Our neck of the woods

Hallie got a hair cut.  She hasn't had hair this short since she was still two.  It is fun to see her with a flippy new 'do.  And it is so much easier to get through the tangles.  Her long hair was getting precarious post-bath time.

We've noticed Hallie has had a surge of the "let me do it!" lately.  Although totally typical for her age, don't tell me it doesn't get a little frustrating for the parents.  She doesn't even like us to ask her to brush her teeth.  She wants to do it without be told to.  I had to revert to my old mantra of "it's just a stage . . . it's just a stage."  And she has already started to chill a little as the week progresses.

Claire met with her physical therapist.  She is progressing rapidly.  Even a couple weeks ago we thought she might need orthotics to help support her ankles.  However, Claire has walked so much that she now has built up those muscles and is not wobbly anymore.  The physical therapist made a list of goals for Claire that includes: walking up the stairs standing (instead of crawling) and getting up on her feet by getting in a pike football position (instead of pushing up with her hands), and running while alternating her arms.  The long term goal for these achievements is six months but the therapist thinks Claire will achieve them much faster.  The fun thing about having Claire see people about her walking is hearing how awed they are by her talking.  Every single person we've seen says "Wow, her talking certainly isn't delayed."  Minutes later they'll say "her verbal skills are really impressive." 

    In other news, it's cold!  Last Saturday it was 64.  We hadn't touched our jackets in days.  This week, we are talking wind chill as low as 30 degrees below.  We've been letting the faucets drip for two and a half days -- trying to prevent frozen pipes!  For awhile there we couldn't get anything to come out of my master bath sink.  Yesterday it warmed up to about 2 below zero and I got my water back.  Tomorrow it is supposed to be 50 and sunny.  That we can handle.  50 is not cold. 

A great thing about the frigid temps is it permits early spring cleaning!  Chris organized the garage last week and we both tackled the basement yesterday.  It feels so good to fill up the car and watch all your extra stuff go off to someone who deserves it.  And in our case it is the good people and patrons of Arc Thrift Store. It feels so good to organize and make space for the stuff you actually use and not the stuff that you feel a nagging need to hold onto.  The older we get, the better Chris and I are about saying "we don't need it anymore."

I do this funny thing with grieving.  Well, it's not so much funny as it is horrifying.  Every couple weeks I will go through a stint where I fall asleep at night, only to wake up fifteen minutes later with this gripping horror that my dad died from cancer . . . that I can't hug him anymore . . . that I can't hear his voice.  During the day, I stay comforted.  I read my scriptures and I pray to keep me that way.  I still miss him during the day but I feel at peace with it.  I feel him close and I know he can see me at times.  But, when I do these episodes where I wake up at night it is so hard to be calm.  The other night when I woke up, I knew I needed to do something proactive about it.  I came downstairs and I compiled a digital storybook about him.  It's pictures of him and my girls called Our Wonderful Grandpa.  It reads like a story book about things he loved and used to do with my daughters.  I did it so fast (one hour) I didn't even fix red eye and I ordered it right then in the middle of the night.  But it worked wonders.  It helped me go to sleep that night and I haven't had other trouble recently.  It came in the mail yesterday and we read it together after dinner.  I feel so much better having it.  And I've discovered a formula for those horrifying moments.  It is simply: do something about it.  If it hurts that you can't see him -- make something so you can see him.  If it hurts that you can't talk to him -- honor him by writing about him.  And you know what?  I know he knows I wrote that book.  I know he knows I read it to them last night.

I'm still up to date on laundry.  I know . . . miracle.

And that is what is happening in our neck of the woods.