Triplets to Keezletown!

What a special afternoon! We enjoyed the company of good friends and three very special little ones. The pictures are better than many words. They make us smile...a lot!

We've been doing some more food processing lately, some successful and some not so successful. We've now picked apples from 3 of our trees. You heard about the first trial on applesauce - UNSUCCESSFUL at least in producing a quality applesauce. Our second tree gave us a wheelbarrow full of perfect applesauce apples - the kind that makes applesauce just from cooking them down and the victorian strainer is mostly just getting out the seeds. We did about 45 quarts and had some to share with our neighbors. Our third tree is called "honey cider" apples and after unsuccessful attempts at locating a small cider press, we attempted juice yesterday. Not so successful. It seems that the first and third tree share some similar properties, particularly that of not cooking down well. So we ended with 2 measly quarts of juice, one of which did not seal. Jason and Kali may experiment more this week (when I'm not around) as Jason finds this incredibly interesting (and I mostly frustrating!).

Yesterday was a day where I just couldn't settle myself into any kind of rhythm. I felt tired beyond words, emotional about anything and everything, and left with little to no energy for my family or myself. Sometimes it's hard to be gentle with me. Is what I'm feeling related to Nora or not? Would I approach my feelings differently whether or not it is related to Nora?

The one thing I'm certain of is that I need more down time at home. Time to just stand in front of our memory box and let the tears flow freely. Time to engage in imaginative play with Kali and soak in her creative chattering. Time for Jason and I to talk and process and be together. Carving out that time, time free of expectations, is the challenge.

Bike rider!

Kali is now the happy owner of a PURPLE (very purple) bike, thanks to Aunt Karen and Aunt Sue. She is also sporting her orange shirt hand delivered from Beijing by Aunt Sue who just returned from refereeing women's basketball at the Olympics.

Thankfully the only warning on Kali's bike says to wear a helmet, which she is already in the habit of doing. She's become quite a cautious girl these days and after asking Daddy to read the warning on her stuffed animal car seat (a gift from Grandma and Grandpa Myers) which warns you to throw away the car seat if the car is in an accident, she is very clear that she NEVER wants to take a stuffed animal friend in the car with the car seat...

Today a year ago...

8/29/07 I wrote in my journal:

"Today's the big appointment day. It's about 6:40 and I've been trying to sleep since about 6 but I think my mind is too full and I'm thinking a lot about our time with the midwives today...The appointment feels like it will be very significant. I'm hoping it will bring some of the reassurance I'm longing for! But I can't help but wonder how I will feel if it doesn't."

And then after the appointment (in which we learned that Nora was way behind on growth and that they wanted to start monitoring us very closely), a few of the many many words...

"Why now? Why on my only other dreamed of pregnancy? Is it my fault? ... I feel guilty - like this is all my fault. I feel like a failure - like I'm growing a "dud" baby. I feel so sad about how disconnected I feel from this little person and how quickly I can start to experience feelings of bitterness or resentment of this baby who is turning my life upside-down. But it isn't her fault. She was Jason and I's decision. She didn't choose to be created..."

It hurts to read back on these words. On one hand it pains me the things the consumed my mental space and emotions during this time. At that point, I was having the hardest time with the idea of slowing down and of bed rest, of not exercising daily and having control over that area of my life. Somehow now that I know how the full year unfolds, that step seems like a very minor and first step on a journey where I learned more about much deeper levels of letting go, and much more painful ones.

It also hurts because now I miss so badly the little one that I struggled to bond with for awhile. She taught me/is teaching me so much. I miss her just as she was when she left us.

Wonderful friends brought us dinner tonight and we got to talk some about Nora, about us, about how we are living through this time. Those times help us heal and grieve healthily.

Some thoughts from Jason

The recent rain (finally), has kept Kali and I mostly thinking about indoor projects for the past few days, which has brought some disappointment in that the front walk will not be finished as quickly as I had hoped. However, anyone who has ever received an eye exam from a five-year-old in baby blue panties and a purple tutu top is familiar with the compensations. Slowing down is sometimes necessary for me to appreciate what a precious treasure it is to have young children in my life. We’re getting housework and odd forays into the outdoors accomplished also, but it’s still a different pace and feeling from when I am trying to incorporate Kali into meaningful progress on a home improvement project.

Kali will be starting next week at Shenandoah Valley Community School, which is a small school based on a Free School or Unschool model that is available as a full time, accredited school option for children 5-11, but which currently happens to be serving families who wish to combine home schooling with a depressurized, democratic, student-initiated educational setting. That is to say there is a good number of students, but they are all part time. This is the way we will be approaching Kali’s schooling as well, but we have not yet formally signed up as a home school family, since she isn’t required by the state to be formally enrolled anywhere until next fall. The lack of formality has not, of course, prevented the irrepressible flow of questions from Kali’s mind to the nearest trusted ear. Many of her questions are mathematical, such as wondering what two times a google is. She recently counted to three hundred out loud to me, which, since it was the first time she’s gotten past the 120s, was anything but boring for me. Fortunately, she seems to have realized that the system is fairly repetitive once you get the hang of it, and has, at least temporarily, lost interest in further accomplishments in the counting department, sparing me what would surely have become a rather dull exercise in active listening. This is all to say that I feel the Free School model is essentially correct in its assertion--as I understand it--that children actually do want to learn, and usually need less prodding than opportunities and resources. I would add to that that having healthy adult models, especially when they can spend work time together, is an essential ingredient in optimal development. I feel that the most popular lifestyles in our society currently give short shrift to this need, and that school as it is usually configured does little to fill the void.

What school does provide (for most kids) is opportunities for developing friendships, which I feel is also extremely important. We hope that Kali can meet some cool kids at SVCS next week! She has her neighbor Reese and her church friends, as well as some cool cousins, but thus far we have not managed to turn those opportunities into the long hours of negotiated co-existence that I feel are the most foundational. Of course, she is only five, and is just now beginning, I feel, to be really ready to start focusing on peer relationships.

In so much of what I’ve written so far, I can’t help but notice how different this week would have been if Nora had still been with us. We would be accomplishing so much less, would be so much more stressed out, would be so much less present to Kali and her antics, would be aching with the burden of her suffering, and yet we find ourselves wishing it could be. It is still so painful, and yet not to shrunk from, to hear Kali making references to her baby sister almost in the present tense, as if the realization has yet to fully take effect. I passed another milestone in the journey yesterday, when I dusted the shelf under Nora’s picture for the first time since her death. We miss her so much. Jason

Aching...

The ache is so strong again tonight! It's like you want to run away from it and then you want to run to it and then you don't know what to do with it when it hits you in the face all over again. The reminders are everywhere:

Kali wants to make a new toy with the old spools we have. She picks out three red spools and she and daddy devise a plan to make a new one. She nonchalantly says that the other one can be for her little sister if she has a little sister...

I play with a little girl of one of our new students today. We run around the indoor track at EMU. She pretends to pick me up to look out the window. She giggles and chatters and at one point her words remind me exactly of Kali at that age. Will I experience a toddler in our home ever again?

One of our students from Liberia had a baby this summer. The baby came early on June 11th, when he was due end of July. He's now just over two months old and is in the top 50th percentile, cute as a button and clearly thriving. I celebrate Sam's comeback from an early entrance into the world. I mourn Nora's early departure.

Tomorrow

Tomorrow feels like a big day and the start of the "one year ago's." This day one year ago Jason and I were eagerly anticipating our follow up 28 week ultrasound tomorrow. We were hoping for the best and fearing the worst. It was the day that started the roller coaster of unknowns and questions and uncertainties and hopes and fears. I had just made it through two very busy days of orienting new graduate students (as I have just done this year as well). It will be a day of reflecting for sure, in the midst of the busyness. More later! There may be some back dated updates soon :) as I have pictures and more thoughts to share when time affords...