Give Your Fuzzy A Present

"Fuzzy is very sad. Fuzzy needs to open a present."

And there it is. Through all the loss and drama my family has experienced during the past few months, leave it to Beatrice to keep it real for Daddy. Both Beatrice and Bryce don't really understand what happened with my Poppa, their grandpa and my Pop, when he died, but Bea realizes he's gone. We've handled it with explanation-light for Bea, although Bryce is still really too young to get it.

They also don't understand my mom's chronic illness and continual health problems, their Nana. They don't know how stressful it was to get Nana from my sister's to us right after I returned from Europe, and then me driving her back home to Oregon so she could reset in her health system while her doctors facilitated some stability. Although with my mom these days it's more like a defective light bulb that constantly flickers off and on, sometimes shiny brightly with radiance, and sometimes going completely dark.

But the girls did feel the stress of their daddy, and that's something I'm going to have to be more sensitive to as they get older and more aware of every nuance to life's pops, buzzes and brain stops.

Any comfort for the chronically ill is always welcomed, and getting mom set up with her iPad and FaceTime so she can see the B-hive any time she wants was critical. I have to continually explain to her how to use the program, but she'll get there. That time to be around any friends and family now is healing, if sadly brief and fleeting. The reality of my dad being gone has all but flattened her to the far side of the universe with a gravity unmatched from the darkest heart of a collapsed star. She's alone in her house now. However, we are working on moving her down to us as soon as feasibly possible.

Fuzzy is Beatrice's little swatch of pink, silky and "fuzzy" Winnie the Pooh comfort that her Auntie Jill made, the Mama's sister. It's her soul food comfort in the form of a blankie; Bryce has her own bigger yellow blankie. Each of us has our own "blankie" of sorts,  some literal or figurative vessel that carries us away and soothes us with a gift of calming joy.

Be thankful for your own well moments of body and spirit, and be sensitive to those loved ones whose very fragility reduces them to motes alighting inside an empty house at dusk. Give them the gift of love and hugs this holiday season; give your fuzzy a present.

Happy Thanksgiving.

The "thankful" box tradition (My family is my why)

Last Thanksgiving another daddy blogger I read, Mocha Dad, talked about his family's "thankful" box tradition.

Throughout the year he and his wife and kids write notes about something they're thankful about and put it in the box. Then at Thanksgiving, they read them to one another.

Such a lovely tradition that Mama and I decided to co-opt for our family as well. We picked out a box, cut out a bunch of images and words that had special meaning for us and covered the box with them.

Of course, our girls are too little to start writing their own thankful notes yet, but in the next few years Beatrice will followed by her little sister Bryce.

We've started reading them earlier this week and it's like listening to favorite songs that represent contextual moments of time.

It reminds us of why we live and love as family. Even under everyday fun and duress, like this week's things I'm thankful for:

• Sharing family colds, snot and tissue gardens.
• Family "workout" walks along the water (pushing the girls in the double stroller, otherwise knows as the "Lil' Limo".
• Ant traps and Windex that kill the rain-driven, food-crazed ants.
• Children's Tylenol that is stickier than maple syrup or tar. And gets everywhere. Except inside the child's mouth.
• Swinging crying babies to sleep like sweaty irregular pendulums of doom.
  
• Getting one girl to sleep while the other one won't.
• The hi-fidelity sound of dueling girl cry-shrieks. Infinitum.
• Watching Elmo's World. Infinitum.
• Developing the career/business rebound after a disappointing 4th quarter.
• Promising ourselves that this year everybody gets at least a wing and a prayer for Christmas. And a family Christmas photo card.
• Our wonderful babysitter who allows us to get out for pre-Turkday Day beer, nachos and Harry Potter.
• Dear friends who are having us over for Thanksgiving today. We're bringing ham and pies and little girlie cries.

In fact, what I've come to find out is that no matter what we've written and added to the box throughout the year (or experienced this short holiday week), it's the why of giving thanks, rather than the act itself, that emboldens our hearts and minds to love and grow.

My family is my why.

Happy Thanksgiving.