Mother Cabrini Shrine

After making a few trips up to Lookout Mountain over the past year or so, snd becoming familiar with the area…R decided she wanted to climb the steps up to the huge statue of Jesus at Mother Cabrini Shrine. We’d visited the shrine before but never made the trip up to the top… I knew M wouldn’t even try because of his anxiety around steps, and I didn’t feel right leaving him behind. 

Yesterday though I decided we’d just give it a try. M was unusually agreeable to going and I reassured him over and over that he didn’t have to climb the steps… he could wait in the car, climb part way and wait for us on one of the benches along the route, etc. Incredibly he didn’t argue, or insist we go somewhere else, so up we went. 

M did end up waiting below while R and I climbed to the top (300+ steps) and he did fine… The trip up was definitely worth it.. the view was SO beautiful, and it was peaceful, serene, at the top. It felt like a holy place. 

We stayed long enough to say a prayer for the family of a dear friend of ours who passed away last week then made the trip down. 

I’m pretty sure we’ll do this again.. After seeing the stairs and the photos I took from the top, M has decided he might like to try going at least part way up next time, and R definitely wants to go again. 

It was a lovely way to spend the day… 

Super moon!

 

sharing a few favorites...

I blog for several reasons...  the main reason is probably as simple as I really like to write, to record our days. Another reason is hoping to help far away family feel more connected to what is going on here, in our lives.

I also love reading other's blogs. I enjoy all kinds of different blogs, but lately have especially been enjoying reading DIY blogs. I'm inspired by seeing what other people are doing... their creativity, resourcefulness, and sometimes fearlessness in getting things done around their home or farm. That's a big part of the reason I write about the projects I work on... because I love so much to read about other people's projects!

So I thought I'd share a few of my favorite blogs... some I've been reading for years, and some I've just discovered.

Here they are, in no particular order:

Five Acres and a Dream   ~ Leigh and her husband are homesteading... for reals... on their five acre dream. I love her honesty (sharing the good and the bad) and her resourcefulness. Want to learn how to make cheese or preserve eggs? Leigh can show you how. :)


Little Earthling Blog (AKA Baker's Dozen and Apollo XIV) ~ Renee has a busy life; 14 children, 5 of them adopted, plus her own photography business. I love her blog because she has such a wonderful attitude... I'm intimately acquainted with the challenges that can be come with children adopted from foster care, and prenatally exposed to who knows what... and I know that Renee and her husband have experienced some of those challenges. But Renee respects her children's privacy, always writes about them with respect and understanding, and her love for her family shines through every post. (And you can always count on her for gorgeous photos as well!)

Ana White ~ free plans for building everything from light furniture to chicken coops... need I say more?!

A Country Farmhouse (AKA In The Fields) ~ Catherine documents, with beautiful photos, the renovating and decorating of her home. The first house ended up drop dead gorgeous, and now she and her husband have begun work on their new (old) house. Did I mention her photos are absolutely beautiful?

One Project at a Time ~ Erin is fearless. She cuts holes in exterior walls for windows, and moves windows from one place to another... during nap time! (Yes, her kids are still small!) I like following along as she and her extended family fix up their vacation cabin, and I love that they are doing it on a budget! Erin's fearlessness is contagious, reading her blog makes me feel like tearing down a wall or something.  (But I won't ;)


DIY Diva ~ Don't you just love the name of Kit's blog? This is another fearless DIY'er. I haven't been reading Kit's blog long, but I look forward to every post. I love the fact that she pulls no punches, she isn't posting "everything is perfect" posts... and she shares the craziness of her life fixing up her old farmhouse by herself. I love that she has donkeys, and enjoy her sense of humor. I learn from her blog, but it also makes me smile. (Read her brief conversation with a local electrician in this post... it's priceless.)

I have other favorites as well, of course, but these are the ones that I keep up with regularly. So... enjoy... check out one of two of my favorites and tell me what you think...

And leave a comment sharing your favorite blogs, I'd love to find some new favorites to add to my list. :)

And speaking of old things....

... with little or no monetary value.

Back when we picked up our shed, I saw that the guy we'd bought it from had a large old wooden ladder laying in his trash pile. It wasn't broken, just a little old and rickety... It was too good to just throw away, so I rescued itasked for it and brought it home. (Actually, I snuck it home... hiding it on the trailer under some large shed pieces... Joe didn't know we had it until we started to unload. ;)

Once it came off the trailer, I had no idea what to do with it. So it laid out by the driveway all summer... while I pondered over it and wondered why I'd brought it home.... and what I could use it for.

That's it in the foreground, the ladder close to the shed is our good, usable, 10' ladder... sadly, the wooden one is too rickety to use.



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E has a great old ladder in her living room (found in their barn when they moved in) that holds a couple of warm throws for cool evenings. So I knew my old ladder could still be useful... but E's ladder is normal sized... the one I brought home is 10' tall. It's hard to find uses for something that TALL...

I finally decided I needed to bring it up on the porch, out of the rain... so the wood wouldn't rot away to nothing while I was trying to decide what to do with it. I moved it up the porch steps, but found that it was too tall to stand up on the front porch except in the highest corners up close to the house. I  moved the pile of mud boots and stood it up in the only open corner that was tall enough (because laying down it took up the whole porch!)... and then inspiration hit... and I started loading it up with mud boots (and a grapevine pumpkin I impulsively picked up at a thrift store the other day :) ).

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Turns out that good-for-nothing-too-big-too-rickety ladder makes a perfect mud boot holder on the front porch! I did end up sawing a few inches off the bottom to shorten it so it could be moved away from the front door a little... and, at some point, I'll attach it up top to the porch header with a couple of screws... just to make sure a winter storm doesn't doesn't blow it over.

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Awesome... mudboots are no longer laying in a huge pile on the front porch, and the big ladder has found a use... I love win-win kinds of situations!

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Frost shadow

Walking out to the barn early the other morning, I noticed the frost on the barn roof was an interesting shape...



As I looked closer I saw that it formed a near perfect frost "shadow" of the big light next to the barn.





It made me think of this quote:



"I believe God embedded the miraculous in the ordinary, and it is our task to discover is and celebrate it."

~Kent Nerburn, author of Ordinary Sacred: The Simple Beauty of Everyday Life



I need to get that book... I think I'd love it.

Do your little bit of good...

Do your little bit of good where you are;

it's those little bits of good

put together

that overwhelm the world.

~Archbishop Desmond Tutu

Jumping on the bandwagon....

I read a few blogs that fairly regularly post writings from the book Jesus Calling by Sarah Young. After reading bits and pieces from the book here and there for several months, but not buying it or even being very interested in it, I finally broke down and bought it last spring. Since then, it's become a regular part of my early morning reading/prayer time...  (I think I resisted buying the book for so long because of the title... I think they could have come up with a much better title, for sure.)

Anyway... I thought I'd share some bits and pieces from the August 22 entry in the Jesus Calling book because it just seemed so pertinent to me, right now, today.

"Trust me and don't be afraid. I want you to view trials as exercises to develop your trust muscles."

Joe was back in the ER yesterday... I won't go into details (for the whole internet world!) but it was more of the same problems he had back in May.

"Refresh yourself in my Holy Presence, speak or sing praises to Me..."

At the hospital yesterday evening I prayed one of my favorite psalms (or parts of psalms), Psalm 59:16b-17 as I waited for all the tests to get done and results to get back... I do love those verses, I start my day with them each morning.

"...and my face will shine radiantly upon you."

Joe's home now, and this week is shaping up in involve a LOT of doctor appointments. (I've already got three on the calendar for M and R, and Joe is likely to have at least one or two as well!)

"Trust me and do not be afraid, for I am your strength, song and salvation."

I'm not sure how it's all going to get done this week, but it always does... It will be interesting to see how He pulls it off this time. (My "trust muscles" are going to be body builder buff by the end of this... ;) )

right now - today - this week

I got up this morning not in the mood to start the day. I've been up a lot the past couple of nights and was tired...and the house was cold... and about the last thing I felt like doing was bundling up and going out to the barn to feed.

A heavy fog was settled over everything and as I left the house I decided to grab my camera (my new one, which I dearly love!) and maybe take a few pictures. I was almost out to the barn before I noticed a whole herd of deer bedded down in the pasture behind the house.

I stopped and took a few pictures and when they started to move away I went into the barn and started my morning barn routine (throw hay, break ice, haul water, rake and shovel manure.. and finish with "hugs" and a little conversation with Murphy, Tucker and Brighty).

As I walked back to the house I played a mental game I play sometimes when the constant demands of caregiving start to wear on me...  It's a pretty simple game, and I thought I'd invite you to play it with me. All you do is imagine your time is entirely your own, you can do anything you'd like with it... no responsibilities, no expectations... what would you do right now, what would you do today, what would you do this week?  I try to keep my plans realistic, something that would really  be possible to do (I never imagine running out and buying a Mercedes or paying off the house!) but that's the only "rule" I follow.

Right now... this is a no-brainer... I'd turn the electric blanket on and get back into bed and sleep (in a quiet house) until I woke up naturally.

Mmmm... a nice toasty bed would feel so good right now.

Today...  I'd laze around for awhile picking a little on the banjo... I have a song I'm trying to pick out, I've got the melody down but have just started working on which runs and slides to put with it. I would eat lays potato chips, washed down by diet Dr Pepper (yeah, I still miss it!) with a little chocolate for dessert. (M is still on a fairly limited diet... can you tell?!) When I got tired of being home, I'd head into Denver and spend a couple of hours in my favorite music store, looking for any new books they might have of banjo music, and keeping my eyes open for a good beginning dulcimer book. I'd also have them pull one of the expensive banjos down off the wall and I'd sit for awhile and play it. I'd stop for dinner on the way home... nothing fancy... maybe  chipotle... a burrito sounds good, or maybe I'd stop for some Indian fry bread. I'd finish up the day with a good book and a cup of tea before going to bed whenever I was tired.

This week... Hmm, a whole week to do whatever I want with...  I think I'd grab the credit card, toss the kids in the car and take off.  We'd head north first, and revisit Mt Rushmore, Crazy Horse, and the Wild Horse Sanctuary. We would only stay in nice motels with pools, the Disney channel, and pay per view movies. M's stomach would be doing well enough that we could eat what we wanted without him getting sick. Once we were tired of So Dakota we'd head east and stop in Greeley for a visit with my cousin MJ... we'd make sure to drive out to Great-Grandpa's homestead while we were there and spend a little time exploring. Then we'd turn the car south and drive down into Kansas to visit my sister. We'd take our time, visiting all the little museums and things we'd see along the way. We'd spend a day or two in Cottonwood Falls, staying up too late talking, before heading west again towards home.

That's it... the end of the game... it's not as good as really doing those things, but it's still pretty fun to think about. :)

 So imagine... no responsibilities, deadlines, expectations... what would you do right now - today - this week?

Special Day

Today was a special day for R... She made her First Communion. 

 Because of the difficulty we have getting to church regularly (because of M), we decided a home Mass would be best and she could make her First Communion then. We invited family and a few close friends (and filled the house!) It was a lovely, crazy day... 

 Here's R before everyone arrived...

 

 ... she took my breath away. 

 And this was taken during Mass. We pretty well filled the living room to overflowing! 

We used every chair we had, but it wasn't quite enough...  

 R and Father after Mass. He was so very good with her, he was careful to explain things in a way she could understand, and took the time (during their visits here over the past month or so) to let her read to him. I found her reading a cookbook to him today... (it takes a lot of patience to listen to a child reading a cookbook!)

 

 And where did I find her, after Mass... when everyone was looking for her to open the gifts they'd brought?

 Outside, in her mud boots, with Grant and the goats!

Oh, oh, oh!

.... I have the best idea!!! 

 Yes, things change quickly here... During the first part of the week my only goal was getting through the day without having M admitted... and now I'm making plans, for him, for the next couple of years. 

 I'll catch you up, share my idea, then I need some feedback... 

First the catch up... Evidently, haldol is crucial to M's stability. Each day this week (until yesterday) was a huge challenge... He would be fine for long periods of time and then virtually nothing at all would cause him to disconnect. He was getting more paranoid (refusing his meds, for the first time in his life, believing that I was trying to poison him) and I wasn't sure we'd make it through the week without admitting him. 

 Yesterday I decided to just increase the haldol back to where it had been before. 

I'm still very concerned about the TD... We are talking to the pdoc about options, and she's consulting with the pdoc in town who specializes in childhood schizophrenia. But trying to decrease the haldol just wasn't working... 

 As soon as I increased the haldol again, M settled down. He made it all the way through yesterday without any problems. It's so good to see him doing better again... 

 So here's my idea... "Internships" for M as a way to teach job skills, social skills, and maybe even find a "niche" for work he can do as an adult. I'll approach businesses in our town about M working for them. I would ask that he be required to fill out an application, but basically it would be volunteer work... they wouldn't have to pay him. He would need to comply with their dress code (uniform etc) and I would stay on site to act as his job coach. He would answer to the manager of whatever business he's working at, but I would one-on-one him, helping him to understand what's expected of him, keeping him on task, etc. I'm thinking about keeping each internship short, working at each business an hour or so every week or two for just three to four months, then rotating into another internship someplace else. Rotating like this should keep him engaged (the novelty of trying new things) and also give him the chance to try out different kinds of jobs, working for different kinds of people, learning different skills etc. 

I'm thinking about trying to put to arrange two 3-4 month internships a year, giving him some time off around the holidays and between "jobs". (If this works, the length of the internships would increase as he gets older.) 

We'd keep our volunteer job at the library as well... I need help thinking about businesses I can approach about this... I'm going to ask the manager of our Chick-Fil-A (he's a very nice guy, who already knows M), thinking that M can clean tables, hand out free samples, etc. I also thought about asking at the senior center and the animal shelter. 

 Any other ideas?? 

 M isn't good around other kids, but is very social and good with adults. His speech isn't clear enough to answer phones or anything, and he's too unpredictable to be around cooking (hot surfaces) or food preparation equipment (sharp things). He would be good at snack bar kind of work... (Hmm.. maybe the movie theater?) He's good with Gameboy and computers, and he can make change, so I think he could run a cash register (if someone was willing to donate the time to teach him). 

Our town is small enough to have some smaller family owned businesses, I think those are the places I'll have to approach... although I might see if Wal-Mart might let M be a greeter (or work with one of their greeters). 

 What do you think? Ideas, thoughts, suggestions?? 

 *edited to add* I've already been given several very good suggestions... Thanks, keep them coming! I'm going to make a list of ideas here and add to it as people leave comments (and ideas!) for me...

1. stocking shelves
2. assembly work
3. fill boxes for shipping
4. pet store clean up/odd jobs

two cups of coffee

My SIL sent this to me... I've seen it before and liked it, so I thought I'd post it here...

The Mayonnaise Jar and Two Cups of Coffee When things in your life seem almost too much to handle, when 24 hours in a day are not enough, remember the mayonnaise jar and the 2 cups of coffee. A professor stood before his philosophy class and had some items in front of him When the class began, he wordlessly picked up a very large and empty mayonnaise jar and proceeded to fill it with golf balls. He then asked the students if the jar was full. They agreed that it was. The professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured them into the jar He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles rolled into the open areas between the golf balls. He then asked the students again if the jar was full. They agreed it was. The professor next picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar. Of course, the sand filled up everything else. He asked once more if the jar was full. The students responded with an unanimous "yes." The professor then produced two cups of coffee from under the table and poured the entire contents into the jar effectively filling the empty space between the sand. The students laughed. "Now," said the professor as the laughter subsided, "I want you to recognize that this jar represents your life. The golf balls are the important things---GOD, your family, your children, your health, your friends and your favorite passions---and if everything else was lost and only they remained, your life would still be full. The pebbles are the other things that matter like your job, your house and your car. The sand is everything else---the small stuff. "If you put the sand into the jar first," he continued, "there is no room for the pebbles or the golf balls. The same goes for life. If you spend all your time and energy on the small stuff you will never have room for the things that are important to you. "Pay attention to the things that are critical to your happiness. Spend time with your children. Spend time with your parents. Visit with grandparents. Take time to get medical checkups. Take your spouse (or good friend) out to dinner. There will always be time to do a load of wash and fix the squeaky door. Take care of the golf balls first---the things that really matter. Set your priorities. The rest is just sand." One of the students raised her hand and inquired what the coffee represented The professor smiled and said, "I'm glad you asked." The coffee just shows you that no matter how full your life may seem, there's always room for a couple of cups of coffee with a friend."

the hogan

Back in 1997 I presented at my first FAS conference. It was a national conference and I was sitting on a parent panel, answering questions with several other parents. 

One of the parents on the panel I'd never met before... she was a Native American woman; the birth mother of a son with FAS. She was a very soft spoken, simple woman. Simple in her dress, her words... and her life. She wasn't highly educated, but something she said at the conference has stuck with me for 10 years now... even though most of the specifics of that conference, the clinical information professionally presented by doctors in the field, has been long forgotten.

She spoke of trying at first to live in the community with her son but, because of his FAS, it being too hard. The community was not a safe place for her son, and had become a painful place for her. So she and her son built a hogan far from everyone else, in an isolated part of the reservation... and that where they lived. 

Happily.

  At the time, I didn't "get it". I couldn't understand why anyone would do that. I thought this woman was quaint and interesting... but didn't fully appreciate her words or the wisdom behind them. (She also talked about people with FAS being "children of nature" and needing nature around them to be happy... something else I've found to be true.) I've realized lately that we've also retreated into our "hogan". Because of M's illness we just don't "fit" into the world very well any more... We aren't hermits, and cherish the friendships we have... but I've let go of trying to fit us into the world. I'll still post here when I can, but my computer time is limited to the very early mornings and late at night... and sometimes, I'm just too tired at those times to think. Please understand if I only post sporadically, or don't stay in touch the way I should... it just means my focus needs to be within my "hogan" at that time. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 For Granny.... pictures from the kid's Special Olympics swim meet. Both kids just started softball (also with Special Olympics) and love it, I'll post pictures when I can...

a new favorite quote~

Out of the clutter, find simplicity.

From discord, find harmony.

In the middle of difficulty, lies opportunity.

                                                   

 ~Albert Einstein 

What's in a name?

When I first began blogging, I wanted to think of a name for my blog which captured our home. For me, as a stay at home, homeschooling mom... home is the hub that the rest of life revolves around. Home is my workplace, my vacation and relaxation spot, my recreation area, and my refuge.

 Home is important to me.

So I choose the name Woodstone Prairie for that first blog (and my other blogs since then). The word woodstone comes from the petrified wood that is so easily found on our land. We have found dozens of pieces of it since moving here about a year ago. We have a fireplace in our house made entirely of petrified wood that was found when they dug the foundation for our house (back in 1977). 

Woodstone also represents the house itself. It's a log home that we are working to repair and restore after it was sadly neglected for many years.

The second part of the name Woodstone Prairie is easy. We live on five acres of never-worked prairie in Colorado. Except for being drier, this land looks much the same as it did 100, 200, even 500 years ago. Deer, coyote and foxes are frequent visitors as are eagles, hawks, and many other smaller creatures.

 

 So that's what's in the name...

Thankfulness...

I believe in being thankful for everything... so today's list will be a little different.
 I am thankful for...

 1. ....stupidly letting the @#&%# drill slip into the side of my finger yesterday. I'm sure my finger will heal more quickly then I'll forget the importance of being very careful around power tools.

 2. ...the seller of this house NOT disclosing that the house needed tens of thousands of dollars worth of repairs. We never would have bought it had we known, and would have missed living in a house that suits us well, on land that we love.

 3. ...the nasty pink carpet that this house came with. (and would have been torn out a year ago, except all our money has gone into more necessary repairs) I've discovered the joys of having carpet that you don't care about ("Muddy shoes? No problem... come on in!" ) and have found that pink carpet hides dirt really well.

 4. ...the kid in our homeschool group who picks on M. Without the latest incident, I wouldn't have received the private emails of support and encouragement from other group members, and wouldn't have written "tightrope walking" which was good therapy for me. I also wouldn't have been motivated to look for other resources and might have missed learning that a new homeschool group is starting in the town closest to us.

 5. ...sigh, this is a hard one. I would give anything for M's schizophrenia to be gone (or even just a little better!) but I am thankful for the lessons it's taught me, like patience, acceptance, and the value of each person... regardless of whether they "fit" into society as smoothly as many of us do. It has taught me that the brain is a wonderful, amazing, and sometimes terrible thing and that the human spirit is more powerful than the most severe psychiatric illness. It has taught me to appreciate the little things, and has brought many wonderful people into our lives... people we wouldn't have known otherwise. It motivated us to move to the country...a move that has been wonderful for all of us. And finally, it's taught me to trust God to take care of us... even when the situation looks hopeless.