Holy Macaroni!

Whoa! I can't believe that I've let a month go by with no new post! Wow! Time sure flies around here. In my own defense I have been a teeny, tiny bit busy. With the big trip to Ohio to visit family, Aaron leaving for the other side of the world, taking care of the kids, the house, the garden, the dogs and the spotty internet connection. (Why, cruel internet service provider, can't you just let me have one whole, uninterrupted hour of internet?) Phew. 

I have been meaning to post. I've been composing long, eloquent, humorous blog posts in my head at random times during the day. The only problem is that my thoughts aren't remotely transmitted to blogger instantaneously. Including the fabulous pictures (which never turn out quite so well in real life.) Finding a quiet moment to sit at the computer and write has been difficult. And not just because of the guilt I feel about the piling up laundry and dirty bathrooms. It's more because it's in these quiet moments that I'm not too busy to think about everything going on. When I'm busy I don't have to think about my mom still being in the hospital. After more than four months. My poor dad staying there with her. Going to work at 3am so he can be at the hospital from 9am-9pm, sleep a few hours and get up and do it again. Aaron deploying, again. Katie dealing with his deployment, again. (She asked in her very first email to him if he was hurt. We had just dropped him off.) And possibly the worst news of all. My grandmother has lung cancer. Stage 3. 20% survival rate. It's killing me. It's killing me because she's my very best friend. She's always there for me. Always. I can talk to her about anything. And she knows me better than me. She's been witness to my most unbearable mistakes and my greatest joys. And it's killing me to not be there with her every second through this. She's not supposed to be around the babies and I couldn't not be here to see Aaron off. We're heading down there next weekend. Don't tell her doctor that I'm letting her hold her great-grandkids as much as she wants. So please, say a prayer for us. I could really use it right now.