update

It's okay.  Drinking and swallowing are fairly complicated skills and they've been not possible for weeks. 

Life.  It's okay. It all takes time.

Love, Everybody

awww

This made me cry tonight, relieved and grateful.

So much love, Grandma

happy birthday, jay

I'm so glad it was a wonderful weekend and you got to enjoy it all.

So much love, and so many wishes for a great year.

We all love you, Val and Everybody

pinewood derby, 2019

 Always fun, always exciting.

 Lots of energy and personalities!  What a great morning. 

Love, Grandpa and Grandma

a pizza ranch birthday!!

 It was awesome!

As are YOU, two birthday buddies:

 Grandpa says you're the best thing that ever happened on his birthday.

 Four years of your sassy self?  How is this even possible?

 Oh my goodness, we love you.

Thank you for coming to this family and being ours. The whole family is better with you in it.

Love forever, Grandma and Grandpa and Everybody

another good day

Be back tomorrow

 What a great day.

Love Val and Everybody

cold, cold, cold, but we don't care

 This morning when I drove to Heidi's the clouds were beautiful in the steely cold air.  The Mississippi River was completely obscured by huge, billowing clouds of steam.

This is from another day, these two scrappy sisters.

This morning the older one showed me a mark along her ribs where the little one had bit her last night.

Yikes!

It looked painful!

A short while later, the little one was sprawled on her belly on top of the child-sized table by the TV. The older one told me to get her off of there.  I said no, she's fine. She'll get down when she's ready.

She frowned at me like, are you kidding? She said, "I'll go get her."

I told her no. "I wouldn't mess with her. She might bite you again."

She jumped back on the couch and said, "Now I'm scared now!"

Oh my goodness.

And this little doll just keeps on getting better.

Onward.  This whole long, stressful, worrisome, freezing cold week is in the rear view mirror.

Moving on forward.

So much love,  Val

deep winter, and life at a stand still

I took this picture out the back steps this morning while I waited for the dog.

It's that bitter cold where you step one foot outside to get the mail and it all freezes up in your nose like ZIP.

Pretty, yes. Winter is so beautiful.  Uninhabitable, but beautiful.

This child is our Boss Baby.  She's making do with her aunts and her grandma and smidgens of her parents when they're home.  Her little tiny baby sister has been so sick and had open heart surgery on Tuesday.  It's all a making-do kind of situation because that's all we've got, and we'll sort it all out later.

Updates from today:

Overwhelmed.  Tired. Grateful.  Relieved.

Take your pick, varies moment to moment.

The stomach flu has also made an obnoxious path through the house.   A child took me by the hand upstairs today and showed me a puddle of puke in her big bed and said, "I choked this up out of my MOUTH."

Oh, sweet Lord.

I tugged the sheets loose and threw them in the wash.

What kind of nonsense is this anyway??

No more.

Onward, and sweet little peanut, we are all so closely tuned in to your recovery.

Love forever, Grandma and Grandpa and Everybody

(Boots purchased yesterday at a Target diversion.  So cute.)

relieved

 These are a few pictures of the art crew on Monday, busy working.

 Whoops!

And then why??

Why do these things go off the rails?

Who cares?  They're washable paints, no harm done.

Today we had to get OUUUT of this boring winter house so we went to Target after lunch and bought sparkly rain boots and Valentine crap, dollar section slippers, bought some birthday presents for Grandpa and had a very good time.

THIS GIRL:

Has had a smooth recovery so far, and we are beyond grateful because this little peanut has suffered enough.  Her caregivers have been mindful of her comfort and have tended her as carefully for pain control as they have for oxygen and fluids.  But still.

We have said if she has a violent distaste for anything touching her nose, we will always understand why.

Valentine's Day is on the horizon.  Tonight I took the Christmas candle lights out of the windows, and have been so grateful for slightly longer afternoons and the February slant of the light these days.

Onward.

Nothing but love, Val

everything is okay

This photo hit right in the chest, and that's the truth, her tiny fragile little self.  I have not held her since the day after her baptism in December, and that day we had no idea how sick she would be in just one more day.

It's been a very long five weeks.

She's okay. Surgery went well, and her heart is repaired.  Recovery will take time and there are potential complications, of course, but tonight, she's okay.  She's recovering, and they know how to care for babies in complicated situations.

We're all hoping this is the beginning of very good things for this little girl.

So much love, Sweetheart.

Love, Grandma and Grandpa and Everybody