Lessons through pain

Well, as any readers who read this blog last year will remember, one of our cats got really sick with kidney failure and almost died. The doctors didn't think she'd make it through the night, so we went to see her thinking we were saying goodbye. But we prayed for her, and the next morning the doctors were amazed at how well she was doing. We took her home, and she started acting like her normal self... chasing her tail around, scratching on mirrors and generally making a sweet nuisance of herself.

But after a few months, she went back into a decline and died October 24. Not quite a year after getting out of the hospital.

It's amazing how much pain and stress it put our whole family through for the past year. Personally, it was a very hard time for me. I know she was "only" a cat, but she was definitely the sweetest one of our three (although also capable of being the most annoying...) and this was my first up-close experience of having to see an innocent creature suffering. I can't imagine how horrible it would be to be that close to a person suffering that severely (or worse).

It also put a good deal of strain on my relationship with God. I didn't and still don't understand why He "healed" her a year ago in the hospital just to let her suffer for another year and die of kidney failure anyway. Was it MY fault? Did I not have enough faith? Did we "undo" her healing by treating her with medication like the doctors told us to?

Or, the worst thought of all: did He heal her just to teach me all the hard lessons I learned this year watching her die?

Of the many lessons I've learned this year, the main two and the only ones I'm going to mention are these:
I've learned to trust God, no matter what. Even when it seems like there can be no possible good, I know that "all things work together for good to those who love God and are called according to His purpose." I don't have to understand what He's doing to trust Him.
The other thing I've learned is to tell God exactly what I'm feeling. He can handle my doubts, my fears, my pain, my tears and even my anger. And through difficult circumstances like these I can either turn my back on God, or use it to grow closer to him. And this life will seem so short compared to eternity that all the pain I feel in my entire life will seem less than the pain of stubbing a toe.

All these thoughts had been growing in the back of my mind, but the Jeremy Camp concert at the state fair was when it all came completely into focus and I had one of those mind-blowing moments of understanding. And that's when I finally let go of everything I'd been holding onto. Whatever else God may have done through one little cat for the rest of my family, I know He used the situation greatly in my heart, and I'm thankful. Even through the pain that I still feel, I can praise Him. He is good, and His mercy endures forever.

And even though she was just a cat, I believe Shadow is in heaven now, and I will get to see her again, just like all the Christian people that have and will get to heaven before me.

~Lizzie

Due to popular demand... pic overload II

OK. Here are my pics from the snow day. Be grateful, 'cause it took me forever to pick out these from the 500 odd pics from that day, even more forever for them to upload, and a slightly less forever for me rearrange them in the right order. (stupid picture uploader...)

My version of that tree...

I like the "no trespassing' sign. :D

Shadow staking birds. She almost caught one too but Lizzie didn't want her to so she scared it off. :(

....and there y'all go. :D

Mice, ideas and new-found goodies.

I think I will go in reverse order of the title so that thoughts of the rodent and the idea won't obscure the yumminess of the cream cheese brownies I've discovered. No, I'm not taking credit for the recipe, only for finding it on the internet. :P

Here's the recipe from one of my favorite recipe sites, "Joy of Baking" - Cream Cheese Brownies (link). Theirs look better than mine I think, but I can never get my food to look like a piece of art. That's Sarah's specialty. I've made three batches of these brownies so far, and the first time they came out of the pan very well without the aluminum foil (we try not to use aluminum foil in baking because it cooks into the food); I just buttered it very well. For some reason though, the second two batches didn't work out so well. They stuck pretty badly. I'm blaming it on the strange sugar I had to use. It refused to dissolve and made the batter very wet and sticky. We've really enjoyed these brownies though (even the sticky ones with crunchy sugar). This is the first time I've made something where I ask if anyone wants some and even my parents say "Yes!" with hopeful eagerness.

And as for my idea, I've been thinking about doing a review blog. I really enjoy reviewing books and movies, and I get criticized for posting my reviews on my own blog, so I figured if I start a blog for that purpose it'll be better accepted. And then, if it ever happens to be big enough that it could actually be a job (with which I could somehow extract money from people), that would be nice. Probably not though, with the current economy. So anyway, I will be thinking on that. And if anyone is interested in being a writer, just send me a sample review. ;)

I hate mice. It's like my cat knows this and intentionally catches and brings into the house more mice than is natural for any cat. She even takes up the slack for our other two cats who are remarkably less interested in small animals. She doesn't look malicious, does she?

*sigh* So just a few minutes ago she came inside a dropped a mouse and then went back outside. We have our broom/trashcan/scream method all worked out. Except this time we were trying to decide if we should let Shadow (the kitty with kidney problems) have a fresh... treat. *gag* And Mom was holding the broom on top of him while we tried to decide to sweep him into the trashcan or somehow let Shadow eat him without him running all over the house... and decided on the the trashcan, but apparently the mouse had already smothered. *shudder* *cough* *shudder*

*grimace* So... I can't leave you with that... ... I bought a new purse today.

It was on sale, and I just couldn't resist. I really like it. :P

~Lizzie

It's called Thanksgiving, not Turkey Day.

So when I wrote this I wasn't thinking I'd be posting it on the blog. Lizzie read it and said that I had to post it so there ya go. :P
The following is VERY long a perhaps boring, feel free not to read it, and there will be no need for applause at the end. (:P @ Jessica)

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Thanksgiving. It's the only holiday in which gluttony is considered part of the observing the special day. Really though, it's not about food, just look at its name. Thanksgiving may cause us to think about turkey, but it honestly doesn't have the word turkey in it anywhere. 'Thanks' is a expression of gratitude, 'thanksgiving' is the act of giving thanks, so thanksgiving is a day for giving out of 'expressions of gratitude'.
So, who do we give these expressions of gratitude? Probably, the host(ess) of the thanksgiving lunch, and all the people who helped cook all the food. Special thanks may go to the person(s) who cooked that delicious turkey. If any members of your party are Christians, or even simply go to church, or really, if anyone is not an atheist, someone will pray before you eat (or maybe if they forget, after a bite or so) and thank God for the food, friends and family. Perhaps later, your party may take turns telling about what they're thankful for. Everyone says friends and family (duh, no one wants anyone else to think they're not grateful for that) Christians will say they are thankful for their God, who saved them. Probably everyone will think of something they're thankful for, that they'd rather not say. Kids, who don't really think about stuff like that might repeat what a parent said. After that, everyone is glad that's over; now they can eat the rest of the day and not feel ungrateful.

I admit, last year I was one of those kids. I never asked myself what I was thankful for, I just wanted food. (Thanksgiving! Mmm... turkey day) Then when I was asked by some one else, I just repeated my parents. The only thing on my mind was drumsticks and dessert.
This year was different. Very different. First of all the day I described above didn't happen. But I'll get to that later. Also, this year I asked my self the question, 'what am I thankful for?' This is to answer that question.

In order to understand what I'm thankful for, you must understand how my year went. I said it was different, and it was. A lot happened that I never dreamed of in the year before.

Only a month after I couldn't think for myself on what I was thankful for, I got sick. Just a few days before Christmas. It was the sickest I've been in a long, long time. I remember falling asleep on the bathroom floor, because I was too dizzy and tired to make it back to bed. I was still sick when the family came for Christmas. No delicious turkey for me. I was only a little better on Christmas day. Nevertheless, there was something about it that made it a very good Christmas for me. Perhaps it was simply because the worldly part of Christmas was taken away (no food and I couldn't properly enjoy the opening of gifts). All I was left with was the Christmas spirit.

Occasionally, during the basketball season, my sister, brother, dad and I would take the time to cheer for the Raleigh Hawks, the team my swim Coach coached. We were the only people who went to the games regularly, but didn't have family on the team. I took a small amount of pride in that. I thoroughly enjoyed these games, and took a boatload of pictures with my Canon Rebel XTi.

March was the East Coast Homeschool Basketball Championships. I imagine it was 'East Coast' because it was hosted on the east coast. Liberty University in Lynchburg Virginia to be exact. Any homeschool team in America could compete in the championship. I was thrilled when my dad decided to drive nearly 5 hours to watch two games, (the championship games for JV and Varsity) and then drive 5 hours back again. We arrived in the enormous court just in time to see our JV boys lose, and get second. It didn't take me long to realize, second means there was only one team better then us in the whole competition. After a couple hours break, it was the Varsity boys' turn. It was a amazing game. They were tied nearly the whole time, but our boys pulled it out, winning by 2 points in overtime. The best of the best. I was enthralled.

Not at all long after, the baseball season officially cranked up. Coached by the same coach of those awesome basketball guys. Even several of those guys played baseball as well. The teams' name was Raleigh Hawks too. This though, was a bit different, because my younger (but not smaller) brother started playing on the middle school team. I was pleased with this because it meant I could go to all the games... and I did. I tried to savor them, enjoy every minute, and capture the great times with photos and dairy entries. Still, the season swept by quickly leaving me suddenly depressed, and wondering where it had gone.

Sometime in the middle of the baseball season, NRCA's Beauty and the Beast snuck up on us unprepared. Somehow, we managed to get tickets, and after a baseball game, a small group of us headed over early to try and save good seats for a few more people. We arrived early, but too late for good seats. We sat in the very, very back. The rest of our party arrived a few minutes after the performance was supposed to begin, and after we were threatened with having our saved seats taken away for other people if they did not come soon. Fortunately, they were running late, and started just after the rest of our group came. The show was absolutely incredible, even with the bad seats. It was all worth it.

Two years ago, I was thrilled to see one of my ultimate favorite books hit the big screen. C. S. Lewis' The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. since then I counted the days for the second book out of seven to also come to theaters. May 16th was the day Prince Caspian premiered, and I was going to begin to see it within the very first few minutes of that day. I didn't, however think I would see it with friends, though I wished I could. It was last minute, as it is often, but there we were, goofing off in the near-empty theater, and hallway until midnight. I had so much adrenalin I couldn't contain myself. Then again, I didn't exactly try.

Ever since the beginning of the year, North Carolina had been in a drought. Because of this, a law was passed that owners of pools may only open their pools if there was water already in the pool, or if they had a well. Coach, the coach of the basketball, baseball and swim teams owns a out door pool, where we have our summer meets. It had no water in it and there was no well. Or any money for a well. So our summer pool did not open. Instead, we swam inside, as we did over winter, and was always the away team in our meets.

Not only did we swim indoors, we swam long course (50 meters a lap instead of 25) two days of the three our team practiced. I absolutely hated long course. With a burning and undying passion. Because of that I began to hate swim practice. I lived for meets and water polo. Water polo became my passion, a reason to go through with the week. I began to love it even more than I hated long course.

In the middle of these strange changes, the play "Annie" which we'd been working on for some eight months sprang up on us. (plays have a way of doing that) we hadn't even run all the way through on production day. Since there was two performances, the first was like our dress rehearsal. Surprisingly, (but then again, not really) both went rather well. Still, I was glad for not having a main role.

July rolled around. Slowly.
I had turned fifteen in May, and was rather annoyed with myself for still not having taken Driver's Ed. I wanted to do it with people I knew. So when the opportunity came to take it with three other people, I took it. Even though the class was at a high school, so I'd be one of very few homeschoolers, I figured it'd be okay. I'm still not sure if I was right or wrong. On one hand I learned how to drive properly, and had a bit of fun with my friends. I also built a considerable amount of character. It was definitely a experience. On the other hand.... I got headaches almost every day from sitting in front of the computer for so long, the teacher wasn't especially good or nice, and my mind was numb by the end from forcing so much boring information in it. It definitely could have been better.

Now I had been taking private flute lessons for four years, and known of the Lighthouse Christian Homeschool Band for nearly just as long. Mum and Dad seemed to want me to join, but I felt that it was too much of a unknown. I simply didn't know enough about the particular band, or even being in a band in general.

During the baseball season I met the director of the wind ensemble. When he heard of how long I had been playing he told me that he thought I should be good enough to make it.
In my opinion, that suddenly made the band so much less of a unknown. I began to seriously consider trying out. There was one not-so-slight problem. Band Practices were on Monday and Wednesday, and the Wednesday practice conflicted with water polo. Thinking maybe I could skip out on Wednesday every so often in order to play water polo, I tried out, making second and also last chair.

After the first band practice I realized what a bad idea it was to try and play water polo, even only so often. Every Wednesday since, I've showed up at that church where we practice, at least five minutes early. With a undying longing to play water polo inside.
It's not that I don't love band, if I didn't, I could just quit. But I haven't, because I do love it. I just wish that somehow I could do both.

It didn't seem like very long after Annie until theatre started again. This time we were doing "Oklahoma!" I tried out for the part of Laurey, knowing I wouldn't get it, and was not surprised. Nevertheless, I took the time to learn the monologue and song, and then I got stressed because I'm a perfectionist.

With the stress of everything that was happening, I could hardly concentrate on my projects for the NC State Fair. Before I knew it, I was rushing, and didn't finish all that I wanted to enter. I ended up with seven entries. I was very pleased when out of those seven, four won first and one won second. Wining a considerable amount of money.

A very short baseball season followed. My brother practiced but didn't play with the team, and we went to all the games.

Then basketball season started, and both my brothers joined the team. As the first game came up I realized a problem. A considerable amount of games are on Tuesday nights. Theatre is on Tuesday nights. Last year everything seemed to fit together like a puzzle. This year? Not so much. Now I was really glad I didn't get a main role; it wouldn't be so bad when I missed a few rehearsals. I skipped theatre to go to the first two games of the season on Tuesday.

NRCA's production of "It's a Wonderful Life" didn't sneak up us. Who am I kidding? Really, it certainly did. We bought our tickets at the door.
There was a guy I knew who was playing the lead role George Bailey. I was rather looking forward to seeing him play the crazy character. Imagine my surprise and disappointment when I read the playbill, which declared that he would be playing George in the night show. Not the one I was at already. I thoroughly enjoyed the show, but couldn't get over that minor detail. We came back that night just to see the guy I knew play George. I actually enjoyed it more than the first time.

The day before "It's a Wonderful Life" we noticed that my cat, Shadow was acting strange. She was refusing to eat and just sitting around. We tried to figure it out, but when nothing changed we took her to the hospital. She has kidney failure. The doctor's figured there was nothing we could really do, and hinted that we might be wasting our money. Somehow, she got better. Well, enough to come home. It was honestly nothing short of a miracle. She progressed slowly after that, and even stopped eating, but slowly began again.
Today (Thanksgiving) she ate some turkey.
Because of Shadow we went nowhere for Thanksgiving. Normally, we would've gone to my Aunt's and my Grandmother's. Instead we had our own meal, all by ourselves, at home.

What you have just read is what I'm thankful for. Not all of it mind you; it's just the out-of-the-ordinary things. The things which have happened to me... really, the things that made me even think of writing this. Not friends family possessions or food. I am, of course still thankful for those things, and I'm thankful for my loving God. But mostly, I'm thankful to my God.
Thanksgiving has two similar definitions: the act of giving thanks, and, a payer expressing gratitude. This holiday is for giving thanks to God. For everything. What we have and what we don't, what we've lost and what we may lose. The good, bad, the painful and wonderful.
There is nothing for which we should not thank Him.

--Sarah

Can't.... breathe.....

*gasp for air* I hate colds. And I think we're running out of tissues... Oh, dear. It was the strangest thing, because this cold just kinda exploded on me (after swimming in the feels-like-it's-38-degrees-instead-of-78 pool) yesterday. I felt fine, until a crazy game of (non-gambling) poker gave me a headache and by the time we got home I had a pretty good cold. It was even worse this morning, and the weirdest part is that Jessica got a cold almost exactly the same way at exactly the SAME TIME.... *insert mysterious music*

In much happier news, Shadow got to come home yesterday and is doing very well. She's only on 400 different kinds of medication, but we're hoping she won't need those too long. She's eating good, and acting normal... for Shadow, anyway. I'm so grateful to God, because on Monday night the vet wasn't giving us much hope, so we went to see her and prayed for her, and the next morning, she was doing SO much better!

~Lizzie

Wow, it's cold.

I just went outside, and realized something fascinating. You see, it's 38 degrees outside. We swim indoors, and supposedly the pool water is 78 degrees. But stepping outside, and diving in the pool feel exactly the same. Actually, stepping outside isn't quite as bad. And I suppose we could be all scientific and say that it's because the air isn't packed as tightly as the water, so it doesn't cover as much of the skin surface, which is why it feels the same.

But I was mostly going for sympathy.

And for those of you who heard about Shadow, (our cat, she's been in the hospital with kidney failure since Sunday) she's doing better this morning!

~Lizzie

Shadow

My sister's lovely little cat has been very industriously making herself annoying recently, so as a day-after-Sarah's-birthday post I decided to rant about her cat. As I type, my forearm is sticking to my desk because of some milk Shadow spilled. Excuse me while I go wash my arm and wipe the desk off. Again.

Yeah, so that story deserves a good paragraph. Daddy left a glass of milk up here on my desk when he was doing some work on my uncooperative computer. Shadow decided she wanted to drink and stuck her face into it (no, I wasn't watching..... I've just seen her do it millions of times. Usually to glasses full of water that are on the edge of a table/desk..... Yep. They fall and shatter. So I should be grateful, right? This time it was a plastic cup.....) until she didn't fit anymore, and then she tipped it over. So my George Muller biography is drying out, and I had to "clean out" a whole bunch of papers... lucky I didn't desperately need any of them.

Yesterday morning she brought in a black snake (again, INSIDE the HOUSE!!!!).... which was promptly trapped under over-turned trash-can (by Mom) and there he waited for Daddy to get home. A couple days ago, Shadow brought in a live bird and began tearing out its feathers under David's chair. Again, it was promptly trapped (this time in a empty yogurt container) and replaced outside. (Miraculously, it survived. We think, anyway. It disappeared after a few hours, while Shadow was locked upstairs.) She also brought in 3 rabbits last summer, plus innumerable mice and birds.

Then there's Shadows obsession with clean water. She has this nice metal water bowl. We even sometimes put ice in it (another of her obsessions). As soon as we give her clean water, she drinks a little and then puts her paw in it, and swirls the water all around (naturally dirtying the water with cat hair and such). Then she refuses to drink it.... because it's dirty. When her water is dirty, she licks the faucet to our filtered water (which is gross, because that's OUR water!!).

She also likes to jump onto shelves (usually ones that are mounted on the wall... and NOT with the weight of a full-grown cat in mind! Fortunately, Shadow is pretty skinny, so she hasn't broken any shelves yet, but they wobble precariously, and she usually knocks stuff off of them.

Then she likes to stand on my keyboard, which makes it make annoying noises, like "bonk, bonk, bonk" over and over..... plus she likes to stand on it while I'm trying to type, obscuring my view and usually messing up my typing. She also likes to scratch on the side of my computer, and her claws catch in the cooling fan and make a scalp-tinglingly HORRIBLE noise.

She tries to open doors, which is disturbing because the door handle jiggles loudly and very redundantly.

And last, but not least.... during thunderstorms, she likes to create blood-curdling meows and pace/jump on my bed and crawl all over me. The thunderstorm doesn't wake me up... she does. I don't think she understands that she's SARAH's cat.

Here is a picture of Shadow:


As you can see, she is a black cat, but she is most decidedly blonde.

And after all that..... we love her anyway. *shakes head and smiles*

~Lizzie

I'm now recovered.

At least, enough to explain what happened. It was very traumatic. I walked in the house from swim practice Thursday, and 2 of our cats were sitting and looking somewhat interestedly at something. If you know our cats, that should alarm you. Interested-ness in them is never a good sign. Since they regularly bring us birds and small rodents (yes, IN the house! That's what we get for having a cat door.) I started looking around suspiciously. And then I noticed the snake.

Believe it or not, that's not the traumatic part. This is the third snake that made it inside our house alive. One of the previous snakes that made it inside was about a foot and a half long and was coiled in the middle of my bedroom. (Whenever I tell the story of the black snake in our room, Sarah likes to demonstrate how loudly I screamed when I almost stepped on it, and then how fast I jumped on my bed. Fortunately, that can't be demonstrated over the internet.) So a fairly small garter snake in the living room wasn't a big deal to me.

When it decided to head for our 114 year-old upright piano that's only about an inch of the floor, I got broom duty. We opened the front door (we enter our house through the garage door thankfully, or we probably would have stepped on it) and tried to "encourage" it to leave. Touching it with the broom didn't work well. It just coiled up and stuck it's head up at us. It reminded me of the little "ankle-biter" dogs, who bark ferociously and try to chase you. As if you aren't 10 times bigger than them.

I did get somewhat tired of holding a broom between it and the piano while we decided what to do. Mom called Daddy and he was on his way home from work, so we decided to wait for him. After all, he's the one who yanked a black snake out of our blue bird house (saving the eggs!) with his bare hands.

But then, as if the crazy snake knew we were hoping he'd just sit there, he started challenging the authority of my broom. He slithered directly toward it! I smacked him in the face, and he stopped. He was next to the wall. I was sitting as far away from the wall as possible, but still blocking the path along the wall to the piano with the broom. So he sat there for a few seconds, and then came directly AT ME! Way too quickly for my taste. I really regretted sitting. I jumped up, ran and screamed.

Just then, Daddy came in. He put a paper bag in front of the snake (who apparently was scared by me jumping up and running and was still just sitting there) and then the snake quickly slithered off.... under the piano. He's been under there since Thursday. Yeah, I know. We should try to get him out. We've been pretty busy though. I think we're going to try to get him out tomorrow.

I think my pride is wounded. That tiny little 6-inch snake came right at me... and I was scared to death. *sigh* Why wasn't he scared? I could have stomped on him if I'd been wearing shoes. Hmph.

~Lizzie