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For the times that you have listened,
For the times that you have cared.
For the times I have reached out to you,
And knew that you'd be there.
For the knowledge you have given me,
And the insight I have gained.
For the love that you have shown me,
Time and Time again.
You have been a true advisor,
But you've also been my friend.
You have helped me pick up broken pieces,
And put me on the mend.
You are someone I can talk to,
Because I know you understand.
You have been there when I needed you,
And lent a helping hand.
You have loved me in a special way,
And this I know is true.
And for all the things you've done for me,
I just want to say, "Thank You!"
Here's to Patchwork! Now and always!! : )
by Pam
Here's a few of my favorite kid things:
I love watching them eat a hot dog!!
I love when they laugh soooooo hard...they almost start crying!!!
I love when they walk up to you out of the blue and say..I LOVE YOU!!!
I love feeling their pudgy little hands in mine!!!
I love watching them sleep...they look like such angels!!!!
I love when they try to talk you into buying Fruit Loops when you have a coupon for Apple Jacks...and they win!!!
I love when they get so excited over something that you surprise them with...that they almost cry!!!
I love watching them think!!!
I love rocking them just after their bath while they're still wrapped in a towel!!
I love how they can make you realize that money and things are not the most important thing in life!!!!
by Chris......who also loves kids cause they made you all Moms!!!!!!!
We pray for children
.....who put chocolate fingers everywhere,
.....who like to be tickled,
.....who stomp in puddles and ruin their new pants,
.....who sneak popsicles before supper,
.....who erase holes in math workbooks, and
.....who can never find their shoes.
We pray for those
.....who stare at photographers from behind barbed wire,
.....who can't bound-down the street in a new pair of sneakers,
.....who never "counted potatoes,"
.....who are born in places we wouldn't be caught dead,
.....who never go to the circus, and
.....who live in an x-rated world.
We pray for children
.....who bring us sticky kisses and fistfuls of dandelions,
.....who sleep with the dog and bury the goldfish,
.....who hug us in a hurry and forget their lunch money,
.....who cover themselves with Band-Aids and sing off-key,
.....who squeeze toothpaste all over the sink and who slurp their soup.
We pray for those
.....who never get dessert,
.....who have no safe blanket to drag behind them,
.....who watch their parents watch them die,
.....who can't find any bread to steal,
.....who don't have any rooms to clean up,
.....whose pictures aren't on anybody's dresser,
.....and whose monsters are real.
We pray for children
.....who spend all their allowance before Tuesday,
.....who throw tantrums in the grocery store and pick at their food,
.....who like ghost stories,
.....who shove dirty clothes under the bed and never rinse-out the tub,
.....who get visits from the tooth fairy,
.....who don't like to be kissed in front of the car pool,
.....who squirm in church and scream in the phone, and
.....whose tears we sometimes laugh at,
.....whose smiles can make us cry.
We pray for those
.....whose nightmares come in the day time,
.....who will eat anything,
.....who have never seen a dentist,
.....who aren't spoiled by anyone,
.....who go to bed hungry and cry themselves to sleep, and
.....who live and move but have no being.
We pray for children
.....who want to be carried and for those who must,
.....for those who never give up
.....and for those who don't get a second chance,
.....for those we smother,
.....and for those who will grab the hand of anyone kind enough to offer it.
For these, Oh Lord, we pray. Amen
Adapted from A Prayer for Responsibility for Children by Ina J. Hughes
"I am often asked to describe the experience of raising
a child with a disability...to imagine how it would feel.
It's like this...
When you're going to have a baby, it's like planning a fabulous vacation trip to Italy...
After months of anticipation, the day finally arrives...
The plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, 'Welcome
to Holland.'
'Holland?!' you say. 'What do you mean, Holland? I signed
up for Italy! I'm supposed to be in Italy. All my life I've
dreamed of going to Italy.'
'But there's been a change in the flight plan. They've
landed in Holland and there you must stay.'
The important thing is that they haven't taken you to a
horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence,
famine and disease.
It's just a different place.
So now you must go out and buy new guidebooks.
And you must learn a whole new language.
And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.
It's just a different place.
It's slower paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy.
But after you've been there for a while and you catch your breath,
you look around and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills,
Holland has tulips.
Holland even has Rembrandts.
But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy,
and they're all bragging about what a wonderful time they had
there,
and for the rest of your life you will say, 'Yes, that's where I was supposed to go. That's what I had planned.'
And the pain of that will never, ever, ever go away,
because the loss of that dream is a very significant loss.
But if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn't get to Italy,
you may never be free to enjoy the very
special, the very lovely things about Holland."
Author Unknown
Hello, Mrs. Jones, I've just called to say,
I'm sorry I cried when you phoned today.
No, I didn't get angry when your call came at four--
Just as eight Cub Scouts burst through my door.
It's just that I'd had such a really full day.
I'd baked several pies for the PTA.
The washing, the ironing, and scrubbing the floor
Were the tasks I'd completed not too long before.
I'd sewn up a dress that my daughter needs Sunday,
And prepared for my meeting with 4-H'ers on Monday.
No, the reason I cried and gave that great yelp
Was not 'cause you'd phoned just to ask for my help.
The comment that threw me, nearly drove me berserk
Was ... "I'm sure you'll have time,
because you don't work."
Author Unknown
This was given to a friend's child on his first day of kindergarten. It was in a party favor bag:
The penny is to remind you that you are valuable
The star is to remind you to always try your best
The eraser is to remind you that it's okay to make mistakes
The life saver is to let you know that you can always talk to me
The tissue is for drying your tears and those of others
The band-aid is to let you know that together we can make things better
The chocolate hug is to remind you that you are cared for
The sticker is to remind you that we always stick together
He threw the application in the trash on the way home from school. He was sure his mother would never know about the fancy test he did not want to take. Foolish boy. She knew.
She did not see the guilt written in neon upon his face.
She did not find trace elements of an important documents on his fingertips.
She did not listen in on his phone calls or search his backpack.
She did not ask his so-called friends.
She did not smell it on his clothes or on his breath.
She did not read his thoughts or hear him talk in his sleep.
She did not feel the hair on her neck tingle or goose flesh run up her arms.
But she knew. She always knows. She will always know. Because mothers talk.
That's how mothers know about the fight at school, the test tomorrow and the project you just haven't started. That's how mothers get you into the class with the tough teacher you think is just plain mean. That's how mothers keep you away from the troubled kid you think is just plain cool. And that's how mothers keep you home from the party where booze is present and parents are not, away from the sleep-over that you failed to mention would be coed.
It is the great frustration of a child's life that he can't trust his friends to keep their mouth's shut in front of their mothers so he can keep his mother in the dark. And his teachers - all of them mothers, too, he is certain - always take his mother's calls.
If the mothers in his life would mind their own business, he could keep his business private.
He feels as if he is living his life on a local-access cable channel.
But the mothers who swirl above his head talk. They have been talking since their children were babies and they felt lonely or proud or anxious. And they still talk.
He thinks they do it because they are natural gossips, because they don't have a life, because embarrassing children is sport to them. Is there anything worse than hearing your name mentioned as your mother passes thru the room on the cordless phone? I mean, really!
What he doesn't know is that if mothers didn't talk, they would spend sleepless nights wrestling in sheets dampened with nervous sweat. They would feel as though they were stepping off a precipice, like Harrison Ford in "Indiana Jones: The Last Crusade." They would feel as though something unseen was gaining on them. What he thinks of as reaction is, for her, salvation.
Each new demand for freedom and privileges from him is met with the same response from her:"Let me think about that." But she is not thinking. She is dialing. And she is asking the mother on the other end of the line: "Have you seen this movie?""Do you let your child play that video game?" "How do we feel about middle-school dances, about the mall on Friday night?""What do we know about that kid?"
He is unaware that he is being raised by a consortium. That mothers meet behind closed doors and hammer out a joint statement. That anti-trust exemptions are as easy for a mother to find as grocery store coupons.
He rages that she is worse than Dan's mother, but what he doesn't know is that she is the same as Dan's mother because she and Dan's mother have talked.
It is a mystery, a frustrating lesson, but he will learn: You can fool your mother some of the time. But you can't fool all of the mothers all of the time.
from the Baltimore Sun, written by Susan Reimer
You'll find there's a family of friends
living here,
A small group of minds,and of hearts;
With some of us clever and some of us not.
At times you can't tell us apart.
There's one who is cranky and one who is shy,
and one who is really uncouth.
And just when your think you've discovered
who's who,
You'll really discover the truth.
The truth that we're all just a little of each,
A group of imperfects are we.
And sometimes I might criticize them to you,
But, don't ever knock them to me.
'Cause the one thing that ties us together
for life
No matter how far we're apart,
Is the love for each other, a family of friends,
A small group of minds and of hearts.
"I got two A's" the small boy cried.
"I got two A's" the small boy cried.
Children deserve a little praise
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His voice was filled with glee.
His father very bluntly asked,
"Why didn't you get three?"
"Mom, I've got the dishes done,"
the girl called from the door.
Her mother very calmly said,
"Did you sweep the floor?"
"I've mowed the grass," the tall boy said
"and put the mower away."
His father asked him, with a shrug,
"Did you clean off the clay?"
The children in the house next door
seem happy and content.
The same thing happened over there,
but this is how it went:
His voice was filled with glee.
His father very proudly said, "That's great,
I'm glad that you belong to me."
"Mom, I've got the dishes done,"
the girl called from the door.
Her mother smiled and softly said,
"Each day I love you more."
"I've mowed the grass," the tall boy said,
"and put the mower away."
His father answered with much joy,
"You've made my happy day."
for tasks they're asked to do.
If they're to lead a happy life,
So much depends on you.
Our Circle
Is a Circle of love
and strength.
With every birth
and every union,
The Circle grows.
Every joy shared
adds more love.
Every crisis
faced together --
makes the Circle stronger.