Mood swings

A few weeks ago Natalie and I were in the car. From the backseat I hear,
"mommy, aylor"
I said, "what?"
"aylor, Mommy, aylor."
"Natalie, Mommy doesn't understand."
Now I've pulled to a red light so I turn to look at her. She starts moving her head and hands like she is dancing and says again, "aylor."
I'm thinking, finally I said, "Taylor?"
"yeah."
Okay, surely my 22 month old did not just ask to hear the Taylor CD. She is too young to be requesting songs. I put in the CD. Natalie starting clapping when she heard Taylor. Our car rides haven't been the same since.
So, I will bless you with some of her singing, but also on this tape, you will see Natalie's vast mood swings. One minute she's singing, the next she is on the brink of time out. She's dancing with Daddy, then crying. Welcome to our world.

This day

I hear all the time that people do not understand how I work for Hospice. For the most part, I am able to easily compartmentalize my job from the rest of my life. It's not usually something that's even difficult for me. My mom can attest to this, she has accused me of being made of stone all of my life. While I prefer not to believe such an accusation, I don't tend to get emotional very often. Today was a good day. Chris and I were both off work. Natalie spent the night with Robert and Joene so we slept late this morning. We went to Denny's for breakfast (my favorite, don't know why, it just is), then we picked up Natalie and took advantage of living in Florida. We went to the beach. Natalie was not sure about the water at first. It didn't take her long though and she was telling us to sit on the blanket because she would be back. Much to her dismay, we didn't let her venture into the ocean alone. At one point Natalie was literally running circles around Chris. Then she took his hand and escorted him to the water's edge. She asked him to sit beside her. I could hear her giggle as the water rolled in and out under her. She was talking with Chris and looking around. They were both laughing. I then realized why people like the ocean. It takes away all the bad stuff. It doesn't matter what you do to the sand, the waves come in and put it back. Natalie and Chris made a huge hole today. They put some sand back in the hole and after a few waves it was filled back in, as if nothing had happened. I thought about the girl, younger then me, sitting in my office crying so hard this week. Her mom is dying. Her fiance was killed last month. She has more on her plate then I can fathom. I thought about the man whose ex refuses to allow him to die in peace. She thinks he is lying about being sick or is somehow doing this to get back at her. She is one of those Truman show people who believe the world starts and stops revolving as she enters the room. I can assure her, it does not. I thought about the very young man in a care facility with a rare form of dementia. And his wife, a recent breast cancer survivor who just needed to talk this week. She'd give anything I bet for the ocean to wash her husband's dementia away. "Mommy, come here." I can hear the ocean again. There's my little girl yelling for me to come and sit with Daddy and her. I get up and dust myself off appreciating the moment for what it is. A rare and precious time that will go far too quickly. I know I'll blink and she'll be going to the beach with her friends. I know I'm not guaranteed any amount of time with either of them. This job does not make me dwell on death. No. It does the opposite. It makes me appreciate life. I treasure more giggles, take in more hugs, let the dishes pile higher, then I would if I worked anywhere else. We go the beach just to go. We get sandy because it's funny. We run in circles and dig holes just because we can. I sneak in at nap time and watch her sleep, just to thank God for her. I pray for at least 86 sets of parents. Why 86? Because at my last check, that's how many children were in pediatric care program in hospice. This job makes me appreciate life for the gift it is. God has given us this day. Natalie is in bed, and my only April 25th with her as a one year old is done. I'm really glad we spent it together sitting next to Daddy letting the water wash all around us. It was a very good day.

You must pay, you must pay not, you must pay, you must pay not...

Our tax journey started mid March at H&R block. It is continuing today with an extension. Our plea for more time. Originally it looked like we were getting a refund. Then the nice lady at H&R admitted she didn't know what she was doing. This clergy tax self employed thing was too much for her to handle. But, she was going to talk with Lisa. Lisa reworked our numbers and suddenly we owed a lot of money to the government and to H & R block. We said no, well, we said no to H & R block. We picked up our info a week and half later and cried to Monica. Monica is my hero, she is chair of our church finance committee and refuses to be intimidated by the IRS. She and Chris have worked on these taxes. With all of deductions, both from being self employed, and standard, we have a low taxable income. This sounds good, but it is not. There is a self employment tax we must pay and last year, we didn't pay enough. So even though it looks like we are dirt poor, (in reality, just regular lower middle class with a lot of deductions) we still have to pay Uncle George. Why the extension? Well, Monica is working hard for us. Maybe George will pay us back in the long run. If not, we'll just use our stimulus check to reimburse our taxes. Too bad ours won't be used to stimulate the economy, it will just refund our savings. This being an adult thing, it's not all that great. I convinced myself when I was kid that Uncle George would be nice to me. He is not. Now, I'm even more afraid of Uncle Democrat. He may make me pay even more. And that is simply just not right. Uncle Republican scares me too because I'm pretty sure if the rich paid more taxes, I wouldn't have to pay. I'm also pretty sure that as long as they are rich, the Republicans will be their puppets. What to do? What to do? Give to Uncle George what is Uncle George's, give to God what is God's, and toast Chris with our glass of water while we eat Spaghettio's. Interestingly enough, a bowl of them is a bowl full of zero's.

Family pics

Well, Natalie is on the way to recovery. We thought she was doing better on Wednesday, but alas, Thursday came with a high fever and another trip to the Dr. Her croup was better, but she had an ear infection. (again) Antibiotics are our friends because 24 hours later we had a much happier Natalie. We were so thankful because we had family pictures for our church directory on Friday and a wedding Friday night. She sailed through both like she hadn't been sick. We purchased the CD of our pics so we could have the copyright, here are a few to share with you. Probably more then you really want to see.



It never ceases to amaze me how Natalie can go from this:


to this in two seconds or less.

A great weekend

I cannot tell you how busy we've been lately. I ate supper at home last night with my family for the first time in three weeks. Yeah, that's ridiculous. Anyways, I had a great weekend. We had Sabrina's bachelorette party and went to Savannah to celebrate her last weekend as a Mathew's. It was so good to be with the girls. I love being a pastor's wife. I wouldn't change it for the world. But this weekend, I got to shed that title and just be friends with my church girls. It felt good. As with any good bachelorette party, I am sworn to secrecy. I searched through my pictures and found a few pictures that I can share with the world (or at least my few blog readers). The first is of Emily playing some air guitar Friday night. Then of Nicole and me eating some cake on the way to Savannah. And last, is our ceremony for Sabrina before we went to dinner. All of us were wearing black pants and hot pink shirts, she had on a white shirt and, of course, her veil and banner. It was fun.




Unfortunately, I got home to a very sick little girl Sunday night. Chris called me on Saturday and told me she had a fever of 102+. She didn't have any other symptoms. He called the Dr. and they told him to give her Tylenol and call on Sunday morning and let them know how she is. By Sunday morning, she had a fever, plus she was hoarse and had a serious cough. So, my excellent husband arranged for an appointment, went to church, preached a sermon at the beginning of service and left to take her to the Dr. He called me Sunday afternoon and said, "croup." They gave her a shot of steroids and sent her home with some oral doses. She won't eat much. Yesterday was pretty rough. She has kept a fever and is just, well, sick. When her medicine kicks in we get glimpses of Natalie, but they are short lived and she is back to sick. Hopefully in a few days she'll be better. My husband is awesome, he took amazing care of her.

This is my baby with croup:



This is the evidence that my baby's on drugs:



I saw a sign up for a free dog the other day, friendly wants a nice home. I'm pretty sure Mocha made that and is advertising herself. :-)

no time

I'm very, very, very tired. I will blog again soon...when I have my next free evening, let me see, that will be on Monday. Have a great weekend!