Last week, I dreamed I was staring into Ellie's big brown eyes, oh so wise.  And I knew in the dream what a gift this moment was and I knew that I didn't want to miss it and I knew that soon I would be awake and all this would disappear.  (A lot to know in a dream right?)  I continually have that feeling now as if I am driving in a car, speeding away from the time we had together. And I want to yell, STOP let me off, I want to go back.  Back to a time when I could see those big brown eyes outside of a dream, when I could hear all those silly made up words.  Back to insisting we go for walks together.  Back to reading and snuggling in bed for hours on end.  Back to finding crayon papers everywhere.  Back to having someone to peel the St. Vinny's stickers off of my purchases.  And I don't want to sound ungreatful for the time we had together, I just feel greedy wanting more.

As I was driving solo to Chicago this weekend, suddenly, I felt Ellie's presence.  It was as if she wanted me to know, "You haven't left me.  I am riding with you!"

 

Can You Feel MY Power?

Ben does not enjoy walking, which is challenging, since this is something Lotta and I do enjoy doing.  This summer we have been biking as our preferred form of transport (within a 2 and a half mile radius from home I mean I'm gonna have to get the 100 pounds I'm lugging home too, so I've got to save some energy for the ride home).  I strap Lotta onto me and Ben rides on his tandem bike.  At the beginning of summer I envisioned that by this point, it would be easier. Unfortunately, that has not happened.  What has happened is that when I am riding my bike solo, I feel like I am going incredibly fast.  I fell like I should be saying, "Look mom, look how fast I'm going!!"

On our bike rides, when we get ready to turn, I will put my arm out signaling our turn.  When I glance back, both Ben and Lotta are also signaling said turn.  Sometimes Lotta makes sure to signal with both arms, just to make sure.  Hills continue to be particularly challenging.  And boy oh boy do we ever have hills here in Madison!  As we struggle up hills now, Ben will start pumping his pedals hard and yell, "Can you feel my power?"  I just love that, that knowing how powerful you are, sharing it with those around you.

Our first summer in Madison I shared with my mom that I wanted to be Crazy Bike Mamma and just ride my bike with Ellie in her bike seat everywhere.  I think I've finally caught up with that dream and then some.

 

Sister Secrets

One of the wange things Lotta has been doing lately, is making funny faces, just like Ellie.  I don't know why.  She will suddenly, when she notices she has our attention start performing her routine.  Lotta continues to close Ellie's room door for her almost every time she passes by, Ellie would definitely approve.  It makes me feel as if these two sweet girls are somehow telling secrets to one another.

On the way to Zumba last week, I saw a little girl on the outside of the Y who for whatever reason, reminded me of Ellie.  Suddenly the little girl said to the adult with her, "Hey, I smell potato chips."  Which made me smile, because what did Ellie like more than potato chips (the liney kind of course).  Well, I suppose you could argue chocolate chip cookies.

Moving Things from Here to There

[caption id="attachment_4878" align="alignright" width="225" caption="Lottta in her birthday suit (gasp! a nudey shot)"][/caption]

We went to the beach on Lotta's birthday (August 15 fo those of you keeping track).  It was a gorgeous day, just perfect for the beach.  Lotta throughout the day would take the food bag I'd brought and put it on her arm, grab her baby and walk across the beach.  Then I realized this was her "purse" and of course she had to grab it and her baby before going anywhere else.

Lotta's favorite game right now is moving things around the house.  Makes it challenging to keep things tidy, as I would like them to be.  I suppose this is what Lotta sees me doing all day--moving laundry from upstairs to down.  Moving clean clothes back upstairs.  Putting dishes away.  Putting dishes on the table.  A dance of moving objects all day long, being imitated by Lotta.  It is amazing to me how she knows that she is a girl and is looking to me for advice on how to do that.  How does she possibly know this at only 24 months?  She must be advanced.

Sweaty sweet

[caption id="attachment_4864" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="Lotta modeling her summer ensemble."][/caption]

This summer has been hot hot hot until recently, when we cooled down to 70 degree days like it is supposed to be here in Wisconsin.  Lotta has decided, perhaps partially due to the heat of the last two months, that she is not a big fan of clothing.  Of any kind.  You can imagine what a damper this puts on leaving the house.  And going to establishments that require things such as shoes and shirt (hey there is no mention of pants, does that mean they are not required?  Or is it just assumed?  Seriously, I need to know.)

Monday morning, I had decided we would venture to Target to finish up school shopping and purchase cake mix for Lotta's 2nd birthday.  Once again, Lotta refused to put on clothing.  Even a diaper.  She just comes and alerts me where she has gone, saying, "pee pee pee pee".  Which is helpful but not quite as helpful as actually placing said pee pee in the potty.

[caption id="attachment_4865" align="alignleft" width="225" caption="Ben excited to go to Milwaukee on a fieldtrip day."][/caption]

I had completely lost my patience and turned into Crazy Mamma.  Not pretty.  Lotta was on the front porch, crawling around butt naked on the love seat.  Having a grand old time.  Finally I just went inside to empty the dishwasher.  Ben came onto the porch and patiently, kindly asked Lotta if he could put on her diaper.  She lay down on the mat I'd put there precisely for that purpose.  I came out to find Ben attempting to fasten the diaper onto his sibling.  Lotta continued to lay as I put on the rest of her clothing.  I thanked Ben for his help.  He informed me that he just tried to talk to Lotta as I normally would (when I wasn't suddenly a mad woman).  I told him yes, that kindness works better than yelling and thanked him for reminding me of that point.  When I'm yelling, I'm out of good ideas.

Finally we made it to Target and were attempting to wrap things up.  (As you know, Target is never a quick trip for me, and we had the additional excursion through Lego aisle.)  I was tired and hungry (not a good look for me) and ready to go.  Lotta headed on over to the card rack and started grabbing cards.  Ugh.  Ben went around to the other side of the cards and stuck his head through to surprise his little sister.  Meanwhile, Crazy Mamma had come back for an encore episode.  I yelled at Lotta it was time to go!  And told Ben he needed to get out of the cards.  He stated slightly panicked, that he was stuck.  I went over and in my crazed state, yanked him out of the cards, not too gently.  Which on the one hand got him unstuck quickly, on the other hand, not my best moment.

When I have a baby, my older children suffer the loss of me, as I fall madly in love with this new family member.  I made an intention to fall back in love with Ben this summer and it has most definitely happened.  He is such a super sweet boy, so thoughtful and kind.  A reminder to me when I forget how to be the mom I want to be.  At the beginning of the summer I struggled with how to integrate Ben back into our daily routine, the rhythm that Lotta and I had established over the school year, did not seem inclusive.  Now I wonder how we will re establish our days with a Ben shaped emptiness filling our days.

Funny Ows

At one point, during Ellie's first round of chemotherapy, she had lots of pain.  It's challenging as a mom to hear your child in pain, particularly when you know said pain is caused by the medication you are giving her.  Ellie rarely if ever complained of headaches, even after brain surgery.  So I knew if she was feeling something, it had to be pretty intense.  It got to me.

Anyway, one day I could not take it any more.  So I told Ellie, why don't we think of the funniest ows we can.  For example, "Ow! This pillow is too soft."  "Ow! My eye lashes just touched my cheek."  "Ow!  I'm relaxing and watching television."  It was highly effective in distracting her and me from all those dreaded boo-boos (as Elmos would say).

Later on, we even turned it into a game at the hospital, trying to think of the funniest things we missed from home.  "I really miss our toilet paper holder."  "I really miss the trash and how stinky it gets when we haven't taken it out."  "I really miss that stain on the carpet in the bedroom."

Well, one day one of Ellie's friends was over (a grown-up type person).  Ellie suggested we play the "funny ows" game.  I don't recall right now why she suggested it at that moment.  When it was her friend's turn, her friend said, "Ow, I broke my leg and had to have a cast on for months."  We all sort of stopped, not really knowing how to respond.

The story from then on was how her friend did not quite understand the task at hand and how awkward that was.

Sappy (sadly happy) Faced Stickers

There was a point when Ellie took a short respite from peeling crayons and became interested in stickers.  Happy faced stickers to be precise.  She would peel the stickers and either put them in a book I'd given her for her sticker collection or she would put them on the wall beside her bed that I had covered with felt.  There was a day I gave her a pack of stickers and went to take a shower.  I came back into her room and she had taken all the stickers and unpeeled them into a pile.  Every single sticker was stacked in the pile on her lap.  I sort of gasped because this was not what I had expected to see upon entering her room.  Which in turn sort of startled Ellie.  She inquired whether or not she was in trouble.  I explained that I was merely surprised she had gone through all her stickers, when I'd left her, she had been in the process of slowly peeling a sticker and placing one on each page of her sticker book.  It was as if her brain had a sudden glitch and could not stop itself from peeling all those stickers all at once.  At the time it was one of those sad/funny (sunny?) moments with Ellie.

Several months ago, Ben and I devised a system to allow Lotta to get more sleep.  Before the system was initiated, Ben loved to wake Lotta up so he could spend more time with her.  As I have mentioned, Ben has become interested in making money to buy himself Legos.  Thus, every time Lotta is asleep, Ben has the opportunity to earn between 1 and 3 cents.  If Ben is completely silent and non-disruptive, he earns 3 cents.  Ben is highly motivated to be quiet now and Lotta has more of a chance to sleep and I am not constantly having to say, "TOO LOUD" in a too loud and naggy voice.  Win-win-win.

The way I keep track of Ben's daily quiet-ness is through stickers on his calendar.  Lotta has noticed me putting stickers on Ben's calendar and she has become quite enthralled.  Although she thinks they are band-aids and so puts them all over her body.  Wherever her pretend ow-ees are.

Recently I unearthed the felt fabric that had been hanging in Ellie's room.  All of the stickers were still attached.  Lotta had a grabulous (great fabulous) time peeling them off and applying them to her body.  It was as if the two sisters were working together on a project.  Made me feel both sad and happy or sappy as Ellie would say.  Sad, wishing that Ellie were here to contribute to all this stickery-ness, or most likely yell at Lotta for messing up her design.  Happy, that even across the expanse of time, the two sisters could connect on this unlikely project.