Saturday, December 11, 2010

hand made



One of the nice things I've noticed about my kids lately is how giving they've become. There was a definite selfish stage there around age 6 that went on for a while and was making me crazy. Billie decided to make a doll for Sloane a couple weeks before her birthday- we worked together on this project each night as Bill read stories to the littles and sometimes stayed up late at the sewing machine. Billie did 95% of the work and the doll actually has and embriodered face on her other side, which is sleeping, so you can just flip her pink/purple/yellow hair over to see that.

Jackson carefully wrapped up his remote control car, which Sloane is always asking to have a go at, tied it with a bow and gifted it to her. Cort (I) picked out a Little Einstiens computer because they use a defunct computer in most of their games as a cash register or to keep track of the books being checked out when playing their most frequent game 'library'. Cort uses a lot of pseudonyms to check out more than his alotted amount of books. Sloane (looking official behind the defunct computer): What's your name? Cort: King of Jedis.

Back to the kindness- when Billie had her concussion she and I spent one night in the hospital. The kids were there for her fall, watched quietly as Bill and I got all flustered and concerned. They sat silently worried in the hallway chairs while doctors, nurses and we all hovered over Billie for an hour or so. Other people played with them and made paper airplanes with them while we ran tests and got checked in, moved to the pediatric hall (with 6 rooms). Eventually Bill took them home to see Nanna and assured them Billie would be fine and home soon.

The next day Bill brought us home from the hospital. Nanna had the girls drawing a welcome home banner for Billie and Jackson was running back and forth sneakily and only gave me a quick hello, obviously busy at work. Billie was still pretty wiped out that morning- Bill carried her to her bed. The littles went right in to give her hugs and see her. The first chance he got, Jackson snuck in to her room and I entered to find pokemon cards everywhere. He had sorted through his entire deck (let me assure you this is no small feat) and picked out all of the 'cute' characters, stacked them up and wrapped them and addressed them to Billie, complete with a few card covers to keep your most special cards in top condition. Billie was smiling and looking over her new cards for two minutes before rolling over and going back to sleep.

These trauma situations aren't exactly fun but it was nice to see how thoughtful everyone was not just to Billie, but to the whole family. We played lots of card games in bed, read stories and watched endless episodes of Teen Titans on DVD together.

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1 comment:

Pat said...

I'm a witness to the niceness...and also to the sheer terror of the concussion. In case anyone has any doubt, this is the nicest family on earth. And Billie, I'm absolutely mad for the doll you made Sloane!