How Many Children Do I Have Anyway?

he past several weeks, we've gotten into the habit of taking my Sister to church with us on Sunday mornings. Then, we bring her home for dinner, spend the afternoon together, go back to the afternoon service, and take her home after supper. It seems to be just the right amount of time for her to be home. When she spends the night, breakfast becomes very stressful for me. She is such a morning person --- I, on the other hand, I'm not. Most of the time when she's with us, she never stops talking, and what she says is just repetition over and over and over again. Don't get me wrong, I love her dearly. It's just that it does increase my stress when she's home for more than a few hours of time.

There's a lot more to monitoring her than some people might think. She needs to be watched all the time so that she doesn't get into things that she's not supposed to be into, very much like a small child. We've had trouble with her with everything from eating too much food to cutting herself with razors. She can't be left alone at all! For example, yesterday afternoon when she was home, I went downstairs for 20 minutes, and while I was gone, Mom and Dad went to take a nap. When I got back upstairs, sister had helped herself to a snack. It was less than half an hour after we finished eating.

One Sunday morning, we were going through the line at coffee after church. Sister started taking the amount of food she wanted, and then I had to have her put some of it back because she taken too much. I looked up at my pastor's wife who was serving coffee and shook my head. She chuckled and said, "How many children do you have now?"

You see, I have three children of my own. Two of them are grown and on their own, and one was at home with us. I have a stepson who is married, and they have a baby. I'm taking care of my parents, which is often like taking of children, except I can't discipline them. And then there is Sister.

Yes. I have nine children. And I am truly blessed.

What Did She Say??

e had Sister over today, and then took her to church again. We sang another of her favorite hymns--How Great Thou Art--and she was so excited!

She gave Husband quite a scare on the way home when she introduced him to a new phrase, "Holy buckets!" (New to him, anyway. Turns out my family is just quite old fashioned when it comes to our expressions because the definition of "Holy Buckets" given on Wikipedia is from a 1960 slang dictionary.)

Anyway, back to Sister. Yeah.

She has Down Syndrome, and one of the ways that is manifested is in an overly large tongue, which is what makes her speech difficult to understand. Since I grew up with her and was the closest in age to her, I can almost always understand her. I forget that other people can't. Particularly bothersome is the fact that some of her letter sounds seem to come out as other letter sounds. For example, she her L's almost always come out sounding like N's, and sometimes her B's come out sounding like F's.

And that's all I'm going to say.

Holy Buckets!

Going to Church

ow that I'm (almost) my sister's guardian, I'm making changes with her visits home. For instance, she can't be here for long periods of time (i.e., more than 30 minutes!) unless I am. That means each time she comes home for the weekend, she comes to church with us on Sunday. Twice.

At first, Sis was so opposed to going to church with us that she refused to come home for weekends when she was told she'd have to go. But then, at Uncle's funeral a few weeks ago, my husband got to spend a couple of hours with her, just the two of them, and he told her all about the Gospel. When she found out that's what our church is about, she suddenly was happy to go.

We were raised in an ELCA Lutheran Church; now, we go to a Reformed Church. Many Reformed churches come from a Dutch background, while the Lutheran heritage is more German and Norwegian, so the hymns Sis and I grew up on are different than the ones we're singing now. The first service this week, I noticed Sis quietly tried to sing along with the hymns, but they were all unfamiliar, and she can't read music. (Her I.Q. is 42--I'm pleased as punch she can read words!) Then, the last hymn was one she knew: O Come, O Come Emmanuel. And she let the whole congregation know she knew it! What a joyful noise to the Lord that was! It was beautiful! She hugged me after the service and told me she loves our church.

Mornings are the toughest time of day for Dad. His head generally hurts worst upon waking, or sometimes it is what wakes him. So, they haven't gone to church with us in the morning. But this week was the second time they came with us to the evening service. I think they had an idea that our religion was a cult or something, because they really avoided going with us for a long time. Mom finds it strange that my husband doesn't like crosses or pictures and statues of Jesus; he finds it strange that she seems to think the Second Commandment doesn't apply. But, they know now that our church is a good one, and this week, I think they were truly blessed by the service.

I know I was. There is nothing like hearing the Law and Gospel preached by a man of God. Amazing!