my weary world rejoices

(Baking this morning. The thing that gets me about this picture is- here Henry's standing on a chair. But someday he will be taller than me. Sooner than I think.)

At this time of year I listen to our local "light rock" radio station; they've been playing Christmas music 24-hours-a-day ever since Thanksgiving. Most of it is just background mood music, but every once in awhile a different version of an old classic really shakes me. So far this year there have been two:

Neil Diamond's Jingle Bell Rock - I mean, who rocks out to that song anymore? But I did the other morning on the way to work when I heard Neil Diamond!

Martina McBride's O Holy Night - Her voice usually shakes me up anyway, but her version of this song made me cry.

Long lay the world, in sin and error pining
'Til He appeared and the soul felt its worth.
A thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices
For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn.
Fall on your knees! Oh, hear the angel voices!

That song is what the season's all about. The weary world - those are the words that resonated with me this year. We all get so weary. The whole world is weary. But then we feel the thrill of hope...
________

Well, enough of that. The other sounds I wanted to write about are coming from my kids. We have these Disney music collection cds, and Kate and Henry have been singing along to them after school. Henry's voice is still pretty off-key, but it is getting stronger and louder- he really belts out those songs. A new viewing interest, because of these singing sessions, has been The Hunchback of Notre Dame.

A couple weeks ago Henry was very excited to tell me that they had watched Peter and the Wolf in music class. At first I thought the interest was purely the Disney/cartoon connection. But then he started rattling off the names of the instruments that represent each character, and I was amazed. He remembered the name of each instrument! I mentioned it in his notebook, and his teacher sent home a book about instruments for homework last week. Usually I can only get him to read one or two chapters a night of the homework books, but he read the whole book in one sitting with me. One chapter was about percussion, one about woodwinds, one about brass, etc.

At times we feel like our kids will never develop a new interest. And it's true that it does come slower than with non-autistic kids. But new interests do come. I hope Henry will want to play an instrument one day- what a great outlet it could be for him!

Thomas has been singing a lot lately also. His preschool is run by a church and so he is my first child to participate in a not-religiously-sanitized school holiday program. In other words, his program Monday night will feature songs about Jesus and Santa, not just snow and penguins.

He announced one night in the car that he made me an angel at school. Henry's class went shopping at the dollar store last week for their families, and wrapped the gifts with handmade giftwrap! I will have to take a picture.

After much agonizing over teacher gifts (because Henry has so many wonderful professionals who work with him every day), I decided to donate to the local food bank in honor of the teachers at his school. The boys helped bake some cookies and banana bread this weekend and I am going to send some to school tomorrow along with a note about the donation. Our food bank is in dire need this year- I suspect it is the same across the country. No matter how weary my world, someone else's load is always heavier.