Friday Night Exhaling

Another week is over.  Phill is at work, kids are asleep, both were in bed early tonight (for a weekend night), Josh at 10.30, and Em went to her room after dinner and didn't surface and now her lights are out and all is quiet.  I'll go in in a minute and kiss her precious sleeping face.  She was out all afternoon with her friend Kim.  I'm uneasy about Kim, mainly due to her home situation but she's younger than Em by a couple of years and they seem to do "kid" stuff.  Walk around town, go to the parks, play hide and seek etc.  I hope.  Anyway it's good for Emily to get out of the house and get some exercise. 
Josh showed me the rest of his exams that he got back, and he did well I think, passed everything except maths.  I'd love to know the percentage of high school kids in NSW who failed maths this semester.  I know both of mine did.  Phill and I can't make any sense of the work they have to do, it's crazy.  I am impressed however with the subject matter of the other subjects, much more interesting than when I was at school.  Sadly though nowhere near as interesting as School Karisma (she's on my favourite blog list, check her out). 
So I'm finally exhaling tonight, and enjoying some time on my own in here on my bed, no tv just me and my laptop. 

Em was waiting for a Sims game to load on her computer tonight and got bored and gave herself a tattoo.  The white part is white out.  Scary.  You know you have an artist for a child when every article of clothing they own has paint on it.  And I hope they always do.  Her drawings are amazing and I can see her work evolving and changing and maturing. 

Her exam papers were artworks in themselves.  The answers were done in different coloured pens.  Some of her more stitched up teachers wrote comments on the papers saying "Only write in black or blue pen!"  Why???  I had visions of my darling girl sitting in the exam room pulling out a pink gel pen for answer A, a turquoise one for answer B and so on.  It was really very pretty.  I love, love, love that she is so different, so unique, so Emily.  Of course, she is sleeping peacefully, I just went in to kiss her, and not screaming in my face right now so I would say that.

At the morning tea yesterday, the boy that she is playing cat and mouse with online was there too.  Quite nice looking, glasses and and earring I think.  He is obviously besotted with Emily, I was watching him and even knowing that he kept stealing glances at her, couldn't leave his eyes off her.  He told her he likes her because she's different to all the other girls.  He's got that right.  I like that he said that but told Emily that boys of that age will say pretty much anything. 

I wanted an easy Friday night dinner tonight so got out some meat for tacos for the kids, last of the pulled beef, and was going to heat some pasta sauce up for Phill and me.  I went down to the supermarket late and bbq chooks were on special so I got one of those, a Chinese cabbage, some coriander (still hate having to buy the stuff after the glut we had this Winter but my seeds are sprouting in the pot against all odds) and some rice wine vinegar and made the Chicken and Wombok Salad recipe I found in a magazine.  The dressing was fish sauce, water, soy sauce, sugar, rice wine vinegar and fresh finely chopped chilli.  I pulled all the meat off the chook and shredded it and added it to the shredded cabbage (wombok), some torn mint leaves from the garden, the coriander and a red onion.  I could tweak it, I didn't put the whole onion in but would next time, and the dressing was probably a bit salty so perhaps less soy sauce, and it could have done with some shredded carrot but it was a tasty, easy dinner, no cooking, and we'll definitely do it again.  The chicken skin, bones and meat on wings got wasted I'm afraid.  I'd normally make stock but it just got thrown out tonight, no need for soup in this weather and I'm trying to empty my freezers so I can clean them out for Christmas. 

So, quiet here, all I can hear is the ceiling fan and the crickets outside my open window.  And my typing.  There it goes again!

No school tomorrow and Josh asked for French Toast for breakfast.  I found a recipe that has brown sugar in the egg mix.  Should be interesting.  I told him to sleep in as long as he wants, we can have a late brekky. 

I found my old Pentax camera when I cleaned out the linen cupboard.  Well it's not that old.  We bought it when Em was a baby and it took some great shots back then, it was our first "good" camera.  After Sarah died we wanted as many photos and videos of Kate and then Emily as possible.  But the camera has a film in it, although the battery was flat.  I have no idea how old the film is or what is on it.  We have had a digital camera since 2000 and I've had my own little Canon digital for at least three years.  I'm a bit nervous to put it into a photo lab here, might send it away for developing, who knows what it might contain?

I don't know why, but typing that put me in mind of when Sarah died.  The hospital took photos of her, I found out later that they do this, bless them, in case a baby dies young and parents haven't taken any photos of their child, or not very many.  At the time when Andrew, our young policeman, told me I was horrified and deeply offended that anyone would be taking "happy snaps" of my dead baby in the arms of strange nurses and in a cold impersonal bassinet at the hospital and I told them in no uncertain terms where they could shove their photos.

Later, much later, I believe I was pregnant with Josh, I contacted the hospital and asked if they still had the photos.  They didn't have photos as such, but the roll of film, in Sarah's file.  I went to Campbelltown Hospital and spoke to the social worker and collected the film.  Then the dilemma, what to do with it?  In the end we took them to a photo lab in the mall.  I remember the looks on the faces of the staff when I collected the photos,  I didn't know what to say, so I didn't say anything.  My niece worked as a photo tech so I knew they'd probably seen stuff like that before.  It was a cold Winter day and spitting rain as we walked out onto the rooftop carpark.  Phill raced to get Emily in her carseat and Kate was beside me and I had to take a peek there and then at my dead child who I had not looked at since I found her that way in her cot several years before.  Why was I so scared to see her?  She was still Sarah, she was just dead.  I still have all those photos in a little book in my bedside drawer.  Only our immediate family have ever seen them.  I didn't show the children but I'm sure they've looked anyway.  I now feel so much warmth for those dear nurses who held my baby so tenderly and photographed her. 

I just got that little book out and looked over the pictures again.  So glad I have them now.