What do you do when your third grandchild doesn’t settle to the same bedtime songs as his older brother and cousin? You reframe Jesus Loves Me, Jesus Loves The Little Children, and This Little Light of Mine to the tune of Hey Diddle Diddle. There are several soft crinkly baby books in my Lolly Bus …
I Hear You
My newest grands, Timothy and Ezra, are at ages where they recognize and respond to familiar faces and voices. Ezra began following his dad with his eyes and Timothy had just started sitting up independently before our recent beach trip. My parents accompanied us and we spent time with my sister and her family while …
My People
Three married children, who made their vows before God and many witnesses, means our family is now eternally intertwined with three others exponentially. His and hers, mine and yours, ours and theirs can become quite confusing, especially since we now have two sons who use the same given name. (It happened in my family too …
An Unqualified Yes
On Wednesday, March 24, 2021, five months into my cancer treatment and three-quarters of the way through my chemotherapy, my website, http://www.afittingreply.com went live. I chose the longest possible commitment period- ten years- and paid in advance to secure my website. I committed to posting twice weekly. There have been days like today when I …
No More Wasted Time
When our kids aren’t sleeping or eating appropriately, we look at what’s going on in the moment to try and find a reason. The problem, however, most likely stems from something further back than we tend to look. Maybe they were exposed to a germ last week that has been working against their little systems. …
I Cried
As I backed the Lolly bus from the garage, I looked up to see if Thomas’s little face was pressed to the window below the blind upstairs. He sleeps in his race car bed in the room above the garage when he visits and he had just told me the previous morning that he peeked …
Let The Walls Fall
Amelia stood in the booth next to me singing Jesus Loves Me at the top of her little lungs. We were waiting for our pizza and her power nap in the car and the sugar from her lemonade had officially kicked in. She and Thomas are practicing to sing together during our family lunch following …
Same But Different
Four grandchildren, similar in so many ways, bear traces of genetic code passed through familial lines from our forebears beyond the five generations for which I can account. I am so much Myrtle passed through David to me, but I am also Ansel through Joyce. The lines expand each time a marriage happens and the …
This Is Hard
Thomas puked in the car again, effectively destroying a third car seat in his three short years. When I asked if he felt like he needed to be sick, he said, “I don’t,” but, according to his mom, commenting from the driver’s seat afterwards, he meant, “I don’t want to!” Then he did. He retched …
The More You Know
My grandson, Timothy, is in his second sleep regression at five months. He was sleeping several hour stretches each night and now he’s not, maybe because he’s teething or developing motor skills like rolling and sitting more rapidly at this stage. My generation was lacking the labels this generation enjoys but maybe there was some …
A Fitting Reply 