Oh Gag

Well folks, I have much that I want to write about tonight...quite a bit actually. And I don't want to get too far behind by not keeping my thoughts updated, because we all know my faulty memory. If I don't get it down here relatively quickly after it's happened, it all becomes a blur. But I'm just so exhausted I have to get some sleep. I'm amazed that I can sleep in this bed at all, since it's where Naki died. But as a wise friend told me, there's one difficult memory here, and many, too many to count, wonderful memories. Our bed is our space...where we'd lay after all the lights were turned out and talk in the dark until 2 in the morning. It's where we would lay at night and watch our favorite shows together. It's where we'd wrestle and he'd put all his submission moves that he learned in training while working at the State Hospital on me and I could never ever win any of those wrestling matches. It's where we spent every Sunday night calendaring the upcoming week so our schedules were coordinated. It's where our little munchkins shuffled to in the middle of the night and would then commence pulling all the covers off of us as they slept sideways with their feet on Naki's face and their heads on my lap. It's where we truly grew to understand each other. And lastly, it's the bed he bought me when we couldn't afford it because I was pregnant at the time, and the mattress we had been sleeping on was so bad my pregnant back and hips couldn't take it. I'd resorted to sleeping in the reclining chair beside our bed and he just couldn't stand seeing me so uncomfortable nor could either of us stand sleeping so far apart from each other. Too many wonderful memories to count...so they overtake that one negative and nightmare of a moment and I am able to peacefully sleep.

That is, until last night. Eva decided that not only was she going to crawl into bed with me, but that she'd squirm and twist and turn so that I couldn't sleep. The icing on the cake was when she tossed her cookies all over the pillow we were sleeping on together. Eeeew. After cleaning her up in the bath and stripping and cleaning the bed, she didn't just toss them she lobbed them. Smart me had a bowl ready for round two, so the cleanup was minimal the second time around. We then slept on the bed with our heads where our feet normally go, and even though logically this doesn't make any sense, I felt like the blood was rushing to my brain the whole time, like my head was lower than my feet. I'm pretty sure the bed is level, so I don't get it. Needless to say I woke not very rested. I am going to go to bed and try to catch some sleep before my bed hog joins me.

So I'll try and post tomorrow if I can. I have some really great things that I need to write down. For now, here are a few of the things the kids have said that I wrote down so I wouldn't forget.

Whenever we hear sirens, or see any rescue vehicles, any one of the girls assume the worst. "Mom, somebody died."

I don't know if Eli figured this out on her own or if she heard someone else say it. But she keeps telling me, "I wish Dad were still alive. But it just doesn't work like that."

Eli told me the other night when I was tucking her in bed, "If I feel my heart beating, does that mean it's growing?" At first I thought she was referring to the way her Dad always teaches her to let her heart grow with love. Then it occurred to me that she was expressing her fear that perhaps her heart was growing and she too might have an enlarged heart like Naki did.

Line told me "I feel guilty because I never feel Dad like everyone else." She sounds like me the day after he died. *we're working on her and her guilt issues*

After our pumpkin picking outing at The Red Barn, I was tucking Malia in when she told me, "I know Dad helped me pick my pumpkin tonight." I asked her what that meant and she clarified it for me by explaining that every year she can never find a good pumpkin and so Dad always helps her find the one she has in mind. But this year was different. She said that "I walked right to the perfect pumpkin, and I know that Dad was helping me pick my pumpkin."

I love these girlies so very much.