Stories I want to remember

I imagine that since the advent of digital photography the rate at which people develop their photos has plummeted.  Case in point:  we haven't developed a single photo since Joe turned a year old.  That's over six years ago.  We have, however, stored thousands of photos on computers and memory sticks and, thankfully, on this blog.  That is, after all, what this blog is to our a family:  a photo album.  The kids regularly ask me if they can read the blog and I find them scrolling back through the years cracking up at their antics and amazed at how so-and-so has changed over the years.  All of this is a semi-long ramble to explain why I include stories such as the following:  because I just want to remember them.

Dave is the grade eight teacher at our Catholic school.  Because of this, the last month (and particularly the final two weeks) of school are a blur of overnight class trips, late night report card writing, very little sleep for Dave and graduation preparations.  The last part always makes me laugh because it proves that, no matter how many degrees one might hold, the vocation of teaching will inevitably come down to scissors, construction paper and glue.  Last night Dave sat in the midst of blue and green construction paper balloons (cut by Hannah) gluing on photos of graduands.  (That's one of the places a BA in Philosophy, a Bachelor in Commerce and a BEd can land a person - in the midst of dollar store merchandise.)  Anyway, the balloons aren't the point; although it sure is nice that the oldest kids are able enough to help with the more inane tasks associated with Dave's career.  What I really want to talk about is the graduation mass scheduled for tonight at our parish.

If you have ever attended our country church, you might have felt a little like you stepped back in time.  For one thing, it is full, and not just with members of the Silver Tsunami.  There are actually a ton of young people and the altar is often packed with boy altar servers.  In fact, we have over forty of them.  The most notable characteristic about these young men and boys is that, of the forty, only around 13 of them go to school.  The rest are homeschooled.  Consequently, Dave realized a few days ago that he would definitely need our three boys to serve at the graduation mass tonight.  The boys love to serve, particularly Joseph who is still basking in the light of his First Holy Communion.  They are actually so eager to serve (and so viciously competitive to get an actual job at mass) that they leave for Sunday mass an hour early and run the mile that it takes them to get there.  As many of you might know, there are several jobs for which one can hope as an altar server.  At our church the boys can vie to be one of the two who actually serve the altar, or one of the two torch bearers for the Gospel reading, the cross bearer or one of the eight or so torch bearers.  There is one job for which none of our boys hopes:  the ringer of the bells.  In fact, they have a sort of phobia regarding the bells; looks of terror flit across their faces when the job is mentioned.

At our church, there are two sets of bells:  one consists of four bells welded together to a handle that result in a ring-y sort of sound and a second set of gongs that are struck with a mallet to produce a tonal pattern.  (I'm sorry, I am lost as to technical names.)  These bells are rung at four separate times throughout the liturgy.  In a sense, it is the bells that separate the altar boys from the altar men.  Our three sons are somewhere between altar boys and altar lads (a new category imagined by their mother):  even after years of service, not quite ready to ascend to the spotlight of the bells.  I have to concede to Joseph, though.  Joe is so possessed of self-confidence that if he were asked to preach the homily, he would shrug his shoulders and respond, "I knew you were going to ask me some day."
 A few weeks ago, Benjamin was overcome by a brief moment of Joseph-style confidence and willingly accepted the bell position.  When he strode forward to his bell perch, my eyes widened, my jaw clenched and I sank a little lower in the pew.  Dave devoutly closed his eyes and slowed his breathing.  I could see Hannah's body language clearly expressing a sarcastic, "Oh, great." If she could have thrown up her hands in exasperation, she would have.  What didn't help was that this particular Sunday was a major feast day and the Eucharistic prayer was much longer and differed from what Ben was used to hearing.  During a normal Sunday there are four cues for the bells:  the first is when the priest invokes the Holy Spirit and the ring-y bells are rung; the second is when the Host is elevated and the gong is struck; again the gong is struck at the elevation of the Chalice; and the last ring-y bells are rung when the priest consumes the Host.  As a mother of so many altar servers, I have forced myself to memorize these cues.

I prayed that Ben had done the same.  The priest began the prayer and Ben waited in anticipation for his liturgical debut.  I wondered if I could somehow will him into the correct cues by staring hard enough at his back.  The introduction lengthened and lengthened and Ben waited and waited.  Until he could wait no longer.  Having lost all sense of time and place, Ben grabbed the bells and in a grand gesture rang those bells for all to hear.  At the wrong place.  As our priest prayed that the souls of the faithfully departed would be admitted into heaven, Ben chose to ring out their entry with as grand a flourish as he could manage.  Father looked over his shoulder with a quizzical look, trying to identify the rogue, and possibly maverick, server.  Ben tentatively replaced the bells and fumbled his way through the rest of the mass.  I can safely say that it was the longest Eucharistic prayer of my life.  A woman approached me afterward to tell me how appropriate Ben's miscue had been:  "Isn't there a legend that when a bell rings an angel gets its wings?"  Yes, yes, there is.  I just don't think we're supposed to promote it during mass.

Now we arrive at tonight.  Our boys realized that they would be serving this mass solo and that one of them would have to ring those bells.  This became the topic of a spirited dinner conversation.  Ben, having sworn off of all bells for good, took his name out of the game and left Jacob and Joe to decide who would take the job.  Jacob suggested phoning one of the homeschoolers to come and help, while Joe inexpertly volunteered for the role.  Hannah suggested that the ringer watch her in the congregation for the right cues.  I told them that, if I attended, I would cough or run my hand through my hair so that they would know when to ring.  I don't think that we reached a final decision, although I imagine that Jacob will have to take the bells in hand and Hannah will prayerfully support him from the pew.  Dave will consider this the least of his problems and I will sit at home and watch Netflix.  Either way, one of our boys will accede to the status of altar man tonight; may the best lad win.

(Sorry for the positioning of the photo.  I am technically inept and have to run to the grocery store, so this is what you are left with.)

A tonisllectomy and adenoidectomy in pictures: Slightly boring

Only four days after Sarah's third birthday, she was scheduled for a necessary removal of her tonsils and adenoids.  Both were extremely enlarged causing snoring, sleep apnea, multiple ear infections and ever-present opaque, yellowish mucus.  (Sorry for that last detail, but it is important.)

 The surgery was at the Pembroke Hospital, an hour away from home, and we had to be there at 7am. So, I decided that it would be best to rent a hotel a room and take Hannah with me so that I could leave Sarah's bedside and run to the bathroom and cafeteria.  Also, as my mother reminded me, Hannah is wonderful at keeping up one's spirits.  The night before the surgery, we went to East Side Mario's in an attempt to get Sarah to fill up on food before the fasting began.  All she ate/drank was a large chocolate milk.

She was very excited to sleep in a bed with her sister, if not a little confused as to why she was sleeping in a strange bed in an even stranger room.  The girls fell asleep relatively quickly, but I didn't doze off till nearly 2am.  We had to be at the hospital at 7am for an 8:45 am surgery.  Somehow, we either overslept the alarm or the alarm didn't work, and I was jostled from sleep the next morning by Hannah yelling, "Mom!!  It's 7am and we just woke up!!"  We have never packed and brushed out teeth so quickly.  I remember Hannah saying, "Don't worry, Mom, your hair is fine." Sarah was woken up and angrily got dressed and hustled to the van.  We arrived at the surgery unit at 7:20 ... and no one even noticed!

Sarah hates to wear clothing other than specific outfits that she keeps in a weekly rotation.  Prior to the nurse handing us the day-surgery uniform, I hadn't thought about how she would feel about hospital-issued pyjamas...  Somehow I managed to wrangle her into them with promises of Dora and treats.  I think.  Truthfully, one week after the surgery I actually can't remember how I got her to put on her hospital blues.

Here we are waiting in the second of two waiting rooms where the surgeon and anaesthesiologist would meet with us prior to the procedure.  Her nose was still running and I was wiping it even moments before she left me for the operating room.  She was also very upset about having to take off her amber necklace with attached Miraculous Medal.  You can see it on the table to her right.

Still, she managed a smile, even if it was a little resigned.

An attempt to open her mouth wide for the doctor.  I was very nervous about handing her off to the doctor and nurse prior to surgery.  I have been through three surgeries with Jacob at the children's hospital in Ottawa.  By the third surgery, protocol had changed and a parent was allowed to accompany the child all the way to the OR and to remain with the child until the anaesthetic was administered.  This change in protocol makes a huge difference to both parent and child.  Sarah's surgery was at an adult hospital that still follows the old protocols, for understandable reasons.  Thus, after meeting with the surgeon, the anaesthetist arrived with an OR nurse to explain about magic gas. She was a small woman in her 40s with the kindest eyes; perfect eyes for someone who wears a mask most of her working day.  Eyes that had the ability to convey reassurance, calm and love to a worried patient; the sort of eyes that one might stare into as one drifts off to sleep.  After explaining the procedure to me, this doctor turned to Sarah and began to describe the mask, the sleeping gas and how it differs from real sleep.  I actually thought, "Hmmm, I don't think Sarah has any idea of what you are speaking.  Maybe you should stop."  Thankfully, I stayed quiet and continued to listen as she described a magic bridge which they would cross (the catwalk to the OR) and the magic key that Sarah could hold to open the door.  And then she said, "OK, Sarah, now you are going to come with me."  Hannah and I braced for all out panic, and Sarah went willingly into the doctor's arms and left us without once looking back.  I think Hannah's jaw hit the floor.  I thank the Sacrament of the Sick that Sarah received the day before.

I was told that the surgery would take 45 minutes, but Sarah was gone for well over an hour and my mind began to race with dire possibilities.  Hannah could sense my nervousness and reassured me, "Mom, she probably cried so much that they had to delay the start of the operation."  Soon enough we got the call to meet Sarah halfway between our waiting room and the OR.  Hannah got a blurry picture of Sarah lying in her hospital-issue crib under a pile of white flannel sheets.  My heart nearly broke in two and I was brought back to Jacob at 18 months being carried back from his first eye surgery.

As we walked back, the nurse told me what a dolly Sarah had been.  Apparently in the recovery room the nurses had asked her if she wanted stickers.  She had replied, "No, thank you."  Even with her tonsils and adenoids freshly removed and morphine coursing through her system, she remembered her manners!  Once we arrived back in the room, she woke up and began to cry and vomit.  This is normal, but still quite scary for a mother to watch.  As soon as she saw me, she came out of her crib and slept on my shoulder for a good long while.

Eventually she asked to go back in her crib where she would alternate between sleeping, moaning and eating popsicles.

She was so compliant in her recovery that she was allowed home at 5pm and we gladly bid goodbye to the Day Surgery unit.  The day was mostly uneventful except for three times when a code yellow was announced over the PA system.  Curious as to what code yellow meant, the mother of the patient next to us googled the hospital code system and shared with us that the meaning of code yellow was that a violent patient was loose.  Ha!  With each code yellow, the announcer would include a location.  At one point, after we had learning the code's meaning, Hannah looked at me with wide eyes and gravely remarked, "I was just there, Mom."

Hannah was such a sweetheart.  Several times she had to run to the van and to the cafeteria to fetch me things that I had forgotten.  At one point she went to the cafeteria to buy herself lunch.  She arrived back with a tuna sandwich which she shared with me.  As I gladly chowed down on my half, I asked why she wasn't eating and she replied that she didn't want to eat in front of Sarah because Sarah was unable to eat.  My eyebrows raised in embarrassment as I looked at my half-eaten sandwich and realized how much kinder my eldest daughter is than me!  I guess that's a good sign.

We arrived home at around 7pm and spent a less than fretful night doped up on Tylenol and morphine - yes, morphine.  Sarah is recuperating remarkably well.  She has her moments in which she grips her ears and cries, but she just troops through and reluctantly accepts pain medication.  I was very worried about this surgery prior to the day and wondered if we should be going through with it.  I must remark that the results proved that the surgery was necessary.  Her snoring and sleep apnea immediately disappeared and, by far the greatest miracle, the runny nose that I wiped minutes before she left for the OR, hasn't been wiped since.  The poor little thing must have had some sort of continuous nasal infection.  A few hours after the surgery I ran into the surgeon and asked him if her adenoids had proved as large as he had expected.  He raised his brow and nodded slowly, "They are supposed to be a half teaspoon in size.  They were each the size of a tablespoon."  No wonder she's breathing easier.  We are all glad to have this day behind us and are looking forward to a happier and healthier little girl.  Thank you for all the prayers.

Sarah's birthday (June 6th)

 It's hard to believe Sarah is three; and what a wonderful three she is.  I can't say enough about this little girl's easygoing, yet stubbornly independent, personality.  She is a delightful mix of excellent qualities.

 As with all Afelskie birthdays, the sibling in celebration is surrounded by other gift-hungry siblings and must fend for themselves in the unwrapping and hoarding of birthday presents.

 The anticipation.

 I'm not even sure she looked at the present after she had opened it; she didn't want to lose time before unwrapping the second gift.

A quick perusal and then the requisite display of My Little Ponies (with wings).  

 I'm not sure what is so interesting about the back of the My Little Pony packages, but clearly something has caught the attention of Joe and Jacob.  The wonderful thing about summer birthdays is that there is enough light from morning till evening to take decent iPhone photos.  Thus, the neon green wall does not appear so neon-y.

The birthday cake.  Many years ago, we moved past Mommy making the birthday cakes.  They were always and inevitably a flop and I have no guilt leaving them behind.  Now, part of the birthday routine is to accompany Mommy to the grocery store where he or she gets to shop the cake bin and pick the (hopefully discounted) cake of his or her choice.  Without a second thought, Sarah chose pink with strawberries. By the way, that photo is the first blog photo of the baby bump (and we're already at 20 weeks!).

 Sarah blew out the candles before we had finished singing Happy Birthday and quickly singed her finger on the candle that she had immediately grabbed in order to lick the icing.  The pain did not dissuade her and she grabbed two more before Isaac could make his move.

 See!  Candles all gone.

 I couldn't resist these photos of Sarah's new bathing suit.  First off, that is a size 4 bathing suit:  She is very tall.

Second of all, the bow on the bum is by far the best part!