Faith's Mom's Blog

Every December, I look for Christmas shows to record and then watch them after Faith has gone to bed. I love curling up with a fuzzy blanket and a cup of tea with the Christmas tree lights on, watching a holiday program. Usually, there is Christmas music involved!  This year, one of the shows I watched was Little Big Town's Christmas at the Opry . It was really good, and one of the most memorable performances was the country band's rendition of the Merle Haggard song, " If We Make It Through December ."  When I heard them sing that song, I resonated with the title. Faith and I had both come down with COVID. Before that, I was just getting over a bout of the stomach flu. (Thank goodness Faith didn't catch that!) In between sicknesses, Faith and I managed to make it to The Nutcracker, but that's about the only thing we did in the days leading up to Christmas.  We made it to our 7th annual Nutcracker performance!  One thing I missed that I was very disappointed a...

Finally, on November 4th, the day the elevator in our building was fixed, I was able to take Faith downstairs so she could check out her new van! It happened to be a beautiful day, close to 80 degrees, which is rare for North Dakota in November. We had respite care that day, so I had her record me getting Faith loaded up for the first time.   Faith is all smiles about her new van! Faith is ready to roll! After loading her up, the three of us went for a fun drive including a trip through McDonald's so Faith could get a chocolate chip cookie. Faith was having so much fun as we drove around.  She kept randomly shouting out things like, "Happy Birthday!" and "Merry Christmas!" (I am looking forward to driving around and looking at Christmas lights with her this year!) I guess she really does think her van is the best gift ever!  Faith inside the van. Earlier this week, we used the van to take her to an appointment with the general surgeon. She wanted to check Faith...

Back in August of 2011, we got our first accessible van. Before that, we had a purple adaptive car seat called the "Special Tomato." Eventually she got too big for her that, and we needed to upgrade to an accessible van. We were thankful to have found one in Bismarck for a decent price. While it suited our needs, there were still some concerns. For one, the electrical system was really wonky, which affected the ramp.  Even with the weird electrical system, it got us to where we needed to go. We even had some fun family adventures like driving all the way to Toronto and back, and also to Winnipeg. The van also got us to some of Faith's medical appointments in Minneapolis and Fargo. Despite its quirks, the 2006 Dodge Caravan was a good van. Except for when it rained. It seemed the electrical system went super berserk during rainy weather. One day we were on our way home from a physical therapy appointment in the pouring rain.  We were driving down Century Avenue (one of t...