November Thanksgiving 13

Today I'm thankful we live in a place that has four seasons. I'm thankful for the local conservatory, as a respite in times of cold weather and dreary landscape.

I'm thankful for a good mattress, electric lights, an automatic dishwasher, and the wherewithal to share with others. I'm thankful to have spent the weekend mall-free.

I'm thankful for the promise of heaven.

Thank you, Rebecca, for another month of focusing on our blessings. (I'm thankful we don't have your long winters!)

November Thanksgiving 12

Today I'm thankful for Amazon, the bookseller. I just received Libby Kumin's Helping Children with Down Syndrome Communicate Better, at a fraction of the list price.

I'm thankful for today's snow flurries. My brother's family from Florida is here for the holiday, and his sons wanted to see snow.

I'm thankful for chocolate, a working vacuum cleaner, the prospect of pumpkin pie, and Google's help with turkey brining recipes.

I'm thankful for a five-day vacation for my husband and my son. We all need a rest.

I'm thankful for how much easier the internet makes communication between school staff and parents.

November Thanksgiving 11

Today I'm thankful for:
-hot chocolate on a cold day.
-my husband and father's tickets to the OSU-Michigan game.
-the writings of C.S. Lewis, who (as Amanda reminded her readers) passed away 45 years ago today. By extension, I'm thankful for the British educational system, which contributed to the quality of his thinking, speaking, and writing.
-Trader Joe's friendly, smaller-scale grocery stores.
-Gordon Foods, for my mother's sake.

November Thanksgiving 10

I'm participating in Rebecca's annual November Thanksgiving posting.

Today I'm thankful for coffee shops, the Psalms, IDEA, money to cover the heating bill, and the essays in my Renovare Spiritual Formation Bible.
I'm thankful for the Ghost of Christmas Past, who reminds me of how blessed I've been with grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and good food and conversation around a common table.

November Thanksgiving 9

Today I'm thankful for my husband's job, when so many are unemployed.
I'm thankful for a reliable vehicle for transportation.
I'm thankful for the mature trees in our backyard, their branches starkly beautiful against the sky, in every kind of autumn weather.
I'm thankful for progress our son has demonstrated in school this week.
I'm thankful for family coming for Thanksgiving.

November Thanksgiving 8

Today I'm thankful for the beauty of this morning's snowfall on the green leaves and red berries of the holly bush by the garage.
And that my husband is not a NASCAR fan.

November Thanksgiving 7

Today I'm thankful for my friends. I'm thankful my family, immediate and extended, are all in good health as we approach the holiday season.

I'm thankful for a good public library, one of the best in the country. Today we visited and found remains of the large annual book sale. I found a volume of Walker Percy's Signposts in a Strange Land, a children's picture Bible from the Taize community in France, a copy of Frederica Mathewes-Green's Facing East (for a friend), Henri Nouwen's Our Second Birth, an anthology of Jewish commentary on the Torah from medieval Yemen, and a copy of Jim MacDonald's Communicate with Your Child (for a friend). Plus a few others. (Emmylou Harris' Light of the Stable!)

I'm thankful for our beagle, who is good company, though she always wants a share of my snack, the front seat of the mini-van, and to be let in or out.

I'm thankful for houseplants, during cold months of the year. The $2.50 Wal-Mart poinsettia I bought a few years ago has grown into a small bush.

November Thanksgiving 6

I'm thankful the price of gas has gone down. Today I paid $1.99/gal.

I'm thankful we've had several days of beautiful weather, for our son's wonderful aide at school, for my husband's job, and for my parents, sisters, and brothers.

I'm thankful I survived last Friday's IEP meeting, my migraine headache ended, and the Crew won last night.

November Thanksgiving 5

Today I'm thankful for music. The local bookstore had a sale, and I came home with Kathleen Battle and Christopher Parkening's Angels' Glory and The Moody Blues' December. Christmas is coming early this year.

I'm thankful my husband helps so much with caring for our son.

I'm thankful we got to see the last Crew game of the regular season a few weeks ago, against DC United. It's one of the memories that will warm us in winter. The team plays for the Eastern Conference Championship this Thursday evening.








Crew cat

November Thanksgiving 4

Today I'm thankful for a washer, a dryer, sleep, weekends, discount bookstores, and fall weather.

November Thanksgiving 3

Some days, and weeks, gratitude is tough discipline. But for Rebecca, here goes.

I'm thankful for the Malem bedwetting alarm. A friend shared hers with me this summer, and today I was able to pass ours on to a friend.

I'm thankful we bought a house with a southern exposure for the family room. Light in cold weather is an antidote to cabin fever.

I'm thankful my grandmother's African violets are blooming again. She passed away in 1999, and the violets always found on her windowsill came home with us after her funeral. Thank you, Grandma.

I'm thankful for dental insurance and a pediatric dentist who welcomes children with special needs.

I'm thankful for the friends I've made through blogging. I have spells of being homebound and don't get to travel as much as I'd like. You're a window to the world. Thank you.

November Thanksgiving 2

Today I'm thankful for food to eat and a roof over our heads.

I'm thankful for the years I have been given. I watched part of Ted Kennedy's tribute to John F. Kennedy, Jr. a few years ago. The Senator stated, "Like his father, he had every gift but length of years." I feel I've been given length of years, some days more than others. . . .I'm thankful for the years our son has been given. Some children in our community, while not facing his challenges, have been gifted with fewer.

I'm thankful for money to buy books, most recently Kathleen Norris's Acedia. I was privileged to hear her speak at Calvin's Faith and Literature Conference. Norris's path through the topic is sometimes wandering, but always rich and discursive. Her account of her husband's illness and death is both generous and thoughtful.

November Thanksgiving 1

Rebecca's at it again.

Today I'm thankful for Intellitools, when I'm not banging my head on the wall, trying to figure out how to use it. The computer program allows us to create learning and expressive activities adapted for children who don't have the fine motor skills to use a pencil.

I'm thankful for today's warmer weather and sunshine.

I'm thankful I got to hear Karen Erickson speak at Xavier's Perlman Center in Cincinnati a couple months ago. She shared great ideas related to teaching reading to children with developmental delays.

I'm thankful for news-2-you, a newspaper adapted for children with special needs. It provides a model for how classroom curriculum can be adapted. The growing company, started by a Cleveland speech therapist, is a family affair. I met the founder's daughter, a former teacher, by their display at the Perlman Center.

I'm thankful the U.S. Presidential election will be over in four days. We got to see both McCain and Obama, and I think the job is too difficult for either one of them. The loser needs prayer. The winner needs more.

Rainbow Ice Cream Cake

1 angel food cake
1 (3 oz.) pkg. strawberry jello
1 (3 oz.) pkg. lime jello
1 (3 oz.) pkg. orange jello
1 gallon vanilla ice cream (won't use all of it)
1 pt. strawberries, fresh or frozen
1 pt. blueberries, fresh or frozen
1 small can mandarin oranges

Cut cake into thirds. Pull apart into bite size pieces. Put in three bowls. Add strawberry jello (dry) to one bowl, orange jello to one bowl, and lime to one. Stir together to coat.

Layer in angel food cake pan:
layer of vanilla ice cream
strawberry coated cake
sliced strawberries
layer vanilla ice cream
lime coated cake, blueberries
layer of vanilla ice cream
orange coated cake
mandarin oranges
layer of ice cream

Freeze 24 hours. Cut with electric knife (or maybe one dipped in hot water).

A conversation with a friend reminded me of this recipe my mother used to make. I think I'll try it, as we bid farewell to summer. If I remember right, it's on the sweet side, so may I reduce the amount of jello mixed with the cake. It's colorful, and children like it. The recipe on Cooks.com says it serves 20-25, but I don't think we found it went that far!

Numbering our days

This has been a rough year* for the families of a few of the women who have been involved in teaching my son, as well as many other children. I haven't blogged about these life-changing events for the sake of their privacy. More news came yesterday, along with an email about setting priorities, from a relative.

I've decided I need to take the summer off from blogging, to focus on "first things" in my life. This blog's original title, "Numbering Our Days," was taken from a great New Year's post by Amanda.

I don't make resolutions on the eve of a new year. Instead, I ask myself one question: This time next year, will I still be among the living?

It isn't a morbid thought; it is simply the most practical way I know of to focus my mind and heart on living--rather than merely existing--through the coming year. As Samuel Johnson said, the prospect of imminent death concentrates the mind wonderfully; and for all I know, my death may be mere heartbeats away. I'm young, but I've had friends who died younger. I'm healthy, but I've had friends who died healthier. The path from the womb leads to the tomb.

For those of us who know that death is but a sleep and an awakening, the fact that we are all dying is not cause for alarm. But it is cause for deliberate living.

I'm returning to that title, as a reminder.

Further listening: Son of mine (HT: This Side of Glory)
*A car accident, a shooting, cancer.

Spring mourning

(edited)
In Lord of the Rings, one of the hobbits mentioned "second breakfast." This year, we're having second spring. Several of our plants leafed out early, were hit by a freeze, and wilted on their stems. The flower beds seem to be in mourning. So far, I've found:

Columbine (wilted)
Salvia
Cheddar pinks (spreading well!)
Hollyhocks (half wilted)
Phlox
Creeping phlox
Delphinium! (first time I've had it winter over; second try)
Sedum, Autumn Joy (half-wilted)
Something that looks like wild onion, but might be small daffodils?
Stella d'oro lilies
Tulips

The leaves on the Zepherine Drouhin rose bush in the back yard are wilted. The weeping cherry buds opened almost fully, then turned brown on the branch. Usually they go from pink to white, then fall like snowflakes to the ground. This year, the tree weeps brown tears. Its blooms were too soon gone.
* * * * *
I think of the loss, sorrow, and grieving at Virginia Tech this week. May God comfort those who are mourning.

Further reading: Campus Crusade Students Killed in Massacre
(I was a member of CCC, as a student.)
Myspace page of Lauren McCain
(HT: Christianity Today)

Good Friday meditation

We spent Good Friday at the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center, in Cincinnati, Ohio. We've visited once before; this time I felt we were coming onto holy ground, as we approached.
****************









This cabin was along a slave trading route; its second story was used to house slaves until they were auctioned off, or transported further south.

A middle-aged man described its history to the group of school children filling the lower level. He choked up for a moment. When he continued, he explained that his ancestors were from Alabama, and they would have been slaves. "It always reminds me someone paid a price for me to be here."





***************
A woman who called herself Miss Sadie described the elements of her costume, and what her role in the house would have been, for a group of school children around the corner from the cabin. She sang Follow the Drinking Gourd, which gave slaves directions for escape. According to her, winter with its long nights was a good time to leave--and Friday was the best day of the week to head for freedom. (Escaping slaves had to travel during the night. Slave owners could not leave the plantation for fear the remaining slaves would escape. They had to hire men to chase the escapees. The offices of the contractors were closed over the weekend, so if slaves escaped Friday evening, it would be Monday before the hunt for them could begin.)
***************













A light from the Rankin house at the top of a hill in Ripley, Ohio (a free state), on the north side of the Ohio River, from the vantage point of an escaping slave on the south side of the river, in Kentucky (a slave state). The Rankins, John Parker, and their friends helped many people on their road to freedom in the north. (Many escaping slaves continued north to Canada. After the Supreme Court's Dred Scott decision in 1857, they could be returned to their "owners" in the south, if captured in a free northern state.)
********************
About halfway through the tour, you enter a round room with a lighted pillar in the center. The walls are molded cement rock, with names carved into them--names of of slave transport ships and "castles" in Africa where the captured slaves were held. Aside from the pillar, the only light comes through the translucent blue ceiling, giving one the feeling of being under water. The pillar is covered with translucent blue and green pebbles. The pebbles represent the souls of the estimated one to two million Africans who died in the ships, during the Middle Passage, and in the "castles."














The room is silent, except for the sound of a choir humming John Newton's Amazing Grace. (John Newton was a slave trader who underwent a dramatic conversion.)
Holy ground.
***************
He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not.
Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.
But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.
Isaiah 53:3-5, King James Version

Ohio's Hocking Hills: Ash Cave

Far above, cave ceiling.














Beside, stairs connect roof and floor.











Below, waterfall lands in pond.

The trail back into Ash Cave is handicap accessible. It's paved and level, and our son walked the entire distance. Trails to other geological highlights in the Hocking Hills are more challenging:
Old Man's Cave
Rock House
Conkle's Hollow
Cedar Falls
Cantwell Cliffs

January: a list for getting through it

Unlike Eliot, I find January and February to be the cruellest months. (I know: there's no bad weather-- I just need the right clothes.) Rebecca's passing the month enjoying the routines of her life, and making lists of lists. Here's one of how I wait for spring:

Reading (old British mysteries--Marsh, Christie, etc.). Just after Christmas, I found a stack of old used ones at the library book sale.

Learning (Intellitools, continued). Last week, two of the technology staff taught a couple of us how to combine scanned book pages and imported audio to create a computerized reading experience for children who may not have the fine motor or cognitive skills to read a book on their own. The MacIntosh is a more user-friendly for this than Windows is. Alas, I now need to translate what I've learned to our home pc.

Baking, cooking, and eating

Visiting (in-between toilet training)

Planning (trying to improve effectiveness of my To Do lists, making appointments)

Doing laundry

Enjoying gifts--a new tea kettle, and two of Luci Shaw's latest (Accompanied by Angels, and What the Light Was Like)

* * * * *
And, last but not least, a little humor along the way.

November Thanksgiving 5: good IEP meeting

Yesterday was our son's annual Individual Education Plan meeting. I had communicated some concerns to staff a few months ago, and was pleased at the response.

The moderator did a great job moving things along, getting the input of the physical therapist, occupational therapist, adaptive phys ed teacher, regular ed teachers, paraprofessional aide, special ed teacher, principal, county service coordinator, psychologist, speech therapist, and parents.

The principal was helpful and suggested several accommodations that could be made. The aide will be able to observe speech and carry that over into the rest of the week, as I wanted.

The adaptive phys ed teacher said she hasn't seen anything in her eight years of teaching like the way our son took off on the tricycle this year. It's increased attention span, direct gaze, lung capacity for speech, morale, self-confidence, etc. (He got a horn on the tricycle today. He honked at the hall intersection. The children in the hall stopped to let him cross, and clapped for him. The art teacher is going to have a few fifth graders make a little safety city, for him to work on waiting, and crossing the street. He's going to have stop signs. Another classmate might accompany him, on a bicycle. The class is studying simple machines in class, and might look at the tricycle, as an example.)

The assistive tech/Intellitools person and one of the district special ed gurus are meeting with the aide and our son's special ed teacher Monday morning, first thing, to continue Intellitools training. The special ed staff person is doing her master's on teaching nonverbal children to read!

The team will meet again for data checks 12/21.

The speech therapist is working on incorporating words from the Love and Learning videos our son has been watching for several years into Intellitools activities.

The moderator displayed (and suggested) the book Teaching Reading to Children with DS, which I have been wishing the school would use with our son. I was very encouraged.

A+