Black Lives Matter

Racism. It's something that I had the privilege of not thinking about for much of my life. I was so steeped in what I now know to be white privilege that I can remember as a teenager being irritated about affirmative action because it seemed unfair, about being confused why my black friend got upset when another girl told her she "acted white" and in more recent years initially not seeing the problem with the phrase "All Lives Matter" in response to the "Black Lives Matter" movement. I am somewhat ashamed of my own ignorance but at the same time, I recognize that this ignorance is just a part of the white privilege I was raised in. I have amazingly loving parents and my mother is a great empath who always taught me to love and serve others, to recognize their hardships, and do my part to try to alleviate them. However, while I remember many conversations about socioeconomic inequality, the struggles of immigrants, mental health challenges for the homeless, etc, I do not remember having those types of conversations about race and particularly about the systemic racism that is still alive and well in the United States today. It is quite possible that those conversations happened but I do not remember them. I am trying to be better now about recognizing my own privilege and I want to teach my children not to be colorblind but to actually be allies to people of color. Because systemic racism, as I keep learning more and more, is a big problem here in the United States. Just this past week, a man named George Floyd was killed by a white police officer for no reason other than the color of his skin. It is atrocious, it is horrific and it has led thousands of people in cities across the United States to protest, in some cases violently, police brutality and systemic racism. And it has led me, a white, upper-middle class woman, to wonder how to be an ally to people of color within my own sphere of influence and what I should be doing to fight systemic racism. Because just being nice to my black neighbors is not enough. Because just being "not racist" myself is not enough. I know that there is a lot that I don't know. I know that I am a newbie to this conversation but I want to be better and I want to raise my kids to know better and to be better.

Those are some of the thoughts that have been weighing on my mind this last week. With Coronavirus still raging throughout the world and our family still sheltering in place (although much of TX is opening up and returning to "normal" life) it is easy for me to feel down and overwhelmed. There is so much bad that is happening right now and so little that I have control over. It makes me wonder if we are farther into the "last days" than I thought. Or maybe this is just the tip of the iceberg? It scares me to think about the challenges my children will face in their lifetimes. I try to hold on to the faith and sentiment expressed in some of my favorite songs "Love Wins" by Carrie Underwood and "Most People Are Good" by Luke Bryan. When I am feeling like there is too much bad in the world is when I know that I need to take a step back. Take a step back from social media and the news trying to always get my attention with the shock and awe of the latest tragedy or injustice. Take a step back and recenter myself on what I can control, like those positive conversations with my children around the dinner table and the service I can do within and around my own home.

And it is possibly with that effort to maintain control over the things I can control that I have continued in my somewhat overenthusiastic effort to diy everything around our house! I finished installing the new light fixtures in our bathroom (with associated drywall patching, retexturing and painting), Eric and I made some beautiful Restoration Proclamations for our ministering families and yesterday we tackled the back yard! Together, the kids, Eric and I transformed a 24 foot x 3 foot patch of sod into a garden of salvia and lantana to help out the pollinators. I chose the salvia and lantana based on three qualifications: I wanted a native plant, resistant to rabbits (because hello we have a ton of bunnies!) and that would attract bees and butterflies. I think I met all three qualifications with the plants I chose and I am so excited that we were able to pull the whole project off in one day! It was super hard work and we got pretty sunburned and more bug-bitten but at least we're one and done! Now here's to hoping the plants survive and thrive.

Finished for now! Still on the docket for someday: re-epoxy the sinks, paint the cabinets, paint the walls, re-tile the floor (slate herringbone hopefully!), new soaker tub, expanded and re-tiled shower!

It was so bright out and I'm pretty sure I sweated enough to fill buckets! 

We also got a new tree for the yard! We chose a lacebark elm. 

On another positive note, we celebrated sweet Emery Mae's second birthday this week! My baby girl is quickly growing up into a big girl! And my heavens but she is so two already! She is very independent and likes to do everything herself. She's very interested in the potty and she likes to take herself to the bathroom, take off her pants and diaper and sit on her little Elmo potty seat although she never actually does anything. Thanks to her speech therapy she is also talking a lot now and expressing things in little sentences rather than single words! She calls Levi "EE-III" and some of her favorite things to say are "my turn" and "no ow"(no help) meaning she doesn't want you to help her. She also calls buckles "bubbles" and icecream "iii!" and she is just the cutest thing. We got Emery two new baby dolls for her birthday and the grandparents got her lots of accessories and she LOVES taking care of her babies. She puts them down for naps and feeds them and pushes them around in their little stroller and it is just adorable. She also insists on sleeping with all her babies now which is so cute but seems so uncomfortable because she tends to end up sleeping on top of them! And when she wakes up in the morning she calls to me saying "Mama! Done!" as in "I'm done sleeping now, come get me!!" Haha. I love her so much!

In keeping with tradition, Emery's birthday cake incorporated strawberries! This year a deliciously moist chocolate cake with strawberry buttercream frosting (made with freeze-dried strawberries) and chocolate ganache. It was amazing!

Baby girl LOVED the chocolate covered strawberries but I'm pretty sure she just ate the frosting off the cake and didn't actually eat any bites of the cake itself Haha

She likes to hold both her new babies while I read them all a bed-time story.

Then she takes them to bed and shelters them like a mother hen. It's adorable.

Anyway so yeah, that's what's been going on here. We've decided to hold off on sending the kids back to their Montessori school till July and so life will probably just continue as it has been for a little while longer. Although Eric and I are feeling ready to maybe let the kids do a play date or two with other friends in an open space like a park. We are really missing Eric's family and will probably try to let little cousins get together at least once this month. And my parents are planning on coming out in July which is super exciting and I can't wait! Also this month we will celebrate Eric's birthday and Father's day so the quarantine-style our-family-only parties continue!

So I gave myself a little Target shopping therapy last Saturday and got the kids new summer sandals and I found this sun hat for Emery in the dollar section and she LOVES it. She insists on wearing it almost every day! Haha.

The playgrounds have re-opened here in TX and the kids and I are very grateful. This picture totally sums up their personalities. Levi is looking a little nervous to be so close to edge but very sweet and thoughtful meanwhile Emery is practically diving in with enthusiasm! She's definitely a thrill seeker!

 

Poor Levi ended up with poison ivy this past weekend! I don't react to poison oak or poison ivy so I didn't recognize it and unfortunately because it was Memorial Day weekend, Levi had to wait three whole days with the itchy rash before I could take him in to the doctor! Getting him to take his medicine (oral steroids) was nigh on impossible at first! Poor kid totally psyched himself out and would not drink it! Total stubborn refusal with much tears and even puking it up when we tried to force it down his throat! Thankfully my husband is much sweeter than I am and finally figured out a trick to get him to drink it: put one straw in the medicine and one in a big cup of cold water and have him drink from both straws simultaneously! For some reason this worked and since they figured that out Levi has been taking his meds and the rash is going away. 

Levi and I like to play games together during Emery's naptime if I have time. This day we actually managed to do a whole Ticket To Ride game before she woke up! He was so happy about it but such a goof when I asked to take his picture with the board! 

Can't believe Emery's hair is long enough to braid now!

Our friends the Hirsts moved here to TX!! We are so excited to have them close by again once things are cleared for us to actually get together with them! I asked for their address and we went and wrote a welcome sign for them in chalk in front of their new house the night before they moved in  :) 

Levi has recently gotten really into sorting all his toys by color. This picture was taken right after he mostly mixed them all up again but you can kind of see the color pile remnants. 

My sweet boy has also gotten really good at coloring inside the lines! I love how happy and proud of himself he looks in this picture! 

Eaten Alive

So May has turned out to be attack of all the bugs. It started with just a few mosquito bites. Then I got some fire ant bites. And then I just kept waking up with more and more bites until two days ago when my entire legs exploded with TONS and TONS of little red dots that quickly swelled and grew into intensely itchy torture spots. After checking our bed for bed bugs, getting an exterminator out to check for bed bugs and talking to my mom, my mother-in-law and all of my sisters-in-law, we have decided that these most recent bites are most likely the result of chiggers. TONS of happy, invisible little buggers who invaded my legs and torso while I played innocently on the back lawn with the kids. Thankfully the kids only ended up with a couple of bites each and Eric got a few on his legs but no one has it anywhere nearly as bad as I do. I seriously look like I have chicken pox all over my chest, back and legs. It's the worst and makes me feel like TX hates me and I should just go back to the West Coast. And I am paranoid that they somehow got into our house and are attacking me from my clothes, the bed, the carpet, the couch, anything! I've showered multiple times, scrubbing at my legs and torso, changed clothes and garments, I stripped our bed and washed all our bedding on hot and dried it on hot and vacuumed our whole house and haven't been on the lawn in several days and yet it seems like more bites keep popping up! It's frustrating and scary and I just want it to stop.

Progression of the bites. From just a few small (but still VERY itchy) bites on my ankles and wrist to...

The appearance of tons of red dots which over the course of a few hours...

Swelled up and became intensely itchy! 

Until today when the swelling has gone down but the number of bites still seems to be increasing and spreading on my legs and on my torso and the itching is still intense! 

To make matters worse, I consulted with a  teledoc who prescribed some cortisone cream and an oral steroid to take if needed but they sent it to the wrong pharmacy!! Not the CVS that I asked them to send it to which is right by my house but instead a lame pharmacy across town that closes at like 5 pm on weekdays and isn't open on the weekends! So I haven't even been able to pick up the meds I need! I've been trying all sorts of other things to help the itching but nothing else has been super effective. Apple cider vinegar, baking soda bath, ice, OTC hydrocortisone and oral Benadryl. The swelling has gone down (probably mostly thanks to the Benadryl) but nothing seems to make much a dent in the itching! I kind of feel like because I was starting to get too comfortable with the whole staying home and sheltering in place thing that God decided to make it tough on me again :(

Anyway...rant about the bug bites over. This month so far, (other than the bugs), has been fine. Eric and I have gotten a lot of things done for our house. We got the new faucets installed in our bathroom and I am halfway through putting in our new light fixtures (the brackets have been mounted and the holes in the wall that were uncovered when I removed the old lights have been patched but still need to be textured and painted). Also, our new couch and chair and accent pillow for the living room came! Yay!! And Eric and I finished designing and ordered some 18x24 new Restoration Proclamations for us and the families we minister too. I've already cut and sanded the wood for those as well so I just have to stain and seal them and they will be ready to go! I am so grateful for our house and that it keeps me busy doing things I like.

Work is going well, my caseload is growing and my patients are improving. And the kids are settled into their routine of going to Dawnelle's house and seem to enjoy it there. Emery is also progressing a lot with her speech and uses a lot of two word phrases now (although she can still be pretty hard to understand). My favorite new thing she does is that she says our names when she wants to get our attention to say something! For example, the other day at dinner, Eric and I were talking to each other or to Levi or something and then Emery said loudly, "Mama! Da! Buba!" And pointed enthusiastically out the window at our nightly dinner guests- the bunnies in our yard :). And she has started calling for Levi sometimes when she wakes up in the morning. I hear her over the monitor going "EEE-III! EEE-II!" Haha. It's so precious and yet I always hurry up there to shush her before she actually wakes her brother up because she always wakes up before him and he is a total grouch if he gets up as early as she does!

So anyway, that's what's going on. I can't believe my little girl will be 2 years old in just 10 days!! My mind is totally blown by that! We ordered her a set of twin baby dolls for her birthday because she is such a nurturer and loves to take care of people. I can't wait to see if she loves them! I'm going to do everything I can to make her birthday special for her even though we can't throw her a party. Hopefully some day we will be able to get together in person with other people again and then we will have to have a big birthday bash to make up for me and Levi and Emery's all lost birthdays.

Just a little girl taking her doll out for a walk.

A couple weekends ago I took Levi with me out to the ranch to return Papi's clamps to him and we got to meet all the new baby horses that have been born this spring! 

They were all soo cute and friendly and came right up to the fences and let us pet them! I just love horses and I felt super lucky we happened to be out at the ranch at a time to catch so many of them being kept up by the barn with their mamas!

While I was on the phone trying to schedule our piano tuning, which took 25 minutes (!) because the guy was such a chatter, the kids decided to dump their playroom into the kitchen. It was crazy! 

Typical evening occurrence these days, chilling outside together as a family after dinner. Which we will not be doing again until we treat our lawn for fire ants and chiggers!!! 

Piano finally 100% done and tuned! I am in love with it!! The piano tuner was quite the character and I'm sorry to say it but a bit of a misogynist. BUT he did tune the piano and so there's that. 

Emery's independence continues to develop. She wants to do everything herself! Put on her shoes, comb her hair, brush her teeth and get herself snacks out of the fridge she can't open! 

Levi's very first drawing of people that actually look like people! I am so proud of him and look how proud he is of himself! Heart melt. 

These two are my light and my joy today and every day. I love them more than words can say!