In Sickness and in Health

While it's not true with all positions, mine should have come with a clause similar to a marriage ceremony. We have had some amazing good times lately, playing in the backyard and the new sandbox, going to birthday parties, and even just getting back to taking long walks.
Then there is the sickness. Week before last, Emi was running, fell, and cut her forehead on the window sill. I have never had to call their mom to come home before, but it was just big enough it needed to be looked at, though not severe enough for the ER. Sure enough, they put a coat of glue on it mostly as a safeguard.
Then this week, Camila has been spiking super-high fevers (105.3). They took her to the doctor and got antibiotics Monday, but today it still spikes every time the Motrin wears off. She's off to the doctor now.
Emi and I are here at home. Emi has been a good little sister through the last few days, hamming it up to make Camila laugh. Today, however, she is teething and maybe a little jealous, so keeping up with the two of them has been exhausting. (And not good for the housework...)
On top of all that, I was in bed with a bad sinus infection all weekend and since it's still hanging on, I have given in and gotten antibiotics for it. Supposedly it is working on the infection but in the meantime it is making me very nauseous. This could be pretty much our worst week ever.
However, I tell you all that not just to update you, but to set the stage. I have joined a nanny forum where I am enjoying the chance to meet experienced nannies and ask them questions. One of them mentioned that being a nanny is one of the things that led her to reconsider marriage. She did mean from observing different parent relationships (particularly the husbands), not from caring for the children. But it set me off on my own tangent of thought.
Lately we've had several crazy days which you'd think would lead me to reconsider being a mother. EVER. But there's so many GOOD moments!
Like the other day when I said something funny and Camila giggled and said, "You crack me up!"
Or like the multiple times a day I pick Emi up and she wraps her arm around my neck.
Or like yesterday when Camila laid her head in my lap, tired and feverish, and declared softly, "You're my friend."
Or like when Emi grins so hard it wrinkles her nose.
Or like yesterday when Camila was feeling well enough for a short walk and told me she was scared of raccoons. "It's okay, raccoons can't get you," I told her.
She looked up at me. "Would you save me from a raccoon?"
"Yes, I would save you from a raccoon or a snake or a bee or a rat or anything else that dared to try to hurt my babies!"
She seemed confident, but it was confirmed when her mother came home. She wrapped one arm around my leg and leaned her head into her hip and announced, "Baba saves me from raccoons!"
Or like a few days ago when we were feeding some neighborhood cats a treat. I held one out to a cat, asking, "Do you want one?"
Emi said, "Sure!" and before I knew what happened, had popped it into her mouth!
All these little moments make the sick times seem worse in comparison, but they also make them easier to get through because we have more good times coming!
(However, prayers are appreciated!)

Happy Birthday, Emi!

So her birthday was last week, but I have just now gotten around to uploading pictures. :( She had a big day on her real birthday and a blast at her party Saturday.

Today she is sick with a very bad cold. She's so miserable, taking 3 naps for the first time in months. She's been snuggling with me all morning, and I think we've read "How Do Dinosaurs Say Goodnight" 10 times. (It's her new favorite book.)
Camila started the cold last week, but is fine this week! She enjoyed Emi's party almost as much as Emi did. She also has "How Do Dinosaurs Say Goodnight" memorized, so I can actually ask her to "read" the book to Emi! That is handy.

Some pictures:

The birthday girl with her gifts

Taking a cracker break

All dressed up for the party. Every time a new person arrived she'd announce, "It's cake time now!" She wanted some cake SOOOO bad!

I love this picture.

The little stinker herself. But you gotta love that face.

Double Trouble

It has been WAY too long since I posted! The girls have changed so much I don't even know where to start.
Though only eleven months old (how crazy is THAT?), Emi has officially crossed over into the Toddler Realm. She began walking two weeks before Christmas, and runs now! She is extremely opinionated, much more prone to fits than Camila was at that age, but Camila also never had a big sister there to consistently foil her plans. Overall, though, she is the HAPPIEST child you will ever see, and entertains herself easily. One of her favorite games right now involves a farm animal peek-a-boo book. The animals have their faces covered by a flap in the form of their "arms". She lifts the flaps, squealing, "Boo!" and giggles away until the next page.
Now that she has walking down, she is determined to master speech. So far she says "boo," "hi," "bye-bye," "go," "all done", "nigh'-nigh'," "up," "ball," "cat," "puppy," and I have a witness to vouch for me when I say the other day, she said "squishy". She tries to repeat other words but they aren't clear enough to really count. (Like when I try to get her to say "Up PLEASE", she will repeat the "p-p-p" sound but can't get the whole word out yet.) She also signs "more," "dog," and "eat". She blows me kisses when I leave. It's absolutely amazing how quickly she's growing.

Camila's growth is has slowed down physically, but mentally she continues to mature. For instance, last week I was teasing that I needed her blanket or something, and she firmly informed me, "It's not OURS. It's MINE." Quite an impressive grasp of grammar for a two year old!

She constantly cracks me up. A couple weeks ago I was struggling with a picture frame. She watched me trying to pry the tabs open with a screwdriver. Finally she said rather gravely, "I think you're too little."

We play pretend a lot. One of my favorite things to do is pretend I'm a baby and she's the mother. She never goes along with it, but always bursts into giggles when I go, "Waaa! Change my diapee!" She laughs and squeal, "You don't have a diapee!"

One thing has been bittersweet. She is realizing already that not all children have a nanny. She watches Olivia, a cartoon about a little pig's adventures at school and at home. Olivia's mother is constantly on the scene, fixing her lunch, driving her back and forth to school, going to the grocery store, putting her to bed, reading to her...most of which I do for her. Then Camila goes to "school" where she sees children crying for their mommies, not their nannies. We go to gymnastics, where every adult is "so-and-so's mommy".

When we're in the grocery store, every adult makes a comment referring to me being their mom. She finds it amusing, turning around in the cart with a grin and asking, "You're my mommy?!"

I act surprised and go, "I am?!"

She'll giggle and go, "No! You're Baba!"

But she has experimented here and there. When I was putting her down for nap one day, she hugged me tight and clipped out, "Goodnight, mom!"

I froze but kept my voice light. "What did you say?" When she repeated it, I squeezed her tight. "Goodnight....DAD!"

She giggled. "I'm not dad!"

"Well I'm not mom!"

She laughed and went to bed, and usually she only does it when she wants attention or sometimes in the store, as a joke. But she has gotten clingier to her mom (not necessarily a bad thing) and occasionally is less-than-happy when I come in to work because she knows it means her mom is leaving. It saddens me in that she used to be so happy to see me every morning and would ask for me all weekend, but it's good that she's recognizing who her mother is and has some loyalty to her. For now, Emi gets excited when I come in!

We have fun during the day anyway, and yesterday I was showered with hugs and kisses before I left. Here are a couple pictures just to update you:

Christmas Eve

It's here, Christmas Eve! When I was a little girl, I LIVED for this day. Even in my teen years, Christmas was what I lived for, year-round.
I'm not trying to sound like I was a very spiritual person, but in all honesty, it wasn't about the gifts. I always basked in the overall joy Christmas brings with it. The hustle and bustle, the toy drives, the special, Christ-centered songs (though I enjoy plenty of the more "secular" carols as well!), the family-friendly Christmas movies, the rush on Christmas Eve, the family time, the magical peace on Christmas morning before anyone woke up...I loved it all!
I used to keep a diary of every day of the Christmas season and make a countdown calendar. It was the highlight of my year.
The last couple years have been somehow different. I think I've been too busy to truly just sit down and enjoy it. I've hardly watched any Christmas movies even. This year especially has been rough, with sickness added onto the hectic work schedule.
However, startig yesterday, I felt like I was finally getting it all back. I couldn't even sleep last night, I was so wound up. And I realized what brought it back: giving.
Our pastor has had an emphasis on having a "special" Christmas this year, encouraging the members to not focus on gifts, etc, but to focus on Christ, which is a good message in and of itself. But in his efforts to de-emphasize gifts, I truly feel he skipped over one of the most important aspects of Christmas, which IS giving. There are so many hurting people out there, many of which (for better or worse) DO associate Christmas with mere gifts and giving. We can reach so many people if we give just a little. It doesn't have to be toys or money or gifts even. If we just share ourselves, our love, maybe even our homes, it could make all the difference. As a little girl I always believed Christmas could be the key to restoring faith, even if I didn't think of it in those words. The last few years I think I've doubted that, that I became bogged down with work and life and cynicism.
But this year, I have decided to throw myself into showing God's love to one family in particular. My family has gotten onboard too, even my grandfather. We are mainly reaching out to the children, but hope to touch the adults too. My life verse is Jude 22: And of some have compassion, making a difference. To me that verse is a promise: your compassion makes a difference. It is also a warning: without compassion, you may not make a difference. In so many ways, this verse embodies the Christmas spirit we should have towards others.
I don't say this to brag, merely to encourage others to have faith. I truly believe one day we will find out we DID make a difference, but there have been times I wondered about it. But this Christmas I am choosing to believe that God can use what I do, not because I did it all in my own power, but because He has promised to do it!
Merry Christmas, everybody!

Communication

Communication is something I am not always good at. I do well as far as general communication about day-to-day things, but when it comes to my feelings, I am a very clammed-up person, except at the WRONG times.

We had a small problem this week that basically came down to major differences in communication. I won't go into detail, but her mom said something in an offensive way (even though she didn't mean it entirely the way it sounded, she did admit it may not have been the best way to say it), I reacted wrongly, and we were forced to deal with it. But we're cool now, and even in the middle of everything, there were no hard feelings.

That's the thing with this job: the good news is, you can become like a family. The bad news is, you become like a family. One thing that came up in our discussion is that it seems like we are ALWAYS together. Even when we are separated for most of the day, we remain in close contact and I am dealing with their life, so they are very much present. As such, we get comfortable with each other, take each other for granted, and get sick of the sight of each other's faces. We're all on the same schedule so we all get tired and snappy at the same time.

But, like a family, we work it out. This is a bit of a problem with me since I haven't communicated with my parents until things got out of hand. I tend to do the same thing here. I'm working on it. Otherwise, everything has been good this week. I threw a party for some friends last night, and my girls came (looking cute and completely well-behaved!). Emi walked a full 3 1/2 steps to me last night! I think by Christmas she'll be everywhere!

Emi, me, and Rachel at the party

Their very first viewing of "A Charlie Brown Christmas". Emi wanted to be just like Camila with her popcorn so she has a bowl of Puffs. :)

Best. Santa picture. EVER.

Photos & Update

I don't have a lot of time today, but I know it's been a few weeks since I posted. We have all been busy as usual! We had great (separate) Thanksgivings, and are currently huddled in the house during a cold, rainy day. (It was 80 degrees this morning, down to 50 now, with lots of wind and rain.)

We are still doing well, everybody growing up. Emi is still not walking, but has the control to squat, pick something up, and stand back up! I doubt we'll make it to Christmas before she walks. Camila is becoming a very dramatic storyteller. She saw the beginning of the Disney movie Tarzan yesterday, and as soon as her mom came home, she ran up to tell her about the leopard trying to get the baby, but the gorilla saved him and took him to her family, but then the big gorilla was really loud and scared the baby, but the other gorilla sang to him and he was okay. Her mother, having never seen the movie, just stared at her until I explained it.

I took them to church again Sunday and they both made it through the service, awake this time! Emi made a little noise a couple times, but my church is very laidback in that way. There were 3 or 4 babies under a year in the service, although a couple had to be taken to the nursery. We sat in the very back and she didn't disturb anybody. Camila did AMAZING, looking at the books I had brought and coloring quietly with her crayons.

She finally is getting to where she remembers my parents in between seeing them, so she will talk to them more now, which they LOVE. These people can not wait for grandchildren; neither can my brothers. My 15-year-old brother informed me that he was disappointed: he wanted to be an uncle by 16. I'm NOT going to make the deadline!

Here are a few pictures:

Thanksgiving picture


All dressed up for church


This is the same picture...but I can't figure out how to delete it.


Emi ready for church

Memory Lane

Work is pretty much work this week. Two 11-hour days in a row, but I have to say it's not all that bad except for I come home too tired to do much in my own life. Me and the girls have a good time, though. The one thing that saddens me is that they may not ever remember these days. But I will.
This weekend started me on the subject of memories. Friday night my family received a last-minute invitation to a Harvest Fun Night at the home of some old friends.
When I say "old friends", I mean I was 15 months when we met them. Until we moved when I was 7 years old, we were practically family in many ways. They had 6 children as well (though we only had 4 when we moved), 5 boys and 1 girl. The girl is about 6 years older than me; I played with the boys. They have a large piece of land in the country and as small children we could roam and play in a safe environment. We went to church together, played together, and grew up together for a time. I even had one all picked out to marry when I was 6! (Although supposedly, according to our mothers, he and his brother fought over me. Too bad they never asked me!)
We moved when I was seven, and didn't come back until I was nearly 16. We didn't see each other for a few years after that. Over the passing of time, our families had grown apart. But in the last year or two, things have changed a bit. Our parents have reconnected in a lot of ways, and one of the sons and I have talked at church a few times. (Note: he's not the one I planned to marry; he's older than us, so wasn't interested at that point in time.)
I was so excited when my mom told me we were going. They have been doing Harvest Fun Night since before I was born. Some of my earliest memories consist of bobbing for apples, the hayride (always my favorite), and the bonfire. I even remember sitting in my carseat on the way home, sneaking a pack of Smarties from my goodie bag without my mom hearing me.
In so many ways, it was just the same that night. It was almost magical. It was the perfect fall night, complete with clear sky and twinkling stars. The moon wasn't full, but at just over half, it kept the night from ever being dark. The games were the same ones I remembered playing, the parents treated me as one of their own, just like they always have.
But the differences were astounding in their own way. I had seen them all at church one time months back, but seeing them there, where I remembered them as children, it hit me all over again. We've all grown up. Since none of them read this blog, I feel safe saying I had excellent taste as a child: my designated husband grew into a good looking man. I do have to say I didn't feel half as interested as I did back then. (His natural bossiness isn't a good mix with my personality.) But to see him driving the tractor for the hayride when I remember sitting on that trailer next to him at 3, 4, 5 years old...it was surreal.
His sister and I played together as children, but since she was so much older, she was more like a babysitter. Not so anymore; we chatted and laughed as friends, on an equal level. The baby of the family, only 2 when we left, also drove a tractor for the hayride. Their oldest brother doesn't even live here anymore, he is a missionary in Honduras with his wife and 2 children of his own.
In so many ways, it was a comforting thing. In the midst of all the craziness in the world, here are two families with a combined total of 12 children, together after 14 years of separation, and we are all okay. Have we had rough waters in life? Yes. But the parents have stayed committed to raising their children for God, even when the going gets tough. The children, aged 29 to 11, are all serving God in their lives, and no one has succumbed to drugs or alcohol, or even the simple lure of the world. And most amazingly, after 14 years, we can still all come together and love and support each other and share memories. It was almost like a miniature miracle.