Have you ever thought about strange accidents, or strange fears or anything like that? I know I can't be the only one who does. Well, a while back I wrote about what I called Momisms. This brought to mind some strange accidents my children have had.
Of course I told you already about breaking your elbow by tripping on your shoelace. But here is a really bizarre accident. We were living at Boys Ranch at the time and the three older girls had to share a bedroom. Not really a big deal. Well, one morning my youngest come out of their room holding her nose blood just gushing. When I asked what happened I was informed that her older sister had stuck a hanger up her nose and yanked it back out! What!!! Yep, I guess after piecing together information that the younger one was only trying to help pick out an outfit for school. Fast forward about 13 years.....my son comes downstairs one morning holding his nose blood gushing. I asked what happened. He replies I don't know it just started bleeding. Knowing better I say: Don't give me that story. I've seen this accident before. You've had a hanger up your nose haven't you? He replies sheepishly yes. Turns out for whatever reason he did this to himself. I didn't want to delve into the whys of this! This is a bizarre accident and it happened to my family not once but twice! Unreal!!!!
How about this one. When my youngest of the older girls was about 18 months old she fell forward in church and hit her nose on the back of the pew. You're thinking not so uncommon. Well, don't be so sure! This was no little bump on the nose -- blood gushing - took me forever to get it to stop. She broke her nose. And when I'm saying blood is gushing in these stories I am not exaggerating. I grew up with three brothers, I have had many, many accidents, I've raised 5 kids....blood is not something that freaks me out.
How about this one --- my oldest daughter sliding in the hall wedges her foot underneath the bathroom door and cuts the top of her foot. Pretty nasty looking cut -- sure left a nice little scar too.
I kinda like this one too. The two younger girls were taking a bath and the youngest comes out to tell me that Charlie has cut her eye. I'm wondering why on earth they are playing with razors around their eyes. So I go to check out this issue. Turns out that the shampoo bottle had fallen off the shelf above and hit her on the eyebrow right on the bone and sure enough - she cut her eye. Nice one Bear!
How about this? Having a bike race with your brother. Riding alongside the road in the gravel and he deliberately steers his bike into mine causing me to wreck so he can win the race. Nasty little scrape on top of leg. A few days later, this same cut becomes infected with poison ivy. Now we have a really nasty scrape. It did eventually heal but left quite a scar. This one happened to me. Maybe that explains the strange accidents my children have.
Now, I want to end with this story. It is not such a bizarre accident but it is amusing to hear. Girls outside riding bikes on gravel road. One falls and hurts herself badly. All scraped up - lots of blood - she is hobbling. I pick her up to carry her inside to clean it up and see how bad it is. I send her sister on ahead with instructions to get me a warm washcloth so I can see how bad she is hurt. I carry the injured daughter inside, get her situated on couch and holler at younger daughter hurry up! I need the wash cloth. She replies: I'm getting it. I go into the bathroom to see what is taking so long. There stood my daughter with a wash cloth in one hand the spray bottle used for wetting their hair down in the other hand. She is diligently spraying away on the washcloth. I take the wash cloth from her, put it under the faucet, wring it out and tell her: you sister could die while waiting on you to bring a washcloth. Fortunately after cleaning the scrape it wasn't as bad as it could have been.
There are more I could recount but let's save those for another post.
Friday, August 30, 2013
Monday, August 26, 2013
God Changes Our Plans
I've done a blog before about my older girls but not my youngest two. When Gary and I got married I had my three older girls and we thought our family was complete. However, God had other plans for us and placed in our hearts the desire to add a little boy to our family. Yep, we knew what we wanted a little boy about 3 years old.
So we checked out options and decided we wanted to go with Missouri Baptist Children's Home for adoption. Now this required us to attend training classes once a month for six months. So we started our training and once a week we traveled from our home in Bethany, Mo to Kansas City to attend our training classes (about a one and a half hour drive). We attended STARS training which qualified us to be foster parents but we chose not to do that. We wanted to adopt and that meant another two months of training. We finished our training and all the interviews, paper work and were given a humongous notebook of children eligible for adoption in Jackson County. So sad to see so many kids needing home; at that time there were 3,000 children in that book.
Well, again, God had other plans for us that were not exactly what we expected. Remember me saying we wanted a little boy about 3 years old? Well, God had our caseworker send us a picture of a little 5 year old boy and his 9 year old sister. Yep, you guessed it - they captured our heart and we started weekend visits shortly after the little boy turned 6. Within six weeks they were living with us permanently and the final adoption occurred within 7 months. They were brother and sister and had the same mother. Both children were developmentally delayed and special needs children.
And our life changed dramatically!!! I cannot even begin to explain all the changes. We had tears, hugs, laughter, exhaustion, loss of patience, and memories. We would not change one minute of it.
One of the favorite memories we love to share as a family is when they were spending one of their first weekends with us. Our son Chris had a little toy car that he drove around in the house. They were playing 'drive-thru'. Chris also had a microphone that went with some toy and they were using it for the order window. One of the older girls and her friend were hanging out with me in the kitchen while I fixed dinner, Gary was watching TV in the living room where the kids were playing and I believe another daughter was upstairs. We had a big house.
So, Chris drives up to the order window and orders a Happy Meal. Amanda asks if he wants fries with that and he says yes. Then Chris says "honk honk!!!" using his imaginary horn. Amanda yells at the top of her lungs "quit honking you bas****!!"
Utter silence fills our household at this point. In the kitchen the two girls and I look at each other and walk to the door to look in the living room to see what is going on. Gary quietly tells the kids, who are looking at him with questioning eyes knowing that they are probably in big trouble, "go to your rooms".
After they head upstairs he starts laughing. And my husband, being the restaurant manager that he has been all his life says his first thought was 'where have they been going through drive thru?'
That little boy is now 21 years old and even with his special needs he has shown us how resourceful he can be. His IQ level has limited him in some aspects but we have never treated him as if he had a disability. Instead, we pushed him to do the very best he could. He has applied and gotten himself a job and is currently working 30-40 hours per work. Prior to his job we had him volunteer at a local nursing home. Five days a week he gets himself up and fixes his breakfast and goes to work and is there by 6:30 am. He prepares his lunch and currently we are having him prepare one meal a week for us. All this in preparation for him getting a small apartment where he can have more independence. Yes, we realize that we will need to assist him with budgeting. We do that already by allowing him to have so much a week to spend as he wants and we help him save the rest. A few weeks ago he went and bought himself a new bedroom set consisting of full size bed, dresser, night stand, mattress and box springs. This was bought with money that we helped save for him. He was very proud of the fact that he was able to save that money and get his own furniture. We are very proud of the fact that he has gotten his own job, gets himself up and to work on his own. Getting himself to work means riding his bicycle.
His sister has more emotional problems and we have been very fortunate to find a group home that she lives in within 30 minutes of us. This is a wonderful place for her as she requires a more structured environment than what we can provide living here at home. She is very happy there and because of the structure she has actually become somewhat of a leader at her home. She comes home for visits and calls frequently (sometimes as many as 17 times a week LOL). She is now 25 years old, works outside the group home and assists with others in the home. We are proud of the way she has matured and how caring she is to others in the home.
She has had a boyfriend for several years. He also lives at the group home. We now have the privilege of helping her plan her upcoming wedding. We are very happy for her. She has found someone she loves and who loves her. The group home is making accommodations so they can continue to live at the home. She is excited to be planning a wedding and we are excited for her.
What a road we have travelled with those two! And it is not over yet.
So we checked out options and decided we wanted to go with Missouri Baptist Children's Home for adoption. Now this required us to attend training classes once a month for six months. So we started our training and once a week we traveled from our home in Bethany, Mo to Kansas City to attend our training classes (about a one and a half hour drive). We attended STARS training which qualified us to be foster parents but we chose not to do that. We wanted to adopt and that meant another two months of training. We finished our training and all the interviews, paper work and were given a humongous notebook of children eligible for adoption in Jackson County. So sad to see so many kids needing home; at that time there were 3,000 children in that book.
Well, again, God had other plans for us that were not exactly what we expected. Remember me saying we wanted a little boy about 3 years old? Well, God had our caseworker send us a picture of a little 5 year old boy and his 9 year old sister. Yep, you guessed it - they captured our heart and we started weekend visits shortly after the little boy turned 6. Within six weeks they were living with us permanently and the final adoption occurred within 7 months. They were brother and sister and had the same mother. Both children were developmentally delayed and special needs children.
And our life changed dramatically!!! I cannot even begin to explain all the changes. We had tears, hugs, laughter, exhaustion, loss of patience, and memories. We would not change one minute of it.
One of the favorite memories we love to share as a family is when they were spending one of their first weekends with us. Our son Chris had a little toy car that he drove around in the house. They were playing 'drive-thru'. Chris also had a microphone that went with some toy and they were using it for the order window. One of the older girls and her friend were hanging out with me in the kitchen while I fixed dinner, Gary was watching TV in the living room where the kids were playing and I believe another daughter was upstairs. We had a big house.
So, Chris drives up to the order window and orders a Happy Meal. Amanda asks if he wants fries with that and he says yes. Then Chris says "honk honk!!!" using his imaginary horn. Amanda yells at the top of her lungs "quit honking you bas****!!"
Utter silence fills our household at this point. In the kitchen the two girls and I look at each other and walk to the door to look in the living room to see what is going on. Gary quietly tells the kids, who are looking at him with questioning eyes knowing that they are probably in big trouble, "go to your rooms".
After they head upstairs he starts laughing. And my husband, being the restaurant manager that he has been all his life says his first thought was 'where have they been going through drive thru?'
That little boy is now 21 years old and even with his special needs he has shown us how resourceful he can be. His IQ level has limited him in some aspects but we have never treated him as if he had a disability. Instead, we pushed him to do the very best he could. He has applied and gotten himself a job and is currently working 30-40 hours per work. Prior to his job we had him volunteer at a local nursing home. Five days a week he gets himself up and fixes his breakfast and goes to work and is there by 6:30 am. He prepares his lunch and currently we are having him prepare one meal a week for us. All this in preparation for him getting a small apartment where he can have more independence. Yes, we realize that we will need to assist him with budgeting. We do that already by allowing him to have so much a week to spend as he wants and we help him save the rest. A few weeks ago he went and bought himself a new bedroom set consisting of full size bed, dresser, night stand, mattress and box springs. This was bought with money that we helped save for him. He was very proud of the fact that he was able to save that money and get his own furniture. We are very proud of the fact that he has gotten his own job, gets himself up and to work on his own. Getting himself to work means riding his bicycle.
His sister has more emotional problems and we have been very fortunate to find a group home that she lives in within 30 minutes of us. This is a wonderful place for her as she requires a more structured environment than what we can provide living here at home. She is very happy there and because of the structure she has actually become somewhat of a leader at her home. She comes home for visits and calls frequently (sometimes as many as 17 times a week LOL). She is now 25 years old, works outside the group home and assists with others in the home. We are proud of the way she has matured and how caring she is to others in the home.
She has had a boyfriend for several years. He also lives at the group home. We now have the privilege of helping her plan her upcoming wedding. We are very happy for her. She has found someone she loves and who loves her. The group home is making accommodations so they can continue to live at the home. She is excited to be planning a wedding and we are excited for her.
What a road we have travelled with those two! And it is not over yet.
Friday, August 23, 2013
Mom-isms
Ever have your mom tell you 'be sure you have on clean underwear in case you are in an accident'? Really, if I'm in an accident and the first thing the Paramedics notice is that I have dirty underwear it must mean that my injuries are not to bad. How about, 'don't cross your eyes they're gonna freeze like that'? I never told my kids this. I crossed my eyes and they never froze. I still cross my eyes on occassion. I would be more apt to say, 'don't cross you eyes - it looks freaky.'
I'm sure you can think of other mom-isms you have heard or even used yourself. This was brought to my mind a while back after my grandson had hurt himself. He had stepped on a piece of glass and his mom and dad had checked to be sure there was no glass in it. All appeared fine until about 4 days later when he was at football practice and kept telling his mother that his foot hurt and he was limping. She told him to just suck it up and go practice. After getting him home she looked at his foot and it was not a pretty sight. The next day she took him to the doctor. They had to drain his foot - he had an infection
Of course as he is telling me about his foot he said 'can you believe she told me to just suck it up?' Me: 'yeah, I would have too. They already checked it and didn't find any glass." Grandson: 'then how did it get infected?' Me: 'You have dirty stinky feet. They sweat and dirt got in the cut.'
This brought to mind a few incidents from my children as they were growing up. This grandson's mother came to me one morning before school and told me it hurt to breathe. Now, I have never been one to show much sympathy to my kids as it tends to make every incident worse. My response to her? "Don't breathe!". Sounds like good advice until you end up at the ER later because she has pneumonia. Yep, she went to the nurse at school. Nurse called and said she needed to go to Doctor, Doctor sends her to ER she has pneumonia. Way to go Kathie!
Another example. Your kids go around with their shoes untied. I was constantly telling mine, 'If you fall and break your arm tripping on your shoelace, don't come to me. I won't take you to the doctor.' Well, one Wednesday night after church my son comes up and says, 'my arm sure does hurts.' I look and it's swollen huge! We take him to ER and the nurse is asking have you hurt yourself? Did you fall? He says, 'I fell'. Nurse says what did you fall on? My son, sheepishly without looking at me replies, 'I tripped on my shoelace and fell on my arm.' Yep, it is possible to break your arm if you trip on your shoelace.
One more example. How many times have your kids taken the pop top on a can and bent it back and forth or even just bent the can itself. Well, my daughter loved to do this. I told her, 'don't come to me when you cut yourself and need stitches.' Well, one night she comes down from upstairs her hand dripping blood. She says, 'I can't get it to stop.' Yes, she cut her finger and in an attempt to not let me know that I was right she went to the bathroom and stuck her finger in the bottle of peroxide. Yep, you guessed it, it foamed up everywhere. Ruined the whole bottle too. We almost went to ER, actually drove there but we got it to stop bleeding so no stitches that time.
For the record, the same daughter had the breathing problem also was the one who cut her finger. And it was her son who cut his foot. Guess he comes by it naturally doesn't he?
How about it - do you have mom-isms that you tell your kids?
I'm sure you can think of other mom-isms you have heard or even used yourself. This was brought to my mind a while back after my grandson had hurt himself. He had stepped on a piece of glass and his mom and dad had checked to be sure there was no glass in it. All appeared fine until about 4 days later when he was at football practice and kept telling his mother that his foot hurt and he was limping. She told him to just suck it up and go practice. After getting him home she looked at his foot and it was not a pretty sight. The next day she took him to the doctor. They had to drain his foot - he had an infection
Of course as he is telling me about his foot he said 'can you believe she told me to just suck it up?' Me: 'yeah, I would have too. They already checked it and didn't find any glass." Grandson: 'then how did it get infected?' Me: 'You have dirty stinky feet. They sweat and dirt got in the cut.'
This brought to mind a few incidents from my children as they were growing up. This grandson's mother came to me one morning before school and told me it hurt to breathe. Now, I have never been one to show much sympathy to my kids as it tends to make every incident worse. My response to her? "Don't breathe!". Sounds like good advice until you end up at the ER later because she has pneumonia. Yep, she went to the nurse at school. Nurse called and said she needed to go to Doctor, Doctor sends her to ER she has pneumonia. Way to go Kathie!
Another example. Your kids go around with their shoes untied. I was constantly telling mine, 'If you fall and break your arm tripping on your shoelace, don't come to me. I won't take you to the doctor.' Well, one Wednesday night after church my son comes up and says, 'my arm sure does hurts.' I look and it's swollen huge! We take him to ER and the nurse is asking have you hurt yourself? Did you fall? He says, 'I fell'. Nurse says what did you fall on? My son, sheepishly without looking at me replies, 'I tripped on my shoelace and fell on my arm.' Yep, it is possible to break your arm if you trip on your shoelace.
One more example. How many times have your kids taken the pop top on a can and bent it back and forth or even just bent the can itself. Well, my daughter loved to do this. I told her, 'don't come to me when you cut yourself and need stitches.' Well, one night she comes down from upstairs her hand dripping blood. She says, 'I can't get it to stop.' Yes, she cut her finger and in an attempt to not let me know that I was right she went to the bathroom and stuck her finger in the bottle of peroxide. Yep, you guessed it, it foamed up everywhere. Ruined the whole bottle too. We almost went to ER, actually drove there but we got it to stop bleeding so no stitches that time.
For the record, the same daughter had the breathing problem also was the one who cut her finger. And it was her son who cut his foot. Guess he comes by it naturally doesn't he?
How about it - do you have mom-isms that you tell your kids?
Wednesday, August 14, 2013
Change - good or bad
OK - I realized the other day that I hadn't posted in here for a while. Not sure why but it started me thinking I needed to do a post. So I started trying to decide what I wanted to write about. A few things flitted in and out of my mind and I finally settled on change.
At work for who knows what reason we were talking about change. Now if you know me very well you know I do not like change. I do not handle change very well. Well, perhaps I should clarify. I do not handle small changes very well but big changes are no problem for me.
Example: If I came home from work today and Gary told me that he just found out his company was transferring him to another state and he needed to be there in 3 weeks. (This actually happened to us. That's how we ended up in Tulsa). No problem -- I take things like this in stride.
However, small changes! Hold the bus! Not gonna happen - I do not like it at all. If after watching my favorite show they announce that the show is moving to a new time next week, I have trouble with this. Don't they know that I plan my nights around my TV shows? There are only a specific few that I really want to watch and don't mess with them! No one called to verify with me that the new day or time would work for me. No I am not happy and I am more than willing to let anyone I talk to know that this new schedule does not work for me!
Don't be changing those drinks in the machine at Quik Trip either! I know where the cappuccino I want is; the second machine second button. Seasonal or new flavors are always first machine first button. Don't let me push the button for my drink to finally look up and see that it has been changed! This does not make for a good morning for me at all!
Now for as much as I dislike change I love to rearrange my furniture. I would do this every other week if I could. I used to live in a house where I could change rooms around. The dining room might become the piano room and the den the dining room. The girls might come home to find that I moved their bedroom! Yep - I love to rearrange my furniture. I don't do this very often any more but I would love to. Does anyone want to come help? We can totally redo my house - move furniture where ever. I'm open for ideas but will need help with the furniture (just not able to move it by myself like I used to).
At work for who knows what reason we were talking about change. Now if you know me very well you know I do not like change. I do not handle change very well. Well, perhaps I should clarify. I do not handle small changes very well but big changes are no problem for me.
Example: If I came home from work today and Gary told me that he just found out his company was transferring him to another state and he needed to be there in 3 weeks. (This actually happened to us. That's how we ended up in Tulsa). No problem -- I take things like this in stride.
However, small changes! Hold the bus! Not gonna happen - I do not like it at all. If after watching my favorite show they announce that the show is moving to a new time next week, I have trouble with this. Don't they know that I plan my nights around my TV shows? There are only a specific few that I really want to watch and don't mess with them! No one called to verify with me that the new day or time would work for me. No I am not happy and I am more than willing to let anyone I talk to know that this new schedule does not work for me!
Don't be changing those drinks in the machine at Quik Trip either! I know where the cappuccino I want is; the second machine second button. Seasonal or new flavors are always first machine first button. Don't let me push the button for my drink to finally look up and see that it has been changed! This does not make for a good morning for me at all!
Now for as much as I dislike change I love to rearrange my furniture. I would do this every other week if I could. I used to live in a house where I could change rooms around. The dining room might become the piano room and the den the dining room. The girls might come home to find that I moved their bedroom! Yep - I love to rearrange my furniture. I don't do this very often any more but I would love to. Does anyone want to come help? We can totally redo my house - move furniture where ever. I'm open for ideas but will need help with the furniture (just not able to move it by myself like I used to).
Sunday, August 4, 2013
Childhood Friends
Childhood friends - who do you think of? I tend to think of my childhood friends in different categories. There are my friends from school. I enjoyed many good times with them growing up. There are my brothers. I was the only girl in the family and I always thought of my brothers as my friends - I still do. I spent a lot of time with my brothers so I considered their friends my friends too. Then there are my cousins.
Yes, I spent a lot of time with my cousins and enjoyed every minute of it. I was lucky enough to live next door to cousins from my mothers side. I was always a little bit jealous because their dynamic was the exact opposite of ours. We had 3 boys 1 girl -- they had 3 girls 1 boy. The girl cousins were my substitute sisters.
I also lived close enough to my dad's side of the family that we could spend weekends with my cousins on that side. I remember those times as being so much fun. First off, their mothers didn't work like mine did. What a unique experience for me to have your mom (aunt) home all day long. So depending on which set of cousins we were spending the weekend with we would spend our time riding horses, playing in Grandma Edith's playhouse (not my Grandma - their other Grandma) maybe playing in the barn, riding bikes around town and just overall having tons of fun. In the fall we would go to Calamity Jane Days with them in Princeton. That was always fun too.
Then we all grew up and started our adult lives. We moved to different states, got married - had kids of our own. When I moved back to my 'Home' town of Bethany (Mount Moriah) I moved close to my friend cousins again. And they were still my friends. We went shopping, to movies, they helped me with my girls and were exactly what one would expect from a friend.
This past weekend I said good-bye to one of cousins. She isn't the first one of my cousins to pass away. On my mom's side I've lost a male cousin. On dad's side Anita is the 3rd one I've lost. It's not easy to lose someone you grew up with, laughed with, cried with, played with, shared dreams, disappointments and joys with. I have many fond memories of times spent with her as a child and as an adult. I will certainly miss her but I know I will see her again one day. For now I hope she is enjoying her time with Granny Lake, Pop Edgar, my mom and dad, Uncle Ken, Aunt Virginia, and our cousins Marcus and C.L.
Yes, I spent a lot of time with my cousins and enjoyed every minute of it. I was lucky enough to live next door to cousins from my mothers side. I was always a little bit jealous because their dynamic was the exact opposite of ours. We had 3 boys 1 girl -- they had 3 girls 1 boy. The girl cousins were my substitute sisters.
I also lived close enough to my dad's side of the family that we could spend weekends with my cousins on that side. I remember those times as being so much fun. First off, their mothers didn't work like mine did. What a unique experience for me to have your mom (aunt) home all day long. So depending on which set of cousins we were spending the weekend with we would spend our time riding horses, playing in Grandma Edith's playhouse (not my Grandma - their other Grandma) maybe playing in the barn, riding bikes around town and just overall having tons of fun. In the fall we would go to Calamity Jane Days with them in Princeton. That was always fun too.
Then we all grew up and started our adult lives. We moved to different states, got married - had kids of our own. When I moved back to my 'Home' town of Bethany (Mount Moriah) I moved close to my friend cousins again. And they were still my friends. We went shopping, to movies, they helped me with my girls and were exactly what one would expect from a friend.
This past weekend I said good-bye to one of cousins. She isn't the first one of my cousins to pass away. On my mom's side I've lost a male cousin. On dad's side Anita is the 3rd one I've lost. It's not easy to lose someone you grew up with, laughed with, cried with, played with, shared dreams, disappointments and joys with. I have many fond memories of times spent with her as a child and as an adult. I will certainly miss her but I know I will see her again one day. For now I hope she is enjoying her time with Granny Lake, Pop Edgar, my mom and dad, Uncle Ken, Aunt Virginia, and our cousins Marcus and C.L.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)