“When the cat’s away, the mice will play,” as the saying goes and we sure did ‘play’ while the teens were gone last weekend! I’m sure they thought they were the ones having fun and enjoying a get-away, but joke’s on them because we thoroughly loved the quieter conditions in which we found ourselves. Having just the three youngest at home made certain adventures more doable than if our whole crew was around. It should go without saying that, as a mother, I will always love having all of my offspring under the same roof as much as possible, but only when I also have duct tape and zip ties on hand. Just wishing, I mean, kidding! Just KIDDING.

It all started with a BBQ supper Danny cooked up for us, the first of the season as there was finally a break in the rainy weather. Thanks to a Dairy Queen gift card Caleb received, we had the perfect excuse to go out for dessert. While the three kids worked off the sugar rush running up and down the hill behind the restaurant, Danny and I were able to talk uninterrupted for at least fifteen minutes and forty-five seconds, which was especially wonderful because he’s had to travel so much recently that getting in quality conversation has been pretty tough. 

The next evening the kids convinced (read: begged) us that a round of mini-golf and Go-Karting would be the best way to spend many of our dollars. The weather behaved, the kids mostly behaved, but the golf balls and courses most certainly did not! Whoever engineered the course needs a course in engineering. Those of us with even a small bit of talent saw our balls roll into corners crowded with everyone else’s balls and skip over the edges of the holes when we all knew they’d ordinarily have gone in, but fun was definitely had. Surprisingly, I won, but Danny got to hold the winning hand. 🙂 👫

Go-karting was short but definitely sweet. While Anna has enjoyed this activity in the past and remembers it, this was the first time she was tall enough to drive a car alone. James had also been a passenger before but did not remember the ride, and Caleb had never had the privilege in any capacity. Since James did not come in first, or second, or third, or second to last in mini-golf, we decided he should ride with Danny, considerably upping his chances of winning the race. Caleb would go with me, and Anna would experience a solo initiation to the world of driving. 

The light turned green and we were off—to a crawl. Caleb’s nerves got the best of him as he shouted for me to “slow down, slow down!” We were left in the proverbial dust as all the other cars whizzed around us, then lapped us. Like all good drivers should, I gave Caleb my phone so he could take photos or videos as we looped around the course at a staggering speed of five miles an hour. And I’m so glad I did. Because it’s the law, you guys. But also because the pictures in my phone are now some of my most treasured photos. I hope you enjoy the following photos taken by my seven year old as much as I do:

Since we’ve had more rainy days than not recently, entertaining the idea of going outside for an excursion on July 4 was more laboriously discussed this year, but I’m so glad we decided to go ahead and spend the day out. It was a warm, if not muggy, day and the sun played hide-and-seek for most of it. 

Though it means a lot of work for Danny, going on the boat is quickly becoming one of my most favorite pastimes. And though it’s not really meant to function as a family boat, we revel in being together on it. This day was no exception. I’m not sure I can properly describe the way the sky and water matched each other in their striations of shady blues and tarnished silver or how the straight line of the horizon was the only solid shape amidst the blurriness of the air above us and the smooth, dark carpet of liquid beneath us, but suffice it to say, it was so calm, so beautiful, and so invigorating.

(Pictures DO NOT do justice to the beauty.) 

The kids relished every seal sighting and I savored every squeal of delight, the wind in my hair, the peacefulness of cruising on open ocean without another vessel in sight, and my husband’s patience and selflessness in facilitating this opportunity for us. Something about being out on the water makes one happily exhausted and we were all in bed before the fireworks could light up the darkening sky. 

As another saying goes, “All good things must come to an end” and with the arrival of our teens, it did. It was back to the daily grind, but after such a refreshing weekend, my spirit was buoyed and these precious moments are now cherished memories. 

One might think there haven’t been any updates in awhile because I’ve been so busy, but one would be wrong. During this last month, I’ve been doing a lot of avoiding actually. Avoiding cleaning out the playroom, avoiding switching the kids’ clothes over from winter to summer (though with weather like this, sometimes sweatshirts and pants have been warranted), avoiding going anywhere I absolutely don’t have to go, avoiding any number of other chores, errands, excursions that probably should be accomplished, and avoiding updating a certain site. Through all the hard work of doing nothing, I’ve now become quite a pro.

While I’ve been busy with nothing, the kids have continued to ask me every single day, without fail, what’s for supper. They are keeping up their end of the family bargain of needing me as soon as I sit down, yelling into a room when I’m on the phone, and leaving as many reminders of their presence in every nook and cranny of the house as possible. They practice music before 8:00 AM, raucously conduct rollerblading hockey games for all the neighbors to hear, request rides for pool playdates, decide anytime after 10pm is the right time for a deep discussion, and some even have the audacity to say they need to be driven to work. 

If you think all of that sounds bad, here’s a short story that’s worse:

There had been a very emotionally and mentally disastrous occasion one evening with one of our children. This unexpected situation was so out of the ordinary and my heart was crying out to the Lord for grace and help. Going to bed with the situation not quite resolved was definitely one of the harder things I’ve had to do lately. 

The morning didn’t seem to bring any new mercies that I could see with my clouded vision. Not only was there no repentance, but now some of my other children were acting out and I was standing in my kitchen wishing for a tropical vacation for one.  Or a redo on parenting–about five year’s worth! Sometime mid-morning, there was a loud crash and then a sprinkling sound coming from the pantry door. Not wanting to immediately rush over to the scene of the crime, both for the sake of the guilty child and myself, I called out, “What spilled?”  

“This thing,” my littlest one replied, holding up my 12” cake pan, “fell over and now there are eyeballs all over the floor.” Naturally. If you don’t have candy eyeballs in the closet that can easily be spilled all over the floor, can you even see the Lord’s mercy in your life? All I could do was laugh and recognize that it was the Providential comic relief I needed in that moment. 

I’m happy to report an apology was issued by the child with the attitude and forgiveness given in return, but I’m leaving some candy eyes on the floor of the pantry. I’m bound to need the sweet reminder of God’s love and care to His own all too soon.

Now that I’ve updated this, I can go back to doing nothing. 

You hear the admonition, “get a second opinion”, a lot when it comes to medical prognoses. Since we listened to Dr. Google first, we figured it was wise to get advice from a real, practicing neurosurgeon before we put all our faith in search result #4. Which turned out to be a good idea because her perspective over the information, symptoms, and scan results was calm, conservative, and competent. 

While Caleb certainly has Chiari Malformation and while there is a bit of fluid around the tip of the spinal column, she isn’t convinced the headaches are caused by these issues. Certain positions of his head didn’t trigger on-the-spot aches in a way that they typically would if you were getting headaches from pressure caused by build-up of cerebrospinal fluid and the crowding of the area by the cerebellar tonsils. 

The doctor would like him to have another scan in six months to catalog any changes, this time with more detail of the spinal canal. Meanwhile, we are to get an appointment with an ophthalmologist to rule out sight issues and continue treating the symptoms on an as-needed basis.  I know I should be happy that Caleb doesn’t need surgery at the moment, but the waiting game is so hard for me. 

Generally, I’m not a go-getter, mission-oriented kind of person like my husband is (how did we end up together?), but now that I know there is a medical issue and my child is suffering, I’m ready to storm the hospital and lay him on the MRI table myself tomorrow. I need answers now and I need Caleb to feel better! I would like to stop asking him his ‘number’ (on the pain scale) every time he asks for medicine. I would like for him to get better sleep and not fall down all the time. I’d like to know definitively if he needs glasses or surgery. I would like to not go through tribulation to gain patience! Please pray that I can rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, and continue in prayer and that Caleb will have a measure of relief from his maladies.