Pre-Easter Stuff

After the spring break/kidney stone chaos, I was happy to have the boys going back to school last week. Except that after one happy day, everyone came down with the barfing flu. Everyone. It was not a nice, quick 24 hour thing, either. We were basically all languishing around, moaning and dashing for the bathroom for the the whole week. I'm still catching up on laundry.

The barfing flu also converged with the beginning of soccer. I've not had my kids play soccer before, and I don't know what I was thinking. Henry has one practice and one game per week. Luke has one practice and two games per week. They are all at different times and at different places. And you know that I now drive a mini van. So guess what that makes me?

It is also Holy Week, the week before Easter, or what we call Pascha in the eastern orthodox church. Usually this does not coincide with western Easter, but this year it does. We go to a blessedly small mission that only celebrates a few services, so that makes me feel less guilty about not attending church much, but even if we go to one or two extra church services, that is a huge deal for us. Last Sunday I attended the Palm Sunday service by myself with all three kids. Craig was still sick with the yucky stomach, and for some reason neither Luke nor Henry wanted to stay home and "take care of Daddy." I was really sad about that, but I pretended I was glad that they all wanted to come to church, since I'm a good mom like that. All I can say about taking my kids to church all by myself is that it is really good that we pray "for those we find it difficult to love" during the great entrance. Because you know who I'm praying for.

Speaking of church, I don't know if I've talked at all about how Luke now says that he doesn't believe in God. It makes me sad, but I try not to make big deal out of it. While he was sick, he said, "Mom, I don't believe in God, but if I did, why does he make sickness?" Clearly he thinks about these "big issues," which I guess is good. One thing Luke does that I don't like at all is say "Oh my God!" Again, I try not to make too big a deal of it, because honestly, anything that I make into "an issue" with him just takes even longer to resolve. Well, I guess some kid at school didn't like that Luke said this, because he followed Luke around for a few days saying, "You took the Lord's name in vain!" Luke just kept saying, "Be quiet! Leave me alone!" Luke reports--and take this with a grain of salt, because he is prone to exaggeration--that the kid finally came up and said, "You said God's name in vain!" and punched Luke. But Luke told me, "I knew you would get mad at me if I punched him back, so I just taunted him and dodged his punches." Not exactly turning the other cheek, but at least it's something.

P.S. This picture shows their latest fashion obsession. They are not allowed to wear these out of the house. I refer to these as undershirts but think of them as something that rhymes with life eater. Or strife heater.