WE'VE BEEN ELFED!!

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Moments that Take Your Breath Away

I don't know if it's the time of year or what but I have been experiencing and remembering many "take your breath away" moments lately.

One of the more difficult parts of being a parent to a child with special needs is learning to deal with the grief.
David will be 13 tomorrow. In 13 years I have come to accept PWS and what it means for him, but there are still times that it hits me out of no where. That feeling of sadness for what never was and never will be.

Tonight I had one of those "take your breath away" moments. It's been a long week. Dave has been working long hours on night shift, and because he is not home at night I am not sleeping well so I am tired. David has been wound up about his Birthday all week.. reminding me 2 million times a day that his birthday is Saturday. Like I could forget. The other thing he has been very excited about all week is that he had his first Middle School Dance tonight. He has had the ticket in his wallet all week and has been so excited.
He was showered, dressed, and had sprayed half a can of Axe on himself by 5:30... (did I mention that the dance didn't start until 7pm?) So we waited until 6:45 to leave the house and I drove him over to the school. On the way we chatted about the dance and he reminded me that he was only supposed to dance with girls.. not boys.
When we got to the school I went in to make sure that whoever was tending the snack table was familiar with David and would make sure he didn't hang out by the snack table all night. I was happy to see 2 familiar faces at the snack table so we chatted for a few minutes and I reluctantly got ready to leave. I said goodbye to David as he headed into the gym and as he walked away with 2 friends he stopped, looked at me over his shoulder and said "you can go mom, I am ok." That is all it took for the tears to well up. I headed to the parking lot so I could be alone in my thoughts. I got into the Suburban, turned the key, and the radio came on. I had the radio on some sappy station that had been playing Christmas Carols earlier in the day. What I heard made chills go up my spine and the tears start to flow.

When David was a newborn he would get very alert if I sang and danced with him. I would slow dance with him on my shoulder and our song was a song by an artist named Joshua Kadison. The song is titled "Beautiful in My Eyes" I used to sing it to David and wonder if he would ever dance with a girl other than me, if anyone other than me would ever think he was beautiful, if anyone other than his family would ever love him. I would slow dance with him, sing and let the tears flow for my beautiful boy.
There coming from the radio was the song "Beautiful in My Eyes" I was frozen, I couldn't move, I felt like the air was being pulled from my lungs, and then the tears rolled down my face. Right there in the school parking lot I realized that David would dance with a girl tonight, and that he has friends who think he is beautiful inside and out. All the fears I had for him when he was a baby came rushing back and then melted away. It made me realize that so many of my dreams for him will come true... maybe not exactly as I had imagned, but they will come true... nothing is impossible. This kid continues to teach me and humble me.

"Life is not measured by number the breaths you take, it's measured by the number of moments that take your breath away"

Happy Birthday David!





BEAUTIFUL IN MY EYES (Joshua Kadison)

You’re my piece of mind, in this crazy world
You’re every thing I've tried to find
Your love is a pearl
You’re my Mona Lisa
You’re my rainbow skies
And my only prayer is that you realize
You'll always be beautiful in my eyes...

The world will turn
And the seasons will change
And all the lessons we will learn
Will be beautiful and strange
We'll have our fell of tears
Our share of sight
My only prayer is that you realize
You'll always be beautiful in my eyes...

You will always be beautiful in my eyes
And the passing years will show
That you will always grow
Ever more beautiful in my eyes

And there are lines upon my face
From a life time of smiles
When the time comes to embrace
For one long last wine
We can laugh about how time really flies
We won’t say goodbye
‘Cause true love never dies
You'll always be beautiful in my eyes...

You will always be beautiful in my eyes
And The passing years will show
That you will always grow
Ever more beautiful in my eyes

The passing years will show
That you will always grow
Ever more beautiful in my eyes...

FOOTBALL, FOOTBALL, AND MORE FOOTBALL!!

Hi!
Its been a couple of months since I have had 2 seconds to do any kind of update. It is football season here in Viking Village and that means that the Knopf household is on the go 7 days a week!

Things are good here, just extremely busy. Football season started August 1st for the little guys. Jake plays on the Junior team, Dave coaches his team. Caroline is cheering and Ryan is helping to coach on the Senior team again this year. High school ball started the middle of August.. Alex is playing Varsity and JV and Aric is on the Freshman team.
What all this boils down to for me is lots of driving!! The JV games are Monday nights, Jake practices Tuesday - Thursday, Aric and Alex practice at the High school every night, Freshman games are Thursday night, Varsity games are Friday night, and youth games are on Saturday or Sunday!! It's crazy, but we have so much fun with it. I love nothing better than to be in the stands cheering for my favorite team!!

School wise everyone has settled into a nice routine. Ryan is off to college.. he is going to school locally this year, so he is home in the evenings (sometimes) Alex is a Junior and Aric is a Freshman. David and Jake are in Middle school and Ben and Caroline are in Elementary Ben in 2nd and Caroline in 1st.

I have been enjoying my days while the kids are in school, but it always seems that there is something to do. I miss having Caroline around during the day and sometimes find it strange that the house is so quiet by 8:15 every day. Part of me is loving it, but a bigger part of me misses it too.

That's about it for right now. Here are a couple of pictures of Caroline Cheering at a recent game, and some from recent games.

Thanks for checking in with us!
Vicki

This is Caroline coming off the field at halftime like an airplane!!





Jake #56 maroon playing center


Dave coaching his guys


and Ben coaching his guys!

Who called it the" Long, Lazy Days of Summer"????

Hi all,
Sorry it's been so long since I have updated. I am sitting here this morning wondering where the heck summer is going! How can it be August 12th already????

Since vacation last month we have spent lots of time in the pool and at the beach, David has spent the last month going to a summer vocational day program in Niantic which he has loved... that ended on Friday and now I have 3 whole weeks of trying to keep him structured and happy all by myself... wish me luck.

The biggest indicator that summer is slipping away from us is that football has started here in Viking Village... umph... this always signals the beginnng of the end of summer. We start out practicing in the blazing heat in August and end the season freezing our butts off in November... usually in the snow... the very thought of it depresses me. One simple fact......

I AM NOT READY FOR SUMMER TO BE OVER!!! As much as part of me is looking forward to the kids going back to school in 3 weeks, I am not looking forward to the routine, the early bedtimes, the homework, the projects, packing lunches, and above all getting out of bed at 4:45 every morning to make it all happen.

On the other hand, I am looking forward to having a bit of time to myself... not having to say " David get out of the kitchen" 500 times a day will be nice! I haven't had 2 consecutive hours to myself since June 22nd when they got out of school! I am looking forward to taking a shower or even use the bathroom without having to solve the worlds problems as presented by 2 or 3 teenagers outside the bathroom door! Why is it they completely ignore me until I either close the bathroom door or get on the phone??? This is a typical 10 minute shower for me.... " Moooom.... tell Jake to take my shorts off or I swear I am going to kill him..... Mooooom he isn't listening to me and I swear I WILL kill him if he doesn't do it right now..... Mooom he took the shorts off and HE IS WEARING MY UNDERWEAR TOO.. He is s dead!!!! Mom... Aric just punched me 'cause he says I am wearing his shorts... these aren't his shorts, they are mine... remember when you bought them for me??? Ma.... hey Ma... ma... gotta talk to you right now.... can I go here... can so and so come here, can you drive me... where is my blue shirt?" or my favorite " Ma... there's someone on the phone for you... usually followed by the door opening and the phone being thrust to the other side of the shower cutrain while my hair is full of shampoo!! Why is it that they just can't say.. my mom is in the shower can she call you back? Yes... I am looking forward to an uninterupted shower.

I am also looking forward to friday night football games and Saturday youth games.. I am hoping that with all the kids in school all day this year, I will get more time to do some things that I have been wanting to do for the last 18 years.... like get caught up on my laundry, clean the entire house in one day, clean out my linen closet, use my kayak a bit more, and here is my late summer fantasy... I am hoping to pack a small cooler, a chair and a good book and go to the beach for the day all by myself! We'll see if that happens.

So that's about it around here right now....I will try to update with some new photo's soon... until then we' will be at the beach trying to soak up every last second of summer that we can!!!

~Vicki