Blind or Paralyzed?

I love when Sadie makes up her own songs. Here's part of one from the other day. "I know Jesus is so rea-oh. And he's so friendwy, and he wuvs me so much. Pwease don't take my Jesus away."

Would you rather be blind or have your legs paralyzed? I probably won't get a choice, and one day I'll probably be both, although maybe not with all the advances that are still in testing right now! So, of you had to choose, which would you rather be? What is your reasoning? Right now, even though it's hard this week to not be able to walk, I think I'd probably choose to have my legs paralyzed. I'm frustrated to not be able to move, but I would adjust to not walking and using a wheelchair, etc. to get around. I may not see quite well enough to drive, but I can still read and see my family, and I don't want to lose that! 

(Update since I forgot to finish writing the post before: I got on steroids really quickly, and I am getting better way faster than I have in the past. My aunt had told me that starting steroids right at the beginning of a relapse makes a huge difference in how fast she gets over her relapses, but the previous times, everything was just so slow getting processed that I hadn't been able to start on steroids until I had been having problems for weeks, so it took months to get better the other times.) 

Sometimes I make jokes about not being a full capacity human, and it's sort of true. I'm tired all the time, way beyond what's normal for a tired mom, which I also am. I don't get much done around the house except laundry. I can't drive anywhere. I'm too tired to fix my hair very often. I can't exercise at the moment, so the only things working at full capacity are my jeans. I forget that while I may not be able to function at full physical capacity, I still have full value as a person. It's hard to get over the mindset that I'm only worth as much as I accomplish. I never think less of other people who can't do things, but I almost always think less of myself for not living up to my own expectations. I need to remember that God doesn't have the same expectations. He just expects me to do my best, whatever that is. I already know these things, but I'm not very good about actually implementing these thoughts and feelings. I need to be a better example to my kids of having a good attitude more of the time. I think they've seen my cry too much the last couple of weeks. I'm blaming my mood on the steroids and possibly not having enough chocolate, specifically chocolate cake. Also, spring break is not much fun when we are stuck at home! 

Vacation planning always gives me energy, so as you're answering the blind vs. paralyzed question, also give me ideas for vacations. You get two suggestions each, one family vacation idea and one couples vacation idea. If you are the first person to suggest the idea we pick, I'll send you a $10 Amazon gift card. 

Naked Crayons

Preston: Aagh! Quick! Turn the lights on! I need to sneeze!

Sadie had divided all the crayons into two piles, one of the piles included all the crayons with no paper on them anymore. "What are these crayons, Mom? These crayons are naked. They don't want to tehw their daddy that they're naked. Don't see them. They want to hide so nobody sees them. I can just put them in this bag so nobody can see that they're naked."

We always change the words to songs. Sadie tried it on her own today. "You are my moonshine, my onwy moonshine..."

Carter: I have to practice so I'm ready for basketball practice today.

Me: Do you realize how funny that sounded?

Carter: Since I was sick the last couple of weeks and missed all the practices and the games, if I don't practice now, I'll look like a fool when I get to practice tonight!

Avery's hair was almost to her waist, just about an inch or two shy of that, so I cut it last night to her shoulders. It was just in the way and getting food in it and getting tangled horribly. Preston kept a bunch of the nine inch long locks because he just knew he would come up with something to do with them. This morning, as he was getting ready for school, he used a clip and attached the hair to the front of his hair. Sadie said he looked like a unicorn. Obviously, I didn't let him keep it on, and I don't think he really wanted to do more than make people laugh. Then again, maybe he's not happy with his hair quantity. Last week, he wore a fake mustache to school one day. I never heard how that went over or if he chickened out and took it off before he got there.

Also, it took Avery an extra half hour to get ready because she couldn't stop looking in the mirror at her new short hair that only took thirty seconds to brush. I probably should have not done it on a whim with my lack of skills, but now Sadie wants the same haircut. At least if I am not the best at cutting hair, all my kids have super fast-growing hair like mine, so it won't look horrible for very long. 

Avery spent over two hours drawing a dragon yesterday. Carter saw it and said, "That looks really good, but I can't believe you just spent two hours of your life that you'll never get back to make it. I would have never done that." (Says the kid who spends ten hours programming one little game for a word study assignment that could have taken ten minutes...)

Pedro's Wig

Preston: I lost the list of all the kids in my class. I need it so I know how many valentines, I mean friendship notes, I need for my class.

Avery: I know how you can figure it out. Just write down all the kids that you can remember. If it doesn't feel right, then you know you're missing someone.

Preston: Do you know one of the weirdest and funniest parts from Napoleon Dynamite? 

Me: When he has a pocket full of tots?

Preston: No, I don't even get why that's funny. 

Me: When Deb is doing glamour shots?

Preston: No. It's when Kip meets LaFawnda for the first time. I just really didn't expect her to be that pretty! And did you notice that Summer's boyfriend looks just like Uncle Matt? And I like when Napoleon says, "If you're drinking one percent milk because you think you're fat, you're not. You could be drinking whole milk."

Bill: It's a good line. Why don't you try it out on a girl you like?

Avery: Everybody stop talking about the movie! I haven't seen it yet! You're ruining it for me!

Update: Avery loved it, by the way. They watched it in the car on the way home from Arizona, so even though they all had headphones on and I didn't know exactly what was happening, I still had the satisfaction of knowing that my kids have a great sense of humor, as evidenced by all the giggles I kept hearing. They keep quoting different parts of the movie and attempting to dance like Napoleon. One of her favorite things about the movie is Pedro's girly wig. 

Sadie has been taking more naps again lately. She gets her pillow and blankets and makes herself a bed somewhere and puts herself to sleep. The other day she made Carter play her "some wuwabyes on the cheh-wo" and told me, "Weave me awone so I can faw asweep." 

Family and friends are always joking with me that if there is a one in a million chance of getting some new health problem, then I will probably get it. I don't know if that is totally true. Sometimes I get things where the odds are more like five out of a million. I hope this last extremely rare symptom of MS was just a momentary thing because it was so weird. I went in the bathroom to take my contacts out tonight. I looked in the mirror, but I couldn't see my face looking back at me. For almost a minute, I stared at the person in the mirror, trying to figure out if it was really me. The sensation of not recognizing myself went away, and I recognized Bill just fine, so maybe things will be fine. If I do have a lesion forming in that part of my brain, life might get really interesting with all the new people I will be meeting every day!