"God Bless Us, Everyone"

After coughing all week, Ruby started to wheeze on Saturday, and a call to the pediatrician sent the two of us into the urgent care. Jasper joined us for the diagnosis, and we brought a nebulizer home. She has RSV, an virus that usually only affects infants. She's doing better now after treatments every four hours for those first days. Listening to her wheeze all night made me feel very grateful for the medications of today.

We made it out of urgent care--where she had endeared herself to the staff--in time for the delicious birthday meal of garlic-rubbed beef tenderloin my mother and father whipped up for me and my December-born brother. Neither of us blew out any candles though--we were too slow, beaten by Pearl and Sapphire who were already blowing by the last note of the song--candles are just so exciting! 

Colors change after firing--we can't wait to see!

 Pearl and I had some neat together time this week.  We had a free day last Thursday, so we danced our way to the Prancing Pig and tried our hand at art. This was her third time there, and my first, so she had to explain things to me, and then wait while I picked out my colors and pattern. 

We thoroughly enjoyed the quiet time together. When I asked her what she remembered about it, she said it was that we got to talk so much.

On Saturday, after the birthday feast, Pearl and I made our way to a live nativity. The others would have liked it too, but they were asleep or too sick. Pearl was very taken with the stories of the Forks' live nativities of the 1990s. I told her about her Aunt Jane Lee's amazing soups and all the fun we had standing in the cold.  She asked to go through this one a second time (of course).



On Sunday we went to a much anticipated High Tea with Charles Dickens, Gerald Charles Dickens, the Victorian author's great-grandson. My parents so kindly hosted a table for us, and my friend from Baltimore also came along to soak up the Victorian vibes. The event took place at the Hotel Hershey, and we enjoyed the environment almost as much as the performance. After scones, scrumptious tea sandwiches, and a plate of tiny and very rich deserts, Mr. Dickens gave us a one man show, and abridged version of A Christmas Carol. I image it was very like the staged performances Charles Dickens gave of this novel and many others. Those took place up on stage, but our Mr. Dickens ranged around the room as he shifted from character to characters.

Afterward my dad got a picture of Mr. Dickens for my book. I will soon have to really set up a chart of the 50 photos I'm required to track down before spring. Hopefully my London editor is finding some British-y photos too, as we discussed! I'm not sure how I'd find a Father Christmas here in Central PA!

Sapphire had some fun days too. She got to spend alone time with Grammy and Poppop, which she loves. Some very-Sapphire quotes came out this week: While I was trying to convince her to let me read to her from *The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe*, she pouted, "I hate heroes." And she seems fixated on wrinkles. She looked so concerned when she told us she doesn't want mommy's forehead to get as wrinkly as daddy's. It is hard to try to stop wrinkling your forehead, even for the best reasons.

She's finally switched from saying "I can't know how to" to saying "I don't know how to." We knew it would happen, and we never corrected her, but she figured out the language rule on her own. She really is getting big (as she tells us constantly).

A missionary speaker gave the kids two sheets of paper for their Christmas wish lists and a Thankfulness list. Pearl started her wish list first, but looked up from the pew to say "I don't want to be greedy." With a sigh of relief, I told her she could make a really long Thankfulness list and it would be the opposite of being greedy. She thought so too.