four children alone and no one to take care of him either. I said, in between gasps, " I love you so much, Brad...Tell the kids I love them." Brad had called 911 and they wanted to send an ambulance out to meet us. Brad sees a hospital (not the one we were trying to get to) off to our right. He veers onto the ramp and runs us up to the emergency room doors. A wheel chair arrives and we get in...I vaguely think there will be a stretcher and nurses and one of those chest-zappers...But what happens next is an hour (?) of sitting in an e.r. room with ekg monitors on...then chest x-rays...and arguments with the nurse that I do not need tranquilizers and that I am not prone to panic attacks nor am I mentally-inducing what is happening to me. After four or more similar attacks (not as intense as the first one), the heart-attack like episodes cease. The verdict is that I had some kind of medicine-induced heart-attack like panic attack. It sounds so flim-flammy and made up. We head back home. We are exhausted. (Later I find out on the internet that this particular medicine has produced attacks like these commonly enough to have research forum boards existing for it.) And as embarrassed as I am, I know I didn't make up what happened, and how could I have known? Mostly, I am just overwhelmingly, washing-in-floods-over-me-even-now grateful that God gave me one more day, one more week, another month with my husband, with my children. So grateful. And so grateful that I wasn't really scared to die and be with Him. Only not ready to go because my work here, my part of the story here just isn't done yet. Deep breath of thankfulness.

So after that... I was sick for a few more days -- slept one day straight through. Then Dietrich came down with a fever and took a week to kick it. Then Lincoln woke up with what we thought was pink-eye. It ended up being viral pink-eye which is basically a cold that "settles" in ones eye. It isn't as contagious (nor is it treatable, being viral) as bacterial pink-eye. His actual cold has been mostly just runny-nose and coughing. Tonight Atticus has a fever and some kind of stomach thing..not sure what's up yet. Despite all these illnesses I have been so grateful to have missed the lice scourge and the stomach flu nastiness that has visited other friends. Even worse, we have had distant acquaintances lose a baby over the new year and others who are battling cancer. My own dad continues to fight a horrid infection related to his initial cancer biopsy. These things and the lingering gratefulness from the e.r. visit has truly carried me through with a good perspective on how light these particular troubles are.

The pictures here are from the 3-hour wait at the Target clinic to get Lincoln checked for pink-eye. It was quite the morning. The kids had enough. Lincoln had to pee in this one.

But we made it in...and it was all fine...

French Braids and Cowlicks

Thea Belle eating breakfast on the boys' preschool morning...

My sunshine girl...

A sideways frenchbraid -- after I was foiled in my heidi-braid attempts by her fierce sidepart cowlick. I need more practice -- happily and joyfully I enter the world of hair braiding, etc.!!

My enthusiastic girl. On New Year's Eve we painted our fingernails red. Thea Belle kept coming over to me and laying her hand on mine and saying "We match!" And I would say, "Yay, Girls!!" and give high-fives. She would gleefully shout back, "Yay, Girls, Momma!!!" Exactly, my girl!

New Year's Eve

We actually had plans to hang out with our neighbors the Deems...let the kids all play and watch a movie and the grown-ups drink wine and listen to music and talk. But everyone got sick -- Deke had a fever, I was still recovering from my chest cold and the Deems celebrated with a family stomach flu. Patooie. So we stayed home, played games, had snacks, played a little wii, and then Brad and I finished up the year with a colossal non-yelling fight that ended with sweet, welcome, and difficult repentance/humility/restoration at -- not kidding -- 11:59 pm. So we kissed, sighed, turned off the light, and fell asleep spooning to usher in the new year.

See - he really was sick...took him 3 more days to kick it.

A good sport with his fever.

wii play.

*love!*

It is very, very wonderful to be loved by this man.

Sometimes Things are Difficult

Blue Tiger of Cuteness

So I am not sure how to get back into the blog -- so much to catch up on. Let's start here: Dietrich got his cast off this week. The fifth trip to St.Paul and two casts later (the first one was red and was cut off a few weeks too early -- he wasn't healed enough yet), I think we are done. He still needs to be able to straighten it out fully before another two weeks is up or we go back for physical therapy. But the skin is looking much better -- it was pretty nasty, flaking off like a bad sunburn and especially weird on his hand, the first day, but it's almost normal now. They told me to expect him to "shadow" his arm the first week -- he holds it very close to his body and keeps writing with his left hand and doing most things one-handed. But I am encouraged and grateful for good health insurance and for the 3-hour long doctor appointments being done for awhile. Also grateful for my healthy children -- we met so many families at Gillette Children's Hospital that have lived at the hospital since their child was born. Families that expect their child to always being in a wheelchair or to only live for a couple years never thriving. As long as the trips were for us (especially the younger two kids), I have walked away with even deeper gratitude for easy path God has given our family and encouraged by so many of the families who testified to God's blessing that he gave their families through their sick and disabled families -- I was in awe at their thankfulness and joy.