Chaos and Confusion – In a Good Way

With 11 people in the house for the holidays, it is a chaotic mess of kids, schtuff, and fun. Mom is struggling with remembering everyone’s name and what is going on. It is a good thing that she can see how two families with children have so many similarities. It seems to calm her when both babies are crying, the older boys are acting the same, and the moms/dads are interacting equally.
She was so excited, when her suprise visitors arrived 4 days early! I was able to get the whole moment on video, too. That is a priceless memory.

Mom is also healing well. Finally, with an antibiotic, she is seeming to heal in leaps and bound each day. I also attribute this to her frame of mind. She is busy making pot after pot of coffee and keeping the dishwasher running. I quickly found out that she is overwhelmed with decision making tasks, like where all the extra people will be sitting, or how much additional food I might need to make. Instead of asking her, I realized that it is easier to not try and include her in the process. She seems satisfied to just do the tasks that she does every day. She just has to do a lot more often.

For Christmas, I have decided to make her a memory jar. She loves to write (I have already given her some stationary and writing things), so I would like to see some of her writing energy put towards memories that she has. My husband is an only child, so his mother is the only one who has these memories about his father, their lives and the history of my husband’s childhood. What I did, was put slips of paper into a canning jar. Each one has a question on it, so she can write down the memory that it jogs. I added a simple journal and a couple of matching pens, to complete the gift.

All in all, it is day 2 of the big social event for my mom. She is feeling less stress than normal so far. I think that the honeymoon phase of the vacation is still in full swing.

I just realized that we are currently a 4 generation household right now. Isn’t that neat?