Day 2,348

The Conley Crud

True life: my family is sick. 

The Dada. 

The Meemers. 

The BubbaJub. 

All down for the count. 

And so I played a little game of “how many clean loads of laundry can I fit on (or around) my couch?”

When snotty vomit from children’s inability to “hock a loogie” lands on two separate beds and on all the linen:  laundry room nightmare. Naturally. And with a fevered babe who screamed every time I put her down, you can imagine how much self control it took to stare at this and the piling up of messes around my house and say “it can wait.” It was almost as hard as watching your kids put all the Christmas ornaments on the EXACT SAME BRANCH and holding your tongue while your insides are screaming “would you just PLEASE choose another branch, for Pete’s sake there’s an entire tree worth of branches! Put it on a different branch! Gah!” Yeah, that’s close to how I felt about my dirty house. Close. 

But in fact, I blocked out the house and focused on the lives that occupy the space instead. A far greater joy and act of service anyways. I made concoction after concoction, remedy after remedy and tried my best to heal their aching bodies, hot foreheads, and congested faces. 

She ran a low fever all day - the highest reaching 101. It’s her first experience with sickness and my first experience with a sick baby under 1 1/2 years old. But she did great and slept most of the day in my arms. 

Because I was stuck much of the day on the couch with a baby who wouldn’t let me put her down, the big kids made sure their mama never lost her smile. They played all around us, and Bearett even preached a sermon. He stood up on that chair and said, “People who are against the message of the Lord and Heaven, you will die on the cross if you have sin in your life!” 

And then immediately after, “SPIDER!”

Well then, my son. You sure are something special!! Haha. This boy is seriously great. Needs a little work on his theology though. 

We ended up venturing outside for some fresh airwhwn Ella Mae woke up. At this point, Daddy was really starting to feel the effects of the bug. His fever rose and though he tried his hardest to ward it off, he succumbed. 

Thankfully, our sweet friends knew what we were up against and graciously brought us supper. It was a gesture that taught me so much about servanthood and something I’ve definitely overlooked until I finally had the perspective from the side we’re on now. Thank you so much. For the meal, yes. But for the lesson in how to serve the church body well, more. 

Effortlessly, the whole family fell asleep around 7, leaving me with some time to run around the house with a disinfecting wipe and cleaner. We’re hoping to have seen the worst of it, but we’ll see!