How I Dealt With My Child's Chronic Illness

I was crying.  

It was becoming more often and I didn't know what to do.  My baby boy was diagnosed with a chronic illness and I felt helpless and afraid. Terrified, actually, and desperate.  Desperate for life to go back to what it was before, to end what was so unfair for him and to be able to protect him like a mommy should.  

I had prayed about it, said all the right things, done all the research.  I became a diabetes fanatic, checking his blood sugar around the clock, documenting, finding trends, searching for anything that would make it better.  This uninvited guest stayed and with every finger poke and insulin shot my boy was a trooper. I was falling down a dark hole, jealous of other moms who didn't have to endure this, mad at the world because they didn't understand, but mostly it was the despair that circled me round and round like a slow tornado, tripping me up, making me feel helpless and guilty that I couldn't make him better.

I cried and worried and prayed in the middle of the night when no one would see. My sweet husband was asleep and he'd been through enough without me falling apart on him again. This particular night I frantically cried out to God in a way I'd ever done before, asking Him what to do, was my son going to be okay, how was he going to live like this for the rest of his life, would he even live a long life?  

And God answered.

In my flurry of thoughts and tears, my mind became still and silent and I heard:

'Don't you think I love him, too?'

Everything in me stopped.  My tears stopped.  Time stopped.  I sat up and looked around as my husband slept soundly.  I just had a miraculous moment but there was no one else there to witness it.  He had spoken to me as if He was in the room.  It's hard to explain, it wasn't verbal, but when you know that you know....it was Him and He had taken the time to speak to ME.

It was as if someone had gently taken me by my shoulders and shook me. I realized I had never truly turned over one problem to God, not this one, not any. The fact that He loved my son as much as I did, MORE than I did, had never dawned on me.  Which meant that my son had a Father and protector that was greater than anything that I could offer or imagine. He was all knowing and in control, and if I let Him, He would overcome my fears, my despair and any disease. He's got this and more importantly, He wanted the best outcome for my little guy even MORE THAN ME.  I still have a hard time wrapping my brain around it sometimes.

From that day forward, I slept soundly.  My despair was gone.  Of course, the fears would try to continue to creep in but those were always quieted with the memory of that moment.  God is not the author of fear. I knew that my son would be okay. 

If you are dealing with a child with an illness, or anything, for that matter...

Dig down deep, when you really think about it, you know that you know...

He loves them too. 

❤️, Elizabeth

Fails - Beyond the Camera Lens

Pinterest is meant for inspiration, right?  These beautiful, crisp, staged pictures. I LOVE to look at them and admit, I want the pictures here to show well also.  But if you really know me, ahem, you know behind a well staged picture there is always is a little bit of crazy going on.  

Amongst all the perfection of Pinterest pictures and HGTV shows, I know there's a hot mess somewhere there too. There's got to be something there besides PERFECTION.  Maybe a pile of papers just out of the camera's reach, toys (well, electronics) are scattered, muddy footprints are on the floor, and there are handprints on the glass doors.  At least that's how I imagine it, because when I take pictures here, at least one of those things is in the background.  And then there's just the out and out fails.  Projects that I imagine are just going to turn out so cute and picture worthy, and well...they turn out like this:

Who could know that I didn't make the curtain wide enough or that the rod wouldn't stay put or the folds wouldn't cooperate?  

Dear iron company...not cool of you to put plastic on the iron. I have enough problems.

I mean really, who could know that if you get a new iron you should notice that there's plastic on the front before you turn it on?  

Ok.  Most people would notice that.  I didn't.  It gets really melty, guys.

Also, I thought I knew how to make a slipcover.  I've made one for a whole couch before and it actually turned out ok.  Apparently, if I add piping for the first time, however, this happens:

This wondrous example of my talent all took place in the same room.  It looks awesome...

And to further show you my abilities, I made another slipcover that was supposed to look like this:

 thefrenchprovencialfurniture.com

But when I got done with it, it looked like this:

If I squint my eyes really hard, I'm sure it looks just like the inspiration picture.  

What is this?  What......is.......this?  A poodle skirt?? Or just a poodle.  I've sewn a big, fluffy poodle.  Fabulous.

I had a friend innocently tell me once that I made her feel really good about her life sometimes.  LOL.  Then I thought, geez, maybe she's right!  I could be an inspiration to a lot of people. God's calling for me is to show everyone, 'Hey, if you mess up that's okay! You'll survive!  Just look at Elizabeth! She's happy!

So this is for you, friend, who is out there having a bad day, thinking you are not good enough, that everyone else's (insert here: life, spouse, children, house, car, situation, etc) is perfect, and that no one fails but you.

Look beyond the camera lens.  Everyone fails.  It's all good.

Look at the poodle slipcover.  

And feel better.

❤️, Elizabeth

I fail to stay as cute during a bath.  I don't want to talk about it.

P.S.- Tell me about your fails...Come on, I know I'm not the only one.  

Please, tell me I'm not the only one.

That Time I Tried To Skip Father's Day - A Bear Tale

We are sitting in church when the pastor asked all the fathers to stand up to be recognized for Father's Day.  I'm gazing around the room, watching the humble, sweet dads standing, mostly wanting to sit back down and not draw attention to themselves.  Then there was this one.  He was standing with his head held high, actually, was he on his toes? Is he trying to stand taller than the rest? This dad was a proud one, he was.  Then I see his face which has the biggest grin.

It's The Bear.

 I lean over his brother to get closer to him and whisper in the 'mom' tone.  "Bear, sit down."

Bear: "No, mom.  I'm a dad."

Me: "You are NOT a dad, SIT DOWN."  He's ten. Why am I having to have this conversation?

Bear: "I am so a dad.  I'm ELLIE'S dad."  His grin got bigger and I know in his mind he was also thinking, Why am I having to have this conversation? And so there he stood with the rest of the fathers and, of course, was among the last to sit down. The fact that someone in the church that morning had given him a whole bag of twizzlers (which he gladly had eaten every piece) was evident.  He was in full Bear mode.

Being Father's Day, I'd been thinking of my dad and Bear's antics reminded me of a time my dad had told me he had also misbehaved in church.  His pastor would leave a written copy of his sermon on the pulpit before church began.  Dad and his friends really wanted to go swimming that day, so they 'misplaced' the sermon.  That was the quickest service they'd ever had and out they went to the pool. Hmmmmm. It must run in the family to be little stinkers.  At least Bear's stunt was over and it didn't result in church being dismissed.

Bear got up and walked to the back of the church as the preacher started his sermon.  I'm thinking bathroom break.  Then the mom vibe hit me and I look over and question his brother with my raised eyebrows. (His brother deserves a more proper introduction, but for now, he is my almost 20 year old sweetheart/prankster of a child, who at 6'2", I still call 'Little B'). 

Me: 'Bathroom?'

Little B grimly shakes his head.  We have this whole nonverbal conversation with eyebrows and eyes rolling and lifted shoulders.  Which could only mean one thing.  Troubles a-brewing.

Little B: 'See that block of sunlight on the wall behind the preacher's head?'

Me: 'Yes.'  I was starting to sweat.

B:  'He wanted to know if that came from the foyer window.  Then he left.'

I could only wait helplessly.  To give you a clearer picture of what was going on, there was a rectangle of sunlight shining through the window at least 4-5 feet tall just above the preacher's head on the wall behind him in the pulpit.  The congregation sees the outline of a window. Bear sees a great shadow puppet arena.

My little guy is a performer.  And perform, he must.

I could only sit in a panic and wait.

Soon I saw the huge shadow of his profile slowly walk by. 

Once.

Oh my.

Twice.

Oh dear. Please sit down...

Three times.

I held my breath.

I knew by the time I got to him the show would be over. I wanted to look away but it was the train wreck you had to watch.

The fourth time there is a little wave of a giant hand.

I smiled just a little.  Wait, what am I smiling at, this is soooo wrong.  And besides, I had already decided I was emotionally skipping out that day. Father's Day when cancer has stolen your father is just a day that you want to get over with as quickly as possible.  I was not going to smile, mister.   

Getting braver, the fifth time there was a giant dancing silhouette.  Shew.  There it was again, a little grin along with my terror.  Thank goodness it was a quick dance.  

Bear returned and both boys were quietly laughing and smiling from ear to ear.  And being the ever so inappropriate mom that day, I silently giggled with them. And then almost snorted. Soon I laughed inside so hard tears were forming and I was trying not to be so obvious as I shook up and down trying to hold it all in.  These kids had transformed me into a misbehaving teenager at the worst possible time.  I could do nothing to reprimand The Bear other than try to muster up the sternest look I could give him.  He triumphantly sat down.

I'm sorry to everyone in the church, I really am. 

While I was mourning and all caught up in death, my boys were celebrating life and I decided to join them.   

My dad would want it so. 

Daddy?!

The Kitchen- What I Wish I Would Have Known...

Over the course of building a house, you learn things.  That your husband likes dark cabinets and you like light ones.  That he doesn't like wood flooring in the kitchen because he knows someday your dishwasher will leak and destroy your floor (he's a wise one, that guy), and that maybe you two are a good team because you can compromise and get light cabinets with a tile floor. 

Besides learning to compromise, we found out some things that I wish I would have know about the first time I built a kitchen about 18 years ago:

1) There are a lot of designers out there that don't charge you one penny to help design your kitchen if you buy the flooring and lighting, etc. through them.  Now, if you are like me and hear the word, 'designer', you automatically run away.  I'm thinking, hey designer lady, I buy 90% of my stuff at TJ Maxx and Homegoods (Oh HomeGoods, I love you) and there's no way I'm going to pay designer prices.  BUT I was pleasantly surprised to learn that some designers have many different price points.   A designer helped us with colors, flooring and any question we had and it was all INCLUDED in the price we paid her for the flooring and lighting.  It was also nice to have some choices shown to us that we wouldn't have known about otherwise. 

2)  I can't speak for everyone's experience, but hubby and I bought scratch and dent appliances off of Ebay with free shipping and warranties included and they have worked perfectly.  The appliances I wanted were not in the budget UNTIL I found this place.  I wish I still had the name of the business but I remember it was in Florida and I had the seller email me all the warranty information ahead of time so I could check it out.  The 'scratches' and 'dents' were all on the sides or places where you wouldn't be able to see them anyway and you would never know there was anything going on with these guys.  The only drawback I could find was that even with the scratch and dent cheaper prices, a cabinet front refrigerator is still a higher price than a stainless steel fridge.  I don't get it.  I mean you are literally buying a fridge with NO FRONT on it and having the front made at your own expense and it still costs more.  Say what???  They are also a tiny bit tricky to install, which I believe is included when you buy the fridge in the traditional manner, but obviously no little man is going to shoot through the internet from Ebay and install yours, so good times.

3) I'm not sure if this is all cabinetmakers or if we just lucked out, but there were several features I requested of our cabinetmaker AFTER he quoted us a price and he included all but a couple in with the original price of the cabinets.  Say whaaatttt?  Hooray!

Pull out sliders on either side of the stovetop and on either side of the sink were both included!

Also included was the extra deep drawer made to look like two shallow drawers (above) and the pull out shelves (shown below) which are in all the lower cabinets.

And now for my favorite thing in the kitchen......

A utensil drawer.  Yes, I'm a nerd.  In my old kitchen, I had one utensil container, bucket, whatever you want to call it, sitting at the stovetop.  It was so full that every single time I would pull out a spatula or whatever, every single utensil would fall out. Grrrrr.  And then the utensil drawer came into my life. 

I love you, utensil drawer. 

It's simply a pull out drawer built like a box with three holes cut into the top where the three canisters sit.  Although I am pretty horrible with tools, I'm picturing that this could be easily made in any cabinet with a pull out drawer feature. 

Ironically, the two items I paid extra for (darn you, Pinterest!) are just okay.  I had to pay a little extra to get drawers under the sink. The Pinterest version shows two full drawers under the sink.  By the time the plumbing, disposal, etc was accounted for under the deep farm sink, I just had this much space left for the top drawer:

The one reason alone to get a one bowl, deep farmhouse sink:  There are dirty dishes in there right now....but you CAN''T SEE THEM!!  I know, it's a dream come true.

The height of both bottom and top drawers are just ok, but not tall enough for dishwashing detergent or other cleaning supplies you'd normally keep under the sink, so it's just not worth the extra money if the room is limited.

The second item was the corner drawers, shown above.  Again, they are ok, but there is a lot of wasted space back there in the corner.  I'm really too clumsy for a lazy Susan (you know I'm going to knock something off back there and then have to stick my hand in that black hole area where I always wonder what's going to grab me from in there).  The drawers are shaped weird but if you don't need the extra space the corner provides, then go for it.  Really, the best thing these drawers are for are for freaking people out when you ask someone to open one and they get more than they expected.  Hehe

You know those daisies in the center of the counter in those jars?  Those are called,' Hey kids, go pick me some flowers to keep busy because it's summer and I'm losing my mind' daisies.  They may also be called weeds.

4) Open shelving was something that was also included in the cabinet price and I have been pleasantly surprised that I have liked this.  I don't like clutter and I'm not great at decorating shelves. Or dusting shelves.  The more I think about it, shelves are not my friend.  But these guys rate up there because they make it very convenient to grab frequently used items.  I just keep decorative items up there as well so when I take down some dishes to use it doesn't look like something's off or it's empty.  The downside is the Bear comes along and drinks Koolaid out of my grandmother's decorative teacups. Sigh. 😂

This is my first time having an island. It's about 4' X 7' which I have found to be a great size, no wasted space in the middle.  Maybe some day we'll even get bar stools, lol.

A couple of other things before I head out:  I once had a gas stovetop with a downdraft vent.  The draft from the vent affected the flame I was cooking with and it was very frustrating.  This time around I went with gas again but made sure to get an overhead vent.  Also, I took a rough inventory of all my kitchen items and made sure I had a place to put everything in the new kitchen.  Anything that was just taking up too much space that I hardly used I got rid of and thankfully I haven't missed those items at all.  Lastly, although I don't have any, I would seriously consider IKEA cabinets if there is a next time around.  I've heard so many good reviews about them and they seem very reasonably priced.

I hope this helps give those of you remodeling or building a new kitchen some ideas and maybe even save some money.  If you have some other tips, please put them in the comments section for all of us to use!  

❤️, Elizabeth

It's summer and there are kids everywhere.  I'm pretty sure they just used all of Elizabeth's dish detergent on a slip -n-slide.  She's happy because she didn't want to do dishes anyway.  I'm happy because so far they haven't thought to put ME on the slip-n-slide.

Give me a little 1970s with a side of Lemon Icebox Pie

I know everyone thinks the decade that they grew up in was the best. 

But there's this decade called the '70s where we neighborhood kids played outside until dark.  Barefoot sometimes (gasp!).  We played hide and seek, searched for Bigfoot (that guy was good, we never did find him), caught lightening bugs and only came inside to eat.  All the girls made mudpies, climbed trees and raced down the street on their bikes with no hands, just like the boys.  Better than some of the boys.  Nobody had ever heard of the words 'transgender' or 'ISIS', all we knew was that we were just kids- dirty, grubby little kids- having the time of our lives.

No one minded to come in and wash up for dinner because we'd played so hard that we were really hungry when we finally stopped to notice.  And sometimes, at least at my house on hot summer nights, we ate Lemon Icebox Pie for dessert.  My mom always could make the best meals and I had no idea that this deliciousness only had three ingredients or that the recipe used to be on the can of Eagle Brand Condensed Milk.  I just knew it was yummy.

I hadn't eaten it in years when I rediscovered it recently.  It took me back to some of the best times in my life and boy, did it taste good.  I knew I'd gone a little overboard when the hubby sent me a text that said,

'I like pie too.'

Um. Ok, well, you see, yeah, I had pie for breakfast,  And lunch.  Like not with my breakfast and lunch but AS my breakfast and lunch and before I knew it, all the pie was gone.

So I've decided this time when I made the pie I'd have to make two.  A His and a Hers.  And His is the one that gets shared with the rest of the family. 

And Hers, well, that's all mine.

Because sometimes we need a whole lot of 1970s in our lives.

❤️, Elizabeth

P.S. - The recipe: 

One can of Eagle Brand sweetened condensed milk, 1/2 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice, and three egg yolks.   Mix together, poured into a 9 inch graham cracker crust pie shell and bake at 325 degrees for 25 minutes.  Let cool and store in fridge before serving.   Good plain or with fruit topping.  Hello 1970s,  I've missed you. Welcome back to the era of simplicity. 

P.P.S.  Disclosure: There was a pie accidentally harmed in the making of this blog post.

It was most definitely HIS.

Elizabeth is a clumsy pie hog, but I still love her.

Introducing.....The Bear

I've been struggling on how to properly introduce The Bear.  He's 10, and there's no description that fits this combo of blunt, wild and wonderful, other than maybe picture Jack Black meets Robin Williams with a dash of Charles Grodin all rolled into one child. There are so many stories I could tell but when I ran across this tribute I once wrote, I thought it may be the perfect way to give you a glimpse of a typical day of my life with The Bear.   

I think you're going to like him...

A MOM'S TRIBUTE

Thank you, Mr. Policeman, for not arresting me in Kroger parking lot, when, to my horror, my Bear yelled to you, 'HELP! I DON'T KNOW THIS WOMAN!'

Thank you, Mr. Fireman and company, who raced to my house to put out the nonexistent fire that was exaggerated by my Bear bursting out of the front door in his pajamas screaming, 'OVER HERE! THE FIRE IS OVER HERE!' when I had simply burned the zucchini.  No fire. Nope.

Thank you to my innocent friend, who never knew that my Bear had filled his water gun up from the toilet bowl when he shot you in the face, for your patience and apparently hardy immune system.

Thank you, elderly man in Kroger, (yes, a lot of things seem to happen at Kroger), for simply smiling at me in my time of exasperation when my Bear wouldn't listen.  I thought you were flirting with me in a subtle way (because I am usually only hit on by the 70-80 age range these days, if at all) but actually you were probably politely thinking that you may need to call for the manager because in my frenzy I was putting all my groceries into your cart.  Good times.

Thank you to the woman in your early 30s who has yet to figure out that your 'match' on Match.com is actually a 10 year old who has snuck onto the internet and created an account with some random guy's picture.  We'll just keep it our little secret. 

Lord, I pray that you give me reminders in my time of frustration with the Bear that one day I'll miss his antics.  I pray for patience and the ability to see the humor in all situations.   And that he always knows how much he is loved.

And peace, Lord.

Yes, Peace.  And Bacon.

Oh Lord, do I need a little peace.

Amen.

❤️, Elizabeth