The Thing That Wasn’t On My Calendar

We're back in our house.  Well, we're sort of back in the house.  We had a busy day, and I'm sitting down on my bed in my "office," sitting against the headboard of the bed with my pillows behind me, typing at my computer.   Being home is nice.

I'm the only one that's here for the full night, though.   My in-laws had my children for a lot of the day with my mother-in-law kicking off the morning by coordinating a full-on cookie making extravaganza.   She prepared the dough last night, and this morning when I woke up, my daughter was already cutting out the final round of sugar cookies for the oven.   All the decorations were ready to be put on and my mother-in-law was prepping to make the icing.

This was for the cookie swap and luminary pickup party my best friend and my family were having at the clubhouse for the neighborhood.   After getting up, I packed my week of clothing and took a good bit of the children's clothing and things in my car and headed over to our house, now with mostly dried hardwood floors, to start the unpacking and replacing of things at home.

Everything had been removed from the walls, countertops, and shelves.  The furniture had been moved to the garage or other floors.   It was going to take time to get everything back in place.   I had about an hour of work in when I had to head over to the clubhouse to get ready with the rest of our two families.

My in-laws and children arrived at the beginning of the event, and we had several busy yet fun hours of neighbors dropping in, food being eaten, luminaries being sold, and subsequent cleaning up at the end.   We had asked my in-laws if they could keep the children for one more night while we got the furniture in the bedroom and some other things moved back in before tomorrow.   They were, as always, glad to help.

It was most-way through the event when I found out something.   These days most things are on our calendars, so remembering someone's birthday isn't what it used to be because we have our devices reminding us.   But this item for some reason I'd missed.   It was my in-laws anniversary.   They have been married for forty-six years today.   And I'd forgotten.   We'd had them tasked with taking care of our children all day, coming to our event, and then taking them home for the night while we started to move back in.

I felt terrible.   My in-laws are like my husband and me, as well as my parents, in that we're not overly sentimental about something being celebrated in a certain way.   They didn't seem upset at all, and yet I was.   They had remembered our anniversary earlier in the week and had had special taco night for us, replete with special margaritas.   They had given us a gift card for a restaurant we like, saying dinner was on them one night when we wanted to go out.   What had we done for them?   We had asked them if they would take care of our children all day long and then could they also watch them for one more night after hosting us at their house for an entire week.

I have wonderful in-laws.  I truly do.   I joke all the time when talking to people that we, "worked on them for several years to convince them to move closer."   And while I make light of it, it's true, we wanted them to move closer because we enjoy spending time with them.   So here's wishing them a happy anniversary today and a thank you as well for all they do for our family.

My husband and I did get the bedroom back in order this evening before going back to spend the night again at his parents to help in the morning get the children off to school.   My husband has the latest iPhone with a panoramic lens.   This is our bedroom after we got the bed put together, only it's not as big as it looks.  That lens can make any space look twice as large.   The hardwood floors look lovely.   My husband says it looks like they've always been here.   I agree with him, they do.

What My Son Did Last Night:  My son came into our room last night around three a.m. with stabbing intestinal cramps.   He's had them before but this was the worst yet.   He and I tried multiple things for about an hour and couldn't get it to abate.   He wanted to be right with me, which is atypical for him.   Eventually, I got him to go back to his bet but he wanted me there with him.   I fell asleep in the twin bed with him, something I haven't ever done before.   He was very sweet, wanting me to stay with him even when it got better because he was scared it would come back.   He thought it was his appendix at one point.  I told him he was okay, that the pain was on the wrong side.

How My Daughter Helped Today:  My daughter wants very badly to be helpful and to do so in a way that doesn't point out her vision impairment.   At the party today she stayed at the front door and handed out luminary candles to every family that came to the event.   She did her job very well and never once complained about wanting to take a break.   I brought her food and drink part-way through.   My best friend's children also helped and worked hard, but I was most proud of my daughter, who didn't take a single break, even to go to the bathroom.  I wasn't at the table much, but I heard her confidently talking to people, explaining things and counting out candles in sets of ten for people.   I am sure some realized she couldn't see, but I would bet a large portion of them never even realized it.

What We Thought We Knew

My daughter had a half-day of school today.   Earlier in the year school had been canceled in case a hurricane came our way, well before it was known if the hurricane was coming our way.  We had some rain, no heavier than any typical rainstorm when the hurricane picked a path far away from us, but since school was canceled in advance, we just spent the day at home.   Today was her makeup day, on a Saturday.

After school, we went to a Scandanavian festival with my daughter's retired braillest.  We always enjoy catching up with her.   She and I ate lots of different foods (Mrs. Aagaard and I are fond of trying all the food options we can fit on our plates.). My daughter ate mashed potatoes and meatballs and then we looked at the items for sale and met my in-laws and son when they arrived.

We left and headed to see Frozen II.   My son and I have been listening to the music from the movie for the past three days as we drove from place to place, making guesses about what would happen in the movie based on the song lyrics and who was singing what.   Today, when we saw the movie, we sat beside each other and commented quietly about what we thought we knew, what we got right—and what we were totally wrong about from listening to the songs before seeing the movie.

My husband doesn't like to know anything about a movie before seeing it on account of he doesn't like to have anything spoiled for him beforehand.  I've never minded that and, for me, I liked knowing the songs before they came on in the movie.  I think it made the movie more enjoyable, knowing the music and songs when they came on, getting excited because songs we liked were coming up and we were going to find out what they meant within the context of the movie.

I had high expectations for the movie.  The amount of resources and talent put towards the movie made it an almost sure win.   And I wasn't disappointed.  My son, after getting home this evening, has had Alexa playing the movie music over and over while he plays Roblox on the Xbox with the volume off.

From two rooms away I'm enjoying hearing the music playing too.   My daughter, before falling asleep in the room with my son, was singing along to the new songs.   I have a feeling we're going to be hearing a lot of the soundtrack over the coming weeks.

The Big Boy Update:  I created a Roblox account tonight and got in a game with my son tonight.  He had a lot of fun being the high-level character, showing me around.   I didn't get very far, but I had fun playing with him.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  My daughter's class had pajamas day at school for the Saturday half-day.   We had a packed day with events happening one after another which meant she wore Christmas pajamas to the Scandanavian festival and then to see Frozen II.   It didn't bother her at all and no one seemed to notice.

Fingers Are Everything

My daughter has been doing better lately.   My husband and I had a conference with her teacher earlier this week and found out something distressing that I mentioned in the post two days ago.   For the first part of the year, my daughter was regularly, sometimes more than once per day, having full-on meltdowns in the classroom.   She would have to go to the "safe corner" and stay there with the stuffed animals and bean bag chair until she was ready to function in the classroom again.

This happened every time there was an "assessment" which is like a quiz or an "evaluation" which is like a practice quiz.   There is more pressure for performance in second grade which shouldn't bother my daughter in the slightest because she knows all the spelling words and the math is a snap for her.   Academically, she has no issues.  School is almost easy for her in that respect.  

And yet she was having dramatic problems in the classroom.   Her second-grade teacher didn't know this was not normal behavior and we didn't pick up on it until we got an email because of how she was treating other students and teachers.   Fortunately, with the anti-depressant medication, my daughter is taking, she is now back to herself.   She's doing well in school and is even happy to take the assessments.

I've been working on my braille curriculum and over the last week have been translating a fully contracted braille article on Haben Girma, the first deaf-blind graduate of Harvard Law School.   Her story is powerfully moving and compelling and I wanted to tell my daughter about Girma's story and how she went from holding out her tray at the cafeteria and having no idea what she'd get for lunch because she couldn't communicate with the staff.  How Girma learned to advocate for her rights under the Americans with Disabilities Act and eventually got her law degree and has helped pursue cases to further the ADA's reach.

My daughter asked me a lot of questions.   It was interesting to her and we had to think about it.   She couldn't ask what was for lunch because she couldn't hear the responses.   She and I talked about how she communicated primarily through a refreshable braille display like the Orbit my daughter has.  My daughter said, "When you're blind, fingers are everything."

Did you get that?  That was her, talking about herself as a blind person.  That's not something she's done before.   We talked about how her fingers were important and how Girma's were even more so because she couldn't hear people talking.

It was a good conversation and my daughter was in a happy mood.   She went in to see Dhruti with the most upbeat attitude I've seen in a while.  Things are definitely getting better for her.   She has a long way to go, but we're going places now.

The Big Boy Update:  My son came onto my bed the other morning and did something with his fingers on my head.   When I asked him what he was doing he said, "I'm doing a bain inspection."  He told me if it turned out my brain was out of whack, he had some steps to to to correct it.   Thankfully, my brain was fine.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  We have had another braillewriter in need of repairs.   They are heavy, sturdy machines and it seems like they should be indestructible but they can be quite delicate.   My daughter's teachers sent home a different one while the main one gets repaired with some admonishing that she not do some of the aggressive carriage returning and "flicking" of the keys she's done a lot of recently.   I asked my daughter if she could explain to me so I could be sure to treat the braillewriter with respect too.  She told me, "it's not possible for you to hurt the braillewriter, you type too slow."

Ten Years

I didn't write this post last night, I'm writing it this morning and changing the posting time to make it look like I wrote this last night.  Last night I had gone upstairs to read my daughter a story and for some reason when I finished reading (I was sitting on the floor at the time) I just leaned over on my lap and fell asleep.

I woke up twenty minutes later with both legs in that throbbing painful half-asleep, half-awake state.  I stumbled downstairs, flopped into the bed and made moaning sounds coupled with incoherent words about my legs being asleep when my husband came in a short bit later.   He and my father-in-law had been playing a game with my son, who wasn't yet in bed.   I asked my husband if he could get my laptop from the car so I could write my blog post, thanked him when he gave it to me a few minutes later and then fell asleep holding the laptop bag.

When I woke up a bit later I deposited the bag on the floor, turned off the light and decided it would be pointless to write a blog post at the time as it would be rife with typos and would have a high probability it would be mostly nonsense.

Yesterday was a rather special day because it was my husband and my ten year wedding anniversary.   We were joking the day before about what ten years was in the anniversary gifts by year list.  We don't exchange gifts for most things like birthdays, Valentine's Day or anniversaries.   I broke the tradition though and had gotten him a card.

I rarely give cards for anything outside of teacher gifts or thank you notes.  Unexpectedly, I'd seen a funny anniversary card a few weeks ago.   The fact that I remembered it for yesterday was surprising, even to me.   When I told my husband about the card (he'd been awake for a while and hadn't noticed it propped up on his nightstand) he said, "I didn't get you anything!"  I told him maybe what we're getting each other for our anniversary is hardwood floors in the master.   He agreed it sounded like a good idea and that perhaps the tenth anniversary was the "wood year" anyways.

Our day was rather like normal, aside from being moved in with my in-laws, who have been exceptionally gracious hosts.   I'm afraid our children and dog aren't going to want to come back home.

For dinner, they had an all-out, no topping missing, taco dinner.   The adults had margaritas.   My son stole a lot of the salt from around my glass rim but didn't want to try the drink as he said, "it would be illegal" since he was underaged.

We'll be with my in-laws for a few more days while the polyurethane dries at our house.   My husband and I have been in our basement a lot (which is where I'm writing this post from now).   I'm looking forward to being fully home though.

What My Son Said:  It happened.  My son has gotten to the age where I embarrass him.   For some reason, this makes me smile because it means he's growing up.   Yesterday when I was dropping him off for school I was saying something like how handsome he was or that I loved him as he was getting out of the car.   He quickly got out of the car and said as he departed, "Mom! Stop being a weirdo!"

What My Daughter Said:  While playing with my mother at her house this past weekend, suddenly my daughter said, "could we go rest on your bed?"  My mother said they could.   They both laid on her bed and decided my mother would tell a story.   My daughter said she didn't want the story to be about her, so my mother said she'd tell a story about me.  My daughter said, "okay but don't tell the story about the bean up mom's nose, because I know that one."  So my mother told a story about a car we called, "shake and bake" when I was young because it was old, shuddered when you drove it and had no airconditioning so you "baked" in it during the summer.   When she was done with the story, my daughter said, "okay, now we can go back and play."  My mother thought about what had just happened.   She knew my daughter wasn't tired, but my daughter knew Mimi needed to take a rest every now and then.   Was she asking to take that rest break to help my mother?   Was it from empathy?  My daughter has a lot of empathy.

Acceptance Begins

There is some evidence my daughter is starting to accept her blindness.   It's in little things: something she told her VI teacher or thing she wrote at school.   It could be in how she's talking to people and not being upset when they ask her about her cane or that she enjoyed being the center of attention at her brother's class or having Theo over to show off her braillewriting skills.   

It could be a lot of things, or it could be none of them.   We're still not sure.   Today, after talking with my daughter and with me, her psychaitrist decided to increase my daughter's medication by a small amount.   This is based on things my daughter has said, things I said and, bottom line, what my daughter asked for.  

She says the "happy pill" is helping, but only so much.   I asked her a lot of questions today on the way to the doctor's office and she said she was happier, but not happy like she was when she was three.   Which is singular, because three was the last time she could see.   I don't know if she picked that age at random because I don't think her memory is accurate back that amount of time.   But who knows.   She brought home this timeline she had made at school which lists events she thinks are key in her life:

The Big Boy Update:  My son likes listening to comedians and recently my mother suggested we check out two she thought my son would like.   He liked her suggestions and we got a good bit of comedy in over the next wee while in the car.   At some point my son was having a conversation with another, older child and wanted to impress him with the comedians he knew.   He fired off at me, "Mom, who is that guy from the last century?"  I said, "I think you mean Bob Newhart".  

The Tiny Girl Chronicles: We had a quick conference with my daughter's teacher today and found out things were very, very bad for the first part of the year.   My daughter was emotionally completely unstable in school and would meltdown regularly.   She was also rude and said unkind things to friends and acted like she didn't care.  This was that internal anger that was manifesting because she was realizing she was going to be stuck being blind.    We had no idea it was that bad.   I wish we'd understood it sooner.   I hate it for her teachers as well as for my daughter.   Everyone agrees things are going a lot better now.  I hope they continue that way.

Mood After School

My son and I went to the chiropractor this morning.   He had had a headache the night before, and last week we were wondering if he'd done something like stood up under the bunk beds and hit his head because he was trying to stretch his neck out.   This morning I took him into the chiropractor again, and he got a similar adjustment, and he was feeling better in short order.

What was interesting was his mood in the car.   His Adderall had taken effect because we had a lot longer drive from my in-law's house in the next town over.  We were late for school, so I got to see him calm and focused on the medicine.   He wanted to listen to my adult grammar book.   It's dry for even an adult, and he couldn't understand a good bit of it, but he said he liked it.

We even picked a chapter on "And, Or and But" usage at the beginning of sentences: is it grammatical or not?   My son knows the answer to that question now.   We got to school not too much after the start of class.   When my husband picked him up at the end of the day for some reason they must have gotten to talking about mood, because this is my son's mood after school, as drawn on the screen of the car in drawing mode:



In the bottom left, my son wrote his goal, which translates to, "Anger down,  Happiness Up."

The Big Boy Update:  My son can be very nice, but he can also be a colossal jerk.   My husband and I don't know what other words to use for when he's like this.   Something tripped him up tonight because he was just so, well, such a jerk.   We have got to figure him out.   Hopefully, before he goes to college and before we've screwed him up beyond repair.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  I got a message from Morgan, our favorite sitter tonight.   She wanted to know if my daughter would like to be hired to make a braided dog tug toy like the one she'd made for Zivy, their dog.   My daughter was almost asleep when I came in to tell her, but she smiled a big smile with her eyes closed in bed and said that yes, she would like to make a tug toy for the new Australian Shepard puppy named Willoughby.

The Same But Different

This morning my house transformed from the place that feels like and is home into a place that seems like home, but isn't quite.   My master was transformed from a warm, welcoming room into a room with no carpet and loud sawing sounds as the father/son-in-law crew worked to layout hardwood floors to match the rest of the main floor.

I packed up and prepared to move my children to my in-laws for the week.   I kept getting stuck in my bathroom and closet.   Multiple people did.  The cabinet people kept coming in and marking or removing the cabinet doors.   Then my builder and I were moving things into the bathroom out of the master bedroom.   Next, my husband came home and I had him and my builder in the closet, talking about a leak problem we'd had for over a year that made no sense (he solved it, he always solves everything).

We were in my closet for the longest while, all up amongst the bedding for my bed that I'd shoved in the corner with the fluffy pillows.   I wanted everyone to leave my closet and my bathroom so I could pack.   It finally happened and then I had to get my son from school and now I'm here, relocated from the house for now, although I'll be spending days at the house and my husband will be there for much of the nights.  

The house is still my house, without question.   It's just strange looking.  Odd feeling.   I hope I like the hardwood floors in the master when this is done.   I'm looking forward to it.   I hope my husband likes them.   I'm not certain he will.

The Big Boy Update:  My son said he's had a headache since after school.   This is odd for him and not something he usually says.   He even wanted some ibuprofen or something to help his head.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  My daughter doesn't want to wear a headband anymore.   She loves headbands, so this is odd.   She sort of looks like a hippy, flower child with her long hair and no headband.   My husband figured out why though: it hurts when she stands on her head.   And this child stands on her head all the time.