Luke's 7th Birthday

It has been seven years since I held Luke in my arms.  Seven years since we said hello and goodbye.

I think about Luke every single day, just as I think about my other children.  But there is an added level of sadness with my thoughts about Luke on significant holidays.  With the anniversary of his birth and death, my thoughts become nostalgic and full of ache.  I wish that I could go back in time and prepare my young, hopeful self for a tragedy that I never imagined would happen to me.  I think about moments in time where I found the strength to say goodbye to Luke for the final time and watch the nurses take him away from me.  Or how not even 24 hours after giving birth I was hobbling through a frigid and wind swept cemetery to pick out my baby's grave plot.  Seven years ago today I became a different person.  Not only did immeasurable sadness fill my heart leaving a deeply engraved hole, but I also experienced for the first time in my life the tangible Grace of God.  There were moments throughout Luke's birth and funeral where a peace that surpasses all understanding surrounded Will and I.  We could almost smell heaven, we felt God's grace that much.  Luke's birth and death are not just sad to us.  He is our son, and we are proud of him, and love him as much as we love Lucy, Emma and Violet.

So, how do you celebrate a day so laden with pain and joy?  How do you honor your son when he is not here?  Well, first we went to the balloon store.

Then we awkwardly explained to the sweet woman behind us in line who the balloons are for when she asked us who's turning seven.  Bless her heart that she didn't shy away from us, but engaged us in a meaningful conversation even when it became uncomfortable.  She showed us true bravery and compassion.  In fact, all of my friends and family who have honored Luke with their love, remembrance and silent prayers have all shown us true bravery and compassion.  It is so hard to know the right thing to say or do in this type of situation, and yet our loved ones reached out to us still.  I cannot tell you how much that means to us.  I am especially grateful for the gift of my Godson's mama, who bravely answered my question about what a seven year old boy on earth would be like to mother.

We made birdseed ornaments with ice this year since we are in a record cold snap.  I forgot to take pictures of the finished product, so I will try and post them in my next blog post.  We then made a grocery list for all of the birthday foods and Will went to the store and picked up the ingredients.  

The girls were inspired to draw multiple pictures of them with Luke, and spent most of the morning coloring for their brother.   Lucy came up with the idea around lunchtime to make rubber band bracelets for Luke to attach to the balloons when we let them go, so that Luke can have rubber band bracelets in heaven.  She ended up turning the bracelets into rings so that the balloons would still float.  Each balloon had a ring on it, with special colors and patterns, exactly what Lucy thought Luke would like.

We went to the cemetery after lunch, as we were hoping to be there at the warmest part of the day.  It was 4 degrees when we arrived.  God only knows what the windchill was, as the breeze was so strong it made Emma cry.  Fortunately Will remembered to bring the shovel, and he cleared a path to Luke's grave while the rest of us stayed warm in the car.  Violet napped and Lucy, Emma and I munched on Tootsie Rolls - my favorite candy when I was pregnant with Luke.

We let our balloons go and laughed when mine got stuck and then cheered when it broke free and continued on its path to heaven.  Will's got stuck too, but didn't break free.  Lucy reminded Will not to worry though, because when we bought the balloons the day prior, Will's balloon broke free and made it's way heaven-bound while we watched in the parking lot.  The balloon store gave him a new one for free.

While we were at Luke's grave, Will got a text from work saying that school was canceled for tomorrow due to the extreme cold.  The timing was nice, and we couldn't help but think of it as a gift from Luke.

We ate all of Luke's favorite foods from when I was pregnant with him - cinnamon rolls and eggs for breakfast, grilled cheese, Clausen pickles, potato chips and frozen pears for lunch, and beef roast for dinner.

For Luke's birthday dessert, the girls and I made Thunder Cake, which is a chocolate cake recipe from one of our favorite illustrated books by Patricia Polacco by the same title.  In the book, the cake is made by a grandmother and her grand daughter to help the little girl overcome her fear of thunder.  There is a secret ingredient in the recipe, which we cringed when we added, but it turned out tasting fine.  It was a toss up if the secret ingredient was the pureed tomatoes I added, or the piece of hair I found in my first bite when we were eating it.  At the last minute I decided to ice the cake with my grandma's frosting recipe because I realized I didn't have the ingredients for the icing the book called for and I didn't feel right about sending Will out for the third time in record cold for another ingredient we had forgotten to put on our list.  It was nice, making my grandma's frosting, and picturing her with Luke in heaven.  It tasted good too, just how I remembered she made it, except hers was on a German Chocolate cake with sweetened coconut sprinkled on top of the frosting.

It was a relaxing day, spent with our little family on earth.  We didn't get a chance to read our signature Luke books, but we did listen to Luke songs on repeat throughout the day which was nice.  Violet kept me from dwelling on any emotion for very long, which perhaps was a blessing as I believe the secret to a good day is living it fully in the present.  This is tricky, when you are celebrating a life that is now in the past but meeting the demands of my earthly children kept me grounded and happy.  The weather was painfully cold, but it did result in us staying cozy and warm in our little house, enjoying our blessings without any outside pressures - Will's work was canceled and the girls yoga class was as well.  

All in all it was a good day.  Thank you Luke, for choosing us for your family and for showing us a glimpse of heaven through you.  Happy birthday sweet boy.  

January

We began the first month of the year by creating vision boards for 2015.  We spent several days flipping through magazines and cutting out any words or images that fit with our hopes and goals for this coming year.  I was surprised with how much everyone enjoyed this family project.  Our vision board turned out great - with each of us taking a triangle segment of the board, pasting things from candy, sprinkles, Disney World, books to read, health to obtain and life to live.  Right now it is propped up on our piano, and looking at it several times throughout my day is definitely a great reminder to make sure we are living the life we consciously are choosing.

We have spent a lot of time indoors this past month due to the freezing cold weather.  The girls don't seem to mind though, and have had fun in various creative endeavors, from putting on shows, planning a birthday party for one of Lucy's dolls complete with a homemade piñata (bottom left picture), creating a craft class (bottom middle picture) and playing many variations on the theme of "store".

 As I've mentioned before, I am constantly balancing the fine line of allowing creative freedom while keeping the house from being destroyed.  I was okay with the girls painting objects, baby sister and even myself with water on paint brushes but I must admit I lost my cool when I found hair of varying colors all over their beds and the carpet in their room.  Lucy was surprised by my reaction, and took me by the hand and showed me how she cleaned up and put all of the hair she had trimmed from her Barbies in the garbage can.  See bottom right hand picture below.

The girls have been making rubber band bracelets all month.  Lucy taught Emma how to make them, and the rest is history.  Besides worrying about the tiny rubber bands falling on the ground and being found by Violet, this is a relatively harmless creative outlet for them.

We have been busy with schoolwork.  This past month the girls learned about the human body, did various science experiments with Lucy's new science kit from Christmas and we had a ton of fun making paper snowflakes and decorating cakes for their play kitchen complete with faux icing and cake toppers compliments of Kiwi Crate.

During the week we get out of the house for socialization and exercise with the girls science class at the library, yoga class and dance class.  If it wasn't for the fact that I am paying for two of these classes you would have to pay me to leave the house with three kids and all of the winter accessories that must be put on to brave the cold.

Thank goodness for my grocery delivery service that I continue to LOVE.  Words cannot express how happy I am each week when they knock on my door with my fresh groceries.  Below are all of the fun things we cooked up in the kitchen - in clockwise order - water kefir cherry soda, chocolate chip cookie bars, frozen chocolate peanut butter banana bites, and fermented garlic and dill flavored carrot sticks. The center picture is of a creamy chicken dish I made with fresh garlic, spinach and mushrooms.  The girls love helping in the kitchen, and Emma loves sampling anything chocolate.

We had an eye doctor appointment for Lucy this past month which she was pretty nervous for, even though she was secretly hoping to get glasses.  She was bummed when her eyes checked out perfect while Will and I did a happy dance for all of the money we would save.  In the bottom left hand picture, I gave Lucy a pair of my old reading glasses from when I used to work as an editor.  I thought that the prescription was mild enough that she can use them for fashion glasses when she plays.  Will tried on the glasses when he got home from work and nixed the play glasses idea as he said looking through them gave him an instant headache.  Both girls had a dentist appointment too.

We also made it out of the house for time with friends at play dates, birthday parties, and covert lunches in the library.

We visited with Will's grandma this past month and had a really nice time.  Emma "secretly" raided the proverbial candy bowl and all of the girls enjoyed playing hide and go seek and making Great Grandma J. smile.

Winter is a difficult time of year with small kids in my opinion and there were several days this past month where I thought our house was just too small for the many emotions our three girls bring - until someone pointed out that if I had boys, it would probably be too small for all of the energy they would bring.  I guess it is safe to say that the winter days are long when you can't get outside as much as I would like.  Here are the sisters below, including me with one of my sisters!

Will is proud of his girls (I'm pretty sure I'm included in this) and is the first to speak up that he loves us if someone says they feel bad for him with all of those girls at his house.  He has finally found a downside to having four girls in the house though - clogged drains.  Here he is below, snaking the bathtub drain.  Yes, that is a giant hair clog that he caught, and it was heavier than my pony tail.  

I like to point out to Will that he isn't the only boy in our family on earth - he has Charlie after all.  Will gets annoyed when I tell him this (which is why I love to point it out as often as possible) and claims that the only reason that we have Charlie is because the rest of us love our cat so much and Will loves us.  Here Will is below, bringing Charlie in for some cuddles on a cold winter day.  Charlie enjoys our cuddles for a bit, but then wants back outside.  In Charlie's ideal world, we would live outside with him.  He really has no interest in being in the house.  We are looking forward to warmer days when we can at least spend our days outside with him!

In the meantime, we make it a point to get outside whenever the wind chill is above twenty degrees.  Here we are below on winter hikes with friends, sledding and snowman building.

Next month is traditionally the most difficult month for our family as we remember Luke's birthday.  Please keep us in your thoughts and prayers as we brave significant emotions and impatience for spring.

Violet at 9 Months

Violet has kept us entertained all month.  She loves to bounce up and down while kicking her legs when she is happy.  In the above picture, she is excited to be riding in the shopping cart for the first time.  Emma was a good sport, seeing as she was demoted from the front seat. Fortunately for all of us, Emma only has love for Violet.

Violet has tested our patience this month by the stuff she has gotten in to from splashing in the pee left in Emma's potty chair, to sucking on the toilet plunger (!).  Here she is below from the top left, in clockwise order: turning off the water to the toilet, stuck between the couches, destroying her big sisters' Lego creations, opening the cabinet door and discovering the kitchen garbage can, and eating crumbs under the dining room table.  We need to get back in the habit of keeping the bathroom doors closed as it seems most of Violet's trouble happens in the bathroom.

Her theme song is Taylor Swifts, "Trouble" and she starts bouncing and grinning when we sing, "I knew you were trouble when you walked in…"  To complicate things further, Violet can now pull herself to a standing position, bringing yet another level of discovery into her playing field and worry to mine.

Violet loves watching her sisters play, and when they include her, she can hardly contain her excitement.  Here she is below, taking a wagon ride and reading stories with her sisters.

Her sleep is still not great, but at this point in my motherhood career, I've given up trying to fix it and am focusing on the fact that she will eventually be past this phase.

Violet loves a little baby doll that Santa put in her stocking.  We have named the doll Rosie, and Violet carriers her everywhere with her and absolutely has to have her baby to sleep.

Violet may not be the best sleeper, but she has a great appetite.  She already seems to eat more than both of her older sisters combined and loves vegetables.  She doesn't care for fruits except prunes and absolutely loves the chicken and beef broths that I make for her.  She sits at the table so long sometimes that she has to rest her head on the table in between bites.  Usually I am the one ending mealtime because she can't keep her head up or I need to move on with the day.

Violet is definitely growing.  She measured in the 95% percentile for height and 50% for weight and head size at her nine month well check up so it's no wonder she is eating so well.  All of that eating leads to a lot of diaper changes.  She soaks her diapers so thoroughly that anything she is laying on or sitting on needs to be washed.  Here we are below getting an early morning sink bath because she soaked through her jammies, the bed and me when I unknowingly picked her up.  Violet does not like baths so I try to make them as quick as possible.

Violet gives great hugs, knows what she wants when she wants it (read: very persistent and will not be distracted), and doesn't stay upset for long - if she gets what she wants.  She loves playing peek-a-boo, dancing and jumping.

I love how wide her smile is while she squints her eyes shut.  I love snuggling with her and kissing her chubby cheeks.  I love all the baby sounds she makes, and how I am her number one, favorite person.  I am savoring these things with Violet, in between the craziness of taking care of my three girls.  Violet has now officially been a part of the outside world for as long as she was growing inside of me!  We love you Violet Rose!

December

December's weather started out mild and we took full advantage with walks every day that the thermometer was above freezing.  Here we are below having fun with the thin layer of ice on the pond by our house.  We threw rocks with all of our might into the pond and it made the most glorious sounds!  It felt like we were vandalizing nature, as the ice would crack but never fully break.  Picture a car windshield that is covered in chips - that's what the pond looked like when we were finished.  It was an exhilarating feeling, but I must admit I did feel a tad guilty when we finally left.  My guilt faded to a grin though, when we went back the next day and the thin layer of ice was as smooth as a freshly repaired windshield.

The weather was mild for December, but it was by no means warm.  We spent a lot of time indoors, playing, crafting, watching movies, having impromptu dance parties and practicing yoga.

We also studied dinosaurs and fossils, learned about volcanoes and made winter themed votives with our Kiwi Crate.  The bottom right hand picture below is a drawing Emma made that I thought Dr. Seuss would appreciate.

The girls had a Christmas dance recital, and danced to the song Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.  We were just barely recovered from a horrible flu complete with fevers, coughs and runny noses and at the last minute Emma decided she wasn't feeling well enough to go on stage.  Lucy informed anyone who would listen back stage before the performance that, "I've never been on stage before but I'm not scared!"  Lucy had a blast on stage and off, and Emma told me later that "the stage was really big mom" and so I'm wondering if perhaps it was stage fright and not the after effects of the flu that made her sick to her stomach and shaking like a leaf when it was time to go on stage.  Emma had a ton of fun back stage though and the girls both told me it was like a giant sleep over with all of their friends, food, games and movies.  I enjoyed socializing with the other moms too, however it was a very long day working as the stage hand for two tiny dancers!

We gave the neighbors something to talk about on a cold, snowy morning when a giant cattle trailer backed into our driveway to deliver the beef we had ordered to stock our freezer with beef for the year and split with friends.  Our next door neighbor who is usually unfazed by all of our suburban farm antics couldn't contain his curiosity and came over convinced that we had finally gone and bought a live pig.  Imagine his shock when I reassured him it was only a cow - and then his relief when he saw that it was in boxes - but I was still overwhelmed with the sheer volume of an entire cow divided into boxes and wrapped in freezer paper.  This was definitely an instance in using math in the real world, as I had to divide up the beef into fractions as tricky as 1/12, 1/3, 1/4, etc.  Needless to say, my former math teacher husband and a friend of mine both came to my rescue and divided the beef for me.

A friend of mine from childhood sent me a box of Meyer lemons from her backyard in California as a thank you for a jar of my honey I mailed to her this past fall.  It was like opening up a box of sunshine, and came as a wonderful surprise on a gloomy winter day.  We spent a lot of time in the kitchen this past month, cooking things to free up space in our freezer for the beef but also to prepare for the holidays.  Lucy and Emma enjoy cooking in the kitchen with us, but have a very hard time sharing the tasks with each other.  In the below pictures they were constantly fighting so Will and I got creative and I put them in a newly invented "Get-a-long" coat, an idea I nabbed from Pinterest.  It served to lighten their mood, until Emma tripped and hurt her neck on the industrial zipper on Will's coat.  Ah, well.  Even a minute of peace was worth it.

We seem to have better luck with peace on earth when we craft as opposed to when we cook.  Below are some of the crafts we did for Christmas.  The girls made gingerbread men shaped crayons out of their old and broken crayons.  They pretty much did this project all on their own, short of using me to put the crayons in and out of the oven.  I really enjoyed watching them take their own craft project from start to finish.  I made up several antique honey jars with rocks from our vacation up north this summer and Paper White bulbs, as well as a fresh Honey Ginger Lemon tea to give as gifts.

 Every year we make an ornament to put on Luke's grave blanket and to give as gifts.  This year Will sliced an old tree branch from our neighbor's yard into thin circles and drilled a hole in the top of each to thread a piece of string.  We then painted the ornaments.  Violet even participated, and painted some red candles with her finger prints for her big brother's grave blanket.  My heart was so full of love and happiness and tears as we all worked together on the ornaments.  It was very special to have Violet with us this year.

We decorated Luke's grave blanket at home, and then brought it to the cemetery.  Emma refused to stand by the grave blanket for a picture, so this is the best picture I could get.  I usually like having a picture of the whole family by Luke's grave but decided it wasn't worth begging Emma for.  There's something to be said for remembering life exactly as it happened anyways.

Our downtown had lots of holiday happenings leading up to Christmas.  In the below pictures we visited a life sized gingerbread house, admired giant Elsa and Anna cakes in our local bakery's windows... 

…and stood on Main Street at exactly five o'clock to watch the town's Christmas lights come on.

We ate outside at the annual holiday market, and even got to talk with Santa.  Lucy was very specific in her conversation with Santa and even waited patiently as Santa was distracted fixing the photo printer (!!!).  Lucy asked for two Friends Lego sets and a pair of pajamas.  I had to be assertive for Emma as Santa's distraction was too much for Emma's little voice, and I let Santa know that Emma would like to be surprised for Christmas this year.  Needless to say, we will be visiting Santa at a different venue next year.

 The girls put their shoes out for St. Nick on December 6th, and were too quick in emptying them in the morning for me to take a picture of their shoes filled with chocolate coins and oranges.

 On Christmas Eve we did a little bit of cooking for a special Christmas Eve dinner, the girls and I did yoga and we got ready to go to church for Christmas Eve.  This year we got a seat, thanks to a note I wrote myself from last year about when to arrive.  It was almost surreal for me to be in our church holding Violet, as last Christmas Eve she was in my belly and my swollen feet were aching in my too tight shoes.  It was so very nice to have Violet snuggled in my arms this year that my heart was happy despite the overcrowded church.  Will and I were given a little gift as well when we overheard the following conversation between Lucy and the little boy she shared her seat with during the service.
 
   Little Boy: What's your name?  What's your sisters names?
   Lucy:  I'm Lucy, and that's Emma and Violet.
   Little Boy: Those are nice names.  Don't you have any brothers?
   Lucy: Yes.
   Little Boy:  Where are they?
   Lucy:  My brother is in heaven.
   Little Boy:  Oh.  What's his name?
   Lucy: Luke.
   Little Boy: Oh, that's a nice name!

I can't tell you how much it meant to Will and I to hear this innocent little conversation and to know that Lucy refers to her brother in heaven as if it is the most natural thing in the world.  To make the conversation even more meaningful, the little boy was the same age as Luke.  Luke will never be forgotten - besides his devoted parents, he also has three beautiful little sisters who love him too.  Here we are below after the Christmas Eve service.  The bottom right hand picture was taken by Emma, unbeknown to me.  I am usually critical of my own picture, but I thought Emma did an excellent job of capturing how I felt on Christmas Eve with my little family.

I am just so grateful for these sweet little girls and I still can't believe that I have THREE healthy and happy girls here with me.

Christmas morning started before the sun came up.  Lucy was up on and off all through the night which kept me from getting good sleep.  However, she was so excited to see what Santa had brought that I couldn't be mad.

Highlights included lots of books and Legos for each of the girls, fun kitchen stuff and essential oils for me, National Park prints that Will's friend framed for me to give to him, and a ride-on bouncy ball for Emma that Santa surprised her with.

Our Christmas break was packed with family get togethers.  Below are some snap shots of our fun with Will's family...

….and fun with my side of the family too.

By the time New Year's Eve rolled around, we were exhausted from our Christmas fun.  We spent a quiet evening at home and tried out a new tradition called a Burning Bowl.  Each of us wrote on little slips of paper things that we wanted to let go of from 2014.  The girls were excited to write down Bad Dreams and I was happy to write down sore tailbone, sleepless nights and Violet's mouth issues among other things.  Will was a good sport and agreed to burn the slips outside in my Bee Smoker while we watched from window in the warmth of our living room while singing, "Let it go, let it go, can't hold me back anymore!!!!"  I should have written that songs lyrics down and put them in the Burning Bowl too!

My family's list of accomplishments was not as long as in years past, but I would say we still had a very successful year.  2014 will go down in the books of our family history as the year Violet officially joined our family so despite the many challenges we faced, it was a good year.  Happy New Year to all of our friends and family.  Here's to a great 2015 filled with all of what makes you happy!