Essary 4.0

Monday, September 12, 2011

Selah-Speak

Selah talks--a lot. At least, it seems like a whole lot to us, probably because Korban didn't really talk at all until he was three, and he still struggles with communication. So it seems amazing and miraculous to us to have a little one who talks so much. She is pretty easy to understand, but she has a habit of just saying the first syllable of a world twice instead of the whole word. It's pretty cute. Here's a list of some of the things she says:

Tor-tor=Korban
Pig-Pig=Piglet
Bank-bank=Blanket
Chick chick nug nug=Chicken nuggets
Fish fish=Fish sticks
Bean beans=Green beans
Pop Pop=Pop-Tart
Ronicheese=Macaroni and cheese
Dine-in-a-soar=Dinosaur
Kang-in-a-roo=Kangaroo
Ah-nen-oh-me-me-me= Anemone (Seriously--it's in one of her Baby Einstein books. Has six syllables when she says it. Hilarious!)
Cha-Cha=Her dear friend Charlie

Lately she has gotten in the habit of telling Korban "Stop dat! Hear me?" Oh my. I don't even realize I say something so much until I hear it from the kids. She also tells Korban to "go play" when he is aggravating her. He says "Alright kiddos," at random intervals and it's funny to me. Guess he hears that one a lot. I call him "little man" sometimes. He has picked up on this and the other day he told my mom "Sit down, little man." Boy was she surprised!

Also, Selah likes to compliment people. It's sweet. Her favorite thing to "like" is someone's shirt. No matter what I'm wearing, she says "I yike dat shirt, Mama." The other day we were outside, and she was playing with our dog Pat. She told him "I yike dat tail, Pat-Pat." I would've never thought to give the dog a compliment on his tail, but she is right. He does have a very nice tail. It's fuzzy and curls over his back right nicely. And he doesn't wear shirts, so she needed to find something to compliment him on.

Tonight when we had our "dee-ocean" as she calls our devotion, she said prayers. She wants to be like Korban. She repeated whatever he said, and it was so sweet. We helped her out with some things to say. For example, we said "Bless Korban," and she said "Bless Tor-Tor." (He pretty much thinks that's his name now. When they are playing and it is his turn with a toy, he tells me "It's Tor-Tor's turn." Maybe he just wants to make sure she understands. Because heaven forbid there be any miscommunication with the turn-taking business.) But back to Selah's prayers. She said "Bless Mama," without us prompting her and I thought my heart would burst. She also said "Bless baby, bless hairbow, bless duck park." So that was her first "on her own" prayers and I don't ever want to forget it. I also need to take her to the "duck park" really soon. Tor-Tor too.

Speaking of being proud, Korban said out of the clear blue "I like the Rebels. Ha-wee Ta-wee!" (Hotty Toddy!) He is his father's son! And tonight during prayers, the very last thing he said was "Bless sitting at the table eating Push-Ups." Ha! He is very fond of Popsicles.

Korban had a little stomach bug on Saturday. By that night he didn't really have any symptoms except for a low-grade temp and he was kind of dragging around. I was asking him questions like "Does your stomach still hurt? Does your head hurt? Does your throat hurt?" Finally he said to me very patiently "No more belly still hurt. No more head hurt. No more throat hurt. I just sick." That cleared it up. I think that might be the longest thing he's ever said. He was probably tired of me asking questions! And today when we left school, he told his teachers good-bye. When we got to the door, he turned back around and said "Bye friends." So much cuteness.

Well, the kids have been asleep for a while now and for some reason I am still awake. Considering that, what with the sickness and all Saturday, I didn't even lay down until 5:30 Sunday morning, there is really no good reason for my eyes to still be open right now. Good night all!

Thursday, September 1, 2011

Organizational Skills

If you know me at all, you know that I am not an organized person. But I want to be. Somewhere inside me, there is an organized woman. She just can't find her way out through all my clutter. My household needs structure, organization, and my life in general needs less clutter. It would be easier on all of us. And I would like that. So I have had a real brainstorm about meal planning and I thought I would share it. I love to cook. Really, I do. But I hate it when I am scrambling at the last minute trying to throw something together and I am lacking an ingredient or I forgot to defrost the meat. Also, we are trying to pinch pennies any way we can. Our church recently had a couponing class and it was awesome. So I have been collecting coupons and trying to wrap my head around all of that business. I have an iPhone. Those are powerful tools in the hands of organized people. Mine mainly just confuses me. But I am learning! I like that little calendar feature. I mainly use it to keep up with appointments, but my bright idea consisted of using it to streamline my meal planning. Brad just got paid, which means I get to go grocery shopping. (Yay!) I planned out meals for the next two weeks and plugged the meals into my handy-dandy calendar as events. So if I opened my calendar for September 2nd, it would say "Jambalaya." Every event you enter has a spot for location, and in that box I put the name of the cookbook that the particular recipe is in. I even set alerts to go off a couple of days in advance for all of the recipes that require defrosting meat so that I will remember to lay the meat in the refrigerator in time. Additionally, I used the little note feature in my phone to make my grocery list. I am forever making really great grocery lists and then leaving them at home, so this is pretty awesome for me. I always have my phone with me; therefore, I always have my list. I have my coupons ready to go, and I am ready to tackle the groceries stores tomorrow morning. I'm hoping this works out well and is a system I can keep up with. I know it sounds crazy, but I was pretty excited about it. Anything to help us along. Actually I was really excited about it. I called my mom and said "Pick any date between now and September the 16th, and I'll tell you what we're having for supper that night." "September 7th," she replied. "Meatloaf!" I proclaimed. She said "Wow!" like I had just done a really cool magic trick or something. She was probably humoring me, but it made me feel good. Also, she is going to help me shop tomorrow, which I really appreciate. I bribed her with coupons for chocolate and Ben and Jerry's ice cream. :)

In case anyone is wondering how family devotions are going, we read about Moses' staff turning into a snake tonight. Both kids got excited and said "Nake, nake." Hope they don't go looking for one. Also, they had a short-lived but very lively brawl in the middle of the story and after that, Selah inserted a finger up each one of my nostrils. But we made it through and afterwards they sat and looked at the Veggie Tales book together, so I think maybe they are getting into it. Also, when we prayed Korban said "Bless coupons." He knows about the coupons because he saw my stack of them and tried to scatter them, and I explained to him that I needed them for grocery shopping. He does like the groceries, so maybe that is why he thought the coupons needed blessing. Hope it helps me out tomorrow!

Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Family Devotions Gone Awry: The Story of Moses in the Basket in the Desert

I have a really great story about our family devotional time, but I need to give some background information first. Back in July, Selah had an ear infection. She wasn't running fever, but she actually told me "ear hurt" and her tubes were draining. We went to the dr right away and got medicine, and went on about our business. After being on antibiotics for a couple of days, she woke up very early one morning with a really high fever. I took her to the ER, and the dr decided to do a chest xray. It came back showing a small spot of pneumonia. He prescribed another antibiotic to go along with the one we were already on, and told me to follow up with our regular pediatrician. Her fever went down as the day progressed, and she seemed to feel better. We gave her the medicine, and went to her pediatrician several days later for a re-check. She ordered another x-ray and it came back showing the same spot. We thought that it just hadn't had enough time to clear up, so we waited a week and then did it again. The same spot was still showing, so we were referred to a pediatric pulmonologist at LeBonheur. A couple of weeks after that, we went to our appointment with him. He repeated the x-ray and the same spot was still there. So he decided to do a bronchoscope. They would put Selah under anesthesia and run a small scope into her lung to take a look. He told us that a small portion of the lung could be collapsed, she could have a foreign body in her lung (said herhad recently found a peanut in the lung of a baby her age!), or it could be mucus, fluid, a tumor, basically any number of things. So we were slightly worried, but Selah was not slowing down and seemed to feel great so that was encouraging. Her bronchoscope was done today. She did beautifully. We had to wait for a long time and she couldn't have anything to eat or drink but she was so good. Bless LeBonheur for having a playroom! We played for several hours while awaiting her turn. She had a good time. I could tell she was hungry--she had a go at the plastic food in the toy kitchen, but that didn't work out so well for her. Quite honestly, the longer we sat there, the more delicious that fake food started to look, so I totally understood. She got so tired, she fell asleep in my arms. (It was way past her normal naptime.) So when they came to get her for her procedure, they let us walk her all the way to the OR. The dr was already in the room and they let us come on in. Brad laid Selah on the bed, being as how I was too short to reach it. She stayed asleep and we were able to kiss her and then leave to let them do their work. Most peaceful separation I have ever had with either of my children for their medical stuff! (One prior surgery for Selah, four surgeries for Korban plus two procedures he had to be sedated for. Ugh. Doesn't get easier with practice.) So we went to the waiting room. Brad went to get us a drink. We didn't want to eat or drink in front of her of course, so we hadn't had anything all day. I had a pack of Jelly Bellies in my purse and I had literally shoved about half of those in my mouth when a nurse walked up to me and said "Alright, mom, come with me to the consultation room and the dr will be in shortly." I thought he was going to have to scope me next because I almost aspirated my jellybeans! Those waits are always so long, but I had practically just sat down. So I was frantically texting Brad so he could come back. He got there right before the doctor. The dr said that he drew some mucous/fluid out of her lung and flushed it with saline to clear it out. They will send it off to culture it for everything under the sun. It will take 8 weeks to hear from that, but he felt sure that it wouldn't show anything alarming. There were no foreign bodies, praise the Lord. I was half-convinced she had one of the wheels of her brother's toy car in there or something. I swear, when Korban was a baby, we didn't have anything that wasn't approved for the three and under crowd. That's not so easy with your second child! Her lung was not collapsed, there was no bleeding, and everything looked good. We are SO thankful. We got to go back to recovery as soon as she woke up. She barely cried at all. They had an ICEE machine (how cool is that?) Selah perked up right away with the ICEE, ate all of that, and they let us come home. She is coughing some, which they said was to be expected, but seems to feel well. Thank You Jesus! We are so grateful to all of our friends who were messaging us today to tell us they were praying. Every time my phone beeped it was a reminder that someone cares enough about my family to lift us up to God, and that is an awesome feeling.

Now for the family devotion story. We have recently started reading a Veggie Tales devotional book with our kids at night. They both love Veggie Tales, and we thought it would be a good way to kick off family devotions. Let me tell you, we weren't sure how much the kids were getting out of it, being as how they spent most of the time jumping up and down on the bed and/or trying to climb on Brad's head as he read to them. But we plugged on. Last night the devotion was talking about Moses and how his mother hid him in a basket in the river and trusted God with his safety. Korban kept saying "in the desert." Not sure how a river could be in the middle of the desert, but okaaaay. Brad finished reading the story and then said we would pray. He asked Korban to say a prayer for Selah and her doctors. He told Korban that Selah had to go to the hospital so the dr could look at her lung and help her get well. Korban asked if she would get a shot, and we told him yes, but that she would be asleep and wouldn't feel it. (They didn't put the IV in until she was asleep, so she really didn't feel it.) Brad asked Korban if he remembered when our church prayed for Selah and anointed her with oil. He told him that the dr might find that there's not even anything wrong, and that we were sure she was going to be just fine. Then, knowing how I worry and thinking of the Bible story he had just read, he turned to me and said "We're just going to put Selah in a basket and trust God to take care of her." I had about half a second to think about what a good analogy that was before Korban burst into tears. Loud sobbing. Tears squirting out of his eyes. It took us by surprise so much that we just pretty much gawked at each other and him for a couple of seconds before we even moved to comfort him. We had no idea what was wrong, if he was hurting, etc. I was trying to hug him and ask him what was wrong. "NO MORE PUT SELAH IN THE BASKET!" he bawled. "NO MORE LEAVE SELAH IN THE DESERT!" Yeah, that whole thing about autistic kids taking most everything literally, that's pretty much true. Oops. We were so relieved to find out what was wrong that we started to laugh. We loved on him and assured him that we weren't actually putting Selah in a basket and we for sure weren't gonna leave her in the desert. Selah seemed totally unconcerned about any impending threat from baskets, deserts, rivers, etc. She just kept on jumping on the bed while we cuddled Korban and tried to make everything okay. "It's okay," Brad told him. "I was just using a metaphor. Can you say metaphor?" he asked him. " "METAPHOR!" Selah crowed as she bounced past. Which made us laugh because, hello, she's 20 months and she can say metaphor. Very cool. The laughing spurred her on and she chirped "Metaphor, metaphor." Yes, metaphors can be dangerous, as we found out. But we convinced Korban that we weren't taking Selah anywhere to leave her and that she would be just fine. And we said prayers and went to bed. But hey, at least now we know that he plans on keeping her, right?

Sunday, July 24, 2011

In The Middle

Sometimes I think I would've been better suited for a middle child instead of an only child. I say that because I kind of always feel like I'm in the middle. Whatever group I happen to find myself in, I'm usually not at the top or the bottom, just somewhere in the middle. I'm a pretty good peacemaker. And I'm a terrible people-pleaser. I say that because, while I want everyone to be happy with me all the time, I'm not always good at making that happen. I try to juggle too many balls and invariably end up dropping some, if not all, of them. (Yes, I do know you can't please everybody all of the time but that bit of wisdom doesn't stop me from trying and then feeling like a failure. I don't know why. I'm just mental that way.) Sometimes I think I'm getting better about with this particular character flaw, and then it sucks me back in. I feel pulled in too many directions, like a Stretch Armstrong doll about to snap. It's like the very people that I want to make the happiest are the ones I let down the most. The weird part is, I don't even think they feel as disappointed with me as much as I do with myself. There are too many conflicts and I can't do this without letting one person down but if I go ahead and do it, I've let someone else down. And I feel hugely responsible for other people, even though I maybe shouldn't. I don't know how far personal responsibility goes; when I'm helping and when I'm making things worse.

Like my mom for example. I love my mom. We've always been close. But sometimes you wouldn't know which one of us is the parent and which one of us in the child. She's naive in many ways; childlike. Sometimes I find it amusing and sometimes I find it annoying. She's not extremely independent and I really wasn't raised to be either, although I think I have enough spunk in me to work around a lot of that. My parents were extremely protective of me growing up. I mean to the EXTREME!!! People asked me what I had done to make my parents not trust me, and I would laugh and say nothing. It was true. They mostly trusted me, I think it was the rest of the world they were worried about. And they had good reason to trust me. I was sort of always a mini-adult. I'm one of those people who follows the rules. I return shopping carts to the designated place, I have a healthy respect for authority, and I don't even tear the tags off of pillows. I wasn't allowed to make a lot of decisions for myself growing up, and I think I'm sort of making up for that now. (They are just lucky I didn't go the other way and that's all I'm going to say about that.)

But it's weird now because I'm not even 30 yet, and I feel like I'm the one taking care of my mom. I know that isn't necessarily true, she does a lot for me and my family. But ever since my dad died I feel like I have to be strong for her. That if I don't hold it together, everything will fall apart. In a lot of ways, I feel like people viewed it as my mom losing her husband but not me losing my dad. Again, this is only my perception of things, and I am smart enough to know that just because I perceive something a certain way doesn't make it reality. I'm used to being an anxious sort of person, but when my dad died I had a two week old infant and an autistic three year old at home. It was like I had so much to worry about that I couldn't possibly cover all of it, so my mind just sort of shut down. All I could focus on was getting through whatever needed to be done and keep on moving. My dad was like that, and I don't think he would've wanted me to just wallow in my grief. And even if I had wanted to, I just don't see how that would've been possible. But just because I was able to keep moving, do whatever I needed to do to get through the day, and do all of that for the most part without having a breakdown didn't mean I wasn't grieving. The very implication of that made me mad. The anxiety I was used to, the anger not so much. The odd part is, it's not directed at anybody. I'm not mad at my dad for dying, I'm not angry at God, I'm not mad at any of my family. I just have this low level of irritability simmering below the surface that I never noticed so much before. Brad (Mr. Mental Health) reminded me that anger is in fact one of the stages of grief. He's right--I paid attention in those social work classes too. I just didn't picture myself being the one getting stuck in that particular stage. Maybe this is what I get for skipping right over the denial stage. Who knows? It just doesn't jive with my personality, and I'd be thankful to work through it and move on.

I feel like I've lost a lot more family that many people my age. Not sure what the "average" is, but any kind of loss hurts. All four of my grandparents are gone, and now my dad. And my dad was a good bit older than my mom, and we had already lost all of daddy's siblings before him. I have a couple of cousins left on my dad's side of the family, but I never see them. Honestly, some of my distant relatives on his side of the family, I wouldn't recognize if I passed them on the street. Nor would they me. And that makes me sad. My mom has an awesome family, very loving and supportive, but sometimes I feel like she gets upset if I try to spend too much time with them. Like they are hers and not mine. Which I definitely could be wrong, I have been known to read a little bit too much into situations. But I have this horror of having no people left. I worry about Brad. I worry about my kids. I don't want to be as overprotective of my kids as my parents were of me, but I still worry obsessively. I want my kids to be able to learn and make mistakes and DO things without the constant fear of "what if?" But my situation is different than my parents'. I have a child who may or may not be able to make decisions for himself, may or may not be able to live independently when he is grown. Of course, we pray and hope for the best but there's still that part of me that has to have a contingency plan. What terrifies me the most is, you just get one chance. How would you feel if you knew there was a very slim chance your child would actually listen to you? If your child got away from you in public and was running towards a busy street and you were screaming bloody murder, would your child stop? Mine wouldn't. Therefore I hold on him so hard it probably hurts sometimes. But that's better than the alternative. The thing that takes my breath away is the worry that I'll miss something. That one of them will be sick and I won't know it. That I will be distracted for just a minute in a public place and Korban wanders into the path of a vehicle, or wanders off and gets lost, or gets taken. I know I shouldn't obsess about it, but I don't know how to stop. How would you feel if your child couldn't effectively communicate, couldn't ask for help in a crowd, couldn't stop when his mother told him too? I know many kids are impulsive, I'm not saying it's just us.

Last night I dreamed that we were walking across a high bridge above some water. One of my teenage cousins was carrying Selah and walking across the bridge ahead of us. I was behind holding Korban's hand and walking across. All of a sudden, my cousin just sat Selah on the bridge and walked away. There were guard rails on the side, but she's so tiny I knew she could slip through them and into the water below. I was screaming for her to come back and get Selah and frantically trying to decide whether to leave Korban and run to Selah or not. I woke up after that. Pulled in too many directions. So afraid I'm going to let somebody down. That I will neglect one child while caring for the other. Of not having anybody left...

We are okay though. I'm just stressing tonight, and thought it would be better to vent some of this rather than leaving it in. So don't worry about us, but do pray!

Tuesday, July 19, 2011

Funny/Sweet Things That Korban Has Prayed For

I love to hear Korban say his bedtime prayers. When he finally had enough words to pray, Brad and I would sort of guide him into what to say and he would repeat after us. We didn't realize he would repeat verbatim (although we should've realized that!). For example, we started out telling him "Bless your teachers," and he still to this day prays "Bless your teachers," every night. Oh, those pronouns. They get him (almost) every time. But God knows what he means. And I have to wonder if God gets as cracked up and as teary eyed as I do listening to him. As he is gaining more speech, he is able to pray for what he wants and not just what we tell him. He always likes for us to repeat whatever he has said back to him, and that is how he knows to move on to the next item on his list. Otherwise, he just blesses the same person/thing over and over. So here is a list of some of my favorites, although I'm sure more will come to mind later:

--Bless ketchup
--Bless Muck (from Bob the Builder, only Korban pronounces it "Meck")
--Bless Veggie Tales
--Bless bellybuttons (He's seriously obsessed with bellybuttons--more on that later. And sometimes he prays for specific people's bellybuttons.)
--Bless screaming (He has a real issue with screaming that we have been trying to deal with for a loooong time now. I have prayed extensively about this too, except my prayers usually sound something like "Dear God, please let it stop.")
--Bless time out.
--Bless Mommy/Daddy saying "go to your room." (I think this may actually qualify as praying for those who persecute you. Ha!)
--Bless little poke. (His term for getting a shot or finger stick. And I'm pretty sure in this case "bless" means "don't let that happen anymore.")
--Bless take off the Band-Aid (This one was said after I put a Band-Aid on his foot and he wanted to take it off and I wouldn't let him. He has a real sensory issue with Band-Aids. I think he was trying to go over my head by praying on that one.)
--He also prays "Get well," which is probably due to how often he and his sister have been sick, so that one's sort of sad and sweet.
--For some friends who are struggling with infertility he would say "Pleeeeease bring them a baby!"
--One night he said "Bless Sue Song." I just sat there dumbfounded, because I had no idea who Sue Song was. Again he prayed "Bless Sue Song" while watching me out of the corner of his eye. Seriously, all I could think of was Sue Storm from The Fantastic Four, and I knew we hadn't let him watch that. When I still didn't repeat him or respond in any way he poked me in the shoulder, stuck his face in mine and practically shouted "BLESS SUE SONG, MOMMY!!!" I then realized he meant our friend Suzanne, and I quickly said "Bless Suzanne!" and he was happy.

Oh, and he says "Bless your friends" just like he says "bless your teachers." We really should've thought and used "my" when we taught him that, but it's still sweet. He also blesses Mommy, Daddy, Selah, Nana, Mammaw, Grandpa, Uncle Clay, Aunt Kelly, Trevor and Haiden (his cousins) most every night. Sometimes he randomly throws in a family member or friend's name that we haven't even necessarily been seeing or talking about, so I have to wonder if he's not more perceptive and a better interceder than I am sometimes! He always starts out with "Dear God" (or as he says it "De-ah God") and then he says his list and ends it with "Thank You Jesus, Amen." Sweet boy.