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Happy Thanksgiving!

dawn — Thu, 24 Nov 2011 13:47:29 +0000

This year I am thankful for Facebook. I posted daily something I was thankful for. It is quicker than my blog. Sorry blog. Here’s a short recap:
- My husband who is very good to me.
- My children who are a daily delight and will no doubt grow into amazing people.
- My sisters and their families, I miss you and think of you all the time.
- My friends, both near and far.
- A cozy home, enough to eat, medical insurance, my health.
- Yoga.
- Technology.
- A long, warm Fall.

There are so very many things I am thankful for, I may just continue to be thankful into the new year. There is no shortage of things to post. I am so very fortunate. If you’re reading this, I’m also very fortunate to have you in my life. Thank you. Happy Thanksgiving! May your hearts be filled with the joy of gratitude all year long.

Dawn

Happy Mother’s Day!

dawn — Sun, 08 May 2011 19:19:01 +0000

Struggling to put into words my gratitude for the amazing women in my life. I’ve decided to revisit a toast I posted here in 2006, with just a few modifications and additions:

To my mom, who gave being a mother everything she had. She had to, she was vastly out numbered. Thank you for making every holiday a special time, for supporting me through successes and failures, and for always giving with all your heart. (I love you, mom!)

To my Nana, who raised 3 children on her own, when such a thing was unheard of. Thanks for taking me fishing.

To my Grandma, who always liked a good shot of whiskey and is the toughest lady I may ever know. Give ‘em hell!

To my Mother-in-law Deb, who drove bus, juggled a house of men, and didn’t learn mothering by example. Thank you for your candor and for always taking my side.

To my Grandmother-in-law, Lue, who has the wackiest sense of humor and is a total Betty. Thank you for always treating me like one of your own.

To my sisters of birth and sisters of circumstance (you know who you are!), thank you for laughing and crying with me, for leading by example, and telling me it will all be OK.

Happy Mother’s Day!
Love,
Dawn

P.S. In honor of my Mother and her on-going battle with pancreatic cancer, I will be walking in the Relay for Life in August, on her birthday, actually. If you’d like to donate and help us fight cancer to give everyone more birthdays, click here.

Thankful 11/26/2010

dawn — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 12:40:27 +0000

Today I am thankful that there are only a few more days to post what I am thankful for.

I am also thankful that there are only 50 more posts until I hit 1,000!

What a productive season of gratitude. Even if I don’t get that scarf I’ve been knitting for a soldier finished in time for the holidays.

Thankful 11/7/2010

dawn — Sun, 07 Nov 2010 13:48:00 +0000

I’ve publicly proclaimed myself a pacifist many times. But that label, like so many labels, isn’t quite accurate.

Mostly I have huge moral issues with the reasons we go to war in my lifetime. I have a hard time fathoming that we have not evolved enough as human beings to accept differences and work out compromises. Apparently I hold a very lofty opinion regarding what human beings are capable of.

That being said, I have very high regard for the men and women who put on a uniform and carry out the will of our government, the will of our people. No matter whether I agree with the masses or not.

Today I am thankful for every person who has ever fought for our country. In fact, I’ve been working with a club I’m in, to have our kids write letters to soldiers currently serving overseas. Truly. I kid you not.

There is a huge reluctance in me to explain war to my children, at ages 3 and 7, how much do they need to know about the fact that we’ve been at war their entire life times?. What I want them to know is that the life and freedoms we enjoy are secured by people. Those people need to be thanked, because they give up a great deal to do so.

We’re working with a group vetted by Better Homes and Gardens. Operation Gratitude.

Here you can write a letter thanking a soldier who is currently serving, or write a letter to a veteran. You (or any group you belong to) can actually send Halloween candy, beanie babies, knit a scarf, or send a bandana. There are many ways to participate and help.

Thank You for Your Support

dawn — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 14:11:18 +0000

Our gratitude goes out to the MOMS Club, Debby, Merrill, Karen, Lannia, Cristine, and Shannon.
Thank you for supporting the March of Dimes and helping us raise $500.

Out of the Mouths of Moms

dawn — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 13:12:53 +0000

The last week has presented certain challenges. There’s the trauma of having a child hospitalized. There’s the lack of sleep for worrying and cries of, “Mom!” in the night. There’s the constant nagging to get fluids into your child.
All that. But none of those begins to touch on the challenges faced by Redding. First, his sister gets loads of attention. She’s got mom and dad following her around with bowls, towels, cool cloths for her head… Loads of medicine and tons of sippees of juice, ice water, Gatorade, Pedialyte, anything she will drink. Redding wants a bowl for in his bed. He wants “puffers” like Annabella’s. He wants a sippee, which thankfully he can have. He wants whatever she is getting.
So Friday morning, I called the grandparents to enlist assistance in watching Red while I took Annabella to the pediatrician. Poppa was at our house a few hours later and Bel and I were off. Red wanted to see the doctor. I figure, why take a healthy child into the waiting room full of miserable illness?
The doctor briefly examined my normally perky girl. Based on her coloring, lethargy, tender abdomen and the fact that she hadn’t kept much down in 2 days, she sent us to the hospital for IV fluids to treat severe dehydration.
So, we stopped home to pick up some necessities. Poppa was out shoveling the driveway and Red was out with him, playing on a sled. I was already weepy over putting Bel into the hospital. I was overwhelmed with gratitude to find Red happy as a clam and my driveway being cleared. Then I had to humbly ask what he had planned for the rest of the afternoon, as I had to go put my girl… And the tears flowed.
Redding winds up spending the rest of the day with Poppa and Gragra at our house, then going to their house for dinner and a sleepover. He gets all the attention of two very doting grandparents. But there’s a problem. He doesn’t understand why Sissy gets to go to the doctor, to the hospital, gets medicine, etc. Poor guy. Plus he’s missing Annabella, Mom and Dad. Poor, poor sweet boy.
Saturday evening Annabella got to come home, but wasn’t very interactive with Red. Still she’s getting lots of attention and fussing over. Medicine, puffers, all that jazz.
Sunday night at dinner we were discussing how he’d been saying things all weekend like, “I hurt myself, I need to go to the hospital.” And, *forced, fake cough, cough* “I’m sick, I need a puffer.”
Annabella hops up from the dinner table with a panicked look on her face, shouting, “I have to go potty, NOW!” She races to the bathroom.
Redding is hot on her heels, “Oh! I have to go potty now, too!” Which is funny because he’s not potty trained. He feels using the potty once a day before nap is plenty.
Someone commented that he just wants to have and do everything just like his big sister.
I replied, “Yeah, won’t he be surprised when he gets his first period.”

Thankful

dawn — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 16:13:07 +0000

There are countless new age advisors selling their inspiration in books and online, urging everyone to count their blessings, be more thankful, embrace the life you have.
Over the week preceding Thanksgiving this year, I signed on to do just that. Each day on Facebook, I posted one thing I was thankful for. As it turns out it made a huge difference in how I felt this year. It’s free, it makes me happier with what I have, it helps me to be more positive in challenging moments, and generally turned a ray of sunshine on my holiday.
In order to keep those feelings going through the rest of the holiday season, I’ve decided to continue to post one thing I’m thankful for each and every day until 2010. It turns out I’m thankful for a many things, great and small, and when I take a moment to examine them it fills me up. My cup runneth over with joy, pride, gratitude, abundance galore.
Join me. Post what you are thankful for on Facebook or here, in comments. It mighty just make your day, your holiday, or a great finish to 2009.

Scenes From a Parade

dawn — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 20:18:24 +0000

July 4, 2008
Aptos, California

How I wish the battery on my camera hadn’t given out. The characters in this parade continue to be priceless, year after year. This year I was particularly touched by how many people expressed their gratitude to the fire fighters.

Being a Mother

dawn — Mon, 12 May 2008 11:55:31 +0000

One of the thoughts I’ve had about being a mother, over the last year, is that I deserve some kind of metal for deciding to have another child. Having Redding was kind of a gift. It was the gift of a sibling for Annabella, hopefully he will be someone she can face the challenges of the world with. Someone to rely upon in the best and worst of times.
A gift to me, in that I am getting to experience what having a full-term child is like. Yes, Redding was born at 33 weeks, but you’d never know it. It is an amazing and precious gift to have a baby that is healthy, that you can read books about without terrifying yourself, that meets common milestones, that is snuggly and affectionate.
Really, though, I owe a great debt of gratitude to the love, support, well-wishes, and even prayers of my family and friends. Without their moral, and outright physical support, there is not way we would have made it to 33 weeks. Hell, without their support, I don’t know that we would have made the decision to go forward.
I am grateful to each and every person who loved and supported us through the last 3 years that got us here.
Where is here? Redding has shed his infant persona and is just an amazing little boy. Annabella is no longer a little girl, but a curious, confident big sister. Everyone is healthy, bar the usual coughs and colds, things like that.
For me to survive preeclampsia and HELLP Syndrome twice, well I am shocked by my own strength. HELLP can be fatal, in most cases the thing that kills is permanent liver damage or failure. In both cases, the symptom that signaled it was time to deliver was excruciating liver pain. The day Annabella was delivered, it had started as a nagging pain, which I tried to ignore. I didn’t know any better. I was already hospitalized and felt like I was safe. Foolish me. With Redding, it woke be up the night before he was born. I feared it was the same pain, but was unsure because I wasn’t out of my mind this time. I got up at like 4 a.m., had some breakfast, called my doctor. She told me to get to the hospital as quickly as possible. I said, “Can I wait until Andrew and Annabella wake up?” Yes, I did. She said that would be fine, as they would have to wait the surgery until they were certain I had digested my english muffin.
OK. Crazy. I also how fortunate I have been to have been under the care of some amazing doctors and nurses. (And one bad nurse who my doctor let have it. Post-partum is when the rest of the HELLP symptoms hit me, and I was on dueling IV’s of pitocin and magnesium sulfate. I was retaining every ounce of fluid they let me have, meaning my kidneys weren’t functioning. My head was pounding, I was weak. Not to mention that my abdomen was killing me, what with the fresh incision and all. And I could not stop throwing up. Laughing hurts with a fresh incision. Imagine throwing up. So, I push the nurses call button for maybe the third time and crying I tell the nurse, “Please help me, please give me something that will make me stop throwing up.” She calls the doctor to tell her what whiner I am. The doctor reads her the riot act saying, “This woman is a trouper, she’s been in pain for months now, and this is the first I’ve ever heard of her complaining. If she needs something, get it for her.”)
I digress. That seems like a million years ago. Like it happened to someone else. Other people. Other tiny babies.
It’s strange. For me, there’s the idea of the baby, that lives in your head while you’re pregnant. Once you give birth, that baby disappears or is reformed to coincide with the actual baby before you. For us, there is the tiny, fragile baby in the NICU. That baby disappears slowly, as they become ready to go home. There’s the bigger (still tiny), less fragile baby you get to take home. The whole evolution of a person is so amazing to witness. I feel so amazingly fortunate to be able to witness and nurture them along.
One of my personal traditions is to thank Annabella and now Redding on Mother’s Day. I thank them for making me a mom. They don’t quite get it, yet. But it just seems like the right thing to do.
“Before you came along, I wasn’t a mom. Now I am. You helped me to find the most amazing adventure of my life so far. Thank you.”

Beliefs

dawn — Fri, 06 Apr 2007 14:11:55 +0000

Sometimes I know exactly what I believe. Other times, my own beliefs seem to bend and conform to whatever the present situation. I like to think of it more as being open to possibilities than being wishy-washy but that is, in all likelihood, defense of ego.
Maybe there’s room for being wishy-washy when it comes to the big universal questions of “Why am I here?” “What does it all mean?” “What happens when we die?” “Why do bad things happen to good people?”
We all find our own understanding, some in philosophy, some in religion, others within themselves. To each their own, right?
When someone very dear to us passed away, Andrew and I had a talk about what to tell Bella. Because our very dear friend was a devout catholic, we decided that if she had lots of questions, it would be OK to tell her that he went to heaven. That’s what he spent his life believing in and working towards, and I certainly wasn’t going to discount that to my child, for the sake of my own non-belief.
Which opens up a fresh dialogue in my head. Do you believe? Or not? What is the cultural value in believing in something bigger than yourself? What is the personal sacrifice in giving credence to a higher power?
Yesterday, I dropped off some stuff at the lab at Dominican Hospital. I usually go in through the emergency room entrance, which is around the back. The lab is up front on the right, opposite the chapel. It’s a Catholic hospital. Somehow that is reassuring. Part of me wanted to go into the chapel and express gratitude for making it to 32 weeks yesterday. Part of me wanted to go in and beg for some reassurance that all the trials and tribulations we’re going through right now will all work out for the best.
I didn’t go in. My hypocrisy does know its own limits, it seems.
And now on to a third seemingly unrelated story.
Last night I had two dreams about Bella. In the first, it was just me snuggled up with her. She was asleep and I was spooned around her and it was the best feeling, because I just miss her so much. I struggle daily with questioning myself, “Are we doing the right thing?” Mostly, I think we are doing the right thing, but it still is hard because of missing her and Andrew.
The second dream was kind of funny. Andrew and I were in Fremont, I was driving the Celica with Bella in the back and Andrew was driving the Corolla. We realized we had some free time, so why not get Bella in to see the Dentist? I said, “Let’s go, I’ll call my old dentist on the way.” We both drive off.
A few blocks down the road, I realize Andrew is driving to my recent old dentist’s office in Milpitas, and I’m driving toward my childhood dentist’s office in Fremont. I call him on his cell to tell him he’s going to the wrong place. I’m pulled over, having trouble getting him on his cell, when I finally get through I tell him, “It doesn’t matter honey, no dentists are going to be around today, it’s Good Friday.”
I woke up. My conscious mind was apparently auditing my dream. I shocked myself awake with the fact that my subconscious was aware that today is, in actuality, Good Friday.
Maybe my subconscious is Catholic. Maybe I can send it into a chapel and find some peace.