All My Loose Ends

It's snowing....

I'm a sap. I love snow. Yes, I love it even in March. Big white fluffy flakes are floating down from the sky and it just feels like the world is peaceful when it happens. I feel safe at home. Wrapped up and warm and the world is lovely and clean and white outside.

I hate winter when it doesn't snow. I hate seeig he dead leaves and the brown grass and the bare trees. I like them better covered in snow. It's pretty. Calm. Perfect.

It's also fairly warm today. Perfect snowman snow and snowman weather. If I can fid our gloves maybe we will go out and play in the snow today.

Emily's off of school today. It's Pulaski Day We're going to shop and hang out. We need some fun time together. OUrs has been in short supply lately.

Where did the weekend go?

Does anyone else's fly by like....I don't know...something really fast? It seems like we pine away all week waiting for Friday night and before we know it, it's Monday morning again and we start all over again.

I'm day dreaming about home improvements today. Due to financial stuff, we'll be catching up over the next couple of months, but once that's done, we're improving the house. Hard core. ;o)

There is so much to do here. SO much to make this place into our home. Something we missed the opportunity to do the last time. My mind is full of paint colors and furniture. Plants and lights fixtures. Curtains and throw rugs. Pictures and knick knacks. We know that in a few years time we're going to move on from here. That space will become an issue and we'll be ready to stretch our legs again, but the foundation is starting here, now and we can't wait to put our mark on this place.

And now it's time...

Several months ago, I stumbled across a blog that I quickly added to my blog roll list for daily reading. I loved Moreena's writing styles and stories about her girls; Frankie, 2, and Annika, 4. I love reading the works of real people who get it. Moreena gets it.

Annika, Moreena and Jorg's oldest daughter, was born very ill and has since had two kidney transplants. Prior to Chrismas, Annika got very sick again and had to spend monhs upon months at Children's Hospital in Chicago. She teetered. Had infections and bleeds. Missed Christmas (as many of you know, a huge tragedy to me) and ran the medical gammet.

Moreena and Jorg have good health insurance and the majority of Annika's lare bills occurred in 2005, but because of a billing SNAFU (the items weren't billed into Jan.) they have already run through Annika's ONE MILLION DOLLAR COVERAGE LIMIT FOR THE ENTIRE YEAR!

I don't have to spell that out for anyone. To top it off, Annika is in need of a third liver transplant. Thankfully, Annika is home right now and doing okay, but Moreena and Jorg are going to need some help paying for the private, special insurance Annika is going to need to supplement the fact that her health insurance is gone for he year.

To the tune of three THOUSAND dollars a month. The family estimates that they are going to need EIGHTY FIVE THOUSAND DOLLARS to get by, medically, with Annika this year.

So, this is where I ask anyone who reads here to consider making a donation to Annika's COTA Fund to help her family fund his private insurance and other medical necessitities during this time. We'll be sending what we can, when we can. If you can't send money, consider visiting Andrea's page and joining the raffle or donating a good or service. Anything will help.

The good news about COTA is that any funds Anni and her family can't use will be donated to others in similar need. It's a win-win situation. Tax deductable and, you get the warm fuzzies from helping someone who needs it. I'll be putting up buttons and links here and in my signatures around the Internet. Do what you can. You won't be sorry.

What's Happenin'?

Emily had a half day today.

Well, she always has half days, but today she attended in the morning because of parent teacher conferences, so we're snuggled in at home before she normally gets off the bus. That's kind of cool. She also has two days off, which is nice as well. I miss her when she's not around.

I'm not going to be talking about the panic around here for a while. What I will be doing instead is trying to list, every time I blog, five positive things that have happened, either that day or since my last post.

So, yesterday I.....
1) Went to the grocery store
2) Drove myself to my doctor's appointment
3) Made dinner and got it in the table at a "normal" time
4) Managed to do some normal housework
5) Fell asleep at a normal time.

The theme of yesterday seemed to be normal, which, trust me, ain't so bad. ;o)

I've also been working on a digital scrapbook page. For two days. It hink today might make three. I'm not sure if I love the result or not. It took no less time than my paper scrapping does. Probably more. But my desk is a mess and things aren't organized yet and this was sort of fun.

We're here...

Sitting in our great big bedroom, watching a movie. Just like old times. We still have some unpacking to do. We got a lot of help yesterday and today and we're functioning at nearly normal right now. Still some work today to ge us entirely back on our feet, but hopefully before we head back to MI this weekend.

It feels odd to be back here. Surreal. Lots of things are the same. Some things are different. Some things will stay different and some things will change. We forgot the paperwork that included Emily's birh certificate in Michigan, so registering for school will have to wait until Tuesday, when we run to the county to get a new copy. She's excited to go back. Her room is all set up and arranged and minus the fact that we need to purge about two moving boxes full of stuff to be able to successfully contain it in the storage she has, it looks nice. I'm thinking I'll get to the curtain making this week and she'll be on her way to her princess room by end of he week.

Holy Smoke! We move in THREE sleeps!

No, we're not done packing. Why would we be. We have THREE more sleeps, you know. ;)

Emily's last day of school is tomorrow. It's hard to gauge how she feels about it. I think as we all do, happy about some things, sad about other things. A conflicted move, to say the least.

But, the kitchen is nearly packed and the rest of the house will follow suit shortly and by Saturday morning, we'll be ready to go come hell or high water. We have some friends coming by to help us out and hopefully some more help waiting in Lakemoor. I think if we're motivated a good portion of the house will be unpacked by Monday morning and we'll settle in again, something we've been missing for the last couple months.

We're less than a week from our move...

in some ways, I think we're making good progress in other ways it feels like we have a lot more to do. Eric is giong to be in IL on Tuesday (leaving on Monday evening) and he's taking the cats with him to cut down on the amount of living thigns we have to transport next weekend. Hopefully, he'll only be in IL a couple days this week (maybe on Tuesday) so we can have lots of time to get finished up.

We'll have enough help to get things onto the truck on Saturday morning and hopefully more help waiting for us in Lakemoor.

I'm looking forward to arranging my furniture and painting. Cleaning up the things we don't love and turning them into things we do. I am looking forward to being home.

There are so many things we'll miss about Michigan--the presence of my parents. The help they have been so willing to dole out as we deal with all of things that make up our life. The nearly built in dog sitter. THe visits and holidays. The fact that on occassion, people have just dropped by to visit. No one ever does that with us. The easy trips up north. The walks at the mill. The fireplace. The routines and places.

But honestly, with everything happening right now, it feels right to close the chapter. To make that fresh start. Not just because of the New Year. Because of everything. It's time.

I realized, over the course of the nearly two years we spent here, that I missed having a home. I miss living someplace I care about (not that I don't care about the locale, but I just don't care about the places we've lived). I missed dreaming about what we would or could to to our own four walls or little patch of grass. I've missed having a garden and a place to sit outside while Emily played (without being under constant supervision by the neighbors). I miss the routine I had that's been absent for better than a year. I miss having pride in my home.

This time is bittersweet for us. Most times of change are. We feel bad about what we leave and happy about what we gain and hope for the best.

The weekend....

was a good one. Eric will be able to stay tomorrow buying us an extra day together. Just 12 days until we move. We did a lot of packing and purging this weekend. The kitchen is all packed save for the few must have items. We swept through the living room today and packed nearly 90% of it. We cleaned Emily's room and packed several boxes and purged a lot of junk.

I'm going to miss my parents, but I'm so happy that in 12 days we don't have to worry about Eric leaving so much and in 12 days we can be a full time, all the time family again, which has been nearly two months in the making.

Plus, we can back to cooking, which I've actually been missing. It's been pre-packaged food and eating out. I miss the ebb and flow of our days.

On Friday night, I sorted through my scrap area. I got rid of a TON of stuff. I rak'ed some on 2peas, stuff too nice to really toss and reorganized a lot of stuff. I dumped about 75% of my eyelets. Tossed some stuff that's not been blessing me (one of the things I've taken away from fly lady). I organized my paper by color. I'm desperate to sit and scrapbook right now.

I'm about to send another film order to www.scrapbookpictures.com. Their film service is GREAT. For $3/roll they develop your pictures and send them back nicely packaged and indexed. Not to mention that you only have to print the pictures that actually turn out. I know, for some, shooting film seems expensive. And it is, but with the quality of my camera and the results I get, it works out in the end.

Prior to taking my own pictures, we'd hit Sears a minimum of twice a year for a minimum of a $100 per trip. $200 is a lot of film processing. And that's at a minimum. This past year I took formal portraits of Emily three times and the family once (including shots of Eric and I together, Eric with Em, me with Em) which would have probably been $400 at least from a place like sears, with the quality really being less (I love Sears pictures, but they're rushed and that usually shows). So, again, that;s a lot of rolls of film.

In other news, I have had one panic attack this week. :o) I don't want to jink myself by talking about it, but I'm stoked.

The Good, The Bad and the Ugly...for the first three days of 2006

The good:

1. Mom's tumor has shrunk another 40%. :o) She has another PET scan coming to see if the witch is dead and to make supre duper sure that nothing else is growing. Yay MOM!
   
2. OUr house is our house again and we rolled around on the carpet like the dog
   
3. I have a FO for 2006 . Knitted, of course. ;o)
   

The Bad:

1. The Wicked Witch of the West stiffed us for the $1600 she owes us, thus far. If contact isn't made this week, we'll be suing her for a helluva lot more than $1600. I was hoping that 12/31 would mean she'd hop on her broomstick and depart and we'd be done with her, but not so
   
2. Panic. Panic. Panic. Panic. :o(
   

The Ugly

1. Have you seen the bank balance?!??! Oy. Annyone else?
   

Five Sleeps Until Santa...

That's what we're counting right now. Emily asks every day. Several tmes a day. How many days unitl Santa comes and we count by sleeps. I hope sh's ejoying the season. I feel like we haven't had the normal build up to the season at all.

But enough of that.

I finished my shopping tonight, though I may pick up something smallish for my brother still. Eric's going out shopping with his aunt tomorrow and I'm heading over to the MIL's to make some more Christmas cookies. I think just snickerdoodles and sometting else simple. We'll defrost the chocolate chip and snowballs when we get home and Emily and I will make sugar cookies Friday.

So much to do has finally come down to these few things. I'm hoping once we get home and get our gifts under the tree I'll get that happy feeling my chest and all will be right with the world for a few minutes.

Eight Days Until Christmas Morning...

Emily is watching a Santa Movie on the Disney Channel. I's nearly her bedtime. I'll let her finish the movie. It's a speical tiime of year, full of little treats and extras--staying up late is one of them.

For Christmas, I'm going to therapy. Almost literally. My second appt. with Dr. Jackson is 12/23 and I meet with the Psychiatrist(sp) on 12/30 to put me on new meds. I'm hopeful as it's no taking two ativan a day to keep my attacks under control.

We leave tomorrow to spend a few days in IL--to try and ease my attacks (though I'm doubtful and worried about having them away from home) and Eric's guilt. At least one of us will feel better, right? ;o)

So, here's the HP scarf, modeled by the loverly Emily

Ihaven't been knitting much and will actually be removing myself from th Knit blog web ring after the new year (when I work on a new site design, of course). I feel guilty, throwing little knitting tidbits in, when my heart isn't in it right now. I know my heart will come back to it, but it seems wrong to be in the ring when I'm really not there mentally. When I get back to it, I'll rejoin.

This is our first packed box. That total is now up to nine.

Since my appointment on Thursday, I've been reading affirmations. About giving up guilt and stress ad the condition that makes me panic and feeling worthy of the good stuff life is giving to me.

And I thought a lot about how this move and this change is probably contributint to my panic.

In trhuth, I'm very sorry to leave my Mom. Very sorry indeed, but I really feel, with every bit of my soul, that this move is what's best for Eric and Emily and I. Since I believe that, I have to let it go. I know i"ll come home. I know i'll be here to help. I KNOW it.

And, I'm looking forward to my little white house with it's bright windows and short walk to the playground. I'm looking forward to the red winged blackbirds and the little crocuses I planted in the front yard. I am. I'm looking forward to sitting on the patio and knitting or reading while Emily plays.

My affirmations says I should give away the guilt and realize I'm worthy of the good stuff. So, there it is.

Sad News. :o(

Today, Emily got off the bus and her bus driver told me that she needed to be talked to. She was sad. Someone had said something on the bus to upset her. I bundled her into the car, concerned.

She said she was fine,b ut a schoolmate had told her a girl in her class had been in a car accident. I reassured Emily that the little girl was probably fine. No big deal. We discussed how we weren't worried about if the car was hurt or not, all that matterd was the people in side.

I sat down at the computer while EMily unloaded her back pack. SHe handed me an offical note from the school.

THe little classmate was killed yesterday in a car accident. just a mile from our house.

:o(

I burst into tears.

I am blessed to be able to help out in Em's classroom most weeks and, of course, had talked to this little girl. She was sweet. She wore glasses. Emily remember that she liked to wear a pony tail holder with jingle bells on it.

Emily's cried a little. I cried a lot. We talked about whether or not she'd have toys to play with in heaven, whether or not she can see us. That we should pray for God to keep her safe and help her family's sadness.

It's such a tragedy. So, so sad. It's all over the news. The little car they were riding in so crushed that not even a car seat could have saved her.

Today in class the children were asking about where she was. A vibe, I guess, becuase not even the teacher mentioned it to me. Tomorrow they'll return to class knowing that she won't return with them. Ever. It's so, so sad.

If you can, say a little prayer. For this little one. That her path into heaven was quick and easy. That her family heals. (two other siblings and an aunt were injured as well). That there are toys in heaven.

Grrr....

Some f*cker has been spamming my comments again., I hate that shit.

Eric got his job offer yesterday. We've accepted and our package is on it's way. It's not quite the raise, initially that we hoped for, but it IS a raise and a great opportunity. Eric called tonight and touched base with my Dad. I just couldn't do it. I'm even panicking on the Ativan right now, but after that phone call and knowing that this day was the worst that I had been dreading and now it's over...I feel better. In fact, I physcially felt a weight lift off of my shoulder. I'll keep the drugs close at hand, but hopefully my need for them will wane for a while.

So, here's my lunch box

I used it tonight.

Inside this little gem is about 8 recipes I use frequently but never can quite remeber how to make (how hot to cook it, how much to add, etc) so I put them on cards and loaded them into the lunch box. The final page of this strip is adhered to the box itself and i'm hoping with the ample layers of mod podge, it will hold up to kitchen use. I used it to make Risotto tonight. :o)

I am the mother of a beautiful child.

and she's so gaudy!

It's one of her bestest qualities.