Trekking Around the World

Remember this?

It's been a while.  I wouldn't expect you to, but I sure do.  One night, 5 years ago last November, we had gotten some yummy Chinese take-out and were sitting in Noah's room at The Children's Hospital.  As we finished up and started cracking open our fortune cookies, I grabbed one and said, "This one's for Noah."  If you can see in the picture, that's medical tape, the kind that used to keep tubes and crap attached to my sweet boy.  We used it for other things, as you can see.

At the time I remember thinking, "Oh how great it would be if You would heal Noah, God, and we could go all over the world (a lifetime dream of mine) and tell everyone of Your faithfulness, love and power."  This was my initial response to reading, "You will step on the soil of many countries."

It's because I had seen myself with a grown son...remember?  And so I naturally thought it was Noah...since he was my only son at the time and all.  And Noah did step on the soil of many countries, so to speak, just not physically with his two sweet little feet.  His blog hit every continent before he died, but that wasn't quite what I had been thinking...

Well, fast forward 5 years.  This post isn't about Noah.  It's about how my heart leaps out of my chest every time I see pictures of a sweet mama and her boy, so very much in love, who are on a journey.  It's about how I can't get them out of my mind, not because I want to, but because God continues to put them on my heart, all throughout the day.

I have mentioned him here before, but I'm asking you not to turn away.  I KNOW reading about a kid that is dying is nothing less than gut-wrenching.  It's HARD.  It SUCKS.  It's a volume of books filled with descriptive words that can't really describe the heartache.  I freaking GET IT!  It's why hundreds stopped reading my blog after Noah died.  I understand.  It's not as fun as Pinterest or Facebook or a hundred million other things.

But I'm literally begging you to let your heart pray for Jarrett, Chelsea, Peyton, Conner and Trek, as they set off on a journey of living life to the fullest, one day at a time.

You see, someone close to them contacted me to pray for them...she had read Noah's blog and couldn't stop thinking about some of the similarities.


Here is where my heart is wrecked.  We never wanted Noah to be stuck in a hospital bed his whole freaking life.  That was never our dream for him...but because of a whole hellofalotta reasons, we were stuck.  There were days I dreamed of stealing him out of the hospital and taking him home...but we couldn't because we didn't have home health care at the time.  It was a big mess.  The closest I got to showing him the world was this...whoopdefreakingdo!


Anyway, Chelsea's heart is living out what I wished I could have done with Noah. 


Am I living vicariously through them?  Only the freedom part...I lived all the rest already.

Either way, my heart is crying out for them to RUN, PLAY, LAUGH, CRY, REST, STARE, LISTEN, SING, NUGGLE, SMOOCH, HOLD ON and LET GO all at once. 


I pray for God's love to fill every corner of their lives with such fullness that this time in their lives will ever be etched in their hearts.


I hate what they are going through but if I had it to do over, which I don't wish for, but if I could go back, I'd run like hell out of that hospital and live whatever amount of time I had with my boy, free from the beeps and meds and tubes and tests and pokes and drugs and smells and unknowns. 


I'd run.

I don't despise what we went through, I do have to say, because 5 years later, I'm grateful to at least have the perspective that life is short.  It's time to live, today, right now, to the fullest.  Time and the people in our lives are literally gifts from God for our joy. 


It's time you, or someone you know, stop holding back.


Hug tighter.


Kiss longer.


Stare at your children.


Laugh your ass off.


Play on the floor with your kids.


Tell your husband you love him.

Tell him you are sorry.


Hold hands.


Turn off your freaking television.  Hell, throw the damn thing away.


Forgive.

Stop caring what others think of you.

Trust God sees the bigger picture.  Relinquish the control you think you need to have.


Smile.

Listen.

Play.

Dream.


Live in wonder.

Baby Trek Atlas may not physically touch the soil of many countries in his short life time, but the way he's living with his big brothers and mommy and daddy who adore him...well, he's experiencing more love than many do in a lifetime.  And, if you spend some time reading his mama's blog, I would venture to guess he'll have you looking around, wondering what matters, and making a few changes and tweaks to what is important. 

That's Trek, a 9.5 month old, teaching us a thing or two.  That's him stepping on the soil of many countries...

Life is short.  How will you spend it?

Better Late Than Never?

Well, I know Halloween and Fall Break were a while ago, but I thought I'd post some pics anyway so you can see the Adventures of Emily and Ryan. 

We had an early snow so we pulled all the pumpkins into the front hall.  Ryan played "ball" with these every day until the snow melted.

For Halloween Ryan was "Adam" from the Garden.  Just kidding.  His little tooshie was raw from 2 months of diarrhea so we let him "air out" at Nana's house.  FYI:  his big D is gone and the kid broke 4, count 'em, 4 molars!  Fun times...

Em and I got to ride horses at a friend's house while we were home in South Dakota. What's that?  Yes, I am wearing a Pashmina with camouflage and running shoes...(no, I wasn't prepared for the chill at sunset!)

Bonus kid points go to Emily this year...she told me she wanted to be Cleopatra and wear her Egyptian princess costume again...it's from two years ago...the bonus points come in that Mama didn't have to make a costume this year!  (*To tell the truth, I kind of missed making one...)  LOVE our niece and nephews pajamas that glowed in the dark!!!  And that's Aunt Kitty behind the sword...let's just say Ryan DID NOT LIKE Auntie's face painted like a kitty!

Ryan, or "Squirt," helped me pass out candy to the kiddos in the hood.  And by "pass out" well, I have video of him chucking it left and right but I'm not sure how to post it here.  He's into that stage of throw down/pick up/throw down/pick up!  Fun for Mama!

In order to stop Squirt from chucking the candy dish all over the hallway I allowed him a few seconds of phone time.  I NEVER allow this as a phone is NOT a toy...not in my book, anyway.  I have a feeling this kid is going to be like his daddy...a techy brainiac genius type.

I guess I did get to sew a little...we were invited to a friend's family party down the street.  Emily insisted that we HAD to dress up, that EVERYBODY would be wearing a costume, so, I was either going to sport my senior year gold sequin prom dress circa 1990, my Grandma's old house robe with slippers and rollers with face cream, or a flapper dress I had made for a murder mystery party we went to 15 years ago...Can you tell which one I went with?  I had to take in the dress, if you count that as sewing.  

And did we have the best costumes there, you ask?  Well, yes.  Yes we did, in fact...BECAUSE WE WERE THE ONLY FRIGGING PARENTS DRESSED UP AT THE PARTY!  So, there you go...Halloween down, Thanksgiving in a week and then December the next week!  This year is flying!

Ways to use your old Halloween candy...

I talked with Em about healthy choices and all the Halloween candy she got this year...she was going to weigh off a few pounds of it and give it to the dentist but decided to donate it to the Gingerbread cause this year, instead.

Two years ago Jason's sister moved in with us for a bit. She and Em and I embarked on what has now become an annual tradition: The building of a masterpiece. You might remember our first creation. It was my favorite so far...since, of course, it was in honor of my sweet Noah's life.

Here's a peek at our second creation.
I enjoyed that one, too, as I have a jewelry business, bebe & boo, and enjoy being creative with new and vintage pieces.

This year, per Emily's request and design, we made Sacagawea's Indian village. Em LOVES Sacagawea!

Anyway, we started at about 8 o'clock at night with a river...

...added a little grass and a bank...

Em put some treasures in the river, as well as a small bridge.

Here's my favorite feature: the fire pit.

Here is the entrance to the village that Em and her Auntie created.

Here's Em's field, ripe for harvest.

They designed little dresses for Sacagawea's tribal members.

(Yes, that is our Christmas tree up in the background...Em quietly carried ALL the tubs up from the basement on Friday morning and placed them smack dab in the middle of the family room floor. I guess that was her subtle way of telling me she wanted me to decorate?!)

That would be a KitKat entrance to the tepee.

Here's Em's creativity at best...a Brave spearing a Swedish fish from Royal Icing River.

We used sugar cones as the bases to our pine trees.

And, as you can see, the actual Gingerbread is the siding on the tepees and the Braves and Little Indian Girls.

This wasn't the smoothest process. I had spaced that we were actually doing the Gingerbread, so, of course, forgot until about 8 pm that I had to make dough and let it sit for 2 hours before baking it. Let's just say, with Dad in Peru, Mom skipped bed time rules and my sweet girl was up until midnight! Yikes! She thought it was great! Here are some things I learned, though, so you don't have to replay my mistakes:

• prepare your dough in advance
• use real egg whites, from actual eggs you crack yourself OR use powdered eggs whites, for Royal Icing...DO NOT USE eggs whites that are in those refrigerated containers.
  

Yeah, that's pretty much it. I use my Joy cookbook that was a wedding gift 17+ years ago for my recipes...Gingerbread House and Royal Icing. I try to think outside the box when it comes to a food or snack that is around the house...it's fun to see what you can come up with. And, your kids are NOT going to miss the Halloween candy, so use it up!

We don't actually eat our creations. In fact, we literally just put Noah's Ark in the dumpster last Friday morning. It's just fun to have them around for a while.

Oh, and I did not even lick my finger or taste test one piece of candy while doing this project because I am on a detox/cleanse...so, if you are trying to lose weight and think you can't do it, think again! I've lost 18 lbs and it wasn't even tempting!

The point is to be creative and have fun! And, you don't even have to be a kid to do it!

Go get your Gingerbread on!

Fun with Em...

It all started at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science...
We hit most of the displays. Em loved it! There was a fabulous gem display that affirms my continued awe of God's creativity! And the dinosaurs! So cool! There was even a skull from a Stegosaurus that was excavated north of Denver the year Em was born. At the close of the day, Em's Nana took her into the gift shop. She chose a bag of rocks (she loves rocks! I told Em that every rock in our yard, front and back, is part of her very own collection...she thought that was awesome!) and a kaleidoscope, not one with beads or jewels in it, but a plain one that allows you to see multiples of whatever, or whoever, is on the opposite end. So, we had a little fun with it and the camera. See if you can figure out what, or who, it is in each pic!