Everything changes in the blink of an eye

Looking back at the last three months, it boggles my mind to even do that. I think of all the silly things I worried about then. Life was suppose to finally be more settled and not tumultuous, the stress of living someplace you aren't wanted was going to be gone, finally being settled. How that can all change, literally in the blink of an eye. I remember my last night in our home, I didn't know it was going to be my last night, I simply thought it was the last night in the town I claim as home, a place I now have no desire to go at all, too many painful memories. If only I had known, that what I had feared would happen a hundred times before (though I thought it would be a fire, Chip thought it would be wind/tornado), our home being gone, would be realized.

There is no preparing for that moment, none at all. A phone call at 6:07 am (I was suppose to be there, but had overslept since I had been up all night for two nights prior packing). I don't know that I will ever forget that call, that time. Of course, I did not know that that call meant the end of our home, he didn't even tell me, I found out when I got there, well before I got there, driving around the corner looking over the field to see my house almost bent all in half, twisted in a way you never thought possible. I didn't even notice the front being folded and pushed through my kitchen floor, until someone motioned to the tongue of the trailer. I can't describe the feeling of realizing that your home is no more, realizing that you have no place to sleep, no place for your kids to play. Then, knowing that I had to go back to our tent and tell Chip, who was sleeping with the kids. I have no desire to live those following weeks again, ever. Losing a home is not just a monetary nightmare, or a logistically issue, it goes to all parts, mind, heart, soul........the soul especially.

Then two weeks later, Chip got fired, and not because he did anything wrong or broke a rule, but simply because some people really are evil. It was salt on a gaping wound. Chip lost most of his friends and his name was tarnished just to cover someones lies. I am still amazed and scared of the fact that there can actually be people who have that much vileness in them, that much anger and hatred.

One of the hardest things is people not giving credit to what this involves, acting as if it's no big deal, it was only a trailer. I lost my faith for awhile, and my compassion. As hard as it is to admit, losing my compassion was more alarming. My faith came back, through prayer, especially the prayers of others. Compassion too, but it wanes. On days when I have had to continually remind people of how hard it is to wake up to a destroyed home (then have your income taken away), my compassion is gone, on others, I try to remember how much worse it could have been, offering my misery for them. Mostly I'm just tired of being kicked to the ground. Tired of being pushed aside by those who should care but don't.

Three months later, life is hard, real hard. It's pretty miserable actually. There's very little to look forward too. Winter is looming. It's going to be cold and long. Plus Christmas, it breaks my heart to even think about that. Paul is old enough to KNOW what goes with that, but not old enough to understand why it won't happen this year.

Today was a rough one. Nothing huge happened, just a bunch of small stuff. Sad news from a friend about her mom was especially troubling. Normally at night, at least I have the feeling of 'we made it through another day', so it's not a sad ending, but today, it's this lonely, empty feeling. I don't know if it was just the events of the day, the foreshadowing of a conversation this morning, or just a melancholy mood. The foreshadowing conversation is scary, though it could be good in the end. I am just ready to be settled, ready to not have a huge mountain to climb, ready to have a home, not just a place that holds a kitchen and a bathroom. Wish I could find the fix for that.

Walking

Dolores trying out her walking skills :)

Dolores is ONE!

Okay, it was on the 6th, but it took me awhile to get the pictures all downloaded. :)  We had a little family thing at the state park here. 

I can’t believe she is one!  It has gone so fast.  As for stats for her, she’s crawling, all over the place, and has taken a few random steps, but not anything regular.  LOVES our teeth and hates having socks on her feet!  She has decided that she’s too busy during the day to stop and nurse, so is nursing mostly all night long, makes for a tired mom, very tired.  I think I am more tired than when she was new :).  Today I am trying to just make her pause and sit with me to nurse, even if for a little bit, maybe after a few days of this she’ll go back to nursing mostly during the day and sleeping at night like she used to!  Dolores loves to do whatever her brother is doing, he’s not so keen on that all the time.

Here are some pictures from her birthday.  I especially love the perplexed look on her face when she first is touching the cupcake trying to figure it out. :)

Finger painting

Today Paul found the finger paints so we tried them out.  Paul had a blast, Dolores did not at all like them.  Screamed!  I tried to get handprints of both of them, but she was not happy about it.  I think I did get enough of one.  Have a few pictures to share from the painting and also from the last few days.

Paul’s tower of blocks.  He was so, so proud!  He got the people on there and asked me to take a picture.

 

Paul wanted me to take his picture after taking them of the tower.  

Dolores tonight, almost one year old!  Just 7 days, I can’t believe it.  I finally found a way to get rid of red eye! 

 

Her smiling!  Yes, she’s holding an empty can of daddy’s special camo beer! :)

Coming after the camera, but so cute!

 

Paul wanted in on the picture taking, with his own empty can, they love those things!

 

Below is the pictures of the paintings that Paul did.  The first one is Paul in the green and Dolores in the red/orange, her feet in the middle.  She was so not happy about this!  I didn’t push it more to get good prints.  I would have taken some of Paul after painting, but he took his clothes, so no way to edit that!

Trying to make the best

We have been sick for like 2 weeks.  I just finally started to feel better and the kids got mostly unsnotty and now I’m feeling sick again.  NOT happy, at all.  We don’t go anywhere, so have no idea how in the world I could be sick again.  Hoping it’s nothing at all and goes away with a good nights sleep!

Yesterday was a rough day.  The kids and I are all short of sleep for various things, and so I sent us to bed at 9, which is crazy, crazy early for us!  We were asleep by 10, only for me to be woken again by the dang dog.  Between those dogs and Dolores I am up way more than I’d like to be a night.  Add in one of the dogs having horrible bowel issues that took place three times yesterday and then three times again at night.  I finally gave up cleaning and today banished her outside and scrubbed the crates, carpet and wall. 

So today I decided to take the advice that I so often tell people and also myself, that of today is a new day.  For being as short on sleep as I ended up being, I did well today and didn’t even start to feel tired until just about an hour ago!  It’s been so nice to be keeping up with the basic household chores, it really makes a difference in mood to only have a days worth of work to do, not a weeks.  Makes the small stuff that I’d like to get done easier to get done, and also not as big a deal if it doesn’t because what HAS to be done is done.

Today ended up being a good day.  It was sunny and finally not windy!  The kids played outside most of the day, and I sat there with them for a large part of it, it was nice to not have something pressing that I needed to get done (again, keeping up with the basics helped there!).  Now I’m ready for bed!  Got a few hours before then.

A return

Goodness, it's been longer than I wanted. The day after my last post we went to the zoo. Paul had a blast. Dolores had fun too, but she's probably too young to really understand a zoo, just had fun smiling at people and playing :). I have a few pictures, but not on here yet to post. The next day the cold that won't die, fell upon us, or me mostly, the next day Paul too. It just won't go away! Sunday I lost my voice, or at least a usable voice. I think I may be getting it back today. Paul's still a little drippy, and thankful (thank you breastfeeding!) Dolores only got a few sniffles! Chip has had it for a few days too. I am read to be normal again!

Okay, blogger just told me I can't upload pictures, so I guess I wouldn't be sharing the zoo pictures even if I had them all ready!

Tired!

All this lack of sleep is catching up with me, I am so tired! We mostly had a good day in spite of it. Paul has been really challenging lately, feeling like I don't have the tools to handle him. This is the difficulty of not having many people to talk to who also desire gentle discipline! No one to bounce ideas off of!

Dolores really started to stand on her own the last few days (she's just over 11 months). She would do it before, but not on purpose, now she does it and sees what she can do.

Today we took a very, very long walk, it was probably close to 3 miles, that is a lot for me! Pushing the double. We walked to dollar general, rather than across the highway to the grocery store. There was holiday weekend lake traffic, I don't think I would have gotten across there! Plus I wanted to see how long it would take to go to dg, and if it was doable. It went okay, I didn't even know that it had been so long until I checked the time, 1.5 hours! But that included being in the store and stopping several times on the way home for passing cars and picking up dropped stuff. Not to bad, at least I thought. I used to walk a mile in 15 minutes, but that was a brisk pace and not pushing 100 pounds of kids/stroller, and I'm about 70 pounds heavier too. It is something I'd do again.

We also set up our zoo trip for Tuesday! Paul has never been so it'll be fun I think. I hope he does okay. Dolores is still at the 'whatever,as long as I get to nurse, it's all good' phase, so not worried about her. We'll be going with a friend so that'll be nice for me :).