Leaping From The Box

Another night of interrupted sleep, another day of hiding yawns and thinking of a nap! Normally the cause is the occasional bout of night sweats or the more frequent waking up in the middle of the night and not being able to get back to sleep. But not last night, or rather, early this morning. This morning at 3:45 my cell phone rings and I know instantly that it has to be Charles. Which means that he’s having troubles again with his “funny feelings” in his head that preclude full blown episodes of violence. Luckily this time he woke up before it had reached the full-blown stage, so a dose of antihistamine, some talk about how he was feeling, how long he had been awake and how long he had been asleep prior to awakening, and then he went back to sleep. But I didn’t! I was wide-awake from then until Bill’s alarm went off at 6. And only then did I begin to doze off for a few minutes before I had to get up and made Bill’s breakfast.

I had been worried about the possibility of Charles having another episode. Sunday we went over to Kat’s and mowed her lawn. Bill got into the kudzu on the edge of the property with the weedeater and had Charles go behind him with the push mower. Unfortunately, Charles found a bee’s nest and got stung on his legs several times. He seemed fine yesterday, but still, I wasn’t surprised when that phone rang this morning. The episodes seem to hit when his immune system is working hard to overcome illness and so I thought bee stings have the same effect as a fever.

May 26th was the last time Charles needed the antihistamine to ward of an episode, so it’s been less than two months. Prior to that he went just about three months. I had hoped that the time between would have lengthened, not shortened. That would have fed my hope that this whole nightmare would just eventually fade away, that his body would recover on his own from the tetanus vaccination. But it doesn’t appear as though that is happening. Time to make that appointment with the naturopath, since both his pediatrician and the neurologist he was referred to were not able to find anything wrong. And I’m hoping that the pediatrician will agree with me that David doesn’t need a tetanus vaccination for his college physical. The college indicated that they might accept a letter of medical waiver from the doctor. I’ve got to double check next week when the person in charge at the college’s health department is back from vacation. But I am very leery of unnecessarily exposing another child to that vaccination! It certainly has wreaked havoc upon Charles’ body.

Last night was Graduation and Charles received his Jujitsu Black Belt. Quite an achievement! Charles worked so hard the past several days, helping teach classes because his instructor had hurt his hip, and also helping prepare for graduation. I think he was too tired to really get the full joy of graduating and receiving that black belt. But he did look pretty happy.

On the extreme left is Honshi Rawls, a 10th Degree Black Belt in something, maybe Jujitsu? I can never keep it straight. And then Charles is to the right of Honshi Rawls. And then to the right of Charles is his instructor, Donnie Chappell, who is a 4th Degree Black Belt in Karate and 3rd Degree Black Belt in Jujitsu. And to his right is his daughter (Charles’ girl friend) Rebecca, who also received her 3rd Degree Karate Black Belt last night. Not a bunch to pick a fight with!

So, now Charles has two black belts, one in Jujitsu and one in Karate. And he is about halfway to being ready to test for his second level karate black belt. It’s a three-year process, so another year and a half to go. Amazing what a can happen when a sibling wins a month’s free lessons in something! That’s how our karate adventures began. Kat won a month’s free lessons at a homeschool seminar in 1999, I think it was. Charles watched Kat that month and immediately wanted to sign up! Ever since, his first love, basketball, has paled in comparison to martial arts.

It must be summer. I’ve had barely any time to crochet lately. I almost miss having to drive David to his dual enrollment college classes at Calhoun each morning. At least then I had an hour, some days almost two hours, solely devoted to either reading or crocheting. Or maybe I should begin to go sit at karate again in the evenings, waiting for Charles to get finished with classes, instead of just dropping him off and letting Bill pick him on his way home. I got a lot of crocheting done there. But here at home it seems like there’s always something else I have to be or should be doing. Dishes, laundry, e-mail, playing with Miss Munchkin, playing Mah-Jong, paying bills, working on webpages, etc., etc., etc. No time for crocheting. And this month the Nextel Cup races are on cable stations, so I can’t even plan on a Sunday afternoon of race watching and crocheting.

I’m currently working on an afghan for David for college, but at the rate I’m going with it, there is no way I’ll have it done by the time he heads of to Evansville. He’ll be lucky if he gets it by the time the snow flies up there. And then I’ve several projects I want to work on. Each day, Annie’s Attic has a free pattern on their website:

http://www.anniesattic.com/free_pattern_day/index.html

So now, in addition to the dozens of books and pamphlets I have with crochet patterns, I’ve been saving many of the patterns from Annie’s Attic. I’ll never have enough time to crochet them all. It’s like books … so many to crochet, so little time!

I do need to begin planning Christmas presents, if I’m going to crochet anything for Christmas. There’s a lion I’d love to make for Miss Munchkin. And my niece Chelsea graduates from high school next year, so I need to think of what afghan to make for that present. Oh, and I know of a new baby that’ll be making his/her way into the world around the first of the year, so I’ll have to make a baby blanket. Lots of projects! Guess I better quit blogging and get to work crocheting!