A lovely day in June

Wow! I hadn't realized that it had been a while since I last posted. In that time one of the things we have done is that we have watched Fergus' end of school year play. The two pictures I have attached are of Fergus drumming (the whole younger class was drumming while the older class danced - this picture is only of Fergus and his friend Ayla) and of Fergus as a streetkid in an abbreviated version of Oliver Twist. They did a GREAT job and it was really fun to watch them. Christena (my MIL) as well as my own parents made the trip to Eden Mills to see him perform with his peers.

That night, after racing from Eden Mills to Glen Williams, he got his first run ever in softball (he has only been playing for a few weeks). He hit himself to first base and then was hit and walked around to score a run. We were over the moon!! What a great day!!!

Friday we had a huge but FAST storm run through our neighbourhood. We were on our way to have dinner with friends in Burlington and saw the dark clouds. As we were getting into the Wagon Doug decided that the increase in wind was making him nervous about leaving the Rabbit under the tree in our front yard so he got out to move it. Since he was moving the car I decided to make sure things were tidy and tied down in the back garden. We told the boys to wait in the Wagon as we would be right back.

We went about our chores, Doug coming to help me once he had the Rabbit safely away from trees and no sooner had we finished when the big pellets of rain started hitting us and we ran for the Wagon. Once we got around the side of the house we were enveloped in a wall of wind and debris. We had dirt, grit, leaves, and bits of twigs all over us; in our hair, our mouths, on our clothes. The wind was so strong we followed our instincts which were to grab the boys from the car and take them into the house. We then watched the storm from the front porch. Within a few minutes we saw that about a third of the houses on our street had lost significant pieces (limbs, boughs, branches) from their trees. We never did end up with anything on either of our vehicles but I am still relieved that we took the boys inside.

And after all was said and done, I still needed to come home from dinner with friends and water my gardens because we didn't get enough rain to keep anything alive. All around town there were trees uprooted and power lines down.

Doug took Christena up to see Henry on Monday. He is doing well. His breathing is certainly much improved. They are very good to him there and allow him to function on his own schedule. That is to say that he is truly a "night owl" and daytimes are not when he is most active. Retrospectively I can see that that was a big part of the challenge Christena faced with him being at home. He wanted to be awake at night and she did not. He still isn't able to do things for himself at night any more than he can during the day, but that is why he kept waking her at night. His schedule was backwards.

He sleeps most of the day away with them only waking him for meals so that he doesn't go without. He is not conversant anymore although he will give one word answers to questions. As I have said before there is some grace in the fact that he is at least far enough into his disease that he doesn't seem to *see* the other individuals around him and how they are behaving. At least he isn't always pressing Doug and Christena to find out when they are going to take him home. He seems settled where he is.

This weekend is Father's Day and I hope Doug gets to go up to Mount Forest to see his own dad on Saturday so that Fergus and Quinn can have their dad on Sunday. I have managed to have the day off so I can be around too.

Fergus, Quinn and I went shopping for Doug's gift on Monday while he and Christena were in Mount Forest. We wrapped it as soon as we got home and hid it from view. Quinn is so excited about the fact that the gift is here, in the house, and ready for Doug to receive that he can hardly stand it. He is counting down the days to Father's Day and is checking regularly to make sure the gift is where I put it. It is very sweet. A cute reaction for a gift he is giving that he didn't actually donate any funds to. Ah well, the innocence of youth!

Have a glorious weekend!