Just a Little Longer

It's blustery outside. Everywhere is white and stark trees. Cold.

Inside I hear the ticking of the clock and the wind blowing and that is all. Quiet. My house is filled with my three kids and two nieces and a nephew and a husband and a brother-in-law and my mom. Yet it is quiet.

Beautiful.

But soon it will be filled with cries of I'm hungry and laughter and talking all at once and dishes clanging and cats meowing and cards shuffling and doors banging and that will be beautiful too.

I love Thanksgiving and the promise of everyone coming together for the holidays. We have so much fun when we all get together. (Of course, a piece of us is missing--my sister Lori and her two boys, Nicholas and Trevor. It's never quite the same without them here.) We've had quite the times together over the years.

I am the youngest of three girls: Lori is almost eights years older than me; Tami is five years older. I was the first married 26 years ago. However, shortly after I married, my sisters married and then we all had kids at the same time. Strangely enough, the kids were all born in rounds. Nicholas, Caleb and Savana were the first round--all born in 1991 and 1992; Trevor, Darian and Jared were the second round--all born in 1993 and 1994. The twins came along in 1997 and then tagalong Jace came along in 2002. So for awhile it was babies and babies and more babies. Lots of crying and fussing and fighting when we got together but gosh it was fun. Actually, it 's kind of a haze in my memory.

We have seemed to gather wherever we--as in Roy and I--lived as we've always lived on a boarding school campus in a dorm, so housing was easy. We could put everybody up in guest rooms for extended periods of time. It has made for great memories over the years. It's a bit unorthodox, I suppose. I mean--really--who gets to do that?? But at least once and often twice a year my kids have had the privilege of having their cousins come over for about a week and they've played "PiggyWants a Signal" by the hour and ran in the gym and ran in the dorm (when Roy wasn't looking) and laughed and stayed up til all hours of the night and had all kinds of fun.

We've gathered at my parents' homes in Oklahoma as well where they've invented banking games that involved an upstairs attic and tins filled with Grandma Donna's buttons or dared adventures for who can stand out in the snow the longest in bared feet; climbing adventures on bales of hay or riding Grandpa's four wheelers out in the field and sneaking Grandpa's candy and eating Grandma Jo's cooking.

My sisters and I have pretty much centered our world around the kids and that's okay because really that's just what we moms do. But we've had our own sort of fun as well--talking and talking and, well, talking. And we've thrown in some cooking for this big crew. My sister Lori is the main cook of the crew as everything she touches is magical in the cooking arena whereas Tami and I are more "just get 'er done" types of cooks. But we love our time together and it flies by so fast that before we know it...it's over.

So you can imagine how sad it was for me when I found out that Lori couldn't be here this time. She decided to spend Thanksgiving with my dad--long story. And then, another long story, Tami couldn't come until this evening. She is flying in tonight actually, so our time together is compromised. But I am looking forward to picking her up at the airport this evening. Then this big crew is going out to eat together at a restaurant that is as of yet undecided. I am sure it will so much fun--filled with lots of silliness and chatting and laughter.

Our time is waning. The kids are growing so quickly. The twins are now almost 17. The oldest ones are 21 and have some of them have serious dating prospects. Darian and Jared joke that they just might marry each other as they recognize the changing tide in our times together. It's a stark reminder that nothing lasts forever. Life is constantly changing--that ebb and flow that gently keeps things moving forward...moving forward...moving forward....

But oh how I wish I could just stop the hands of time and keep things just the way they are.

When everyone piled in Sunday night, Jace was sleeping and unaware of their arrival. But he realized it as soon as he got up Monday morning and saw Jared sleeping the couch. So there Jace stood in the living room, his eyes barely open, and he said, "Mom, how long until they leave?" I said, "They're leaving Saturday after church." And then he cried, "That's not nearly long enough! That's not even a week! Can't they stay longer, Mom? Please? Just a little longer?"