One by one

One by one they drop like flies, my family members. Once one stomach is finally able to keep down solids, another one decideds it cannot. So far Sunday was Shay, Monday was Nate, Tuesday was Jack, Tuesday afternoon was Chris, Wednesday was Craig, and today, Austin. Only 2 of us left and we both feel like we have a target on our heads at this point, never knowing when the urge to vomit will hit........no fun.

Enough about the sickies. I want to gloat about my dear, sweet, but still a pre-teen drama queen daughter. I have to say I have never seen Hailey so determined and so passionate as I have about Alexander's Heart. She asked me to make a site award for her and she has been spending time online (supervised of course!) looking at other blogs and finding ones that she feels are written by caring people and giving the award. I still don't know how to write html code for these things so she's attaching the thing to emails and sending it on to the recipient. She is just so in love with this, it makes her feel good and her self esteem has taken a huge jump.

Since Alex has died, she has had some struggles. It's hard to say what is a byproduct of his death, what is a byproduct of school (counting the days til the end of the year so we can homeschool and be done with that place!) and what is a byproduct of her just being a 12 year old girl. Whatever it is, we have definitely had some rougher times with her and it's nice to see that turning around and her sweet, caring nature shining through. After a few months of her not really being happy at all she is back to herself in a lot of ways.

One of the things it's nice to see again is her passion for running has come back. Her competitive spirit in this area has returned. Hailey is an excellent runner, she's fast and has a great deal of stamina. She is out there now running every day again and I couldn't be happier to see it.

I think giving her the responsibility of that website has made a world of difference in her life. Last night, for the first time in a while she actually took out her homework and completed it with no fuss. She is taking her responsibilities much more seriousely.

I can't even begin to tell you all how proud I am to be her mother. Alex's struggle and death weren't for naught, the lessons didn't go unlearned. My children will grow up to be better people for it and I can't wait to watch them do it. They all have such a caring spirit it brings tears to my eyes.

I am working on my "meet Hailey" blog post (remember i was introducing all the kids?) And hopefully when all the pukies leave my house I will have more time to devote to it. I also have about 100 pictures on my camera to go through and edit for this weeks "weekends are for pictures", I think you'll like them.