Ho, Ho, Ho!

I always knew my good intentions to mail out Christmas cards would come in handy some day. We're using all the stamps from Good Intentions of Christmas Past to send out Malkolm's stories, plus we bought 300 more stamps today. Looking at all these older Christmas stamps, wondering why I never got around to sending out Christmas letters and cards except for maybe once every five years or so.

We're down to the last stack of addresses, and we may have them out tomorrow if all goes well.

I remember when I started this stay-at-home mom thing. I thought, "Oh, the time I would have!" I just knew not spending 60 hours in an office somewhere would lead to my having way more time to do stuff with the kids and Sia, to send out Christmas Cards every year, to really keep the house clean, often have some baked goods baking in the oven ... and we must not forget always to make healthy dinners for my family. Well now. I think I'm in the middle of some kind of cruel joke. There's never a clean house (unless Sia does it, or someone else, like my niece, who cleaned the house just after we left for the surgery -- when we returned home from the hospital, I nearly fainted), we have peanut butter and jelly for dinner more often than not, and there are only baked goods in the oven because I occasionally move them there to clean off the counters.

I knew Malkolm helped out a lot around the house, but with him supine on the couch, it's even more apparent to me -- before his surgery, he would come home from school, help me with the Ebay packages, do his homework, empty and load the dishwasher, put out his clothes for the next school day, pick up the living room, help fold clothes and hold and play with Maina as I finished whatever I needed to do to get the packages to the post office and get dinner started. He's been helping fold clothes since he was 3-years-old (I think it is fair to say it is his least favorite chore, and he does not miss helping out with the laundry right now).

This young man has also been waking up to his alarm clock since he was in kindergarten. Setting his alarm the night before, getting himself up every morning without assistance, getting dressed, making and eating breakfast himself, taking his heart medicine, getting his school books and backpack ready for school and then waking me up to get him off to the bus stop.

I remember when my husband bought the alarm clock for Malkolm when Malkolm was getting ready to start kindergarten; I scoffed. He won't even use it, I told my husband, he's too young. I remember my own days of sleeping through the alarm day after day, my mother threatening to spray water on me to get me out of bed for school ... and then, here's this little kid, who has turned out to be more responsible about waking himself up than many adults I know, including myself. I must admit I was totally wrong about the alarm clock.

I guess this is all helping me to have a bit more self-discipline and also encouraging Malia to step up and take on more responsibility, which she seems to be taking in stride. I actually enjoy cleaning side-by-side with her, she has a very bright and encouraging spirit about her when we are cleaning together.

All in all, things are moving forward. Just looking at this pic from the night before the surgery, when we were messing around in the hotel room just taking random photos ... Malkolm has come miles since then, and the long and short of it is that I have too. I think that God really works on us through our kids, and my eyes are opened and my faith is stronger, and although I'm tired, I am growing and learning and enjoying every minute... even the tired and grumpy ones.

And maybe this year we will mail out Christmas letters ... oh um, well maybe not, we don't have any Christmas stamps left, after all. ;)

-Jennifer