Thanks to the wonders of sharing (read: Sick Kid #1 shared with big brother (and also, apparently, with Dad)), I ended up spending today at home. Okay, I thought, I’ll get him all tucked into bed and have a nice quiet day. And then I remembered that it’s spring break and, unlike last week, I would not have the house to myself.

So much for that nice, quiet day.

I had planned to finish a short story today while Sick Kid #2 slept off his headache/fever combo. I had planned to get a little revision work done on another project. I had planned to be productive, but in the end, I didn’t do any of that.

Instead, I calmed down an upset little Cricket, who wanted to watch a movie instead of going to lie down in bed. I gave him some Tylenol to get his fever down, tucked him into bed, and read him a story before turning his bottom bunk into a nice, dark cave. Then I sat down and stared at my computer screen for a little while. Didn’t really do anything, just stared (and scrolled through Facebook). Thumper played on his Leapster, which he loves, and I love that he’s so into the educational games. Kid loves to learn. 🙂

I ended up running to the store while Miss Tadpole watched her brothers for a few minutes, because Cricket wanted some 7-Up. A quick stop at the library for a print job led to an unexpected yet exciting conversation with the librarian (watch this space for details). When the caramel apple dip in stock at the grocery store proved terribly disappointing, I decided to make my own and then prayed I had all the ingredients.

I did, and it was amazing. I have my seventh grade home ec. teacher to thank for the cookbook I got the recipe from, and a longtime bestie for the recipe itself. And, thanks to the wonders of Facebook, I was able to thank them both. 🙂

Miss Tadpole and I spent the afternoon eating apples with our homemade caramel dip and watching movies. It is my considered opinion that one can never see The Cutting Edge or Emma too many times (which is probably a good thing, since I have two versions of the latter). We talked, and laughed, and it was so, so wonderful.

What I thought was going to be a less-than-fun day at home (I hate when the kids are sick because I feel so powerless and all I want to do is make them feel better, but I can’t) turned out to be pretty fan-darn-tastic. Between sick kids and bored kids and moody kids, it could have been a not-so-nice day. But with Cricket eventually content to sleep away the day and with Thumper absolutely absorbed in his animal-catching game, it was actually pretty peaceful.

In some ways, I think the teen years are even harder than the newborn and toddler years because there’s just so much going on, and sometimes it’s hard to remember what it was like to be that age. After all, fourteen was a lifetime ago. And fourteen was hard.

But I think in the end, days like this will count for something. I think in the end, days like this are what the kids will remember when they’re all grown up and struggling with how to raise their own kids. And I hope that, in the end, they’ll want to recreate days like these. Not the whole staying-home-with-a-sick-little-brother part, but the part where we had a ton of fun.

Days like these are what make family time so much fun, and life worth living. Days like these are when memories are made. Days like these are rare and special.

Days like these were meant to be treasured.

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