First off:
School shopping - don't like.
My niece, Dea - do like.
Moving on.
The Search for Tank
The best story of the Mammoth Cave trip happened at the campsite. It was morning, and our tour didn't start until 10:45 (which felt like 11:45 because of the time change), so we were being good, relaxed parents and were allowing the kids to wander around the whole of the camping area. It's not very big, and I figure, in reality, most people don't really want to steal my children, especially not 4 of them.
They were sticking together and making walking trips around the camping loop and through the wooded area in-between. No problem. Then they called me over a few camp sites to see a deer. I saw the deer and pretended to be enthusiastic about the obviously-fed-by-people animal (cause pretend enthusiasm is what all the cool moms are doing these days). On my way back to the campsite I started counting kids. Miciah, Dea, and Elijah. No Teancom. I asked them where he was. They didn't know. "He's at the bathroom." "No, Elijah was just in there, and Tank wasn't with him." "He's at the campsite." "No, I was just there." That's a problem.
We tried to stay calm. Chances were that he was fine. Chances were that he wasn't too far away. ... But, you know, he's only 5.
We sent all the kids different ways around the loop and Rob split through the wooded area in the middle. One of the other campers said, "Are you looking for a little boy?" Rob replied that he was. "He went that way." Good start on our search. The best part of the whole thing was what they said next.
"He looked really young to be walking by himself, but he was walking with a purpose. He was banging his stick on the ground and when he walked by he looked at us and said, 'I made this trail!'"
Sure enough, he was just a little further down the line, banging his stick as he walked, so no big deal. And our whole family has since been saying, "I made this trail!"
Elijah
For the first time in his short life, Elijah bore his testimony at church. I loved it. It wasn't the semi-memorized normal spiel about how he knew the church was true and that he knew President Hinckley was a prophet or whatever. (Not to knock that sort of little kid testimony-bearing.) He brought up his set of scriptures and, from what I could understand between the mumbles, said that he'd been reading Joseph Smith History and that he liked it. Then he said that his dad had given his uncle Rick a blessing and that Rick had lived and he liked that, too. And he closed the testimony and sat down.
It was so simple, and yet somehow so powerful. Here's a 7-year-old little boy, bringing up his scriptures, talking about how he was reading Joseph Smith History? That's good stuff. On top of that, I'm his mother, and I see what he does at home. We have a Must Read for Half an Hour to Play the Wii rule, and almost always Elijah brings out his Book of Mormon to read. I don't ask him what he's reading most of the time, and I don't know what he's getting out of it, but holy cow! I often can't find the time to read the Book of Mormon, but my 7-year-old, who is just starting to understand the complexities of the book, he's reading it everyday? Wow, I'm a slacker.
But to me the point isn't really that I'm a slacker. It's that Elijah is amazing. He wants to be good. He wants the Priesthood. He wants to serve in the Church just like his daddy. He wants to pray and receive answers.
It's humbling.
Uncle Rick
You'll remember that I posted about Rick when things were looking pretty grim. Well, he's turned it around and is now recovering nicely. He'll hopefully be home by the end of the week, though he'll still need full-time at-home care for a while yet. His accident was on June 10th and he's been in the hospital for all but 4 days since. That's a long time! He's working on things that we take for granted, like walking further than down the hallway and sitting up without passing out. We're happy he'll come home soon. The kids are SO excited to see him.
Strep?
2 weeks ago I was disastrously sick. Fever for 3 days, my throat killing me. I stayed in bed for what felt like (and almost was) 72 hours straight. I finally went to the doctor and he told me that he thought I had strep even though the Rapid Test was negative. Prescribed an antibiotic and told me to go home and get back in bed. I said, "I've BEEN in bed. I want to get OUT of bed!" The next morning I felt amazingly better, and I've continued to improve from there. I finished up the obnoxious 10-day, 3-a-day antibiotic even though the culture revealed that I did not actually have strep. Interesting.
ASL
Tomorrow is my Beginning ASL 2 final. Hurray! I've got a greater than 100% in the class, which I'm proud of but still, it makes it awkward to do things like, "Hey, I know that the class requirement of extra sign hours outside of class is now only extra credit, and I know that I have a better than perfect score in the class, but I did all the work for that requirement, so I'm turning in my 8 hours." I feel like it makes me a jerk, but heck, I'm working hard. The teacher is probably looking for places to dock me points, but for the life of me I can't show up for things under-prepared.
Aw, maybe I won't turn in those 8 hours.
I keep receiving compliments on my sign. I took Rob to a deaf event (even though he barely knows how to say his name - he's a good sport), and was flattered when other people complimented me to him. Someday this will cease to thrill me, but it just feels like confirmation all over again that I'm in the right place at the right time. I love sign and I'm good at it. It's a good feeling.
And last but not least, this song has been in my head:
The End
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