Cough cough cough and other equally fascinating news

Last evening was cozy.  The pellet stove was warmly humming; I was crashed exhaustedly on the couch beside it and at one point realized all five of us were in the room.  Tim was reading in the chair on other side of the stove, the baby was playing on the floor, Gabe was listening to music on the computer and Israel and Zion were on the couch with me.  Pretty sure even the cat was there. :)

Yesterday the two older boys started piano lessons.  They LOVED it.  They are taking lessons from a teenager that we know in Bridgeville.  She is teaching them chording to worship music and how to read music.  The first song they are learning is How Great is Our God and Gabe especially can already play and sing along it.  He is going to play and sing it for the Fine Arts Program next month.

Zion was reading to me out of his little booklet that he brings home.  If someone listens to him read then he gets to pick a prize out of a box.  I looooooove the excitement of them learning to read - it's just one of the best things.  I also love the first pronunciations.  All the vowels are stretched waaaaay out and sort of change shape mid-word.  "Haaaaaaaaaaat"  "Nooooooooot".

Gabe spent a long time last evening doing long division on the chalkboard in the hallway.  Math makes him happy.  He likes it and feels good at it and is good at it.  He did not inherit this from his mother.

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Since the girls got sick last week, sleep has been EXTREMELY SPARSE.  But....I FINALLY got a blessed, wonderful, amazing solid night of sleep last night.  Felt like a new werman today.  (prounced like "vermin".)

The night before last I was thinking about how I felt like sleep deprivation was like a steady hammer chinking away the foundation of my functionability.  Chink chink chink chink.

Recipe for One Sleep Deprived Exhausted Insane Person: Two children with fevers and misery followed by one round of RSV and coughing till they vomit and neb treatments every 3 hours around the clock and not hardly sleeping for over a week and having the dumb virus yourself.  And then needing to get up at 7 AM to get the boys to school every morning during the week.

Oh. my. word. I was so exhausted after a week and a half of this.  Tim was also helping steadily by the way.

But last night everyone slept so much better and today I felt so much better, and the difference was just about joy inducing.  I was driving to pick the boys up from school being SO JOYFULLY HAPPY that I wasn't EXHAUSTED.  That my brain felt normal and not sleep fogged and headachy and my eyes felt bright and I felt simply springy and I could do a normal chore without dread and fatigue.

Observations:

1.  Cough medicine is amazing.

2.  Friends who bring you food when life is less than stellar are amazing. (That's YOU, Nikki and Deb!!) 

3.  I NEEEEEED at least 45 minutes to 1 hour BY MYSELF at some point in the evening to best handle staying up all hours of the night or getting up repeatedly.  If I don't have just a little bit of time of my own, all the children everywhere aaaaaalllll tthhhhheee tiiiiiimmmmeee all feels way more overwhelming and intolerable.

You are SO. WELCOME. for all my "interesting" news.  I'm off to do exciting things like...not cough.  And...listen to everyone sleep.  Splendid and marvelous things, these.