Narcoleptic Day

That's what yesterday was...narcoleptic. You would think that I had run a marathon the day before. But that's the thing about Emily's dress...there were no late nights, no marathon sewing because it got down to the wire. I actually managed my time well.

But I still slept all day. I had, in fact, gotten up at about 9:30 but had to move fast to get back to bed 'cause sleep was coming fast!

Times like this I wonder about what I have actually inherited from my illness. For 2 years after that, sleep was in charge. When my body said it was time (2 or 3 times a day), it was to my benefit to make sure I was at least sitting down when I felt it coming because I did not have any choice in the matter...sleep happened. I was once standing just outside the front door, holding 1 month-old Meave, and it hit me, fast! I actually simply fell over into the bushes! I was so scared that Meave might get hurt that I stayed mostly conscious until my neighbor picked me up and I could get us into bed. So weird.

When Meave was 7 months-old, the Donahue clan all went to Disney World. I was awake for 12 straight hours (unheard of for me at the time), until we got to the hotel. Michael and the other parents took all of the kids swimming while I collapsed in bed. During the next few hours, Michael and my sisters-in-law were in and out of the room. I could hear them, and even see them through slits in my eyes...but I could not move. One sil thought I was awake so asked me a question and was completely freaked out when I just laid there like a mummy. I got an earful about how freaky I was the next morning when I finally woke up for breakfast!

So anyway, yesterday was one of those. I am better now.

Pink Eye and Loving Sisters

Maggie has had a painful left eye for the past couple of days. Itchy but no yuckiness. Too much pain this morning so I called the doc to check for pink eye. They "seemed" to confirm it...I think they were not going to take a chance so we got some antibiotic drops. Personally, I think it is a stye...or maybe a cold that is irritating her eye because the diva is really lacking in diva temperament at the moment.

When Meave found out that Maggie was sick, she suddenly came down with a "terrible stomach pain, Mama." Meave has absolutely no problems with schoolwork, so I figured a day off would not hurt her. It was all she could do to make her excitement at getting to stay home with Maggie look like a burp!

So after we see the doc, I am waiting to check out and Maggie has laid her head down on the counter. Meave has been standing on a chair behind her choosing a sticker when I notice that Meave has quietly started stroking Maggie's hair. She says quietly, "You'll feel better soon, Maggie." Bless her heart!

We decide to go eat some lunch...Meave has noticed that Maggie might need some food. Sure enough, as soon as we finish lunch, Maggie has more energy and Meave says, "Look, Mama! Maggie has perked right up!" Where did my 7 yr-old learn to talk like this?

When we get home, I tell Mags she should probably rest...so Meave goes into the bedroom and gets a movie ready and tells Maggie to just lie down and feel better.

Later, Maggie is feeling MUCH better and starts teasing both Meave and Molly with her "infective fingers!" I think the kid really does listen when I tell her not to rub her eyes because she can spread the germs, but man she is getting the biggest kick out of making her sisters squeal.

Later, there they are, 16, 11, & 7...sitting on the couch with Maggie in the middle, cuddled and quiet for a change...taking care of Maggie.

Ever said how much I love my divas?

Do all kids have these moments that fill your heart?

A Blink Moment

You know when you see or hear something that just makes you stop...and all you can do is blink a few times?

There is obnoxious music here...




I truly cannot wrap my brain around this.

A comment on this post delineates the similiarities between this and Irish dance...I see it too. But what I do not see in ID is the push for young girls, babies really, to look and ACT as if they are in their 20's. In ID it can be about the sparkly, and yes over-the-top, presentation. But it is not about teaching my young daughter to move like a stripper, to smile like a doll, to look like the newest video-jockey on E! News! The bloomers on my 16 yr-old cover more than those tiny bathing suits!!!

What I cannot wrap my brain around is the psychology of it...the mind set of the mothers...and what it is doing to the little girls who are told that in order to win a child's beauty pageant she must look, walk, strut, pose, and dance like a grown-up stripper. Ugh.

Kid Knitting: Cable Shrug & Cardigan

This looks like a giant red slug...but it is a shrug for the youngest diva. There are cables there on either side of a moss stitch center.


Here is the slug flayed open...


Here's the cables!

Meave found this yarn in my stash where it has remained buried because it is acrylic, and I have become such a snob about acrylic! But, Meave loved the color and the sparkles, and she decided it would make a perfect "arm thingy" for Christmas. How could I say no? So I made this pattern up...and I am so bored with it already. It would get lost if she was not checking on my progress everyday.

I was at the local craft store for some reason, and I went through the yarn aisle as I usually do. They used to have all sorts of wonderful yarn, but I guess not enough serious knitters frequent the store, so they have scaled back to the usual crap. I have become a bit of a brand snob, too... Red heart, Patons, even Lion Brand I consider to be yarns of last resort. But I found this yarn below...

Patons, wool and soy. So very soft and wonderful! Got it, fooled around with gauge, started this little cardigan. Another one out of my head...one of these days I need to write my patterns down. Christmas present for Meave.


I have resolved to sit and knit every night as there are so many things I could make for Christmas. I do love it, and it is better than snacking!!!

Redskins WON!!!!!!

Like I really care...but Michael is working on the girls. They watch the games with him...and he took them to a game last weekend. What is it about men and taking pictures in direct sunlight?






They came home sunburned...do ya think Meave was ever able to look UP and SEE the game?!?

What a hoot.

Clarity

I woke up from my dream this morning knowing the universe...in that space between dreaming and being awake, I was so clear. And then diva Maggie launched herself on me for a morning hug. As the muddy real world quickly rushed in to obscure the clarity, I said, "Shit," and Maggie replied, "Well, la-di-dah!" kissed me and ran away.

When will they learn that we mothers need to wake slowly, that we are trying to bring the wisdom of the universe through that sleep-wake space so it can function in the real world? Don't they understand that it will only make their lives better?!? So, stop jumping on me in bed!!!!

I actually possessed that clarity once. It came in the first couple of days of recovery after I was hit by a truck while I was jogging. Yeah, there I was, 27 years old, in peak form, getting ready to begin dancing with a ballet company...I had just returned from an incredible summer intensive, and I was a dancing Amazon. Felt the need to go running, and 2 blocks from my house, BAM! Threw me into the intersection, broke my leg...broke my invincible ego.

I really do not remember the hospital. For some reason my "memories" are of my sister Katie in the waiting room with 2 idiot men - my boyfriend and her future husband. I did not witness this, but here is her story as "I remember it": she rushed to the hospital with the 2 idiots in tow. It was hours before she could see me, and, as BOYS are wont to do, the 2 idiots got bored and began mis-behaving. They started throwing things at each other, sparring with rolled up magazines, hitting each other (they were 25 and 27 respectively) and generally acting up until my sister made them sit down on opposite sides of her. She scolded them and told them to behave...which they did for about 5 minutes. And then they turned on her. Her boyfriend, Idiot #1, kept trying to kiss her, and she told him to knock it off. Idiot #2 (my moron), started whispering in her ear on the other side, and she whacked him. All of a sudden, Idiot #2 stuck his finger in her ear at the same time that Idiot #1 stuck his finger up her nose!!!! She smacked them both and stalked off to ask the nurse one more time if she could see me...and this is when she showed up in my ER room in tears. Tears caused by idiot frustration, not by seeing me laying there!!! We dissolved in laughter as she related her waiting room adventure.

So, the clarity...the next few days were a trip. I was on some powerful pain meds, and I was sleeping almost constantly. Something interesting happened while I was sleeping...I would move into that in-between place and stay there. I was very conscious in this solid place. Drug induced? Probably, but here's the thing - I knew peace. I knew clarity. I KNEW. I could not explain any of it, not even to Katie, but that place was so real. There was no fear, insecurity, pain, or ego. And the best part? I still had it when I was completely awake. And I could go back to it when I went to sleep.

Do I still KNOW? No. Over the years it faded, but I could still feel what it had been. Now, all I know is that it happened, but I cannot explain it or even find vestiges of it anymore. My grasp on it was broken when I got sick in 2000, when my brain was creatively re-wired by the high fever and lack of oxygen.

But this morning, it came for a very brief visit. Why now?

My aunt, my father's sister, is very ill. She is in ICU on a ventilator back in California. We all grew up together, her 6 kids, we 5. We were literally one big family, and we did absolutely everything together. And now we are all waiting.

Diva Maggie once lamented that she has had more death in her young life than anyone in her school. She might be right. It all began in 2000 when I almost died. Over the past 7 years, we have lost aunts and uncles, friends and friends babies, about 10 pets (big deal for a kid...we had quite a menagerie for a while there), my father in 2003, Michael's father in 2004, my grandfather at the beginning of this year...this Saturday marks 5 years since my dad had the heart transplant surgery that should have been a miracle. It was, unfortunately, the beginning of the end. And I can't get it out of my mind right now.

It is always a shock when suddenly I miss my father. When suddenly it is as if he just died. We are all missing him so much right now. Everyone, and I mean EVERYONE, counted on Dad's strength, his wisdom, his clarity. Maybe that's what came to visit me this morning. Maybe he is near, waiting for his sister.

Psychosomatic Hypochondria

Seems like a redundant phrase, doesn't it? Psychosomatic Hypochondria...emphasis on the "psycho."



Michael was working from home. The phone rings and he answers. He hangs up and yells, "Since when does Meave have allergies?" I go to the living room and answer, "Never."

"Well, she's been sneezing for the last 20 minutes and they want us to come get her."

Very perplexed, I head off to the school.

I open the office door and hear this explosive series of sneezes...fake ones. I walk in and am greeted by concerned looks from the office staff. I look at my red-faced, sweating 7 year-old, working hard to sneeze her brains out, and, trying hard not to laugh, I say, "Knock it off." And she does.

The office staff are now scraping their jaws off the floor as I lead my cured child out the door for a chat. Something is up.

After a long chat about how she really needs to go home 'cause she her throat now hurts (from sneezing for half an hour) and she has a fever (elevated body temp from the sneezing exercise she has been engaged in), I start leading her back to class. Gotta nip this one in the bud.

I keep asking if something is wrong...somebody being mean? Something freaking her out in class? Is she worried about something? As we near her classroom, she grabs my leg and starts crying about how she just misses me SOOOO MUCH! We discuss the fact that I am always home when she gets there and that when she needs me I show up at school...and her shoulders sag in defeat.

She goes into the class room as her concerned teacher comes out to talk to me.

"I have never seen an allergy attack like that!" she says.

"It was fake," I tell her. After she blinks a couple of times, she bursts out laughing. Meave likes her because she is funny, and I can see now that she has a good sense of humor. We discuss the testing that is going on and how Meave has a perfection complex that rivals my own, blah, blah, blah... As I left, she was smiling, and Meave was working.

As I am leaving the building, I am asked several times about Meave's attack and watch each jaw drop as I say it was fake. The school nurse laughed and said it was the most committed performance she had ever seen. And then she patted me on the back and said, "Good job, Mom!"

When I got home and told Michael why I was without the youngest diva, guess what his jaw did. And he said it was a good thing that I went because he would have believed her. Good divas always believe other good divas.

Oh no...musicals

I am a dancer...I am constitutionally and physically inclined to dance. My husband is an actor...same disposition.

Guess what our children are....musical theatre GEEKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It is just occurring to me at this moment that my daughters are actually the perfect genetic product of their father and myself. And I can't stand it!

(Oh, you know I can...'cause they are mine and I MUST continue to LOVE them...I must, I must...)

They are cleaning the kitchen and the I-pod speakers are blasting. Do they listen to "Sound of Music" or "West Side Story?" Oh, no...it's "RENT." Even little Meave is singing about "dropping her stash"... oh, man.

Have I ever said how much I actually dislike musicals?

How did this happen to me?

Ahh, knitting...

I have been itching to knit the past few weeks, but when I finally have time during the day to organize myself, it is late in the evening...and I no longer actually have the brain power to organize myself. And I really want to be doing something big, but can't seem to figure that out either. Susan did ask if I could make something warm for her noggin this winter, so I have been perusing the patterns. I found this below and am doing a test for Meave...


I told her I like the hole at the top myself and might leave it there. She looked at me like I am such a dork and mumbled, "Yeah right, Mama." Then she snorted at me!



She's been taking notes from Maggie on how to jazz up a photo op.

The hat is called Cap Karma and was designed by Smariek...click that link for her blog, the hat, etc. Thanks, Smariek


And the Pinwheel Sweater is finally done. The yarn is wool and silk from Mystical Creation Yarns...fantastic stuff. So soft, smooth and strong...I had to keep scissors with me on this one because I could not break this yarn with my hands.

Which presents an unusual dilemma...I typically feel that if I cannot break a yarn with my hands then it will not stretch very much...but this sweater is growing!!!

Yes, I did knit it looser than the pattern called for, and it is bigger than the pattern, but the growing has to stop! Molly loves it and has been wearing it. She wraps up in it like a big blanket, but that was not how I envisioned it. I think I am going to try my trick of soaking it, letting it drain mostly dry, and then put it in the dryer for a bit to tighten it up...anyone have an opinion on that?





More about this sweater here: Long Lost Knitting...

On a MUCH Lighter Note...

For a few days on dance.net there were these advertisements for dance poles...from hardcorepoles.com...uh-huh...

So, Susan checked it out and found at that we hard working moms can afford to get one if we put it on layaway!!!!!!!!!!!!! Might be worth it just to get some "Mighty Grip"!!????

Make sure you have your sound on when you click the link (which seems safe...I get every pop-up and weird attachment there is, and nothing else came up with this site).