Absence Makes the Mind Go Wander

Been a long time. I wonder how many of you have given up on me? Well, here’s some of the scoop.

As some of you know all too well, we have been dealing with some health issues with my husband. It appears he has early onset dementia. Now we are trying to find out what is causing it. Unfortunately, scheduling the testing has been a pain.

We’ve had some major life-style changes around here, most of them to reduce the amount of stress John has. He can’t process stress well anymore, and it’s not pretty when he goes off. The girls and I have routines in place, and I have some moral support from friends near and far. That helps alot. Right now I am taking this all day by day.

The hardest part has been trying to explain what is happening to the girls. I know it goes over Rachel’s head. I think she knows the basics which is “Dada is sick” and “don’t frazzle Dada”. Of course, she still acts up/acts out and does all the typical four year old stuff that will drive the average parent nuts. But I try to step in as much as I can to re-direct Rachel.

Rachel is learning some self-control; I do think putting her in Pre-K was the smartest thing I’ve ever done. A very structured school environment is helping her learn self-control. Everyone once in a while she will stop herself and yell “Brain, stop it!” when she is acting out. Oh, she’s a creative one.

With Sarah, the best way for me to explain things to Sarah has been to compare Rachel and John. The things Rachel is struggling to learn, her Dada is slowly losing. She gets it.

I think Sarah may be, in reality, a 35 year-old Chinese woman in that 8-year old exterior. I work hard to keep her from thinking she is now second in command in the house. She is a big help to me — actually both girls can be. Sometimes when I’m at the end of my rope, one or both of them will bring me a little hand-made snack (yeah, PB, crackers and cheese!), a Coke, or they will do something like pick up our bedroom. Or give spontaneous hugs.

They are good kids — even when they drive me absolutely nutty.

For those of you on Laddie Watch, he hasn’t had an attack for two months now. He is just enormous — almost twice as big as Sydney. This, of course, gives Sydney conniptions. He’s learned to jump on my computer chair. For all I know, he has his own blog. Who knows what these dogs do when I’m not home.

We officially said goodbye to the Diaper Genie. Rachel has been pull-up free for a month now, and before that was staying dry at night for a month. It is a relief to not have to deal with Genie parts, pull-ups, etc. That was 7 years of my life. Oy.

I had a pretty good birthday on the 4th. A friend watched the kids for the afternoon and a chunk of the evening. I was able to make significant progress on my grading, and then John took me out for birthday dinner. We were all back at the ranch by 8 pm.

One very nice surprise has been the outcome of my participation in Club Scrap’s Birthday Card Club. Since July, I have been making birthday cards for club members. It’s been a fun enterprise. Most of the cards I make border on the goofy/bad pun side. Any wonder?

This month, I’ve been on the receiving side of club. Every day, I’ve received at least one card, some days up to seven cards. These are all hand-made cards — all lovely. They make me all warm and fuzzy. That’s not a feeling I get very often.

On my crafty blog, A Scrapper’s Thoughts, I created a Flickr gallery of the cards I’ve scanned so far. Please feel free to head over to that blog and take a look at the wonderful artwork of the club.

Well, this is quite enough for now. I’d much rather write about the goofy things than the hard stuff. I do promise to update more often, now that I’ve gotten the big chunk off my mind.