Chaos Smoothers

I told myself in April that once May hit, life would slow down and I could regroup. I also told myself I would take up the reigns of the personal blog, since The Rambling Historian had such a solid run during the semester for our homeschool co-op.

And then...

Life imploded.

I say imploded and not exploded because in retrospect, the last two months seem to be some elegantly orchestrated chaos. Just this shimmery, shiny bubble where big things happened and all the details just danced around the edges and smoothing the chaos in ways that brought about the best of outcomes.

For example, Paxton's brain went on the fritz. The first couple of times it happened we attributed it to heat overexposure. By the fourth or fifth time, his symptoms had escalated to that of watching a drunk midget having a stroke. It's not a good look for a six year old boy. The husband was with us for that one. Someone told me how wonderful it was that he was home for this ER run for once. I think it's one of those chaos smoothers. Most other ER runs of the last decade have been made sans husband; like the time I was carrying a bleeding toddler on my hip and dragging a three year old into an emergency room wearing a blood stained t-shirt with the words "Guess What's Cooking" wrapped tightly around my eight month pregnant belly. There's really no dignity left at that point.

This kid's brain event was weirdly my entire focus. I didn't even know where the other kids were or who was watching the dogs until a day or two later. Then came the insurance hassles, appointments, referrals, and the "soonest we can get him in is the end of August." It's not the best way to live-- on tenterhooks, wondering if his episodes will continue and knowing our one option is more ER visits until that elusive appointment. His brain decided one more doozy of an episode would do the trick and we went straight to Arkansas Children's in Little Rock. Lovely, lovely place. I would never hesitate in returning or telling others to go there as well. He had a 26 hour EEG-- I used selfie mode on my phone so he could watch the tech glue the wires to his head, to which he proclaimed "I am sooo cute!" Uh, sure.-- and then an MRI, which was seriously the best part because I got to be there for the laughing gas. "It smells sooooo good... it's cherry."

He believed his hospital stay to be the best vacation EVER. They brought him food in bed. He got to order whatever he wanted to eat, and he could watch TV and pick what he wanted to watch, he received some amazing Lego sets, his bed could recline and it was like a ride for him, and above all, he got to relieve himself in a urinal that kept tabs on how much liquid waste his body produced-- "How much this time, Mom?!?!" Nobody needs to be that excited about urine.

Paxton's brain also made sure this second ER visit happened on the husband's days off. That was fortuitous and chaos smoothing. The diagnosis was complex/complicated migraine. He's on daily medication and has done brilliantly on it. I got the statement of benefits from the insurance company and was more than pleased to see that nothing was owed on our part for the $20,000.00 bill. Fairly certain chaos smoother should be a hashtag. #chaossmoother 

All while this little man was doing his weird brain thing, all three girls needed to be prepped and ready for camp. Looooong story short, the pediatrician's office where we used to go took like five months to remember to send over records to our new family clinic. I needed shot records. After way too many hours trying to get administrative types to get records to the right places, I finally was ready to get Evelynn her tetanus shot. The Health Department didn't think to tell me I needed an appointment to get this done when I had talked to them previously, and they offered the soonest available date... in the middle of the girls' camp week. Did you know you could get a prescription from a doctor for a tetanus shot and got to Walgreen's where they administer said shot? Blew my mind just a tad. #chaossmoother 

This could easily be an album cover.

Volleyball took up quite a bit of time the early part of this summer-- Evelynn is playing this fall. I gulp at the magnitude of volleyball events sucking up so many dates in my calendar from May to October but her love for the sport makes it worth it. So practices and fund raisers were sprinkled around the brain thing and camp and business. Weirdly enough, these things never clashed; where one event stopped, the other started. #chaossmoother

I had decided months ago that when the girls were at camp, I would redecorate their room and clean out the other room. The request dubious-- a combination of Star Wars and Audrey Hepburn. Sometimes I am amazed at how diverse they are in their interests and revel in how unique they can be... and then they ask for Star Wars and Audrey Hepburn. Good thing I had months to consider this. 

The cleanout was real. The girls' things were completely cleaned out and organized. Evelynn's room was insane. Have you every cleaned out an artist's quarters? It's like all the papers, pens, pencils, markers, and pastels breed in the corners. No one tells you these things when you are feeding a passion at a young age. She has mad skills. And I know that these things are important to her craft. But I found like 500 hundred writing utensils in every nook and cranny.

That's a cubby box that is about 1/3 to 1/2 full.

Cleaning out the rooms and sorting through mountains of clothes the kids have outgrown is the most freeing aspect of regrouping. All four kids have been all growing monstrous amounts for the last three months. No one tells you these things when you have kids close together. Oh, you bought new clothes for summer? How about we all outgrow them before summer even hits full force. Out with the old, in with the new. #chaossmoother

Somewhere along the way, we picked up another cat and four chickens. The husband and girls were out for a run on a trail and found an abandoned kitten. He is super young, but he has done well. After much discussion, he was dubbed Yondu. After a week or so, I think Toothless or Night Fury would have been better because he looks just like that dragon in cat form. He's quite sweet and cuddly, a far cry from our other cat, Fleur, who only cares about people when her food bowl is empty. Having another animal that is easy-- #chaossmoother

 This is the general standoff between Oaken and Yondu. Neither is quite sure the purpose of the other. 

The homeschool life hasn't slowed down much either. I can't even remember what happened that I neglected to post the last two lessons on the other blog... I think I hit the end, walked out of the building, and was done. I may or may not have emptied that particular book bag yesterday (said in the smallest of voices). Someone did ask my girls when the end of their school year was and they told the person "I don't know... we haven't really been doing much of anything." One of that fantastic 'pinches bridge of nose' moments. The clarification is I really didn't have an "end of school year" date. The last two years have been more 'year round' school, so we can fit in travel, our homeschool group activities, and a bit more wiggle room in our schedule. While we don't do the extras-- like science, history, and language arts-- we continue with reading and math. Three months without those two and it's chaos once September hits. #chaossmoother

I'm already gearing up for the next school year. I sold some old books at a sale that was somewhere between the brain thing, a volleyball camp, and a tetanus shot. Out went the pre-K and kindergarten books and other items for the first time in many years. I didn't sniff once over that. Pre-K and kindergarten teachers are a special breed of people, and I'm thoroughly ecstatic to no longer be in that realm. I lost the surface of most the shelves and desks in our school room/office, and even some floor space for the last month or so, and finally found it yesterday, as I did the massive switch of incoming/outgoing books. I seriously considered another bookshelf, but reigned myself in and actually removed quite a few redundant and out of use books. I sniffed over that dilemma. What's done is done. I found my desk, and cleaned out files. And the final check was written for the travesty of the Pennsylvania house became in the last four years. That whole mess and stress has ended and it seemed so exceptionally anticlimactic. So I gathered all the files of old bills and mortgage company paper work that dogged our steps for years and........ I BURNED THEM ALL in a giant pile outside in the yard. Now that, THAT, was the cathartic gesture I was looking for. #chaossmoother

I think that brings us up to the now. Life can get to be such a blur and I tell myself to write it down before it fogs over and is lost. I won't always want to remember the chaos, but I want to remember what made it all smoother, running along from imploding bubble to the next.