A Patrick Luau

On Thursday evening, Grandma Midge was shooed out the door to go to her weekly painting class. As the door closed, a flurry of activity ensued...some might even claim chaos for a few moments. Canopies were assembled and anchored, tables and chairs for 75 were placed around the yard and decorations were put in place. Just in time for a rain shower! As children were gathered inside and adults took shelter under the canopies, some made reference to the last "party" held in the backyard...D's and my wedding reception almost six years ago.

When she came back from painting class Midge had no idea what awaited her in her backyard... 75 close friends and many relatives including all of her children, their spouses and her 12 grandchildren. People from all times of her life were there to help celebrate the 60th birthday of one amazing woman. It was so fun to do this for Midge. When asked later if she suspected anything, she said,"I was expecting the boys to have done something rude or embarrassing! Not have a real party for me!" In the past they have posted her age in five foot high posters on the roof or garage, mowed it into the grass and outlined it with orange spray paint, or similar antics. So, yeah, she was pleasantly surprised!



The food was traditional luau fare...kalua pork, teriyaki chicken, rice, mixed tropical fruit, drinks and cake. Both Mimi and Sweetsa loved the rice and meat, and Sweetsa managed to get her hands on some of the fruit too, sucking it to "withereens". Jacob ate a hot dog as did most of the other little ones.





Sweetsa-girl chased her cousin Curlytop (who is 6 months older than SP), trying to get a taste of the delicious snow cone she had in her possession. I was elated to discover that Sweetsa didn't care if the snow cone had syrup on it or not, she just wanted that cold shaved ice!

Although there was a jumping "castle" available for the kids to enjoy, the little ones rarely ventured more than ten steps from the snowcone table. So the older kids claimed the castle and everyone was happy for a time!



That is until the real storm came. Luckily some were paying enough attention to the weather to get most stuff inside before a mad dash to shelter occurred. When the lightning got too close, then even those who stayed under the shelter of the canopies to visit came inside too.

It was a great party for a great woman. I'm so glad to be a part of her family!

Can't get ahead for trying

Today after lunch, I sat down to nurse Sweetsa and try to get her to take a nap. Earlier she fell asleep only to awaken and start screaming 5 minutes later. After a few minutes of nursing, Sweetsa let me know there was no way she'd be napping any time soon. So I let her down and went to see what was keeping Mimi and Buddy occupied so quietly in the kitchen.

I found them making a "special treat" for everyone. Mimi called it Marshmallow Matey Crunch, but when she gave me my portion it was more like mush. What can you expect when cereal has been stirred together with milk, water and juice, and then liberally squished between preschool fingers for who knows how long? Oh, yeah, Buddy was really helping but dodged the picture.

And after cleaning up the specail treat, I returned to the living room to find out why Sweetsa is suddenly so quietly content...has she fallen asleep all on her own? No, that's almost too much to hope for. Instead she has been un-sorting the laundry for me! I guess it's just going to be one of those days! At least we're not in the hospital or dentist's or doctor's office!

The Wheel of Time

**SciFi/Fantasy Fans be warned this is NOT about Robert Jordan's series or any of the RP and web worlds based on the series.**

Ever since I can remember, I have heard the phrase "History repeats its-self." I've also heard the explaination that we have to learn from history so that we don't repeat the mistakes (this from one of my history teachers, when asked why we needed to study history). And I believe that, although I think there are other, more compelling reasons we should learn about our history and heritage, but I'm not going to get into that right now. This post isn't really about history, except on a very personal scale.

The wheel of time has turned again and we find ourselves back where we were five months ago, sadly enough, dealing with Buddy's teeth again. In January, Buddy slipped and knocked his mouth on the side of the tub. He knocked his teeth out of their sockets and ended up in surgery a couple days later to reposition and repair them.

You can kind of see how they're mis-aligned in this picture. He wasn't able to chew/bite because one tooth was behind the bottom teeth and the other one kind of crossed the biting plane.






The surgery fixed the teeth and life was good again: no more pain, soft diet or crooked teeth!






And along comes the 3rd of July! At a block party, Buddy was enjoying a neighbor's skateboard (kneeling/laying on it and pushing it with his hands). Suddenly a little girl runs up to me saying, "I think your little boy bit his lip."
Somewhat concerned, I scanned the crowd and found Buddy in the arms of our second counselor in the bishopric. He repeated the bit lip theory, but my heart sank as I transferred him to my arms. Yes, his lip was bleeding, but his teeth were once again knocked back! *sigh*

We tried to take him to the ER, but our hospital does not deal at all with dental trauma...even if it's a holiday, and the child is 3 years old. GRRR! Because it happened on the eve of a holiday, his dentist was out of town. When we got a hold of his partner (who was also leaving town), he explained that in all likelyhood, he would loose those teeth, despite any "heroics", as he put it. This because they had already survived one trauma, but were seriously weakened in the process. We made an early morning appointment for the 5th and tried to enjoy the Fourth. (Which we did have a good time...with the help of a little Ibuprofen, Carnation instant breakfast and some Twinkies, he did great!)
So we spent the morning at the dentist yesterday, getting the teeth pulled. There was no resistance as the dentist pulled those two teeth out...just twisted and out they came :(



And so All I Want for Christmas is My Two Front Teeth keeps going through my head when I see his new smile. D came in last night singing it, and we had to laugh. After six weeks' healing time, Buddy can go back in and get "fitted" for space holders, so his permanent teeth won't be affected by his recent dental excitement!

I'm already getting used to the new smile and the new lisp...ya'll'll see when you're here in a few weeks!