Sigh. It's actually Sunday, the 16th as I write this. I've avoided putting down words for the past few days because I knew today was going to be hard. So, let me explain that, and then when I post what few pictures I've taken, I'll explain the normal day to day goings on. What a week! I haven't exactly cried, but have felt some weight of all that the week has brought with the visitation and funeral for Shauna's mom, fitting in last minute time with the girls, living our "normal" life of at least Benaiah's life schedules, and work schedules, and not forgetting that it's December and Christmas is in two weeks. And then, Aaron, Shauna, Everly, and Nora left to go home today. 5 weeks. They've been here for 5 weeks. That's a really long time and we got used to having them around. We didn't get much else done, but it started to feel like a routine to see them almost every day. It wasn't quite like a vacation because we weren't doing everything together, the 12 of us, but just coming in and out of each other's days, dropping off the kids here and there, going out and doing one fun thing every other day, going to work and appointments. It was more relaxing for me than when we go on vacation because I have all my normal stuff and routine with me in their normal spots, like meds and bathroom supplies, and I wasn't the one living out of a suitcase in an unfamiliar place. And now, we all have to adjust to not having them here. I've exchanged more texts in the last month with Aaron and Shauna than I have all year. We've had more in person conversations about life things than we usually have on vacation. It's just now going to be weird that they aren't here.
And yet, I know, and I even pushed it, that they need to go home and get some space. Both Shauna and Nora need their downtime and you just can't properly get it when you're in someone else's space. Shauna needs to resettle, get back to some parts of normal life, as she adjusts to the new normal of not having her mom here on earth. That's a lot to handle. I get that way, too, where, I just want everyone to leave me alone so I can think for half a second. When you are in a crisis, you don't have time for every single emotion or to process each step. It's when you take a step back from the situation that things become clear. I've recently discovered that I do really well in a crisis because I'm organized, I don't have to think about the things I have to do at home, but can't do because of lack of energy or motivation, and I like having a firm deadline to make me hustle and keep me on task. Being part of a crisis gives me a sense of purpose. I'm needed and wanted. Give me too much downtime surrounded by physical stuff, depresses me because I know that stuff isn't important and don't want to take the time to deal with it. Crisis gives me an excuse not to deal with it. So, today, I'm grieving the loss of having extended family around. I'm grieving that I'm needed as much. I'm obviously hurting for Shauna and her family, too. But I also know that my children will miss their cousins a ton. This last month has changed our relationships with the cousis in significant ways. Having the girls all to myself instead of knowing who they are through other adults has been eye opening. I'm a different person when I'm the sole adult around. And as Tom, today's preacher, said, you've got to spend in person physical time with other people. Not Skype and Facetime. Not texts and emails and phone calls. In person, by yourself, one on one time. And I finally had that with my nieces. I treasure those days with them, helping them math, making sure they ate well, sharing gluten free food with Everly, encouraging them to read better books, and watching all the kids interact, even argue, with each other. It truly has been a special time.
This season has been weird. Seeing cousins, but it wasn't vacation. Doing Christmas activities spread over weeks instead of days and keeping up a normal routine. And now, they won't be here on Christmas or the day after to open presents and eat together. It's almost like Christmas has come and gone already and it's now New Year's. I won't get together with any of my side of the family either. We don't even have a Christmas Eve service. Instead, the church is having their normal services on December 23rd be family friendly, which means all the kids will be in there, except the nursery. I'm kind of grateful that Christmas Eve will be more laid back, and maybe we won't have to stay up so late wrapping gifts and rushing through it all. More time to reflect and be together. And then, New Year's will be even more dull, so we are going to pick up with school again on December 30th. We are officially taking this next week and the week in between the holidays off. I've counted every day as a school day, so we are at 90 out of 180 school days, meaning we are right on track on days, but maybe not on the content I had hoped to be. Remember in our state, we just have to count days. For homeschoolers, content is all up to us. We don't have to take tests or abide by state standards. And that is a blessing. You might wonder then how then do we know what to teach? Well, we have resources and the majority of homeschoolers get through tons of content, just not necessarily in the same order or intensity of a public school system. Are there homeschoolers that fall through the cracks and fail to teach their kids anything? Sure there are, but they are much more rare than you think. We value our homeschooling rights and freedoms and are blessed to be in a state with the same values, and with a non profit organization that continues to help keep it that way legally. For us, the less government involvement on all things, the better, (in most circumstances, believe me, I've been grateful for the legal system and laws for many things, too). Deregulation is best so capitalism can flourish. End of story.
I don't want to go back to school because I know what I want to and should teach, but at the same time, having the lighter schedule has been fun and better for all of us. Life comes in seasons and chapters, right? Closing this chapter, this season, and then digging into the new year with a new season and chapter. Yup, pretty much. But let's take a few moments to recognize the special last few times together and memories made, and maybe grieve a little about the memories we ran out of time for. And then let's stay "surrounded" by family and "surrendered" to Christ as we move forward, adjusting to new and old "normals." Our current lifestyle doesn't allow us to wallow too long, lol. Back to church for the evening activities we go! And life marches on....
Back to Friday, the 14th,.....
Our rest day. We deliberately stayed home and rested knowing that Saturday and Sunday were going to be full days again. Keturah caught a cold, so she was sick in bed and even took a nap! Benaiah had a morning shift, so 7am-3pm and he's loving it because it's mostly adults that have worked there for a long time and they focus on the job instead of goofing off. I'm not sure what else we did to be honest. Hm,...
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| I buckle myself in! Now you're stuck, so I'm going to push you over onto your back like if you were an astronaut ready to blast off. HE didn't like that of course. I liked that he was contained for a hot minute. |
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| "I'm a stupid driver because I bang into walls!" That's exactly what he said! He's been listening too much in the car I think. And he was LAUGHING about it. He was banging into walls on purpose! Oi! |
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| Bailey taught Keturah how to make her own "squishies" so that's exactly what she's been doing! She's using stencils that my parents got us as kids, maybe from a book of the month or stencil of them month club. Yeah! |
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| She used the stencils and then colored them in. She stuffed them at first with bits of a plastic bag, which is very resourceful. Then Grandma gave her some foam from a box of oranges and she's been cutting that up and using it. Cute idea! |
Saturday, the 15th, we had brunch with the 12, then Benaiah went to work, we went home and got ready for the nursery volunteers' Christmas party. The Christmas party was right across the street from Gary and Leah's. They were at a wedding so Aaron and Shauna babysat Justin, Keturah, and Abishai. Benaiah was at work. The Chirstmas party was a lot of fun with white elephant gift exchange, charades, and a sing off. We had gobs of food, and we brought wassail, leftover shredded potato casserole, and a cranberry crumble dessert I made up with whole berry cranberry sauce on the bottom, gluten free flour and oatmeal, and some butter, cinnamon, nutmeg and a little bit of stevia. The top came out pretty dry, but the cranberry sauce melted a little bit and then reformed when it cooled off. It worked like I thought it would, yeah! We ended up with the Elf movie and ugly Christmas sweater cookie decorating mix, as well as a gift card to Kirkland's, which is a home decor store. I'm thinking of regifting that one because I don't need any more stuff! They did have some cute coffee pj pants, though. We'll see. It was a wonderful party and it was fun getting to know more of the staff, too.
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| Trying to play a board game with little brother is near impossible as he tries to play them his own way. We were waiting on Aaron, Shauna and the girls to get back from a sleepover so we could have brunch together. |
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| Yummy brunch that Grandma made! Eggs, pancakes, sausage, and fruit! I had an egg and sausage gluten free soft taco shell, yum! |
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| Brothers. |
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| Another man vs manchild tickle wrestling match. Guess who won? Not the man child! Socks always protests when someone is screaming and it looks like they are getting hurt. |
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| From the couch to the floor, boom! |
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| Cutest little Grinch fruit kabobs I have ever seen! And gluten free, too! We had a great time at the church nursery volunteer party! |
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| It's a good thing we didn't tell the babysitters what time we'd be back because we were nearly an hour later than I expected. Abishai was beyond tired and all razzed up. Justin was playing board games. Everyone had had a turn at playing Minecraft on the PS4 (it's a good thing that gaming console is easy to trasnport! It only needs an HDMI cable, and thankfully, the in laws have at least figured that out and hooked up their laptops to the big TV often enough to have one available.) Aaron and Shauna still had major packing to do before hitting the road back to New Orleans tomorrow. |
Sunday morning Keturah stayed home with us because she was still ill. We took her to church with us and she sat with us, which is a good thing because then she was able to witness Ellie's baptism. Benaiah played drums on the big stage and Justin has his normal day. Jared and Abishai got to hang out in bed for awhile, and had some interesting conversations. We ate lunch at home, and then I had nursery duty, Justin had small group, and Benaiah's youth group was having a movie night playing Elf, eating pancakes, and partying. Keturah, Abishai, Jared and I went grocery shopping. Nothing spectactular except having to say good bye to the J4. Leah shed some tears during our prayer time with them, and Jared prayed because I think Gary was going to get choked up, too. I had accepted the fact that they were leaving and had cried earlier in the week. I was ready to dig back in to our normal life I think and make the best of Christmas that I can. And we have a very busy week ahead with appointments and last minute Christmas stuff, so here goes.
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| Bwahahahahaha |
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| My little drummer boy! No, I don't take pictures of him every time, but I KNEW he was pretty excited about playing both the electronic drum kit and the acoustic drum kit during the same song. And he's enjoying playing the traditional Christmas music because it's a totally different rhythm than praise and worship songs. The worship band has found some pretty awesome renditions of some of the traditional songs this year, too. It was an awesome worship set! |
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| Then this happened. Yeah for Ellie!! and Chris and Mary, too. Again, Chris plays bass guitar on the worship band and is one of Aaron's childhood friends. Mary grew up in New Palenstine like Shauna. They lived a couple of streets over from us in Beech Grove, and our big "J" out front came from a tree Jared cut down from their front yard. Mary cohosts a podcast and helps people with their social media (hint, hint, something Gary's been looking for someone to do) and I'm not sure where Chris works, but he's pretty handy. It's always sweet to witness a baptism with friends (acquaintances?) you've known for a very long time and watched their family grow. Awesome day! |
The end
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