The Daily Hailey

Tomorrow is the official friendaversary of Cher and I.

🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳🥳

Nine years of being besties, and without a single regret!!

We usually try to go out together, even just for a little something, to celebrate our friendaversary. For lots of reasons, this year is not the year for it, so rather, we spent some intentional time just being close and still. Also sushi bowls! Because they were long overdue.

Goodness our friendship has weathered a lot of storms! This last year hasn’t been gentle on either of us, but conveniently, we have stood strong together!! What we call our everythingship is rock solid 💪 Which we are both SO thankful to God for, because these kinds of times can truly rip people apart.

Not us, though 😘😘

I’m sorry our friendaversary wasn’t big and fluffy this year. No outings. No gifts. No fancy treats.

I’m also not sorry that our friendaversary was as it was. It was peaceful and quiet and just me and you. Just resting. Sharing air. And maybe some iced coffee mixed in there.

It was perfectly imperfect for celebrating a perfectly imperfect season of life 💜

I love you, sweet Cherice. My BEST friend 💜💚🧡 I would hide on the floor from door to door salesmen with you any time 😘

I love you 💜
I love you 💜
I love you 💜
I love you 💜
I love you 💜
I love you 💜
I love you 💜
I love you 💜
I love you 💜

And more to come 💜

If the title of this blog was somehow unclear, I’ll say it again.

Dekker got a job. A REAL job. Like, on payroll, with a schedule and responsibilities, working hard for his money.

We took some pictures before he left. Like, first day of school, but actually first day of work. Same idea. He was positively beaming. Cher drove him in (Thank you, Cher! 💜) and I picked him up.

There is so much more I want to say here. I want to give ALL the details, but in order to maintain boundaries with some people, I feel I can’t share more 😔 Which SUCKS, because I don’t like not being able to share joys with the rest of you. But that is the situation we find ourselves in this time around.

Bottom line. Dekker had a GREAT time. He LOVES good hard work and being busy. He will do very well in this job, and I am SO proud of him for locking down a real gig at this point in his life. Way to go, Dekker! You are incredible and will have everyone around you looking bad in no time 🤣

💜

As an aside, if anyone nearby is willing to drive him to or from once in a while, please let me know! That is the one part of him having a job that will make our life a little messier, but it will be worth it. He also needs some drives for drivers ed, now that his learners is officially in hand 😅 Goodness times are crazy.

I am SO grateful for today 💜

My dear daughter, Miss Laela Hazel, made me a gift in her IA class. And today, she brought it home and presented it to me. And while a lot of us moms oooo and awwww at everything their kids bring home (even when the suck) this thing is SO ADORABLE!!!

Behold 🙌

I love this little ghost for a handful of reasons.

I LOVE that she gave it to me and made it with me in mind.
I LOVE how excited she was to give it to me.
I LOVE that she was “stuck” using watercolors for the white of the ghost because it looks intentionally sheer.
And I LOVE that if you look at it just right, it looks like a shrugging ghost wearing a puffy vest.

This one right here. She’s excellent. We have our moments, and the power struggle can be strong, but we always come back to each other 💜 SO grateful for my Laela.

And my ghost. She needs a name.

People are picking up on the fact that days are a bit more challenging over here. I really appreciate all of you who have reached out and been close, while not being overbearing or nosey. You have ALL struck that happy medium right on the head, and we are SO grateful for your warmth and efforts to show love.

I had a really nice visit with one of the home care nurses this morning.

I had a really nice day with Cher.

We ate really yummy raisin bread grilled cheese sandwiches for lunch, ingredients gifted to us yesterday by friends.

I had a really nice phone call with my mom.

And for supper, we ate really yummy pizza, courtesy of one of Brady’s colleagues at Zaks. And a surprise really yummy dessert, dropped off by a friend who we only met because she loved eating our apples when walking down the back alley that she came to our door one day.

Oh and we shared the lemon out of the dry ribs between the little ones 🤣 I’m not allowed to post the videos but goodness would I LOVE to! An obvious highlight 🍋

Guys. We have it so. Incredibly. Good. It boggles the mind, as my mom would say. It is hard to be a big group of sad sacks when we are so covered and supported.

Brady ate pizza and drank Pepsi for supper, and he promised to eat cake with me later this evening 🙂 I can’t wait!

I am humbled yet again by the outpouring we have received today.

Yesterday, I wrote a post about how happy I was to receive a yummy meal from the church. Towards the end of the blog, I said the day ended heavy. It was on sentence. And I can’t even tell you how many people reached out to me 💜 It is incredibly reassuring.

Meanwhile, today a friend brought over some treats/grocery items, including a Costco pumpkin pie!! Amazing!!

And a loving friend from Kinasao popped by with fresh baked cookies! Ack!!!

The texts, called, and pop-ins today felt like a beautiful wealth of love and care. And while today was not that much easier than yesterday, I have peace.

I am sitting in the living room, ready to eat some scoopy corn chips with guac out of my fridge, and to watch some Intervention on Netflix. Post chips, I will crochet. Probably way too late into the night. But Brady is more and more tired, and if I lay in bed in the dark at this point, I will just spiral. So Netflix and crochet it is!

But first 🙌 we guac.

Our day was fairly peaceful. It wasn’t perfect. There were hard things. But for the most part, we were all peaceful.

Our little foster bestie was over, and we had arranged to drive them back home in the afternoon. I suggested 4:30ish, and planned to go to Wendys and just buy a schwack of junior bacon cheeseburgers because I really really didn’t feel like making supper. But unbeknownst to me, our church had shared a large lunch together, and the leftovers were shuttled on over to our place 💜 Thus providing us a WAY yummier supper, free of charge, in the comfort of our own home. Thank you, all.

Conveniently, SO much food came our way so we could portion some out and send it home with our foster bestie . Yay for TWO households not having to make supper!

As I said. The day was peaceful. It was good. It has ended heavy, though, and I am ready to call it for the night.

I am SO grateful that we are seen and cared for by our church, our community, and all of our people far and wide. Your love and prayers are felt 💜

Today was not a bad day, but it felt very full. Lots of kids in lots of different places, going in lots of different directions. I did have some time to sit, but also I ran quite a bit. I keep trying to list all of the things we did, but it instantly gives me anxiety 😅 So I’m going to stop.

What I can say is that before long, I will be tucked away in my room with my husband, watching a show and snacking. Even though Nathan Pyle says its wrong.

I’m still short one kid, but the others are all home, and most are tucked away. One went to bed early, still reeling from last nights sleepover at her friends house. One went down at a normal time. The three little ones are quiet in their room already. And two are still up and around, winding down with a book.

Our life is so full and so precious. It is not easy or gentle. But we were not promised those things.

Thank you, Lord, for family and friends who show up for us, for a yummy supper, and matching jammies on little bodies.

I slept well last night, which is pretty rare these days, and I am SO grateful.

Turns out I really needed it because WOW was it a rough morning over here! 😅 Yikes, man. Yikes.

However, once the chaos died down a little bit, Brady got up and had coffee with me. We haven’t had coffee together in a long time. It felt like home. I loved it.

Coffee could only last so long, however, and the was full of little ones, organizing, emailing, prepping supper, and all the other things that are normal and and take up most of my waking hours. No complaints! Just, busy!

As I type this, I have a kid eating an apple out of our backyard next to me. One smaller kid pulling up using my pants as the hand holds. I have a kid playing with the digital calendar. A kid practicing piano. My island is FULL of apples, pumpkins, and tomatoes. My countertop is full of potatoes. Goodness we have it SO good.

Sure, throw in between the mayhem of gifts and freshness are gross documents that need signing and sending. But there is also a precious memory book already made depicting our day at Kinasao. Some crochet projects. Dishes I need to hand back to people who have fed us.

Meanwhile, the potatoes seasonings are starting to smell in the kitchen in a nice way. Yay for Kinders and their delicious products.

I’m really grateful when I look around my home and see how covered we are, and in all the different ways. There are hard things, don’t get me wrong. More than most of you know. But there is SO much good.

For both sides of our coin, and every dumb little bumpy edge surrounding them, I praise the Lord!

I won’t lie. The highlight of Laelas birthday for me was using SO much of our stovetop real estate!! 😍 Remember when we started renovating our island, getting a new stovetop and hood vent, etc? Remember how it was grossly overshadowed by Brady’s mobility deteriorating? Well. What did end up happening was we traded in our little pine cupboards and laminate top for a white IKEA island with drawers, and a beast of a butcher block island top, assembled and oiled up perfectly by Brady himself. It was the last house project he did before he couldn’t stand up anymore.

The highlight of that island, however, is our super stove. Eight elements!!! Does a person use all eight at once? We haven’t, no. But we used six yesterday!!! And it was SO FUN!!!

Even if we don’t use all eight at a time, the space is still welcomed, being that our pots tend to be YUGE and its nice to space them out a little. Also, whoever helps with supper can do it without rubbing shoulders too closely.

Rowan helped by frying up the sausage, and then we both took a pan and got the perogies fried to perfection. 😘👌

So for supper, we had perogies and sausage with mushroom gravy, plus corn on the cob, and broccoli with cheese sauce. It was all SO yummy! Haven’t made a feed like that in a while!

And her MAIN request was for her dessert to be sugar cookie bars! I made them for Christms treats, and then again for LD’s birthday, and now for hers!! Her exact words were “I’ve waited ALL YEAR for these!!!” It seems like they landed.

Ok. Whew. It was a cute day, but mostly, it was a yummy day. Watching “13 Going On 30” didn’t disappoint, either.

I have a second TEENAGER!!!! 🤯 Laela is officially 13!

Behold 🙌 Her last twelve months in photos!

It has been a hugely shaping year for Laela. Her grade seven year was one she loved. She loves the high school. She loves working at the concession. She loves volleyball. She loves the computers in the library. She loves home ec. She loves youth. She loves later bedtimes, more freedom, and older friends.

She endured some bullying that I recognize is par for the course as kids grow and change and move through junior high, but it was hard to watch her confidence beat down a little. For a good while there, she flip-flopped between overalls and dresses until she got teased enough that she changed her tune. That was a tough one for me, but conveniently, she has of course proved that fashion is the least important detail of hers. She is incredible all on her own, regardless of her outfit.

Laela is a total go-to for so many things. She is responsible and playful. Hardworking while being singsongy. She can rise to just about any occasion, and when she can’t she gives some really, really soft hugs. I’m not sure anyone has softer cheeks than her.

I can confidently say that Laela is the total package. She is everything you want your teenaged daughter to be. And she will be the total package as an adult when the time comes. Her character speaks loudly, and it is GOOD. Does she have struggles? Yes. Is that normal and allowed? Double yes. Is she constantly seeking and learning and aiming for greatness? All the way she is!

This girl right here 🙌

She’s one to watch 💜

Happy birthday, dear girl. I’d relive your wild delivery every day if I had to in order to keep you 💜