Fertile Soil

Last November, I attended the Christian Musician's summit and happened to have the opportunity to meet Katherine Scott, a very talented singer/songwriter from Ireland. She had some beautiful songs about life in general and remaining faithful through tough times. During one of her song transitions, she started talking about her own life and mentioned her observation that the "waiting periods" in our lives are God's way of preparing the soil of your heart to plant new seeds. A very Irish saying, but I found it very true.

Bryan and I are in one of these waiting periods. Everything it seems, is falling apart or not working out the way we had planned. We are in a flurry of uncertainty in many different aspects and thus we wait for answers and direction.

And so as we wait, we ask our friends to pray for us as our soil becomes more and more fertile.

Today

Today began at 5:45 am with the ear piercing squall of a toddler who did not yet want to be awake, but who certainly did not want to be asleep alone. She screamed until her father brought her to our bed, where she quickly made herself comfortable between our two bodies, laying vertically to that her head was on him and her feet were shoved into my back.

Soon, she was squirming around, spinning and pressing against the two of us until nobody could sleep anymore and we all decided it was time to get up.

Bryan drove us all into town where I was to have my MRI. However, upon arrival it was determined I had already had an MRI in the hospital (I have little recollection of much of my hospital stay) and thus the doctor had decided to cancel the MRI and await further instructions from the neurologist. In the meantime I am to continue taking the pills and not drive for fear I will seize again.

Bryan had already left so I had to call him to turn around to pick me up.

We then went to the hardware store to retrieve spray foam for the vents to block the rodent stink from the crawl space until he has the time to go spelunking.

We are home now, he has sprayed the foam, the candles are lit and he has requested that I help him tear out the wall in the garage. I reminded him that I can barely hold a pencil, let alone a hammer, but this seemed to be of little consequence to my husband. So I will go out and cheer him on, but there will be, I assure you, no wall removal by me.

Where I've been

I've been asked why I haven't blogged lately. The long and short of it is that the fan has been hit, the sky is falling, the basket has dropped out.

I suppose things started getting a little dicey when Bryan was part of the Chrysler corporate white-collar lay offs back in November. He quickly found a job @ a local dealership however, and we thought that would be a nice stop-gap until he found a more permanant position. WELL.

Since then, I have also found out I have no job after June thanks to state-wide budget cuts in education. Then, everyone got really sick this winter, one thing after the other until we all had various stages of respiratory infections or pneumonia.

On March 20th I was at work after having been off a few days, but not able to miss any more. I started to feel dizzy and then my eyes rolled back in my head. This was only the beginning; I ended up having seizures and being taken to the hospital via ambulance. That began a two week adventure which continues today. I was diagnosed with non-epileptic seizure disorder and sent to follow up with my regular physicians.

Tomorrow I have an MRI to see if I have MS.

In the meantime, Bryan is working from 8am to at least 9pm (it's currently 10:22pm and he is still at work) Friday-Tuesdays (he has Wednesdays and Thursdays off.) This means we rarely see him and when we do, he's exhausted and frustrated.

Aside from employment and health issues, we had the added bonus this week of discovering our water heater had been spraying water for an indefinate amount of time, flooding our garage and soaking the wall. We now have black mold on two garage walls and need a new water heater. We were blessed to have two friends who volunteered their time and money last night to come and rescue us and stop the leak and replace the tank on the top of the water heater until Bryan has a day off and can work on things.

We also have something dead under our house (in the crawlspace,) and the odor is wafting up through the vent in the living room. This means the entire house reeks of dead animal and will continue to do so until Bryan has time to go spelunking under the house in the crawl space to figure out what smells and get rid of it.

We have been blessed by family and friends however, my cousin and aunt took Evie while I was in the hospital, my friend Anna took the week off to help me out since I was seizing every 30 minutes and needed full-time care and Bryan had no sick time and was in jeopardy of losing his job (and our medical insurance) if he left work. I don't know what we would have done without them all.

Finally, Bryan's Grandmother came to visit and has been here to help out the last few weeks. It was so nice to see her and she was so generous doing laundry and dishes, and helping with general house cleaning and with Evie as I regained my strength so I could go back to work.

Needless to say, it's been a very busy time for all of us, and I have not been on the blog much. Please keep our family in your thoughts and prayers as we continue through this time of continued trial.

Seriously?

Somali pirates took another boat today: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7994980.stm and the American ship captain remains their hostage aboard a small fiberglass lifeboat along their coast. Their plan, apparently, is to continue to take control of merchant vessels, and bring them to the area in order to have more leverage in the stand-off with the Americans. They seem to be trying to get the lifeboat to the Somali shore to gain the maximum leverage.

My question is, why have we not just taken them out? I mean I'm all for being pragmatic, but seriously, they are holding one of our people hostage and taking more people around the world hostage and getting away with it. At what point do we say enough is enough?

Just yesterday the French decided they had had enough and sent in their own commando troops to take back control of a French vessel, they killed the pirates and were able to save the lives of all but one of the hostages. Perhaps I've watched a little too much 24 as of late, but I am really wondering why we haven't sent in our own Navy Seals to get the American captain back. Can we not take a life-boat full of Somali pirates? Really?
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Evie's hideout

First, collect every blanket and pillow you can find and build a nest. Add a pile of cloth diapers for softness and throw a few items from the hamper for good measure.

Second, add a few plush friends and check for softness

Finally, ask your mother to stop taking pictures and leave you alone...you say something like "No picture, go ny-night mommy!" Because you are an example of excellent manners and behavior.