Don't judge me! I am not ashamed.

Since I was little, I have loved Cadbury Creme Eggs. The original ones - not those wanna be caramel ones or mini-eggs. Those are lame. The original Cadbury Creme Eggs, however, are one of the greatest pleasures of life.

Since I started buying my own groceries about 15 years ago, I've purchased my very own Cadbury Eggs. On my weekly grocery trip, I always buy two -- one to have that night and one to have one other time during the week when I really need a delicious sweet treat. The Eggs have a season that lasts from about mid-February until Easter, so that does limit my consumption of them to about sixteen Cadbury Eggs per year. Only sixteen. Since I love them so, you can see why it's important that I not miss any of my planned Egg opportunities.

But this year, this year of 2012 when the Mayans predict the end of the earth, Keaton discovered my Cadbury Eggs.

It started innocently enough. One Sunday night after I had been to the store he saw the Eggs and asked, "What are those?"

"They are my favorite candy ever," I responded.

In hindsight, I should have said, "Vitamin rich spheres of dirt covered mud beetles."

What came next, of course, was "Can I have one?"

This is my youngest son, a child I carried within me for nine months and watched take his first breath. He is the bringer of joy and laughter into our home. I would give my right arm for him, my left one, too, even my life I would give!

But my Cadbury Creme Egg?  Sometimes our children just ask too much.

I took a deep breath, warned him that the creamy texture inside isn't for everyone, and told him he could have one of the eggs, all the while secretly hoping that he would find it disgusting and run to the trash to spit it out.

But he loved it. He ate the whole thing.

I took a deep breath and adjusted my Egg shopping strategy in my head. It's okay if he likes them. It's really okay. I just need to make sure he has some and I can still have two per week. That's not so hard. I can do this. The Mayans weren't right -- the world will continue to spin.

The next Sunday, I proudly bought three Cadbury Eggs. That night, Keaton and I each enjoyed one. It was a wonderful, chocolaty bonding experience.

Then the next night it happened. After dinner he said, "Mom, can I have one of those creamy egg things?"

"I don't know if we have any more."

But I did know. I knew we had one more Egg and I also knew that it was mine. I was already one down on my sixteen for the year, and this little rat wasn't about to take another one of my Eggs. I even bought him one of his very own, and still he wants more and more and more. Am I destined to never have Cadbury Creme Eggs to myself again?  Who does this child think he is wanting his "creamy egg things"? He doesn't even understand the delicacy that he is partaking of. He doesn't deserve that Egg.

He knew we had one, too. Innocently (or so he wanted me to believe), he said, "Yes, I saw one more on the counter."

I panicked. I didn't know what to do. I was having flashbacks of the episode of Friends where Joey couldn't go out with a girl because she kept eating food off his plate. I kept thinking "Joey doesn't share food!" Finally, in a moment of brilliance, I shouted, "WE HAVE ICE CREAM!"

"Do we have chocolate syrup?" he asked.

"YES!" I shouted, sensing I was about to win.

"Okay, that sounds good," he responded.

Sucker.

I made him a bowl of ice cream, and then I did what anyone else in my shoes would do. I took that extra Egg off the counter and I hid it. That's right, I hid that thing where no one would ever find it. No one but me.

I think he asked about it one other time that week, and I told him I wasn't sure what happened to it. Technically, I wasn't lying. I did put it in the cabinet, but it had been a day or two so something else could have happened to it since I last saw it.

A couple of nights later, we were letting the boys stay up a little late watching a movie in Tucker's room. Trey and I were watching tv in the living room, and I was on the couch enjoying my previously hidden Cadbury Creme Egg the proper way. (You must peel off just enough foil to get to one bite at a time, and then nibble away the chocolate in that section, scoop out the creamy filling with your tongue, marvel at its goodness, and then move on to the next small section, peeling the foil as you go.  But anyone who's ever had an Egg already knows that.)

I was about halfway through the experience when Keaton came out of Tucker's room to ask for a glass of water or something. I tried to act cool, holding the Egg down so maybe he wouldn't see it, but trying not to be so obvious that he would know I was hiding something from him. I thought I was in the clear, but at the very last second he turned around and said, "Hey!  Where did you get that?"

As I fumbled for words, my back-stabbing husband did not hesitate. "She hid it from you."

"What? Where did she hide it?"

"I can't tell you or she'll be really mad at me," Trey said.

Traitor!

I felt bad. I felt that my love for Cadbury Eggs had overtaken my love for my youngest child, and I felt guilty.

But then I took another bite, and I felt better.

Pallet Wall Art..The Obsessions Continues

It appears I have lost the ability to sit on the couch and watch tv. Don't be alarmed, though, because I plan to do my best to regain that ability as soon as I finish this post.

One of the very first things I pinned on Pinterest was this beautiful wall art. If you know me at all you know that I am ridiculously, gloriously cheap, and since this artwork is made with a repurposed wooden pallet and some paint I considered it to be practically free. But what words should go on my art?  Where should I put it?  How can I make it uniquely my own?  And, most importantly, how on earth can I paint letters that look that good because Lord knows I can't free-hand it!

I began staring at this big blank place on our wall where a cheap picture used to hang. It was a poster in a plasticy poster frame that for the most part matched our decor and filled the blank spot. It met an untimely death during an indoor baseball game played by the Hickman boys. I always tell them that as soon as they break something they can't play inside anymore, and I acted sufficiently appalled at the fact that they had broken the picture, but I never liked it much anyway.

So...I had location.

Then I pondered, as I often do before I start a project. Four or five weeks of pondering, in this case. I spent about six hours (all totaled) reviewing lyrics to hymns that I might consider using. I kept a running list of ideas on my ipad and even began grouping the lyrics by topic - those about grace, those about music and singing. (Yes, I'm type A even when I'm being artsy.) Some of my favorite finalists included:

• echoes of mercy, whispers of love
• tune my heart to sing thy grace
• how great thou art
• no tender voice but thine can peace afford
• all is vain unless the spirit of the holy one comes down
• redeeming love has been my theme, and shall be till I die

and that's just the short list. 

I also considered skipping the whole hymn thing and going straight to the source by using scripture. I considered Psalm 37:4 (Delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart) and some excerpt from I John 4, the scripture from our wedding. After all that, I finally decided on lyrics from the original artwork. 

After location and pondering came pillaging. I had the boys on the lookout for wooden pallets on the side of the road. I crept past construction sites hoping to find one sticking out of a dumpster. I called local department stores and asked if they had any to spare, and finally got lucky with a couple of local businesses. 

You know how I know Trey really loves me?  He dumpster dived with me. After a Sunday afternoon of pillaging pallets from dumpsters, I had two varieties to choose from. I chose the one with the smaller slats because I knew that I had to saw them and smaller meant easier.

I removed the slats from the base of each pallet with a hammer, and then sawed each slat into three somewhat equal pieces. Part of what made the original so cool was its imperfection, and that took a lot of pressure off me, too. 

When it came time to saw, I felt all brave and capable, so got out Trey's circular saw and plugged it in and read the directions. Then I remembered that he was at work and that I didn't know what I was doing and I pictured myself bleeding out with my arm sawed off in the garage all because of a Pinterest project, and I saw the boys having to dial 911 and attempt to save my severed arm by putting it in the freezer, and I realized there wasn't room in the freezer for an arm, so I chose to forego the circular saw and instead used a combination of a small manual handsaw and an electric hand saw. You're welcome, Hickmans. 

To connect the boards for the signs, I used the staple gun and some brads to attach two pieces of one inch plywood strips to the back. The brads were small enough that they didn't come through the front. The plywood strips were $2.49 each at Hobby Lobby, and I used two. We already had the brads. 

In the original, the wood was left wood-colored. My wood, however, wasn't exactly wood but more wood-ish, and the color wasn't great. I decided to paint it off white, and had to buy paint at Lowes. I got the little sample size, and it was about $2.50. The paint didn't cover the wood-ish material very well, but when I finished the first coat I actually liked the effect, so I left it at one coat.

The fantastic Deanne at work told me how to make the letters look like I knew what I was doing. I printed the lettering in the font I wanted, placed it on the sign, and then went around the lettering with a ball point pen leaving an indentation in the wood. I still couldn't see it well enough to paint, so I then went over the indentation with a pencil. Then I painted. It's not perfect, but remember that imperfection is the point, right? 

I had two pieces, and I didn't have any idea of what to put on the third. Hanging two would have worked, but in my head there were three of them. A trip to Hobby Lobby solved my problem when I found a cross for $8.99. Using my something-is-always-40%-off coupon on my phone, I got it for $5.40. I hung it on the third board with a nail. 

For hangers, I affixed wire to the back of each piece with the staple gun. 

Here's the finished project, all for about thirteen dollars.

Now I have to figure out what to do next. I still have some pallets, and I'm still collecting them. I think I have a pallet addiction. And I already went to the trouble of finding all of those song lyrics. They need to be on something. In our Sunday school class this morning I remembered that there is absolutely nothing on the walls in there, so maybe that can be my next project. I suppose I'll begin the pondering phase.

On a side note, yesterday I picked up these old cabinet doors at the Habitat for Humanity Restore for a buck a piece.

I have a project idea for one of them, but I bought five. The other four have turned into a perfect art project for the boys on a Sunday afternoon. They are currently outside painting masterpieces as all of the neighborhood kids look on and offer their creative inspiration. This might just be the best five bucks I ever spent.

My Greatest Fear

or, as an alternate title, it's a good thing they're alive so now I can kill them.

Disclaimer: No Hickmans were injured during the course of this story.

My greatest fear is that something will happen to my children. I recognize the futility of attempting to wrap them in bubble wrap and confine them to their rooms, and I do my best to keep the crazy paranoia at bay, but it doesn't always work.

We live on a street with lots of families, and I'm grateful that the boys have kids in the neighborhood they can play with. They cavort from yard to yard playing football and what-have-you. I'm happy about this, yet I remind them about six hundred thousand times a day to "stay away from the street!" and "watch for cars because they can't see you!" and I do frequent checks to see if I can catch them being less careful than I think they should be so we can have a quick mini-lesson on how to watch for cars and stay away from the street. I know they are as safe as boys can be playing outside, and I know that boys should play outside with their friends, but still, I always fear they will be careless and something horrible will happen. I figure probably every parent feels this way.

In the scene I'm about to create, it's important to note that I've been feeling a little run down this week. I've been dragging myself out of bed every morning and doing my best to act like I feel great, but I feel exhausted. I think the problem is that I've gotten back into my gym routine, so at night I'm really tired. So tired, in fact, that I'm sleeping really hard. As a result, I've had these wild and crazy dreams every night for like two weeks. I'm doing hard work in these dreams - running from killers and escaping fires and warning people of disaster and such, and I think all that work is making me wake up tired. This is my hypothesis regarding my lethargy.

(It occurs to me here that it may seem to the outsider like I'm in need of a psychiatric evaluation. I won't agree or disagree.)

Tonight we got home from school around 5:15, and the boys immediately went outside to play basketball. I considered straightening the house a little or finding something for dinner, but ultimately I felt the need to crash on the couch for the twenty minutes I had before Keaton's basketball game.

So I dozed into a state of conscious oblivion and briefly wondered if anyone would notice if I just slept until tomorrow. I thought about turning off the living room light, but that would have required me to get up from the couch, so the idea quickly passed.

Then it happened.

The scream.

A blood curdling scream of panic echoed through the garage. I knew immediately it was Keaton screaming, and I could hear the terror in his voice. The scream was continuous and strong, so in that split second I knew that Keaton was okay but he had seen something terrible.

I leaped over the dog gate, threw my phone on the floor, and as I entered the garage I saw the neighbor's truck stopped at the end of his driveway. The back lights flared, so I knew it was running. Keaton was now screaming words, but all I heard was "Molly's dad!" and I could see Molly's dad running around to the back of his truck.

I did not see Tucker.

In the two and one half seconds that followed, my worst fears were realized. I knew in my heart that there was a person under the tires of that truck, and that our lives would never be the same. I was moving in slow motion in the beginning of a Lifetime movie, and I blamed myself for allowing my children to play outside and not sitting with them every minute and trying to take a quick nap and just all around being the worst mother ever. I saw a funeral and weeping and I knew that I would never, ever recover. It was my greatest fear realized.

And then I saw Tucker.

And then Molly's dad picked up a misshapen object from under his truck tire, raised it up, and said, "I popped their basketball."

And then Tucker began to scream. It was a blood curdling scream of panic. A scream delivered not because of serious bodily injury to a loved one, but because he just discovered that his basketball had been popped.

Seriously?

I mumbled, "Dear God, I thought it was a person," and I clutched my screaming-but-perfectly-fine children and retreated quickly into the house and began to sob. I'm sure Molly's dad probably considered the emotional stability of my household for a moment or two before he got back into the truck.

I cried, and when I calmed down, Keaton calmed down.

Tucker continued to wail. Wail terrible cries of lament and pain as he lay crumpled on our living room floor.

"Tucker," I said calmly, "It's just a basketball. We can get a new one."

"But I loved that basketball.  It was my favorite one. And now I can't play basketball anymore," he choked out between sobs.

I guess I just thought I had calmed down because crazy mommy surfaced so quickly.

I was crying and yelling at him. "I thought it was you!  I thought you were under that truck and it was horrible! You guys just scared me to death! I can't stop shaking! I thought you were run over, but it was just a stupid basketball!"

"IT WAS NOT STUPID! IT WAS MY FAVORITE ONE!!!!!!" he screamed.



And so the event ended as they often do at our house: "You are being ridiculous. You've been screaming for five minutes and I'm not listening to it anymore. Go to your room until you can get some control of yourself."

I guess tomorrow we'll buy a new basketball.

More Projects...

It's no secret that I've begun this weird crafty streak (see my previous blog post). One of my good friends, Tiffany, laughs every time I start talking about a new project because for years she's had to create anything that needed to be created in my life. I have a little fear that I'm turning into that person who gives home made gifts to everyone that I think are awesome but everyone else thinks are really ugly, yet I continue to craft. If I give you something ugly, just look excited and then put it in your closet at home. I'll probably never know, and I'll certainly continue to enjoy the oblivion.

This is something I made for my mom for Christmas. It has all of our names on it (with one empty space for Wendy's July baby). I wish I had a better picture that included the frame.

This is wreath I made for the newlywedded Barretts. My sweet new niece seemed excited when she saw it, and whether it's in the closet or not is really of no concern to me because I had a good time making it.

Then, I found some shutters at the Habitat for Humanity Restore that I really wanted to make something with. The only problem was that I had no idea what to use them for, and I'm just cheap enough to NOT buy something unless I know its exact purpose. I visited the store several times, admired the shutters, and left without them.

One day as the boys came in from outside I heard the familiar crash of the ugly baby gate we keep leaning against the doorway so that the dog doesn't get out. I hate that gate, but not as much as I hate chasing the dog down the street because she slipped through while the boys are coming in the garage door. I've done this many times - in my pajamas, in bare feet, in the car - all the while yelling at the boys that "THEY KNEW THEY HAD TO SET THE GATE JUST RIGHT OR THE DOG WOULD GET OUT!"

I had been blessed with a shutter plan, and when I arrived at the Habitat Store to make my purchase I was excited to learn that the sets were only six bucks each - twelve dollars for the whole haul.

I went back and forth about how to make this fantastic dog gate that existed only in my head. I thought about using a hinge to attach it to the door frame and a hook and eye for the opposite side, but I do my best to keep holes out of the wall because we will someday sell this house. So I decided to make it free-standing. A trip Lowes found these - they are actually caps for fancy fences, but they would work perfectly for the feet of my dog gate (awesome shadow in the background, huh?).

I went to work attaching the feet, and I learned that Keaton is a master measurer and hole-marker. I did the first one, and he marked the other three perfectly. Once I had the feet on, I realized I would have to re-do the hinges to make it fold the way I wanted, so Keaton and I removed and re-installed the existing hinges to the way we wanted.

Then I spray painted. Let me tell you, spray painting shutters is a pain. You have to spray them open and spray them closed and spray them partially open and touch up and blah blah blah. It took two cans of paint and a long time, but finally they were green. (FYI - I don't think it would have been faster or less meticulous if I had painted with a brush.)

To make them a little more interesting, I added some birds and some curly-thingys (that's a technical term).  I must say that I'm pretty happy with the way they turned out. Our living room went from this:

To this...

The only potential problem I see with this arrangement is that Roxie could easily jump over the gate if she took a mind. I'm certain, however, that she doesn't know this. As long as I keep the secret, we'll be fine.

I have one more project that I've already bought the stuff for, and then I think it will be time to break out the ol' sewing machine. Once I figure out how to work it, that is.

Why I Love Pinterest

I have often remarked that I am not crafty. I have friends who are uber-crafty, and they intimidate with their creativity. I've often wanted to be crafty, but I just haven't had it in me.

I also just flat out haven't had the time. I know this is a bit of a broken record, but I would guess that during the school year teachers put in more hours every week than any other profession on earth. As a high school English teacher, it was not unusual for me to work from 7:30 until 5:30, pick up my kids and take care of evening activities, and then work for another hour or two after they went to bed. This happened at least three days a week and probably more, and it does not include the three or four hours I put in on a light weekend. These are serious underestimates for the times when major papers were turned in for Pre-AP. If you know a teacher, thank him or her. It is the most rewarding yet life-consuming job on the planet.

That is not to say that in my new role as Assistant Principal I'm not busy. I love my new job. It's exactly where God wants me to be right now, and it's a blessing for more reasons than I can list. However, (this totally IS NOT complaining) it's kind of exhausting. If it's any indication, I went to sleep Friday night at 7:00.

But I don't grade papers anymore.

It's been a culture shock for me. I found myself physically incapable of sitting on my couch without a stack of papers in my hands. I felt like I was forgetting something every time I left the house because I didn't have papers to take. My brain was exhausted from my new job, but I couldn't turn it off...ever.  I fidgeted, couldn't sleep all night, made up stuff to do, and I think I started to get a little depressed. My brain kept saying DO MORE DO MORE DO MORE DO MORE. My house was messy and my kitchen wasn't painted and my yard looked like a jungle and I wandered around feeling like a failure because people without papers should not have messy houses and weeds in their yards. It was difficult for me to adjust to a normal life - where it is possible to stay afloat with less than an eighty hour work week.

I considered learning how to crochet or knit so that I could have something in my hands to work on all the time. I watched some You Tube videos and practiced the same starting stitch about a hundred times, but then I could never get the next stitch. I think I'd still like to learn and have had several people offer to give me lessons, but I'm not exactly a natural.

Then I found Pinterest.

This weekend I have completed several Pinterest-found projects, and it's been fantastic! I may have cured myself of the "I don't know what to do with myself blues."

Here's what I've done:

S'Mores Bars: My cousin Dona recommended a different s'mores recipe, but I made this one because it didn't have eggs (the boys are both allergic). It was super easy, and they were good, but I was little underwhelmed. Next time I'll try the ones she suggested and just let the boys eat marshmallows or something. ;)

Bacon, cream cheese, and jalepeno crescent rolls: You guessed it - crescent rolls filled with bacon, cream cheese, and jalapenos, then folded up and baked. Delicious and also super-easy. How can you go wrong with bacon and jalapenos? 

Since we painted the kitchen last weekend, we've hung accessories on the walls that I forgot I had. They have literally been in boxes since we moved into this house seven years ago. Remember the grading - I blame it for my lack of unpacking. This cross is one of those items. Then, last night the boys were trying to remember their memory verse for Sunday school this morning, and Trey and I talked about how we should have a place to post the memory verse each week so they can see it all the time. I remembered a Pinterest tip that you can use dry erase markers on glass, we rummaged through some boxes of old pictures, and Presto! Memory verse in the kitchen (and easily interchangable when it's time for a new verse)!

Finally, my major project of the weekend is this wreath. I love the way it turned out!  I have poinsettias already made and some ribbon left, so I may make another one to give away. Since it was half price ribbon week at Hobby Lobby, I estimate the cost of this project to be about ten bucks.  Awesome!

So look out world, The Storm is a-craftin'. Follow me on Pinterest so I can follow you back. I have lots and lots of ideas for projects. It's just a matter of which one to do next. If you know of places in the B/CS area where I can find old windows, shutters, or wooden pallets (besides the Habitat store), hook me up. Keep in mind that I am ridiculously cheap.

See you on Pinterest!

Just another visit to the doctor

Tucker has bad skin.

Since he was born, Tucker has been plagued with what we've called eczema. All by itself, it sounds minor. But it's not minor.

He has spent his entire life covered in sores. His arms and legs, specifically, have been completely healed only once in his life, and that was for about two weeks last spring when he took a powerful anti-rejection medication that is usually given to organ transplant patients. We knew at the time it was a one time deal  -- he could never take it again. Other than those two weeks, he itches and scabs and bleeds and scratches. His sores are innumerable, and he has truly never known relief from them. This is kind of a blessing, actually. He doesn't know what it's like to not itch and hurt, and so he lives. He plays baseball and swims in the summer and goes to school and bleeds and scratches and it's his life.

We've seen dermatologists and allergists and the like, and we've "controlled" it sometimes and it's been infected and then it's better but just gross and painful and we continue on.

In the past three months, however, I've decided that I am a horrible mother. I think I realized this because he's started a new school, and I get to be there with him every day. It occurred to me that these new friends and new people at this new school know Tucker first as the kid with the sores. I knew they asked him about it. They asked me, too, "why does Tucker have sores all over him?" and it broke my heart.  I began to see him going into intermediate school and middle school and high school and having to first overcome his skin before he could make his mark in his new place. The thought still gives me this horrible feeling deep in my gut.

So I took him to the doctor, like we always do when the skin gets increasingly worse instead of staying just plain awful. He took an antibiotic for staph (as we often do because he has open wounds all over his body), and we hoped for the best. Two weeks later I took him again because he still seemed to be getting worse. Our awesome pediatrician, who always looks for new ways to help Tucker, put him on a different antibiotic and mentioned that there is a pediatric dermatologist in Round Rock that he'd be glad to send us to if we were up for trying something new yet again.

I made an appointment for early November, the soonest they could see him, but his skin continued to worsen. Finally I called the doctor, desperate for an earlier appointment, and they agreed to fit me in the next day provided that I changed to a different doctor in the practice. It wasn't what I wanted, but it was something, so I took the appointment.

Tucker and I made the hour and forty five minute drive and decided to have lunch before the appointment. Tucker chose a place called "Z Pizza," and it turned out to be the most hilarious place to have lunch. This was because Tucker spoke with an Italian accent the whole time, exchanged all the's for zee's. "Z Pizza at Zhis place is Zee best pizza I've ever had!" He was cracking himself up.

Off we went to the doctor, and when we arrived we learned that Dr. Tee, the pediatric dermatologist we wanted to see, found out we were coming and rearranged his entire schedule so he could see us. The nurse ushered us to a room and made Tucker don his very first doctor's office gown, booty hanging out in the back and all. Doctors don't usually make kids strip down and put on a gown, so it was pretty funny to see my eight year old's face when the nurse said those classic words: Take everything off and put on this gown, open in the back.

Dr. Tee was amazing. He studied Tucker, asked tons of questions, and really paid attention to us. After a few minutes he offered some theories and began explaining the tests he wanted to run.

There are moments in life that stop your heart. When the world around you keeps moving and panic rises in your throat and, just for that second, you can't breathe. You want to scream for time to stop and back up and I can't do this and no thank you and you must be wrong and this isn't really happening.

I learned this week that the word "biopsy" has that kind of power.

As the moment passed, all I could think was that I could feel my face. I felt it change into the face of one hiding what was really happening, one who appeared brave and strong and positive and altogether unaffected when what I really wanted was to cry. I knew Tucker was watching me, and I couldn't hear what the doctor was saying because I was so focused on what to do with my damn face.

I knew he wasn't doing a biopsy because he thought Tucker had cancer, but it didn't matter. It was like this thing, this giant monster of Tucker's skin that loomed over every day of his life was coming out of hiding and facing us. I realized that for so long I'd feared that what causes Tucker's skin to break out is something devastating, terrible. Something that would take him from me. The biopsy was going to show me how big the monster really was, and I don't think I was ready at that moment to know the answer. We had worked so hard to keep the monster stuffed in a little box, and I knew that we would never be able to put it back in. It was terrifying.

Long story short - okay, long story less long - the doctor did two 3 millimeter punch biopsies in Tucker's right arm, and then we went to the lab where they drew four vials of blood (he almost passed out). I smiled, I joked, I made a bet with Tucker about how many homers Pujols would hit in the World Series, and Tucker never once cried. He tolerated all of this a million times better than I ever expected. We have since joked that Trey and Keaton should never again send the babies to the doctor alone, but the babies did okay.

I must say here that I realize people all over the world and here in our own back yard have real problems. There are incurable diseases and debilitating conditions that make Tucker's skin problems look minor. I am well aware that in the big scheme of things, this is not the worst. But we just can't keep watching him suffer if we can help it.

Today the incredible Dr. Tee called with results. Tucker does not have celiac disease (that was a theory), and we now have documented evidence that he is one incredibly healthy eight year old who happens to bleed all over the place. His liver and kidneys and electrolytes and everything else they can test with your blood are all normal.

He does, however, have both eczema and psoriasis, an overlay that occurs very rarely. It seems people are supposed to get one or the other, and my little over achiever has managed to have severe cases of both.

But Dr. Tee thinks he can help. He wants to start Tucker on a new oral medication. It has lots of scary side effects, as do all medicines, but Dr. Tee's professional opinion is that the benefits will far outweigh the risks. For the first time in his life, Tucker could have complete relief. I'm so excited I can hardly stand it, but I'm also a little afraid to be too hopeful. Either way, the monster is a great deal smaller.

Tonight I asked Tucker what he thought it would be like to not itch all the time. He laughed a little and said, "I guess it would be like being a normal kid." 

"Oh, honey," I told him, "You are way too special to ever be a normal kid."

I'm pretty sure he made a face at me.

Then I told him when his skin got better, I was going to buy him new sheets. I think he was genuinely excited when he said, "And they won't get bloodstains on them!"

I know of no better way to end this post than to let Trey end it for me. As he told my mom in our latest facebook message conversation: "It seems like there are some risks with taking the medicine, but they think the benefits outweigh the risks. I would rather take a calculated risk for myself then to decide to take a calculated risk for my kid. I'll try not to worry....God always takes care of us and there is no reason to think he won't continue."

Keaton's First T-Ball Game

I haven't blogged in over a month. I've formulated several posts in my head, but none of them have actually made it out onto the keyboard. Perhaps they'll come soon.

Part of my trepidation is that the post rattling around in my head is regarding the differences and similarities between high school and elementary school. I'm very concerned that my people on both ends of the spectrum will interpret something I have to say as an implication that one is easier than the other, and that is most certainly not the case. Someone I respect more than just about anyone in my professional life told me from the beginning (I'm paraphrasing here) that people think elementary is easy, but it's not easy, just different. She, too, worked in both elementary and secondary schools, and now that I'm six weeks in I know exactly what she meant.

So that post will someday be posted, but for now I'll share about one of my favorite subjects in the world. Keaton.

It's good to be Keaton. It's fun and exciting and an all around good time just to BE Keaton Hickman. After six years of his life, I've realized that the rest of us in the world just don't enjoy ourselves enough.

Tonight he had his first t-ball game, and he couldn't have been more excited. He was serious business as a player -- he made sure he wore his batting gloves and showed off his swagger. You could just see the fun seeping off of him while he was on the field.

Now, in t-ball, the kid hits the ball off of the tee. The opposing team attempts to field said ball, and the player runs to first base. As the next batter hits the ball, all of the runners advance one base, and this continues throughout the entire batting order. Every great once in a while the defense gets an out, and the out player takes a seat on the bench, hopefully without crying. Finally, when the last batter hits the ball, all of the runners run through to home to finish out the inning.

Keaton was the last batter.

Here's how he told the story of his game to several people after it was over.

"I hit two home runs!  One time, I was running, and the player got in my way, but I was running so fast that he got scared and moved and then I scored a home run. I scared him because I was so fast!  The other time, the score was four to four and the pitcher was at home plate, and he had the ball, and I ran so fast to him, and when I got to home plate I just jumped right over him. The coach said I was safe. I JUMPED over him and scored another home run. It was awesome."

In reality, I'm pretty sure the score was like 30 to 30 because virtually every kid rounded the bases, and Keaton did run all the way through THREE times because there were three innings and he was the last batter. (I'm not sure why he didn't include the third one in his home run count.) But also, in reality, on the last play of the game the pitcher was waiting for Keaton on home plate with the ball, and Keaton did his level best to leap over the player's head so that he could be safe. Both boys ended up on the ground, and Keaton earned his final imaginary home run of the night.

It's fun to be Keaton Hickman.