It's easy to get caught up in the hustle and bustle of Christmas and it can easily become a stressful time of the year instead of a joyful one. In our family, we know that Faith does best when her normal routines are kept and the fewer surprises the better. We really tried our best this year to keep everything as low-key as possible and do less for Christmas than we have in the past. This included less shopping, less baking, and less activities in general.
Instead of baking Happy Birthday Jesus cupcakes this year for Faith's teachers and caretakers, I found these cute cupcake Christmas tree ornaments and I wrote on the bottom of each one "Happy Birthday Jesus 2013"
In the end, all I really wanted for Christmas was for the three of us to go our Christmas Eve service at church and while Faith wasn't willing at first, eventually she relented. The next day since opening Christmas gifts is outside of her normal routine, we had to actually coax her to open the gifts. Hard to believe for a 10-year-old, I know. Going to church and opening gifts was enough Christmas for her.
Me and Faith and our matching "Bison Nation" T-shirts
Daddy and Faith opening gifts on Christmas morning
Although I tried to coax her into going to our family gathering at Grandma and Grandpa's, she had simply had enough of doing things outside of her routine and did not want to go. Instead of the battle escalating to an all-out screaming fit, I just let it go. Of course I was disappointed but I ended up having a great time with my family!
My sisters bought everyone these funky holiday shirts and we all put them on for our family photos. It was a lot of fun to see what kind of shirt everyone got. Both my parents got Duck Dynasty shirts that say, "Duck the Halls" and they got my brother a sweater that we all thought was ugly but decided it actually looked pretty good on him! We also ate lots of yummy food and played a hilarious board game called "Loaded Questions." There was certainly no shortage of fun and laughter!
Having fun with the family in our awesome holiday shirts!
This year, I learned that by doing less and having less stress makes for a much Merrier Christmas. Not only that but it also allows us to focus on the real reason for the season - the birth of our Savior.
Dear Faith, Maybe Faith is much wiser that the rest of us who have to go to every extreme to make it a dazzling time!! We eat too much sugar and rich food and wonder why we feel ill!! We stay up too late, shop too hard etc. No wonder there is a let down afew days later!! Through the years it has gotten much quieter here. The kids are grown but none married so they are home every holiday so that means I am always cooking!! I go abit over board with decorating the house. My depression days, though taught me that alot of light is a good way to ward off depression in these dark winter days. I do no baking, all my shopping was pretty much online. I had the Christmas children's service to plan in church. We are so tiny we only have four kids right now but there are tiny ones coming up!! That was stressful with the younger moms full time workers I had to take over. Christmas Eve was our final practise and even then noone had tried on costumes to know what fit!! It was a real chaotic time with things changing right up til the program was to start. On the way to church I still had to walk into the barn in my good clothes and get manger hay!!! Some lines were forgotten. One nervous little seven yr old pulled off his tie and sent his halo flying! The first bit they were all angels of Christmas, but were far from angels otherwise!! Some lines were missed, they sang loudly but off pitch, but some how I have to think Jesus gets s chuckle at our meager attempts at perfection!!! It was a great Christmas anyway! Now for some rest!!
Today marks Faith's 8th day of school and we are all adjusting to a new schedule. Faith has made huge strides this past summer in sleeping better and having more energy so we decided to have her go to school from 9:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. 5 days a week. This is a change as last year she did not go Tuesday and Thursday afternoons due to how tired and worn out she would get. Faith's first day of 4th grade School starts at 8:30 a.m. but we asked if it would be okay for us to get her there at 9:00 instead. This allows us to more time to get her first feeding into her before she even gets to school. Her aides noticed last year that when we brought her to school without any food in her tummy, she was pretty sluggish and tired upon arrival. Sometimes, after getting her to school she wouldn't start getting her feeding until after 9:00 a.m. which meant, that because she gets a feeding every 3 hours, her last feeding of the day didn't end until 10:00 p.m. Another advantage to
Last Wednesday I had my yearly doctor exam and when she said I should get my tetanus shot updated, I didn't think twice about it. The nurse said my arm would be sore for a couple of days, gave me a handout and stuck the needle in my arm. The next day my arm was sore and although I found it a little harder to pick up and carry Faith, I was glad the pain wasn't going to last long. Boy was I wrong! But not only was my arm sore, my whole body was. I felt achy and extremely tired. According to a medical site on the Internet, these were mild side effects of the Tetanus shot. If these were only mild side effects, I would really hate to have them at a moderate or severe level. On Friday, two days after getting the shot I felt so tired that I took a four hour nap after getting Faith off to school. Then on Saturday I took a three hour nap up until 7 o'clock but still felt tired and was able to go back to sleep around 10. On Sunday, finally the fatigue started wearing off and I didn
Today we said goodbye to our Special Tomato adaptive car seat. And special it was. It helped Faith stay safe and secure in our Hyundai driving her back and forth to therapy appointments, shopping excursions and many other activities. It also helped us through our time of not being able to afford an accessible van. Like all adaptive equipment , the special car seat was expensive and although it is the law that a child is secured in a car seat while traveling in a vehicle, neither health insurance nor Medicaid would pay for it. Thankfully, we were able to receive funds from the fundraiser, the Great American Bike Race ( GABR ) which helps families pay for services and equipment that insurance doesn't cover for kids with cerebral palsy and related disabilities. After doing research on the Internet and talking to Faith's physical and occupational therapists, we decided to go for the Special Tomato adaptive car seat. You would think something with that name would be r
Dear Faith,
ReplyDeleteMaybe Faith is much wiser that the rest of us who have to go to every extreme to make it a dazzling time!! We eat too much sugar and rich food and wonder why we feel ill!! We stay up too late, shop too hard etc. No wonder there is a let down afew days later!! Through the years it has gotten much quieter here. The kids are grown but none married so they are home every holiday so that means I am always cooking!! I go abit over board with decorating the house. My depression days, though taught me that alot of light is a good way to ward off depression in these dark winter days. I do no baking, all my shopping was pretty much online. I had the Christmas children's service to plan in church. We are so tiny we only have four kids right now but there are tiny ones coming up!! That was stressful with the younger moms full time workers I had to take over. Christmas Eve was our final practise and even then noone had tried on costumes to know what fit!! It was a real chaotic time with things changing right up til the program was to start. On the way to church I still had to walk into the barn in my good clothes and get manger hay!!! Some lines were forgotten. One nervous little seven yr old pulled off his tie and sent his halo flying! The first bit they were all angels of Christmas, but were far from angels otherwise!! Some lines were missed, they sang loudly but off pitch, but some how I have to think Jesus gets s chuckle at our meager attempts at perfection!!! It was a great Christmas anyway! Now for some rest!!