Alison Hodgson

Expert on the etiquette of perilous times.

In Honor of Canada Day though slightly delayed

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This was taken over a month ago, the day before we left for Montana.  I was watching Ren and Willa for a couple of hours.  These pictures were taken in the fifteen minute period that I wasn’t holding Willa and walking around with her.  Since she was separated from her Mama and was already planning to refuse her bottle (after refusing her nap) and since she’s a smart girl, she probably knew she needed to make a plan for survival – a gorgeous bod like hers doesn’t just happen people, it’s made.  Lydia’s bowl of popcorn seemed a logical place to start.

She had observed that you grab the bowl and then move your hand towards your mouth.  Hmmm, maybe there was more to it than that.  She decided to get a closer look:

Here she lunged forward to try and maneuver closer, never removing that little hand grasping the bowl.

Let’s try that again.  Hand back to the mouth, but still nothing.  What’s missing?   
Here she lunged again and actually grazed the popcorn and we realized the two were going to need to be separated: Willa and the popcorn, that is.  Lydia, needing to choose, decided she couldn’t be separated from the popcorn and divested herself of Willa.  

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Lydia is on a baking kick and has earned the nickname, “Birdie Crocker” from her Aunt Torey. A batch of chocolate chip cookie bars is being whipped up as I write. Eden is shuffling through recipes in a mini baking kit she received for her birthday and Christopher is bobbing around, avoiding some schoolwork and getting in the way of the young Ms. Crocker.

“You know Mom,” he said to me, “one of my joys in life is eating cookie dough before it is baked.”

Since his other joys seem to be teasing his sisters, shrieking loudly, staying up late and then sleeping in to all hours, I’m glad (the risk of salmonella aside) that this is a joy we all share.

https://alisonhodgson.com/2008/05/459/

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Late last night Lydia had an appendectomy.  

She’s doing great.
As I write she’s watching a movie, surrounded by the flowers and balloons and clutching the stuffed horse her father bought her.  She’s thrilled to be missing school.
I spent a very short night’s sleep on a little chair bed beside her and am having a little trouble typing and spelling.  
This has been a surreal time.  24 hours ago she was fine and now, thank God, she is fine again.  She is our middle child, between an older brother with special needs and a much younger sister.  Hers is a challenging position.  Paul and I are praying that God uses this experience to communicate to Lydia, in the depths of her spirit, that she is a cherished member of our family, that she is beloved, because she is.

https://alisonhodgson.com/2008/04/466/

Sweetness

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Most people, I think, were raised on cookies or bars.  I was raised on cookies.  It would be interesting to consider the sort of people who are attracted to making bars.  There is much to be said for them, they are certainly quicker and, if you crave it, there is the option of uniformity.  It must be pleasing, for some, to be able to cut perfectly square or rectangular bars, leaving the curled up edges to be eaten in private by the baker.  This is all conjecture since, as I mentioned, my experience and expertise is with cookies.

And yet,the other day, it was chocolate chip cookie bars for which I had a craving.  I didn’t do anything about it until Lydia fell upon me crying because Eden was driving her crazy.  Eden, who can be quite a pill, wasn’t really doing anything.  I diagnosed cabin fever of the deadliest kind and, as I held my sobbing girl close, tried to think what might be a good occupation for someone who is sick and tired and generally feeling fragile.  Baking seemed a possibility.  I suggested making some bars and Lydia agreed.   That it could hit the second bird of my own craving was a bonus.   
Once we had settled on the recipe and she had begun to measure ingredients, Lydia came back and sweetly apologized for her earlier fit.  This is always her way, given a little room and some compassion  her conscience invariably pricks and she makes things right.  
Today Lydia made the bars again.  She wanted to do it herself and with the help of her sister and one of our visiting friends she measured out the wet ingredients and mixed them.  It looked strange and so she called me to check.  It was easy to see that she hadn’t fully creamed the butter and sugar before adding the eggs and vanilla.  She was worried.
I told her to start measuring the flour and I got the mixer going strong.  It soon beat everything into a creamy mixture.  It wasn’t what it would have been, but it was fine.  
“Is it going to be OK?”  Lydia asked after we stirred in the dry ingredients.
I assured her it would be and then asked, “What if it wasn’t fine, what if it was ruined?”
She thought for a moment, “We could start over.”
And in most cases we can.  Today we have plenty of butter and sugar and eggs, it only would have taken time to measure them again.
I poured in the chocolate chips and we both leaned forward to hear them hitting each other as they landed.  This is one of my favorites sounds in the world and I have taught Lydia to appreciate it too.  We mixed them into the dough and then carefully spread it in the pan.
I put the bowl in the sink and filled it with water to wash.  “Sweetie, you know if you try anything, odds are -“
“You’re going to make mistakes?”
“Yep.  And the sooner you figure out they’re nothing to be afraid of, the happier you’re going to be.”
The bars have baked and been cooled on a rack.  Lydia is cutting pieces for everyone as I type.
If you had a bird’s eye view of our kitchen today you would have probably been able to figure out I was teaching my daughter how to bake.  But you might not have known, what I am coming to understand I get to do day after day, in the most mundane situations, is that I was teaching her how to live.

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I might be posting this from my bed.

Paul awoke at four this morning and inadvertently woke me too. Unable to get back to sleep, we got up to walk Jack a little after five.  It was all for naught because the trail was icy and neither of us felt like falling on our duff.  Picky, I know.  We walked Jack around the yard and then went back inside.  It wasn’t even six.  We collapsed into bed and passed out.  I would probably still be sleeping if Lydia didn’t need to get up to go to a program she attends once a week.
She felt sick and had a sore throat so we went to the doctor instead.
We have reached that point in the winter of eye clawing desperation.  
Tonight I am taking Lydia to the Hannah Montana movie.  I know that this isn’t going to help me in the eye clawing category, but it will mean a lot to my little girl and it is recorded here as evidence of my Good Motheredness.
Torey and her two girls, as well as all my kids are on the bed with me.  
And now Paul is home.

https://alisonhodgson.com/2008/02/541/