Another week?

My mini vacation was too short! I'm not ready to go back to work tomorrow. Ack!

Thursday was great with R. We went to a nearby park/playground in the morning. There were TONS of kids from a local Head Start program there when we arrived. It was a little overwhelming, so R stuck pretty close to me except when he was sliding down a crazy fire pole! He did it over and over again. A told me later that R tried it for the first time the last time he took him to that park a few weeks ago. I would never have known because R was sliding down like a pro. Unfortunately, he wanted me to do it with him, and when I slid down, although I was much more graceful than I imagined I'd be, I slammed my knees into the pole and now I'm covered with some scary-looking bruises. But we had SO much fun. Later, after most of the kids cleared out, R made friends with some older girls and played with them until we left. At first, they were annoyed by him because he ran up to them to tell them, "Be careful! I don't want you to fall!" when they were swinging from the rings. But then they were playing chase with him later, which was nice.

A and I have decided to stop telling R to "Be careful!" because we realized that it doesn't do any good - it doesn't affect his behavior at all at the moment, and because he just keeps telling other kids to be careful, which doesn't always go over very well. ;-)

On Thursday afternoon, R and I walked to the library, took out a bunch of books and read stories there, then we picked up some cookies at the bakery around the corner, and walked home. It was lovely.

On my big day off on Friday, I ended up shopping all morning with A. I bought some things for the house, some toys for R, and then we went to L.L. Bean. A and I both need work clothes, but I ended up with all summer things (shorts, skirt, cropped jeans) because they were having a big summer sale. Then, we headed home and I cleaned the house the rest of the day. I think I sat down to relax for half an hour. But that's okay. It was what I wanted to do. Only I want to do it for another few days!

This weekend was really hot here. I think we hit 97 on Saturday. So we headed to the Museum of Science to be indoors and cool. We went to the Butterfly Garden and checked out the electricity show. I was nervous that R would be scared by the show because it's very loud and bright, but he LOVED it. He asked to leave a couple of times, but that was because the presenter was talking too much. All that educational stuff, you know. :-)

We spent the rest of the day in our family-sized inflatable pool. It's amazing how comfortable the heat seems when you're half-submerged in cool water.

Today, we visited with friends, took naps, and spent too much money at Target. (What is it about that store?!? I go in there with a very specific list and end up spending twice as much. Today I couldn't turn up the Playmobil nativity set. I wanted it last year, but couldn't find it anywhere, so I grabbed it today. I think it will be fun to set it up and play with it with R.)

We ended the day and weekend with S'mores made in the toaster oven. (It was way too hot to light the grill.) I love sharing things like this with R! He was so excited while they were toasting, he was running around the house doing a crazy, kicking dance. Then he talked about how delicious marshmallows are. Normally, we try to limit the sugar he eats - especially around bedtime - but we finished dinner early tonight, so I figured it was okay. R ended up running up and down our street, chatting with our neighbors ("Let's go say hi to [insert name here]!!!!"), and showing everyone his new binoculars (from Target, of course). He was so cute.

As promised, a few new pictures...

The aftermath of fingerpainting

R took this picture of his new Tonka trucks all by himself

One of R's first written Rs! (He has since figured out how to make them face the right direction.)

Enjoying S'mores!

A day for the boy, a day for me

I have Thursday and Friday off this week. And, boy, do I need it! The last two weeks have been incredibly exhausting and stressful. First, we launched a new website at work. That required several nights of virtually no sleep for me and A, as we had to fix page after page of sloppy code from the third-party firm hired by our marketing department. It felt a lot like college! One night, A and I worked until 2:30 a.m., headed to bed at 3 a.m., and then I was woken up 5 minutes later by R. I think I had at most 2 hours of sleep that night.

Then, my company had a community service day where we split up into four groups and headed out to Head Start centers and preschools in Boston to paint classrooms, prepare literacy bags, etc. It was a lot of fun and very rewarding (and sobering - it made me so sad to see the difference between what R has access to at his preschool and what poor children in the city have), but physically exhausting. We had a required-attendence party afterwards, so it ended up being a 12-hour work day for me - the day after my no-sleep stretch.

THEN... the next day, we started our company's conversion to Microsoft (Exchange & Active Directory) from Novell. I'm the IT director (among other things), so I had to stay late on Friday night, work half the day on Saturday, and work for a few hours on Sunday as well. And, Monday and the rest of this week have been challenging at work (to put it mildly) as we've been trying to fix problems for pretty much every one of our 100+ employees.

So, I'm really looking forward to a day with R tomorrow and then a day to myself on Friday! I don't have anything planned yet. On Friday, I'll probably end up cleaning the house and working in the yard for most of the day, but that's fine with me. My house is such a mess that it's stressing me out - cleaning it will make me happy. But I'll probably also take some time to go shopping at my favorite place for bargains - the Christmas Tree Shops. (They don't just have Christmas stuff - in fact, they only have Christmas stuff at Christmastime.)

I have some cute R pictures to post - hopefully, tomorrow. Before I go tonight, though, I just have to say that a wonderful miracle has happened to someone I love. It's an answer to 2 years of prayers, and I'm so happy and thankful and excited. More on that later, but for now, praise God! :-)

Not much to tell and yet I go on and on ...

I haven't had much to post about in the last week, plus I've been working late or dealing with R's sleep issues at night. (I did have one glorious night on Monday, though - on Tuesday morning, anyone who asked me how I was doing heard in reply, "Great! I got 7 hours of uninterrupted sleep in my OWN bed!")

Last weekend was SO much fun. On Saturday afternoon, we took my friend Alicia out for her 35th birthday. We went to Kimball Farm, where we played a round of mini-golf (note: 3-year-old energetic boys are not ready for 18 holes of mini-golf), took a fabulous ride on the bumper boats (I got SOAKED! I got pinned under the waterfall for at least 5 minutes, which felt great since it was in the 90s that day), and had the most enormous "small" ice creams I've ever seen. Then, we went to Alicia & Art's house for dinner and relaxing with them and Art's mom. It was a wonderful day.


On Sunday, we drove out to Worcester to take R to the Ecotarium. It's part science museum, part nature trails, part planetarium, part zoo, etc. When we arrived, they were just about to start a planetarium show aimed at the 3-6-year-old crowd, so we tried it out. It was perfect! R has been really interested in learning about the solar system, and the show was basically a visual tour of the planets. He loved it. At one point, when we were flying through the rings of Saturn, I almost started crying at the beauty of this universe that God has created. Later, I found out that A had the same reaction. The rest of the Ecotarium was pretty cool, too. R liked the hands-on exhibits, the polar bear, the train ride (of course!), and watching a turtle rip apart its lunch of some kind of rodent. Blech.


This week, we put R's crib/toddler bed away. I really wanted to do it because it was taking up so much space in R's room now that he has his twin-sized bed. But it made me sad, too. I don't really miss when R was a tiny baby - I always love him best at the age he's at. But when R was born, I really thought we would end up using the crib again for another baby. And that's just not likely anymore. And, even though I'm 95% okay with that, it still makes me sad.


Today was another one of my days off from work so I could be with R. I decided to just hang out with him at home because we hardly ever do that, and I think it's important for him to think of home as more than just a place to sleep and eat. We made cookies, played in the pool, read stories, played with play foam, and danced and played instruments to old reggae and ska tunes. I was proud of R because he did a lot of playing and making up stories by himself - without needing me to entertain him constantly. I actually got to do the dishes and throw in some laundry! Later, though, when I was trying to get him to take a little nap, R said to me, "Mommy, I need some friends to play with!" I'm pretty sure he was just saying that because he didn't want to lay down, but I still felt badly. I'm such a homebody and am fine hanging out by myself (and actually NEED to do it sometimes), but R definitely isn't. He loves being with his friends at school three days a week, and on weekends, we always get together with at least one of his playmates. So I figured a day just hanging out with his mom would be okay. But apparently, I'm boring. :-) So we headed to a nearby playground to scrounge up some friends. When we got there, though, R wasn't too thrilled about sharing the playground with anyone else. Oh well! [R asked me to take this picture of him - he insisted that I take it of him from the back.]


One great side effect of my spending these days with him every other week has been R's new appreciation for his daddy. I was hoping this would happen, but I wasn't entirely confident that it would. Before, if I was around, R would completely ignore A or even tell him to go away. R wanted me to do EVERYTHING for him, and he didn't want A to do anything. Tonight, R asked A if it was A's turn to do bedtime and stories. When A told him it was, R yelled, "Yaaaayyyyy!" and ran into A's arms for a huge hug. Hallelujah! I mean, I love that my son is in love with me, but it's nice to share the spotlight once in awhile.

Wednesday night

R and I had a great night together. There was no whining, arguing, crying, or defiance. We just had dinner, talked, watered the plants, and then had a stress-free bedtime. Yay! R even asked if he could help me when I was putting dishes away. He voluntarily Swiffered the floors and ate all his dinner. While we were eating, I told R about the surprise birthday party we had at work today for my friend Alicia. He was fascinated by the fact that we had TWO cakes! He then asked me what kind of cake I had, so I told him (strawberry ice cream cake from Cold Stone Creamery). He was quiet for a little while, then asked me, "What kind did Aunt Alicia have?" When I told him (chocolate cake with chocolate chip ice cream layers), he said, "Wow, you sure had a lot of desserts!" Then he described to me the cupcakes they had at school today for a classmate's birthday. I love having real conversations with him!

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Yesterday, we got the monthly Audubon magazine and there was an article about how global warming would change the Massachusetts climate. I had heard before about how it will probably mean that our house ends up on beachfront property, but this article really made me think about other aspects. It talked about how basically we'll end up with the climate of Virgina. And how we'll have many more species of snakes, spiders, ticks, etc. And that we'll lose the amazing fall foliage display. And, it examined the possibility that we'll have more illnesses and diseases because germs won't be killed off during the cold winters. It also highlighted some potential benefits - e.g., to some species of currently threatened shore birds. I wasn't shocked or scared by any of it; it mostly made me sad. Because I love New England and everything about its weather and nature.

But I also wonder: Will the change to a Virginia-like climate also make New Englanders friendlier and more welcoming? The few times I've visited Virginia, I was blown away by how nice people were. Could any of that have to do with climate?

Hmmm ... probably not.

Unanswered prayer

Yesterday, A and R went with me to church. (A had ulterior motives: he wanted R to get to know the nursery attendant so that we can ask her to babysit for us.) R only lasted about 5 minutes before he insisted he had to use the bathroom (he remembered using it on Easter, so he wanted to do it again - he didn't actually have to go), and then he wanted to go to the nursery to play with the toys. He and A came back just after the sermon, though, because there was a boy in the nursery that R wanted to share a toy with, and the boy didn't want to, so R was kind of hurt. Anyway, R was great during the rest of the service. He even went up with me during communion. So, despite the motives and the results, at least my boys were with me at church!

Pastor Goodman's sermon was on unanswered prayer, and it was another powerful one. He talked about how it would be crazy for God to answer everyone's prayer requests - it would result in utter chaos. (He mentioned the movie, "Bruce Almighty," but I kept thinking of a Garth Brooks song that goes, "One of God's greatest gifts is unanswered prayer.") This is something that I've, for some reason, been able to accept. I do pray for specific things to happen sometimes, although mostly for my friends and family (like, for A's eczema to be healed). For myself, I have more vague requests: that I'll raise R to be a good person, for help in my marriage/at work/etc., for comfort when I'm worried/depressed/anxious. I've always had trouble asking for very specific things because I know that God knows what's best for me. And, when my prayers aren't answered immediately, I know that God either has a different timetable or a different plan in mind for me. I worry when people pray for very specific things because what happens when those things don't happen or don't come true? Will they be disappointed in God and lose faith?

Well, one thing that Pastor Goodman talked about was how a lot of times people get angry at God for not answering their prayers. But he said that the best thing to do is tell God that you're angry at him, that you want to know why he ignored you, that you're mad and desperate and feeling very isolated from him. Because in doing that, you're still talking to God - and that just that act of talking/screaming/crying/etc. at him keeps you close to him. Pastor Goodman said that the absolute worst thing would be to become indifferent and just stop talking to God altogether.

I think that's such a wonderful message. Because I think that when people get disappointed in God or mad at him or even doubt that he exists, they tend to just give up and leave their faith behind. (I know I did!) We think it's not okay to get mad at God. But I'm sure that God would prefer that we be honest with him - even if we just want to tell him that he bites the big one. Because even in doing that, we are somehow comforted, healed, made better. I know that one of my most desperate prayers, which was simple ("Please help me") yet uttered when I was doubtful that God was even there, gave me a little bit of peace just in saying it. It reminds me of Annie Lamott's two favorite prayers: "Help me, help me, help me" and "Thank you, thank you, thank you." Because sometimes that's all we can manage. I think that it really doesn't matter what we're saying during prayer; it's just the fact that we're saying something at all.

And, the hymn we sang after the sermon? "What a Friend We Have in Jesus" - My favorite verse:

Have we trials and temptations?
Is there trouble anywhere?
We should never be discouraged;
take it to the Lord in prayer.
Can we find a friend so faithful
who will all our sorrows share?
Jesus knows our every weakness;
take it to the Lord in prayer.

It's 11:21 pm and R is still awake!

I don't know what is going on, but R is wide awake. We've been trying to get him to fall asleep since 9:00! And here I had been hoping that this would be my one night where I could sleep in my own bed for the entire night. (The last two nights with the new big boy bed have been pretty rough. Last night, I spent hours in R's room either serving as a human bed rail so that he wouldn't fall out or trying to calm him down from night terrors. When I finally crawled into my own bed at 4:30 a.m., A started snoring. I wanted to cry.)

I need a break!

Normally, work is the last place that would help me relax. Today was busy, but productive. I'm so thankful to work with such a great group of people. I really love the department that we've built up during the last few years. So, I decided to buy a slew of gooey, warm cookies at the bakery downstairs from our office to share with our team. And, that was the best thing I could have done. Not only did I get to make people happy, which made me happy, but everyone came by to chat - or I swung by their office to say hi. And that hardly ever happens because we're just so busy all the time. It was the recharge in my spirit that I needed!

Now, we'll see what recharging I need tomorrow...

:-)

Mid-week thoughts & pics

Thank you all for your prayers for Dr. Petit and my co-worker. The sadness (and evil) of these events led me to remember a very powerful sermon that one of my pastors gave a few months ago. I asked him to email it to me, and I wanted to share part of it where he actually related a story told by William Sloan Coffin:

During the years when Rev. Coffin was senior minister of Riverside Church in New York City, his son Alex was killed in a tragic car accident. Alex was driving in a terrible storm; he lost control of his car and careened into the waters of Boston Harbor. The following Sunday, Dr. Coffin preached about his son's death. He thanked all the people for their messages of condolence, for food brought to their home, for an arm around his shoulder when no words would do. But he also raged; he raged about well-meaning folks who had hinted that Alex's death was God's will. "I knew the anger would do me good," he said.

Then he went on: "Do you think it was God's will that Alex never fixed that lousy windshield wiper ... that he was probably driving too fast in such a storm, that he probably had a couple of beers too many? Do you think it was God's will that there are no street lights along that stretch of the road and no guard rail separating the road and Boston Harbor? The one thing that should never be said when someone dies is, 'It is the will of God.' Never do we know enough to say that. My own consolation lies in knowing that when the waves closed over the sinking car, God's heart was the first of all our hearts to break."

And, this is how I comforted myself on a lighter level:

Last night for dinner, A made his incredibly delicious chicken pesto pizza. I got R all excited about it (we haven't had it since he's been eating solid foods) by telling him we were having "green pizza." He was thrilled by that, and he actually ate quite a bit of it (except for the chicken). So, thank you to A for indulging my craving for it - it was delicious!

When my boys picked me up tonight at the T station, they surprised me with these beautiful roses. R picked them out himself!

Tonight was A's night out, so R and I hung out, made dinner, and then had an impromptu jam session in the living room. R asked me to put on one of his kids' music CDs, and then he demanded to know where his drum sticks and "drums" were.

Later, we listened to Toots and the Maytals. R insisted that I play the drums, while he played a shaker and did some funky dancing. It was great.

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Finally, yesterday, we had some "tree guys" come and do a lot of work in our yard: they shaped the overgrown maple trees that were about to take over our house, they ripped out two huge bushes in front of our house, and they shaped and trimmed our crazily overgrown hedges. The woman that owned our house before us never did anything to the yard, so it's been an uphill struggle for us to make it look somewhat respectable.

I'm so excited about the difference! Our house looks so much bigger, and now the sunlight actually makes it through to our front yard. Inside the house, our living room is much brighter because the big window isn't half blocked by a giant bush. I can't wait to start doing some planting...