Normal

Yesterday was such an incredible day!!!  The culmination of a dream and planning and preparation and a brave leap of faith.  A birthday party for a 3 year-old attended by eight 2, 3, and 4 year-olds accompanied by moms with a few dear friends.  An Abby Cadabby themed party

 as Abby was the first character who captured my granddaughter's heart and attention through a video screen and still does.  Other than a few visits with 2nd cousins, the birthday girl has not had the privilege of play dates or Sunday School.  She has been living the life of a shut-in especially during the winter months.  This summer was just too hot and humid for her to be outside much and she was so sick the month of July.  So, yesterday really was an incredible leap of faith.  A guest list was made, invitations mailed, and then lots of praying.  Would Grandbaby girl be healthy or would we have to cancel?  Would the invited guests be healthy or would no little ones be able to come?  Would the day be too hot for the birthday girl or rainy and we'd have to be inside where her toys and air-space would be compromised??

We were just incredibly blessed!  A blue-sky, breezy, cool day!!  Outside it was with canopies for shade and plenty of open space for little ones to run. Grandbaby girl was healthy!!!  Only one little guest had to cancel due to possible illness and her other grandparents and Aunts will be coming for their own visit next week.

The other fear ~ how would the little ones respond to the birthday girl?  She looks more like a baby than their peer, she is on oxygen, she can't sit very well, can't walk without a special gait-trainer, can't "talk" understandably, can't blow out her own candles, can't eat cake.  How would the birthday girl respond to all the commotion of a party and all the little ones??

She was in her element and as I carried her around to greet her guests (down on one knee at their level), she smiled and did her special kissy greeting, and the girls got a one-on-one look, but most did wave or say hi or blow a kiss in return.  She sat in her specially decorated little booster seat on a blanket on the ground with the girls sitting around her so they were all the same height.  Candles were lit on cupcakes for the girls and they each blew out their own candle so the birthday girl could see lit candles but did not have to contend with one of her own.  While a clown was face painting, the birthday girl wanted to lay down on the blanket and gab with one of her guests.

 Pretty soon two or three were sitting around her, one brought a book she and her mom had brought for a card (we had said no gifts) and another one was trying to read it to grandbaby girl.

  When most of the guests were running around with their tutus and wings and wands, we decided to put the birthday girl in her gait trainer.  She is not strong enough to really move it well on grass, but Grampa moved her near to the action, and one of the 2 year-olds decided to push her around!!

  It was just the most precious afternoon ever!!!  Party guests seemed surprised at the no gifts request, but what they didn't realize was that they were the gift!!!  I do not have a vocabulary big enough to describe how I felt watching her face throughout the afternoon.  An afternoon to just feel normal.  Simply amazing.

Misadventures in Kayaking

The last time we went kayaking, it was Memorial Day!  This past Sunday provided an opportunity we couldn't pass up.  We headed out with friends to try a paddle in a pond attached to a large reservoir about an hour away from home.  The description in her book was enticing, no motor boats, eagles, pristine.  Following directions in a book and putting the address into two GPS, we did eventually find Gate 43, although my eyes were shut for a few miles while we went on what seemed like a toboggan ride over a dirt road through the woods!  Arriving at our destination, the ranger told us we were not allowed to use our own kayaks in an attempt to prevent the spread of invasive plants.  This information was not on the Government website nor in the paddle book.  Having kayaks on our cars, we did not want to shell out money to rent kayaks so we were directed to another pond not too far away.  This was a little disappointing, the brook leaving the pond was overgrown and not navigable.  We did spy a little thing swimming across a patch of lily pads.  My friend said snake, I said muskrat?  The men ahead of us said SQUIRREL.  It was too funny!  I wish I had had an unobstructed view to snap a picture.  The men made a valiant attempt to navigate a few channels into the marsh grass and succeeded in rousting out a heron.

Kayaking adventures continued Monday.  We dashed up the road after supper to a small pond, just to get a little time together while there was still some daylight, maybe see some beaver.  As we began to take the boats off the roof, my hubby groaned.  One of our paddles comes apart for easy packing and one is permanently stuck.  He had taken the stuck one out of the car so he wouldn't have the mud in the front seat on his commute to work.  It was still at home.  Two kayaks....one paddle.  No problem!!  It was different, but we managed with half a paddle each!  Canoe strokes were remembered and I appreciated the lighter weight of half a paddle.  So, not complete misadventures but certainly not the paddles we had visioned.

Stuck

Last fall, my sister and I spent a few days in New Hampshire.  It was a much needed escape from responsibilities, a chance for uninterrupted quilting, and take in a little shopping and a few short hikes.  While we were there, we decided to take on a challenge of memorizing the book of Colossians and reconvene a year later to recite the whole book.  I had found the challenge here ~ two verses a week with built in times of review.  Seemed very do-able.  Well, I do not want to admit defeat yet but I have a lot of ground to cover to catch up to my sister.  She is ahead of the game and should be all done mid-September as she had already committed a few portions to memory over the years.  I keep letting life get in the way.  Ok, I admit it.....I am TERRIBLY UNDISCIPLINED!!!!  I am a poor manager of time!!!  (That's putting it mildly)  I desire to come up with a schedule and stick to it ~ there is plenty of available time that I just waste.  I need to set aside just a few moments a day to memorize, exercise, and work on some special projects ~ transcribing my grandmother's journals for one.

So, I find myself STUCK in chapter two!!  I should be nearing the end of Chapter three by now or even further.  The middle of Chapter two hit me hard and so I was just stuck there ruminating.  Now, I'm just stuck.

 Colossians 2:6-7 ⁶ So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live in him, ⁷ rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness.

Overflowing with thankfulness

It just hit me like a ton of bricks.  I arrived at this section just before graduation season and it was just perfect for my desire for high school graduates in particular.  So many young people who have professed a faith in Christ leave home and their church family and completely turn their backs on everything they know is right to experience what they think they are missing.  This is my desire for them that they would be strengthened in their faith and not be so weak as to walk away from it.  

But that last bit, overflowing with thankfulness.  How had I missed that??  Forty some-odd years and yet I guess I've just skimmed over that part, missed it completely!  So, I have been stuck this summer on "overflowing with thankfulness."  Rooted, grounded, strengthened in the faith, continuing to live in him all these years, YES!  But overflowing with thankfulness??  I must confess, I don't think my life reflects that at all.  So, here I find a challenge within a challenge.  While I need to get on with the memorizing and try to catch up with my sister so we can finish what we set out to do, I need to overflow with thankfulness!!  

Music for a Monday

Music for a Monday.....

This hymn has been swirling through me this morning.  I think it is the response of my soul to times of transition.  No transition for me other than an empty house while the Babymomma and her babes are visiting the other Grammy.  I guess I am feeling a dear friend's angst as her youngest heads to college.....and I think I am probably tuned in to my young warrior as he packs up for a big transition ~ a temporary leave or not being able to return? I'm not certain, but in between is an adventure in Africa, then packing up his stateside residence and relocating.  I am proud of him and so glad he is free enough to be able to pick up and move and stretch and grow but I also know that there is a piece of him that is churning and anxious and wondering if it will all work.  For both of these precious ones, I am praying that they would feel a blanket of peace over these next few days especially.

A Perfect Storm

July 4th week ~ Grandbaby girl's been healthy so we were optimistic that we could get her up to our small town's "3rd of July" festivities....band concert, supper picnic, see lots of people, bring her home before the bonfire and bugs.  Maybe even a local parade on the 4th!  Well,  the storm clouds crept in.

Tuesday, baby brother had a well baby appointment and Grammy and grandbaby girl spent the morning at Barnes and Noble.  She loved seeing all the books and people and met an adorable 3 year old autistic boy in the children's section.  Meanwhile, the pediatrician spotted something on baby brother that she didn't like and called over to the local hospital who spoke with the first rumble of thunder....go to Children's.  Phone calls, dad home from work,....off to Children's.  Grammy could handle supper and bed with grandbaby girl.   Thunder and lightning....an evening in the ER, no real answers, but mom and dad and little one home at midnight.

Wednesday, in and exhausted, disappointed to be just home...but .a ray of sunshine through the storm clouds, a patriotic photo shoot in the livingroom....sporting duds they'd have worn to a parade...

Thursday, surviving a week without our day nurse, staying in while the waves roll, a visit from our hospice nurse, grandbaby girl is a bit more secretional but we chalk it up to teething.   In for the day, preparing to pick up Grampa at the airport on Friday and deciding babies and Babymomma can come for the ride.  Somehow, we were completely unaware of the dark clouds forming quickly on the horizon, the full moon looming which would impact a tidal surge.

Bedtime Thursday night, grandbaby girl throws up shortly after going to bed......

Friday morning, completely socked in and the storm just hits us from all sides.....no airport trip (thank goodness)....grandpa is stuck due to sandstorms.....fever just soars for grandbaby girl......all her medical personnel locally are on vacation.....no night nurse Thursday night, no day nurse, pediatrician away, back up pediatrician away, Hospice and VNA nurses both away!!!!!  Babymomma manages to get a hospice nurse to come out and the PACT team is called, by afternoon a Coast Guard Cutter is sent our way, and now Grammy is left with baby brother while the Babymomma gets to be strapped into an ambulance holding grandbaby girl for a ride to Boston.

A weekend spent at Children's, they came home Sunday night.  Baby brother survived the weekend with Grammy.....or is it Grammy survived? Grampa finally arrived home ....a surf advisory was in affect for the rest of the week, but we at least had some nursing coverage to help.....and above all, God who made heaven and earth and holds us close.