Big Boys and Wii Arms

Among John's presents yesterday were a few this-boy-is-growing-up presents, a remote switch so that he can turn a lamp off and on from his bed (thanks to as-seen-on-tv), a lamp for the little bookcase by his bed, an alarm clock with big digital numbers so that he can start to learn that he can leave his light on for 1 hour, or 30 minutes or whatever after he is put to bed, and a small shelf that hangs above his bed that he can reach that holds a few books for him. This morning he was sitting in bed with his light on reading/looking at a book waiting patiently for his daddy to come get him for his bath. The big boy just keeps getting bigger every day, not just in behavior, but in stature also. On Christmas eve as we were standing together in church I was holding his hands as normal, at the full extension of my arms. I've known for a while that he was not fully or even mostly extending his own arms to hold my hands, not until Christmas Eve did I realize just how much taller he had gotten, when he took my hand and rested his whole face in there at first I wondered why he was trying to wipe his snotty nose in my hand, then I realized hey, that's his chin, holy cow this kid is getting taller. Why did he do this, I haven't a clue, it was silly at a moment when his mommy needed some silly, sweet how God provides even those things that we need.

The grown-ups are enjoying their present too. Mark and I are trying to purchase the parsonage here, we have been given a can't-miss-deal on the price of it, but even at that it is taking everything financially that we have and so this year we purchased no presents for each other and only a very few for John from us. My sweet and generous mom sent 4 boxes for us in the box that contained John's most favoritest Playdoh. We didn't have a clue what was in the boxes, except for the first which by it's packaging was obviously a game for the DS that she had given me for Christmas several years back. We were shocked, amazed, delighted and speechless when we unwrapped a new Wii and some components for the grown-ups. Now this is very much a first-Christmas-after for us, comparable to the first Christmas after my dad died, and the first one after Mark's mom died, a friend described miscarriage as a bitter pill to swallow, it is by far the bitterest we have tasted yet. So while we were still into Christmas for the celebration of the coming of Christ, and made sure that John enjoyed his Christmas, both Eve with church celebrations and Day with presents, games and toys, for us there was/is a missing joy that we know will eventually return but is certainly not here now. Last night after we put John to bed we decided to give the Wii a real run, we had played a bit through the day, but really it takes too much floor space and too much in-front-of-the-tv to have John in the floor while you are doing this. We played tennis, we shot pool, played badmitton, and every other game on the thing and my favorite we rode the cows and knocked down the scarecrows, more importantly we laughed, we smiled, we giggled, and we carried on without tears or sadness into the wee hours of the morning. Well this morning we have Wii arms, mine are more tired and sore than Mark's, but it certainly reminds me of days gone by when the skin between my thumb and first finger was bruised from the Atari joystick (mom and dad saved us by sending us to bed so they could play, hmmmm, their hands were red the next day too) and who could ever forget Nintendo thumbs once you've had them, ouch, but really you can play through the pain ;) Moreover we are looking forward to playing again after John is in bed tonight and think we might have even found some things that John can play on here too. Thanks mom for both the Wii Arms and the Wii smiles!