Jack the Bulldog

If this came in little-girl sizes, I’d likely get this for Audrey.

My six-year-old daughter Audrey just may end up a vegetarian.

I read Charlotte’s Web earlier this year to Audrey and three-year-old Fiala, and the story impacted Audrey so greatly that she can no longer eat pork.  She deeply empathizes with Wilbur.  At first, my husband Martin thought this ridiculous — actually, he still does — but I could see in her tears that she was abundantly sincere, and we’ve decided to let her eat according to her conscience.  Anyway, many people don’t eat pork for a wide variety of reasons.

Fiala, little stinker that she is, uses this as ammunition.  “Aaaaaauu-dreeey,” she sing-songs across the table with a chunk of meat on her fork, “I’m eating piiii-iiig!”

Audrey bursts into tears (yet again), and I correct Fi, admonishing her on the graces of kindness.

Audrey’s tender heart toward all creatures great and small has changed the way I evaluate books.  “How many moments in this story,” I search my memory, “will bring Audrey to tears?”

A week ago or so, I decided to read Little House on the Prairie to the girls.  It’s not in the curriculum we use, and I think its omission is a travesty.  The book is a must-read, in my estimation, for any American girl.  I discovered the series when I was eight, and read it non-stop, much of it secretly by night-light, until I was finished with all nine books within a week, an experience that left me exhausted but completely satisfied.  Shortly afterward — weeks, in fact — it was determined that I needed glasses.  I’ve read that eyestrain cannot cause one to become near-sighted, but my experience makes me suspicious.

Anyway.

The Ingalls family, in the early pages of the story, sets off in the 1870s to parts West, possessions in a covered wagon, their dog Jack, described as a beloved brindle bulldog, trotting tirelessly under the wagon.

Completely as a side-note, in the last 18 months, our family has dog-sat both an English Bulldog and a French Bulldog.  I cannot see either of those lazies trotting tirelessly anywhere.  Jack must have been the longer-legged American Bulldog, or maybe even a Boxer.  That’s just my own theory, though. 

As the wagon fords a creek, suddenly the water violently swells and rises, sweeping even the mustang ponies off of their feet, threatening to upset the wagon.  It’s quite a tense moment.  When the family arrives on the other side of the creek, it is discovered that Jack is missing.  Laura — and Audrey right along with her — is completely distraught.

I sat there as the chapter ended, a sobbing six-year-old on my left, an unmoved three-year-old on my right.  Fi had sat contentedly through the whole thing, brushing a dolly’s hair, and was now happy that the reading was over and that she could get up and play.  I put out my hand to hold her back, my mind racing.  It had been a long time since I’d read the book, but I thought I remembered that Jack was discovered later to be completely fine and wholly alive.  I surreptitiously flipped through the next chapter, and found, to my relief, that Jack’s “resurrection” happened in just a few more pages.

“Audrey,” I asked her, “would you like to keep reading?”

“NNNOOOOOO!!!” she emphatically wailed.  “I never want to read that book again, EVER!!”  She started to bolt.  I caught her back.

“Little daughter,” I told her as gently as I could, “I know you’re very, very sad for Jack right now.  I don’t want to leave you sad.  Will you let me keep reading?  I think what happens in the next chapter will make you happy again.”

“Nothing can make me happy!” she continued, very dramatically.  “JACK’S DEAD!!  HE DROWNED!!  PA CAN’T FIND HIM!  HE WASHED AWAY IN THE RIVER AND HE’S DEAD FOREVER!!!”  In her tone and in her eyes, she was dripping with accusation:  How could I read such horror to her?  How could I even consider that she’d want to read about the death of a dog??  What was wrong with me???

I looked over again at Fiala, and marveled that there can be such different personalities in one family.  Fi appeared to really not give a hoot what had happened to Jack.  Those two little girls are opposites in nearly every way, the same as my oldest two boys, Ethan and Grant are.  Grant is the anti-Ethan, and Fiala is the anti-Audrey.

In spite of both girls’ wishes, I convinced both of them that they’d be best off, listening to another chapter.  They settled in again, Fi back to her dolly-brushing, and Audrey with a grumph and a pout, tears still streaming down her cheeks.  I resumed reading.

It’s also funny, what a blank slate children are.  What is cliché and so very transparent to a long-time book reader like myself came as an absolute shock to Audrey:  The “wolf” who threatened the Ingalls’ camp that night was not a wolf at all, but an absolutely worn out, mud-crusted bulldog named Jack.

Audrey squealed with relief and joyous shock, literally jumping up and down at Jack’s resurrection.

Crisis cut short, tender feelings soothed, normal life and hope in good books and a mother’s heart restored.

I shared a slightly abbreviated version of this story with my friend Kathy on Monday, figuring that, as an intense co-animal-lover, she’d appreciate Audrey’s tender, powerful feelings toward Jack.

Instead, she cocked her head and looked at me.  “Is that what God does with us?” she mused.  “There might be something in that.”

Thrown for a bit of a loop, I think I stood there with my jaw slack.

We had just finished an epic conversation on what God does with us, when things are pending, unfinished, when the results are not easily seen, when the light at the end of the tunnel is a pinprick point, too far to fathom, and we are battling the fear that our heart’s desires might be low on God’s priority list…

“Is that what God does with us?” she posited again.  “Read the next chapter in our lives just a little sooner, out of mercy for our tears?”

I thought of my interaction with Audrey, and could clearly see the parallel.  I had felt it important to not just flat-out tell Audrey, “Jack lives.”  In those moments when Audrey was dissolving in a puddle of emotion, I made the decision that it was important for her character, and just for the appreciation of tension in literature, and to experience the coming joy, to not reveal the outcome in advance.  Yet, I didn’t want to abandon her to her heartsick, out-of-control self.

She was so sincerely broken for Jack’s death, yet I knew that Jack didn’t actually die!  I tried to soothe her, knowing things would truly be better — and very shortly! — and was almost unable to do so, because Audrey was almost violently upset at both the book, and at me.

I know that not every sad story has such a joyous outcome.

Still, though, is that what God does with us?

I’d never considered it before.

I’m learning to trust that He has my heart in His hands, my tender, short-sighted, and often mistakenly-distraught heart.

I have 100% iron-clad, unwavering confidence in the God of Philippians 4:19, “And my God will supply all your needs according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus.”

My NEEDS.

I know He’ll supply my NEEDS.

I have a 100% iron-clad, unwavering confidence that He’ll supply all of my NEEDS.

But my wants?  The deep desires of my heart?  The things that I long for, that stir the deepest part of me?  The things that speak peace and beauty to my soul, and satisfy my emotions??

I’m much less confident of that.

I’m very aware that, very often, He’s much more concerned with building my character, molding me into the person of Jesus Christ, than He is with answering every whim of a prayer, every emotion-sotted plea.

Trusting my Father God with my heart is much more challenging than trusting Him with my needs.

Yet, does He sit with me on the little sofa in the quiet room, reading the story of my life to me, tenderly calming me by — on occasion — compelling me to sit still just a while longer and listen, because He knows that the outcome, which currently looks so bleak, will actually be filled with JOY, the kind of joy where I squeal and jump up and down with elation and relief and unabashed surprise???

Perhaps He does.

I think He does.

I think I may be experiencing a bit of that, right now.

My heart can scarcely believe it, but I’m picturing Him, right now, turning those pages, gentle voice and all-knowing mind drawing me back from the brink, longing to return to me the hope that I have almost abandoned.

Harder, indeed, to believe that, than believe that He’ll meet my needs.

But, thanks to Jack the bulldog, and an insightful friend, I’ll listen more carefully — both now and in the future — for my God to scan those pages ahead, and do more than console me, but reveal the truth that was hidden, a truth that holds satisfaction, and which does meet the desires of my heart, the heart He created.

Fiala health update. :)

It appears we’re on the right track with Fiala’s health.  She isn’t healed up quite enough for me to have full-on hope, but the hope is glimmering.  Last night, I talked with a woman who, 30 years ago, almost died from a systemic Candida infection, and comparing her story to Fiala’s was a confirmation.  Not that Fiala almost died.  But, much of what Fiala is experiencing, the lady had, too.  And she knows Fi well enough that, once I suggested to her that Fi may have Candida, it was like a light switched on for her, “Oh, yes… of course… why didn’t I think of that???”

We see the naturopath next week.  I’m going to ask for stronger antifungals.  Nystatin is working juuuuuussssst well enough to help, but it really has only made a small dent on Fiala’s head-to-toe symptoms.  Although — I know this is a little strange — I do know that fungal infections can be very slow to heal, and I know this because our dog suffered from Valley Fever, which is also fungal.  It took her most of a year to come back to full health.

At our favorite restaurant (the only one where everyone likes the food and there's something everyone can eat), Fiala's normal meal of plain refried beans and plain lettuce has been upgraded to having cheese on top, and a side of sliced avocados. She's in heaven.

The place which has had the most improvement is on her scalp.  From ear to ear, across the top of her head, Fiala had crust, a good ¼” thick in places, like the worst bout of cradle cap you’ve ever seen.  She lost quite a bit of hair from it, and for the last couple of months, when we go any place public, most of the time, I have her wear a hat, because it’s just scary/sad to look at, and freaks people out.  I was looking at hear head last night, and though her hair is thin, it is probably 80% healed, which is just amazing.

Fi’s chin is significantly better, as well.  It’s red and rashy, still, but not oozy, crusty, and bloody.

Other places on her body have slightly improved, and some not so much.  That may be because we could use up the 30g tube of Nystatin in a day or two if we followed the instructions to apply it to “all affected areas” three times a day.  Instead, we have to make the tube last for at least a week.  So, she’s not getting great coverage on “all affected areas” which is virtually every square inch of her body.

Fiala is still on a sugar-free and starch-free diet, minus a small ration of blueberries daily — her one joy!  I’ve even tried some protein-type foods, just to see how she’d handle it:  chicken, hard cheese, almonds…  I’m still leery of pretty much everything, and it’s hard to tell often when something has an ill effect.  But, so far, so good.  Fi doesn’t like chicken, though, we’ve discovered.  She adores cheese.  “Orange cheese?  Can I have orange cheese?”  And we’re only two days into an almond trial, so it’s too early to tell, but she does adore them, and is very excited to be eating almonds.    Precious girl.

Unrelated to health, the other day, I was making dinner, and my girl who lives to “snug” came up to me with arms upstretched and said, “Mama, will you please hold me?”  Now, normally, I would plop right down on the kitchen floor for a few snugs, at least, but I was in a terrible hurry, and said, “Oh, Fi.  I’m so sorry, but I can’t hold you right now.”  She flopped down in despondency, and wailed, “But I can’t hold myself!”  Ha!  So true.  We can’t hold ourselves.  That’s why we need Jesus, and the Body of Christ, and the support of family and friends….  She’s a good reminder of all of that, to me.  I’ve been giving much thought lately to how the things that the enemy has meant for our destruction, the Father — as is His specialty — turns it into a blessing, and for the benefit of many.  I feel like that, even though our three-year battle with Fiala’s health is not over.  She is so worth it.  So very, very worth it.

Just about everything but parenting

• Writing:  If you have read here for a while, you may remember that much of my 2010 and part of 2011 was taken up with ghostwriting a book.  The book is now available for sale — here at Brushed by God — and soon elsewhere. 
• School:  During the school year, it seems like a genius plan to work for six weeks then take off a week.  With these regular breaks, my house gets clean, special trips happen, everyone breathes a deep breath.  But, ’round about this time of year, when just about everyone else is done with school and we still have four weeks left, it seems less than brilliant.  We’re not finished until June 10.
• Garden:  Thanks to repaired irrigation tubing and some short, cute fencing, my garden now really looks like a garden, according to my husband who blessedly did the irrigation and fence work.    However, the fence does not keep out our dog, who has an odd — and maddening — affinity for corn plants.  My corn, some of them 18″ high, does not like it, either.  The garden sits in a side yard, and we may have to run a sturdier barrier from house to side-fence to make the garden dog-proof.  Otherwise, the garden is taking spectacular shape.
• Fitness:  I am now feeling stronger after nearly three weeks of hiking 3.5 miles, three times a week.  This makes me happy.  My “fat” jeans are looser, too, even though I’ve really lost no weight.  I guess that’s from muscle gain?  I don’t know.
• 

  My bodybuilding cousin Romney, military wife and mother of two.

  Random extended family thoughts:  I’ve been reflecting on how widely differing my extended family is.  It’s really a cross-section of American society in general…  Just amongst my cousins (including both sides of my family), one is a nun, one is gay, another just placed fourth in a body-building competition — it has been interesting to watch her really transform in the last 18 months,  one is a single dad, one lives in a neo-hippie commune, one is teaching English in Japan, one is a theater professor, some are academics, some are blue-collar workers, some are Christians (in various manifestations), some are pagan, some are married, some not…  Lots of really disparate interests and paths of life.  I find it really fascinating.  Are most families similar to mine in their dissimilarities??  I don’t think there’s enough closeness in my extended family, and I’m sure there’s some cause-and-effect somewhere in there, but I’m not sure of the root…  I’m sure I’m part of the problem, too, sadly.

• Church stuff:  Over the summer, I’ll be attending a Beth Moore Bible study (the updated version of Breaking Free).  Yesterday, my pastor’s wife asked me if I would, during one of the weeks’ meetings, give a little testimony based on the story I wrote last week, on the story of my son Wesley’s life, and how God really saved my life (literally) through him, when I thought it would kill me.  I was really pleased with her request.  I printed out and edited the original story because I have to hold it to seven minutes, which required me to cut it roughly in half.  That’s OK.  My writing is generally too bloated and filled with unnecessary asides, anyway.  I have pared. 
• Household stuff:  My hubby installed a “new” microwave over the weekend.  Our “old” one was just 5½ years old, but literally falling apart –  the vent broke off and had already been replaced (then broke again), the door handle completely broke off…  Replacing the door was going to cost us nearly $200.  Ack!  We couldn’t do that.  Thankfully, he works for a homebuilder, and we were able to get one out of a model home for less than half of retail.  Cool!  So, it’s five years old or so, but it’s never been used.  A friend of ours has the same model and is very happy with it.  I now have to figure out how best to clean stainless steel, as it is the first stainless appliance in our home.  Small complaint, though;  I’m happy to have a functional microwave.
• Birds:  A Northern Cardinal (and today, his mate) has been visiting my back yard for the last three mornings.  Cardinals are not rare in the Phoenix area, but they are uncommon, and in the 5+ years we’ve been in our home, this is the first time that we’ve had a daily visitor.  Mr. Cardinal has pleasantly interrupted my mornings. 
• Other cardinals:  My husband was asked to design a home — like a manse — for a cardinal in California.  I’m very proud of him.  It’s a modest 1600 s.f. house on a very narrow lot.  My man is brilliant and thinks in 3D.  He whipped out the plan in one day.
• My mother:  In sad news, my mom is back in the hospital.  I can’t remember how much I blogged about it last year, but in July, we nearly lost her.  She has Marfan Syndrome, and her skeleton is collapsing, which has given her decreased space for her lungs (and other organs).  Additionally, half of her diaphragm is paralyzed.  Then, she got double pneumonia.  She recovered, to our great relief.  She is a stubborn lady, and that can pay dividends when fighting illness.  She has lost a tremendous amount of weight and is very frail, and has been placed on oxygen “as needed”.  In the last month or so, her need for oxygen has been 24/7, with her oxygen saturation dipping into the 60% range or even down to 50% if she’s off of oxygen for even a short while.  After a doctor appointment yesterday, the doctor sent her straight to the E.R.  She has double pneumonia again, and is correspondingly hypoxic.  She was supposed to have major surgery (an estimated 12 hour ordeal) on the 25th of this month to resection her spine and to put in metal supports inside her ribcage area.  This is a risky procedure even for a healthy person;  for her, the doctors had given about a 60% chance for surviving surgery, mostly because of the extremely mushy shape of her arteries — she’s had two AAA repairs and one femoral artery replaced already due to aneurysms.  However, the surgery is really her only hope — aside from miraculous healing — for longer-term survival, since right now, she’s slowly being suffocated.  With this bout of pneumonia, the doctors have indefinitely shelved the surgery.  She’s crushed about that, but — unlike past stays — she’s relieved to be back in the hospital.  Normally, she is an unwilling patient.  I can’t decide if it’s a good thing or not that she’s happy to be in the hospital.  Your prayers would be greatly appreciated.

Summer panic… and peace

Right about this time every year, there gets to be a tight feeling in my chest, which I have to fight for… oh, about five months.  It’s a bit like claustrophobia, but it’s more along the lines of heat-o-phobia.  Truly, I despise summer in the desert.  Some people really love the heat and thrive in it.  That, however, is not me.  I have worked hard to find things to appreciate about the place I live so that I’m not living with a crappy attitude and wishing to be elsewhere, half of my life.  My husband is a native, his dad is a native (which is REALLY rare;  the Phoenix area is a valley of transients)…  My mom and stepdad are here, my sister and brother-in-law are here, my niece is here… plus, we truly have the most amazing church where we both serve and are fed.  Not to mention my husband’s fabulous job that he’s been at for 19 years.  It’s highly unlikely that we’ll be leaving any time soon.  I have come to value the benefits to living here, apart from the weather, which, any time I really let myself think about it, I could pretty easily conjure up some tears.  I mean, I really despise summer in the desert.

But, I will not dwell on the endless 110°+ days;  I will, instead, continue to look for things that make the desert tolerable or even pleasant, and fight the heat-o-phobia and its accompanying tears which threaten to steal my peace.

Several things have made the transition into summer easier for me this year:

1. There have only been a handful of 100° days so far.  Today, as I write, we have been the beneficiary of some low-pressure front, or something like that, and the temps are supposed to top out in the 70s.  Yesterday’s high was 80°.  I know that God doesn’t allow these sort of days solely for me, but I like to think of them as Him giving me a bit of hope and reprieve, letting me know that I can make it, and that it’s not ALL oven-like misery.
2. I have been waking earlier.  Much earlier.  A couple of weeks ago, I started hiking a mountain — hill, more like it — that is nearby.  I wake at 5:30 a.m., am on the trail by 6:00, and home by about 7:15 just in time to help my hubby gather his lunch for the day, his to-go mug of coffee, and to kiss him goodbye.  The first day I did the early-morning hike, Martin said, “You could do that every day and it would be OK with me.”  Other than a spunky 2yo who sometimes wakes way too early and won’t stay in bed, and has the power to open the fridge and take out everything she can’t eat and have a surreptitious binge whilst Daddy is in the shower and Mommy is not yet home, it works really well.  And, I have the great feeling of becoming fit and healthier, as well as breathing in the cool, early morning air and being there to (almost) greet the sunrise.  I do a balloon-shaped trail that is about 3.6 miles, savoring the temperatures that are in the 60s or 70s…  It has been wonderful.  And, somehow, it’s SO MUCH EASIER for this night owl to roll out of bed at 5:30 for a hike, instead of, say, the stationary bike.
3. 

   I think ours is taller than this, and it's in bloom.

   Our backyard is now over five years old, and the pathetic little saplings have matured and grown into a lush (for the desert) green oasis.  This may not seem like much, but when I’m surrounded by hot, brown, and dry, it’s such a blessing to be able to walk into my back yard and breathe in a little bit o’ GREEN.  The trees are now climbable, and one of them even has a little rope swing attached.  We have two medium (but lovely) fruitless pistachio trees and two large tipu trees.  Wonderful.

4. My garden.  Again, it’s only May, and I got it in a good month later than I should have, so who knows how fruitful it will actually be.  But for now, it’s medicine to my soul to push the dirt around and coax and nurture little plants into being.  Usually once a day (at least), I pull out my kneeling pad and just sit on it, looking at the garden.  Even when there’s nothing to do in it, I feel good looking at it either up close, or just glancing out the window while working in the kitchen.  Over the weekend, my hubby installed soaker tube for the irrigation and put up a little wire fence to keep our dog (and small children) from romping through the tender growth.  He proclaimed, “Now it looks like a real garden.”  I concur.

Family, baseball, book-writing, and God’s provision

• Taking Fiala off of potatoes was so beneficial, I hopefully thought, “Maybe what I thought was a corn reaction was really potato!  Maybe she can really have corn!”  So, last week, I tried her on corn for three days.  That was dumb.  Ever since, she has been SO itchy, poor girl.  New lesions developed on her face, which she then scratched into oblivion, and are now infected.  So, for the third time in less than six months, she’s back on antibiotics (Septra), as I wasn’t able to contain/control/heal the infection with topical bacitracin.    Bummer.  But, at least we know how to treat it, and at least I know now for SURE that corn is totally off-limits.  Every couple of months, I try it, and I’m just not going to do that again, for a very long while.  Though it would be so handy if she could eat corn, it’s just not worth it.
• Ethan’s Little League team lost in a very close game last night, their first loss of the end-of-year tournament.  The final score was 3-2.  It’s a double-elimination tourney, so they have at least one more game.  If they win tonight’s game — and they should! –  they will play again on Friday.  If they win THAT game, they will play again on Saturday for the championship, because the team they will potentially meet on Friday (which is the team to which they lost, last night) is undefeated.  (Double-elim tourneys are confusing, but I think I finally have it figured out!!!)
• Our dog, Tally, is recovering SO WELL from this most recent bout with Valley Fever.  She is still on twice-daily fluconazole, but it is so encouraging to see her have her energy back, and she’s building muscle tone by eating extra food and zipping about the back yard.
• I’m in my final hours of ghost-writing the book I’ve been working on since February.  Even though it seems like there has been continually “one more thing!” there really is light at the end of the tunnel now.  Even though I have very much enjoyed work on it, I’m ready to be DONE with it.  I hoped to be done yesterday.  Then today…  Nope.  Still need work, probably 2-4 hours on both tomorrow and Friday.
• God provides.  A few weeks ago, after assessing the girls’ summer wardrobes, and finding both paltry, and being in greater need than what we have the budget for, I prayed that God would provide.  Within a couple of days, I got a phone call, “What sizes do your girls wear?  I have a bunch of clothes, size 18 months through 4T…”  Which is exactly what we needed.  Thank you, Jesus.  Another mom tentatively approached me at church on Sunday about some hand-me-downs for my 8yo son, as well.  She kind of danced around the topic, and when I finally figured out that she was trying not to OFFEND me by offering me second-hand clothes, I told her gushingly that I LOVE hand-me-downs, and was very thankful, and completely NOT offended. 
• My husband’s brother, after not living on his own — EVER — for his first 40 years of life, moved to Colorado a couple years ago, and all but disappeared.  But, after leaving a message for him at his church last week, we finally were able to get a hold of him, and are delighted that we will be able to see him later this summer during our family’s vacation.

Sad things.

• My mom has been ill.  After five days in the hospital (week before last), she told the doctors, “I will be going home at 6 p.m. tonight.  You have 12 hours to do whatever it is you need to do.”  She’s very stubborn.  I could write reams about my concerns about my dear mother, but it all boils down to this:  She does way too much, which is terribly hard on her body, but keeps her mentally sane and emotionally balanced.  ~sigh~  The tables are indeed turned, with me checking in to see if she called the doctor on this, or the insurance company about that, and chastising her for turning down her portable oxygen tank to 3 lpm instead of 4, even though it “lasts longer” that way.  ~heavy sigh~
• My hubby and I went on a date night on Saturday, which was cut short by us rescuing a doggie.  Big ol’ guy — 60 lbs at least — with short legs and a bully chest… maybe an English Bulldog/Lab mix.  Or, Mastiff + Staffordshire Bull Terrier.  Dunno.  He came right up to our truck, loved on us, rolled on his back and let us rub his tummy, gratefully ate the food we got at PetsMart for him, willingly submitted to a much-needed bath at home.  I quickly jumped onto the lost & found listings on Craigslist, and submitted a report on www.pets911.com, and trolled the last 4 months of lost dog reports.  However, I secretly hoped, those first few hours, that we wouldn’t find the owner, because I wanted to keep him forever, and had warm and affectionate feelings for his chocolate brindle messy self.  Until he attacked our dog.  Golly, my priorities, upon the really frightening event of breaking up the two dogs in our family room, which left mom and five children all shaking and crying, were really solidified:  New dog — danger to our family dog, and potential danger to any small child wandering in/nearby a dog fight — is out the door.    On Monday, after an hour of driving around the neighborhoods in about a mile radius from where we found him, I took him to the pound.  They keep him for “a minimum of 72 hours” and assess his adoptability, at which point they either euthanize him, or put him up for adoption.    It’s still heavy on my heart, and it has me wondering why God appointed that responsibility to us, and if we did the right thing.
• Sort of related to the first thing up there, I find myself REALLY wanting to be in a house into which we could invite my mom & stepdad to live.  I’ve already talked with my stepdad about it (a while ago, after another medical scare from my mom), and he does want to live with us should my Mom pass… That was both a hard and a beautiful conversation.  Joe has only been my “Dad” for 12 years;  I was already married and with my first child when he and my mom got married.  However, I love him dearly, and he is the most involved grandfather my children have (though my “real” dad and my hubby’s dad do love our kids, and they do see them regularly), and it KILLS ME to think of him on his own, after my mom dies.  My hubby and I have talked a bit about selling this home and buying one more appropriately outfitted for a “guest,” but, obviously, this is a BAD AWFUL time to be putting a house on the market, and it would really, really, really have to be OF GOD for it to happen.  So, I’m praying.

Standardized tests, losing my wallet, bread, shopping, and a sick doggie

• I am considering having my kids do a standardized test before the end of the school year, which I’ve never done before.  The purpose of this is at least three-fold:  1) To assess their progress;  2) To see if there are any holes in their education which I need to fill;  3) Acquaint them with the style of test that they will likely see much more of, outside of our homeschool experience, when the time comes.  Looking into it, I decided that the Iowa Test of Basic Skills would likely be the best choice, because it is much more comprehensive than many other standardized tests, but still at a fairly reasonable cost.  Then, I see that one has to have a bachelor’s degree in order to administer it.  Rats.  Since I completed only 2½ years of college, that means that either I have to choose a test without such a requirement, or enlist the help of someone else in administering it.  I bet my stepdad would, but it’s such a bummer that I can’t just give the test to them by myself. 
• I lost my wallet today.  I went to the grocery store for a few non-perishables, then went to the library to 1) pick up some books I had placed on hold; 2) return some DVDs that we managed to remain in our DVD player after we had returned the covers; 3) pay off the fines that accrued on our 30 or so items while the “hold” had been placed on my account due to the missing DVDs; 4) confess that an additional DVD had “developed” a crack in it while in our care.  When I went to pull out my debit card and my library card, I discovered that I had no wallet.  I assumed that I had somehow left it in the truck, so I left my items at the counter, and went to get it.  No wallet.  So, I went back in to the library, took care of #2 and #4, and ran back to my truck.  I raced back to the grocery store, praying all the while that if my wallet was discovered by someone that they would be honest and turn it in.  After fruitlessly checking the area where I had previously parked, I went in to the customer service desk.  THEY HAD IT!  I was so relieved that it was there, 100% intact, that I forgot to ask the customer service person who had turned it in.  Thank you, Jesus, for answered prayer.
• The fourteenth time is almost the charm!  I have baked FOURTEEN different versions of my vegan bread recipe, and this last one was the best yet.  I’m going to tweak it yet again… just once more… (I think!), so I should be able to post the recipe very, very soon.  It’s been a hard-fought battle, lemme tell you!!!  Gluten-free, vegan, corn-, rice-, and millet-free…  Plus, tasty AND whole-grain!  It has not been easy.
• Ross:  The haven for those who have expensive tastes, but not the $$ to back it up.  I wanted a real leather black or brown purse.  I have a number of purses, but needed a new everyday one, and I have been looking for quite a long time, because I could spend no more than $20 on it.  Voila!  I finally found one that I really like, at Ross, on clearance, for $10.  It’s “leather with man-made trim” but for ten bucks, I’m not quibbling.
• Our dear doggie, Tally, has Valley Fever again.  It’s actually likely that she never quite kicked it last year, though she had improved so dramatically as to appear totally healthy.  She started seeming mopey about six weeks ago, but that was concurrent with the start of Little League season, which means that we’ve been absent much more often, leaving her in her crate or in the back yard, as weather allows.  She doesn’t like when we leave her, and who can blame her?  Still, she had started to lose weight… and when she took a step outside last week, and I noticed a little limp, I thought, “Moping does NOT make you limp.”  So, I took her to the vet on Friday, and explained to the vet that I’d really rather not spend $180 on a blood test to confirm what he and I both know, and would he please just prescribe fluconazole?  Understandably, he would prefer that we do the test, so we would know what her baseline numbers are, and to rule out any other possible (though very unlikely) illness.  But, he was willing to prescribe the medication on empirical evidence alone.  However, I talked to the vet’s office this morning, and apparently, they forgot to call the rx in, which means we won’t get it until Monday.  I hope Tally responds quickly to the medication, and that we soon have our spunky, happy dog back.

Good signs

• The most recent report on baby Abigail is that today, Monday, is the best day yet of her nearly five days of life.  It’s by second-hand report, but from what I heard, she’s off of antibiotics and oxygen, and is NURSING without throwing up!!!!  Bless God!  She still needs prayer — on Saturday, I was elated at her improvment, then she had some backward progress, so I don’t want to let up.
• Our dog is doing better, too!  In case you don’t remember, she has Valley Fever, which is actually a fungal infection.  In the blood test for Valley Fever, they measure eight levels, and Tally was at the 7th of 8 levels — very severe (I’m not sure exactly what they measure, but whatever “it” is, it doubles — 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, and 256, which is often death, and anything beyond 256 is near-certain death;  Tally was 128).  The vet was pretty grim about her long-term health, and had us geared up for 1-2 years of medication to get her back on track.  But less than four months later, she has been off of anti-inflammatory/pain meds for nearly two months, and she is down to the 4th level, or 16.  Sixteen sounds WAY better than 128.  She’ll still be on fluconazole for at least 3 more months, but we are so happy that we have our healthy, happy dog back.  She has also gained four pounds back, which is a lot for a dog of her size.  Yay!  I used to think it was yuppie/stupid to spend a great deal of money on a pet.  I still don’t think that pet = family, though I don’t look down on those who do, Kathy!!  It’s just not my paradigm.  However, we’ve spent well over $500 nursing Tally back to health, and I’m just glad that since we overhauled our budget this past winter, that spending money on Tally doesn’t mean we don’t have food for groceries or anything like that.  I bless God that we’ve had the money to nurse her to health, and not just give her palliative care, which is sort of the view my parents had regarding sick pets.
• One of the things I got for this very-fast-approaching school year is Typing Instructor.  I got version 16, which was a lot cheaper than the most recent version.  Anyways.  It came on Friday, and Ethan has been “playing” it as much as I’ll let him, ever since.  He’s already boosted his average wpm from about 12 to 18.  It’s a good sign, I think, when your child is begging to do more “schoolwork.” 

At the risk of tooting my own horn…

…if you or any of your children have food allergy or intolerance problems, PLEASE make this recipe:  Allergen-Free Breakfast Cookies.

Sometimes, it really seems like God is watching out for my future, as well as my present.  When I started homeschooling, I had no idea that I would eventually have a kid with a learning disability who thrives in a homeschooled setting, but who would likely be pressured by school staff to be medicated, if I had him in a regular school.  I had no idea that I would have a different son with serious food intolerances, an immune disorder, and a life-threatening allergy to peanuts.  Again, all easily treatable at home, but it would be a rats’ nest if I was trying to navigate him safely through the public school system.  I am part of local Yahoo groups for both allergies and celiac disease, and this is the time of year where conversations are FLYING with talk of difficulty with school administrations and policies, tips from parent to parent, heartbreak, commiseration…  I say a little prayer of thanks as I delete those messages, that they are not relevant to our situation.

More than a year ago, I developed the above recipe simply based on the fact that my cupboards were bare of our usual breakfast foods.  But, now that my baby needs me to be:

• gluten-free (well, I have to be gluten-free, so she is by default)
• soy-free
• dairy-free
• egg-free
• almond-free
• banana-free
• yeast-free

and… it’s now looking like she has problems with POTATOES*, of all the hypo-allergenic foods, I’m really scraping the bottom of the barrel for breakfast foods that have at least a modicum of healthfulness.

Enter my “accidental” recipe from last year.  Seriously, it’s one of the most unique-but-successful recipes I’ve developed.  They are so good, yet also so healthy, AND free of all of the allergens that bother my baby Fiala.  What a “coincidence,” eh?

Yesterday afternoon, we were in desperate need of groceries…  Well, not really desperate;  we have food in the house.  But, we had a dearth of items that I could eat.  Beset by hunger pangs, I snacked on half a can of Bush’s baked beans!!  Ack.  So, making those cookies this morning, enjoying their hearty tastiness, knowing they were altogether safe for Fiala (I think!), wrapping some up to freeze…..  It just felt great, all around.

Only tangentially related:   I love fresh fruit, but by the 4th or 5th day after going to the grocery store, the fresh stuff is gone, and I’m combing the cupboards for something dried or canned.  So, during my late-night shopping trip, I got prunes (and raisins and cranberries).  Wrinkle your nose if you may, but I like ‘em, and so do my kids.  I filled a bag with pound and a half of gooey, healthy, sweetness (on sale!).  After putting the groceries away, I sat down with my current book and five prunes.  I left the bag — bad Mom! — on the coffee table when I went to bed.  It was found by our dog, who, apparently, adores prunes.  She chewed the bag open, and consumed all the contents, as evidenced by the bits of sticky plastic spread around our family room this morning.  My 12yo, whose job it is to daily collect the dog waste, is not pleased.  I’m just mad that the prunes are gone. 

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*Not sure about potatoes, yet.  But, her skin was greatly improving from the antibiotics she’s been on since Friday, and from eliminating eggs, banana, almonds, and yeast.  Then, on Monday I gave her a few chunks of red potato — she LOVED them, but woke up yesterday with red, crusty, peely cheeks again.  I wasn’t sure if it was potato that was the problem, and I went ahead and gave her potato again last night.  Her cheeks are worse this morning!  So, potato is out.  I’m going to do my own little patch test later this morning, when she awakes from a nap.  In the meantime, this is a really interesting page on potato (and other) allergens.

Father’s Day, My Birthday, etc.

• We had a really good Father’s Day celebration at my father-in-law’s.  We had a cookout, watched baseball, then watched Bad Day at Black Rock, which is sort of like a Western film noir.  Very cool.  My kind of movie, for certain.  Well, pretty much everyone got to watch all that stuff.  I was off, attempting to get Fiala to go to sleep.  She woke up at 7:00 a.m. (after being up at 4:00), slept about 10 minutes in the car on the way home from church and DID NOT SLEEP at all until she was home in her bed at about 8:00 p.m.    She was one exhausted baby.  Still, it was a great day.  I have to be so careful not to be envious of my in-laws.  I mean, where they live.  They’re in Desert Hills, which is just west of Cave Creek.  They’re on several acres, and their house backs up to the “landscape” of the Sonoran Desert.  They have horses.  I’m not really into horses, now that I’m a grown-up and know how much work it requires to take care of horses.  However, I spent a lot of the day looking into the back, and seeing Wesley climb on the bales of hay, and watching him train one of my father-in-law’s dogs, a big yellow lab, to climb on top the bales, and to climb into a huge wood-sided wagon and let him pull her about.  Kids just need to be outdoors and do that sort of thing.  I love our home, I love our neighborhood.  But, I would dearly love to have room to spread out, and to be in a more natural setting.  I don’t need a bigger house, but it sure would be nice to have more property.  *sigh*
• I have a few disposables left, but I brought all our cloth stuff to the nursery at church for the first time yesterday.  One lady in the nursery, who I do love so, said a few gentle but pointed comments like, “I cloth diapered my kids, but I made sure to bring disposables along when we went out.”  I changed Fiala right when I brought her in, and told them that, unless she pooped, they wouldn’t need to change her again.  But they did change her, because that’s their SOP.  I may eventually change my mind about bringing disposables along for trips outside the house, but… I don’t think so.
• My Dad and I have had a rocky past, but it’s been steadily improving over the last… four years or so.  I had a great conversation with my him on Father’s Day, at night, after we were back from my in-laws.  Many thanks to my husband, who wrangled our four older kids, fed them, and got them into bed so I could chat with my Dad.  He gave me an update on his life…  He really does have an interesting life.  And he’s dating, which shouldn’t be such a weird concept to me, but it just is.  Then he asked, “How are my granddaughters?”  which made me all warm and fuzzy for a couple of reasons.  The first is that, for years, he was in denial that he was an actual grandparent, so even for him just to say “granddaughter” is a huge growth step for him.  The second is that, even though I adore my boys, I found it especially sweet that he inquired about the girls.  He thinks Audrey is a hoot.  To him, she’s the classic “sanguine” which he finds amusing and intriguing, especially since there are no true sanguines in our family, like for generations, at least on his side.  Since Audrey fits nicely in the sanguine box, he could easily relate to both our joys and our struggles in raising her, because he classifies pretty much everyone with those four personality types (sanguine, melancholy, choleric, and phlegmatic).  Martin and I need her to obey (not be a robot girl, but, nonetheless, obey) but we don’t want to squash the sparkle of her personality.  And, he listened with concern about Fiala’s skin, and prayed for her, over the phone.
• Speaking of Fiala’s skin — coconut oil makes it worse, though I sincerely appreciate the suggestion from everyone who mentioned it.  Her little body broke out in a whole-body rash after I applied it.  And I used it for a good week, just to make sure that the reaction wasn’t coincidental to something odd I had eaten.  I Googled it, and while it appears to be rare, allergy to coconut does exist.  I’m not 100% certain she’s allergic to coconut, but I’m not going to use the oil again.  I’m back to my homemade salve, which really does help, better than any topical lotion, salve, prescription, over-the-counter, etc., I have used.  However, if it helped having me completely egg- and nut-free these last two weeks, the benefit was minimal.  I had a g.f. cake with eggs and butter in it yesterday, but I still think I’ll stay off of eggs and dairy, just in case.  On Sunday morning, my pastor suggested rubbing pure vitamin E oil on Fiala.  Duh!  I slathered myself in E oil my whole pregnancy.  Why didn’t I think of that?  I will try that starting today.
• My birthday was Saturday.  My hubby and I had a date night — only the THIRD since Fiala was born, eight months ago today.    I had no problem leaving my other kids with a babysitter, even when they were tiny.  But, it’s so hard with Fiala.  Martin says that she is my security blanket.    Maybe so.  Part of the reason it is so difficult to leave her with a babysitter is, I’m leaving her with them during her fussy time of day, and as her mom, many times that’s extremely difficult for ME to manage — fussy baby plus four other children — and I’m her mother!  But, I love our babysitter, Mackenzie, when we can get her!  She is lovely, intelligent, extremely competent, artistic, lots of fun, and my children adore her.  She’s now 22, and has been watching my kids since she was 13 and we only had two children.  There is a guy at my church that I so want her to marry.  Mackenzie works at the Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf, and he comes in there from time to time.  She knows who he is, but he has no idea who he is.  She used to have responsibilities at her church, but she recently stepped down, so on Saturday, I was like, “Cooooommmmeee to my chuuuurrrrrrrrrrch,” so that she could spend time with that guy.    Anyways.  On our date, Martin and I went to P.F. Chang’s, then saw Star Trek, which rocked.  And, he gave me a case of wine for my birthday!  That seems like a weird gift… but four years ago, we went to the historic La Posada for our 11th anniversary, and we had the BEST WINE EVER, and now, every glass we have had since is, “It’s just not as good as that wine.”  A couple of months ago, I finally found it online.  It was difficult to track down, because it turns out it was a custom crush with a private label.  So, I had to find the vineyard that produced it.  They did have a few cases left, but we’ve never purchased a whole case (12 bottles!) of wine before.  Martin raided my e-mail, found the info, had a case — which turned out to be the last in existence — shipped to his work, and then stored it at a friend’s house for a week.  So, it still seems weird to get wine for my birthday, but it’s such good wine, and it has such lovely memories attached.  It’s a 2004 Fairfield Pinot Noir, from the Willamette Valley in Oregon, made by LaVelle Vineyards. Maybe next year I can get a Stan Fellows painting.