One week down, 3-5 to go. It is clear that one person is handling this whole collision of circumstances like a champion. Cally has been nothing short of amazing. She continues to smile often, tell us she loves us out of the blue, and crack jokes. We have been so fortunate to have friends, colleagues, and students help us by reading and playing with Cal, moving and stacking our wood, babysitting, offering to clean our house........ We are so lucky to have such a great community of people in our lives. It helps to have a dynamic daughter who has charmed folks enough to make them want to help out.
That said, there is one player in this family who has sort of taken the back stage but been a key player in this whole charade. Hazen Philip is incredible. Since this whole situation unfolded a week ago, he has rolled with it, brought tons of smiles to his sisters face and kept everything in perspective. Even before the accident a bond was forming:
When Cally came out of anesthesia after her leg was set at the hospital, grumpy as a bear coming out of hibernation too early, there was only one thing that made her smile...... not her mother, her father, her favorite stuffed animal. Nope, none of those things helped, what made her smile at 2:30am with a body cast recently wrapped around her agile little body, was her little brother, whom she'd only known for three weeks.
When doctors or nurses would come in and talk to us, she always wanted to make sure they knew she is a big sister and that her brother's name is Hazen.
When visitors come over, they are so good about making Cally feel special and of their utmost concern, but who can resist a little moment with an infant:
I'm not going to lie, there have been moments, when Hazen is hungry and is crying and Cally needs a book read and is whining and John and I look at each other and wonder how we are going to survive this month or so. But, we've learned to multitask and become number one fans of the Moby wrap. Yep, that's Hazen in the brown contraption on John's chest and Cally in his arms. Before all this happened, John wouldn't have stepped near the Moby wrap-- it seemed too feminine and complicated. That changed when Cally's Orthepedic Surgeon saw me wearing Hazen in the Moby at the hospital and proudly proclaimed that he loves the contraption and wears it all the time with his own 9 month old son. Now there aren't many daytime napping hours that pass without Hazen wrapped as snug as a bug on one of our bodies.
The moments of chaos are rare and most of the time we have nothing to complain about. Here's to the little man who continues to pack on the ounces (he weighed in at 8 lbs and 13 oz the other day) and helps put everything in perspective.
And here's to keeping our life as normal as possible....... like taking a walk down to the mailbox and getting the paper.
