Well, it’s about 6 p.m. on a very quiet Sunday evening here in Omaha. Patrick is taking a little time in the playroom and I thought I’d throw out a quick update.
It’s been a simple day. We slept in a little bit because we were told no labs. I had Patrick in the bathtub when there was a knock at the door. It was his home nurse. She hadn’t gotten a change of orders. So while she called looking for those instructions, I got Patrick back out of the bath and dressed just in case. But she got it sorted out and went on her way.
That put us a little ahead of our expected schedule for the morning. We ate breakfast and got meds and then pulled out the Dora Candyland game they have here to play while waiting for our next plans.
I decided that maybe a Sunday morning outing would be a nice change of pace today. The Mormon Trail Center has a gingerbread house display every Christmas. I’d heard about it from more than one of the nurses. So I invited any of our friends at the house willing to be up and out earlier in the day to meet us at 10:30 to go over. (I am still hiding from crowds to protect Patrick from illness with his weakened immune system.)
We don’t have many early risers in the house right now, so only our friend Wendy joined us. Her son is 18 and had a transplant a year ago. So while he slept, she came with us.
The gingerbread houses were fun and impressive. There were simple displays from scout troops and other kids groups. There were also very elaborate displays with sculpted candy and such. It inspired us to want to set up a gingerbread house making activity here at the house.
Then, we went upstairs in the visitors center and took a brief tour. I should maybe get tired of that, but I really don’t. I see so many parallels between the sacrifices that pioneers made crossing the plains to our life right now. Separated from husband and family. Small living quarters. Nebraska weather. And hard trials. I was really glad we got to go.
And they finished off the tour with this little video about the true and first gift of Christmas, Jesus Christ. I’ve been meaning to share it with you. Now seemed like the right time. I was talking to Brian last night. He’s doing all the grunt work of Christmas this year. Mailing cards, wrapping presents. Meanwhile, I’m here with my little nativity advent tree and only serving Patrick and the other people in the house as my jobs right now. It’s a different Christmas season and teaching me a lot.
Anyway, we came back to the house and ate lunch, put in some laundry, visited with some of the other kids for a while. Patrick was sent a 12 days of Christmas gift countdown by our church youth group and today was the first day to open a present.
Then the elders came with the sacrament. Our usual guy was busy this week and so this was a new father-son duo that came to visit. They got a bit lost on the way. It always seems so very brief when there are no meetings around the sacrament. I miss church horribly right now. I’m realizing that I had found a way to work scripture study and prayer into our hospital routine.. But this new Ronald McDonald House routine has been harder that way. Patrick can’t sleep in because of labs and that’s when I was reading before. And with his insomnia, he is up till almost 11. You think finding time to blog is hard? Try finding time for quiet study and meditation when you have a 6 year old who is desperately stir crazy with you in every waking moment.
But I can tell today that it needs to be a priority. Sundays are kind of a day to refill spiritually and I can tell that my lamp is running on empty and there are no meetings of any kind to refill me. That falls to me these days.
There’s no dinner in the house tonight so I probably had better go up and make us some dinner here sooner or later. But I thought that while I had a quiet moment and an internet connection, it was worth checking in. Sorry about the typos in yesterday’s blog post. I wrote from my phone and I obviously didn’t do a good job proofreading.
Patrick Hoopes 