Gloria in Excelsis Deo: {SQT} That Week Without Sleep

1. Parish Carnival

In between soccer in the morning and orchestra practice in the afternoon, our family attended the parish carnival last Saturday: the kids anticipate this all year!

John getting an autograph of Fozzy Whittaker of the Panthers,
who was there with his kids

2. Wildlife Encounters

After Mass on Sunday, our family joined the Life Chain. For those who aren't familiar, that is a nationally organized pro-life prayer chain in which people stand in prayerful silence along the road, holding up non-graphic signs against abortion.

So, there I was, managing the little kids along the road, when I thought I had stepped into a rose bush and become entangled in thorns terribly piercing my skin. I tried to pull out of the "rose bushes" and looked down to discover I'd stepped into a nest of biting ants.

For those of you who live on the West Coast . . . here in the South we have innumerable species of BITING and FIRE ants that swarm and leave terrible welts on their victims.

You can imagine the scene when I broke rank from the somber, silent prayer warriors, tore off my ant-infested shoes, and ran away barefoot while pushing my stroller crazily down the hill.

Later, another bald-faced hornet got trapped in our garage where it ended up living and buzzing the entire week.

Also, I had a truly up-close encounter with a giant cockroach, but that merits its own entry down below . . .

3. Pumpkin Patch

On Monday, I took the kids to the pumpkin patch. We are in a new stage of schooling at which our sixth grader's academic load is such that he had to work through all his Monday work over the weekend prior in order to be able to attend. But I know that my years are counted when a son his age is going to be delighted to go to a pumpkin patch, so I was tickled to have him enthusiastically there.

4. Another Entrepreneur in the Family

Mary (ten next month!) has taken on her first piano student, a six-year-old neighbor, for pay. Mary is teaching out of the Faber books and is taking her duties seriously, planning out the lesson plan in advance. I admit, I spied a little, and was delighted to hear her using encouraging tone of voice the whole time.

5. Miscellaneous

Our three-year-old sits next to me while I teach Kindergarten and one day this week he showed me his white board and said, "Me drawed Fr. Reid."

Portrait of our pastor

6. My White Whale

Chris was in the bright lights of the big city of New York all week. It was one of the hardest weeks at home in my memory, most of it just not fit for a blog. I've written numerous negative paragraphs for this blog post and gone back to delete them.

I was (am) extremely sleep-deprived, having gotten a cumulative four broken hours of sleep or so over the first 48 hours, and, after that, even getting four or five hours per night ain't that much. Why most of the children woke so often, so many times overnight, all week, I don't know but it was like something I've rarely experienced.

The second night of Chris' absence, when I tried to tumble into bed, I discovered a larger-than-life cockroach who had gotten waylaid in his journey and ended up IN THE BED, IN THE SHEETS, CRAWLING AROUND.

I didn't burn the house down, nor even wake six kids and go check into a hotel, so I think it's fair to say that reason prevailed.

I did, however, strip the bed sheets and stay awake all night.

Good thing I did keep paranoid vigil because you know what? That cockroach was back two nights later and he escaped my clutches (and the tome I was going to smash him with) yet again.

He is now my White Whale.

“...to the last I grapple with thee; from hell's heart I stab at thee; for hate's sake I spit my last breath at thee.” ― Herman Melville, "Moby-Dick or, The Whale"

11-year-old taking out the trash, 3-year-old helping

We chugged along this week, me failing utterly at maintaining graciousness and Christian charity while keeping up with the house, the homeschooling, and the kiddos, on almost no sleep. I can't lighten my sixth-grader's academic load since he's in a hybrid program now, but I lightened my fourth grader's load so she could be my right hand helper, and I lightened my other two children's academics because I knew I just couldn't manage more. Still, I was crushed by it all and greatly humbled.

7. Wedding Anniversary

On Friday night, Chris' parents came to town to celebrate (on the actual day) their fifty-fifth wedding anniversary. What a milestone and a model for us all!