Thankfulness Day #5

A sound:

Well, I'm trying to get the sound on here as a video clip but I'm still working on it.  It's a clip of Colin's voice.  I am so thankful that I have some video clips of him.  We aren't ones for taking tons of videos like some do, but I used to use the iPad to catch him talking and also doing his thing in school.  I didn't have a decent cell phone until maybe 5 years ago so much of what I have is from the iPad. Anyway, it's such a sweet sound to hear.  I love when I get Facebook video memories or TimeHops of him. It's hard, sometimes, but I usually end up smiling, at least inside when I view one.  Colin could say "no" sooo clearly.  It was a quick "no" but definitely understood.  He would say, "uh huh" with an up tone to say "yes" or "more."  He could say, "moo" for movie. "Bap" when he wanted his bipap back on.  He could say "mama" and "dada" and "aunt". He would try to enunciate some words or use his sounds in syllables to say a sentence. We didn't always understand what he was saying but much of the time you could figure it out in context of what was going on.  The cutest was when he would say, "Awww, awww". That could mean many different things. It could mean something cute or something he liked, or if something sad/bad happened.  Oh, another of the cutest was when he said, "OH HO." That was his OH NO which also meant something was up/something was wrong.  

I'll work on getting some clips up, I promise.  But for now, here’s a cute pic of Colin  

Thankfulness Day #4

 A Food:

I could go many ways with this...but I will keep it simple.  Ice cream.  Or is it ice-cream?  Or icecream?  No matter how you write it—it’s allll good to me. Okay, I’m certain there are flavors that I don’t even want to try but I can’t even think of any right now. I’ll eat any ice cream—from store brand to super premium. It’s all good!  I truly like vanilla best. Vanilla bean is tops. It’s so versatile. Sometimes I like toppings but plain is good too. 

I can’t remember a time when I didn’t love ice cream. Growing up we were dessert people and ice cream was usually my #1 “go to”. 

Even when I wasn’t feeling well I could eat ice cream. To this day, if my stomach is feeling queasy, ice cream makes it feel better. 

Oh and back in the day, growing up on Long Island, “Wednesday is Sundae at Carvel!”  Loved Carvel!  We frequented Carvel a lot as I remember.  Rocky Road, Butter Crunch, mmmmm.  

When I was pregnant with Colin I didn’t gain much weight (way different than with Casey). My OB gave me permission to have ice cream every day if I wanted. And so I did. 

Well, it’s bedtime and I have to go to go brush my teeth as I just had a bowl of vanilla ice cream with caramel sauce :) 

Thankfulness Day #3

 A Color:

That's easy.  Yellow.  Anyone who knows me knows that Yellow is my favorite color. I don't have a lot of yellow clothes, or yellow furniture or a yellow car, but we do have 'the yellow room.' For some reason we have names for many of the rooms of our home that aren't traditional names.  We have Casey's old room (he used to sleep in there), the wish room (Make a Wish transformed our attached garage into a bedroom/swinging room for Colin), the aunt room (a guest room which was used primarily by visiting aunts), and we have the yellow room. The yellow room is a family room where we spend a lot of time,especially in the evenings and on the weekend.  And yes, the walls are a bright, rich yellow.  I've noticed that I've subconsciously placed many yellow knickknacks in this room.  

When I was little, I vaguely remember my mother asking me what my favorite color was.  Maybe I was 10?  I'm sure she expected me to say blue (which was hers).  I wasn't really sure, at that point in time, but I wanted to be contrary so I blurted out "yellow!"  Since then I was committed.  My parents went to Florida and brought me back a bright yellow tee shirt that had Florida written across the front in black letters.  I think I wore that shirt 100 times that year.  

I love sunflowers.  They are my favorite flower.  But I do love daffodils and yellow roses, too.  When Gene proposed he brought me a bouquet of red and yellow roses.  Around our anniversary of our first date and our wedding anniversary, he tries to find me red and yellow roses in remembrance.  

Our house is gray, but we had our garage stained yellow.  I won that one.

Yellow is cheerful, yellow is sunshine. Yellow is energy.  Yellow is creative. 

But, it has to be the right shade of yellow.  Dingy yellow can be the opposite of all the positive aspects of yellow, as I see it anyway.  

Oh, PS My astrological sign is Leo. Yellow is associated with Leos along with orange and red.  Show me a sunflower that is yellow, red and orange and I'm in love. 

Thankfulness Day #2

 Technology:

Is it cheating to say 'the Internet'?  I guess the web is the all encompassing technology.  But I am very thankful for it. 1997. I had no computer.  I think Gene had some kind of work computer.  But we didn't have one that I had access to.  Casey was diagnosed with SMA in May of 1997.  Who had ever heard of Spinal Muscular Atrophy before?  Certainly not us.  My sister contacted Families of SMA (now known as Cure SMA) and they sent her a bunch of information. I kept a box of their newsletters in our backroom.  I couldn't look at them without sobbing.  There was too much sadness.  And back then there was NO treatment. Today there are 3!  My SIL lent me a desktop computer so I could use the Internet to research SMA.  For some reason we had it on the floor in the living room. It was probably because we had to hook it directly into the modem and it was only able to reach a certain area. So I learned about the Internet and AOL and Yahoo. I learned about SMA.  I also found my lifeline.  There were other families out there with the same diagnosis. We weren't alone.  I know I did a lot of emailing with families back then.  There was no Facebook or anything like that.  One mom set up a website and a board where we could write back and forth to each other and ask questions and give support.  A true lifeline.  There have been families that I connected with back then that I am still friends with today.  And that's kinda cool.  

Thankful Day #1

 I had fun with 30 Days of Thankfulness several years ago.  I hadn't found another set of prompts I really liked until I found this one.  It seems doable so I'll give it a whirl.  

A Smell:

Gene made bread in the bread machine and it actually turned out pretty well.  It's been hit and miss over the years. We go through phases when we use the bread machine and then we don't touch it for months at a time.  I have a thing about yeast.  I've not been too successful at baking anything that requires yeast.  But, with a bread machine I have a fighting chance. But back to the smell.  The smell of baking bread is homey.  It tickles my senses and my nose feels happy.  Having a happy nose makes the rest of me feel happy.  Every room in the house that I walked into had the delicious bread baking smell.  I actually walked outside and came back in, just so I could get the smell fresh in my nose again.  Weird-probably. I could even smell it in the bedroom when I went up for the night.  It made me smile.