Tag Archives: family

Where Did January Go?

Actually, I’m now starting to wonder where the first three weeks of February have gone. I used to think weeks lasted a long time. Now they seem to pass in a breath.

In December we traveled to California to visit my stepmother and our son, daughter-in-law and grandkids for Christmas. This year we saw my stepmother first, so we wouldn’t have to worry about being sick and having to leave before we planned so as not to infect her. Which was what happened last year.

At 94, her age was severely restricting her social activities: she was no longer able to negotiate stairs, was increasingly subject to falls, and spent most of her day sitting in a chair looking out the window on the quiet street where she lived. That or watching television. Midday was her one active, alert time, so that’s when we scheduled our meeting. We shared lunch, a photo album featuring her great-grand-daughter, then played dominoes. She beat us both. We had a wonderful time. The next day we headed down to San Diego to be with the kids over Christmas, and returned home a couple days after.

On New Year’s Day, she suffered a stroke that left her unable to talk and paralyzed on one side. Two weeks after that, she went home to be with the Lord. When my cousin called to tell me, I was… not surprised, and really not even sad. In fact, my first reaction was elation. She’d been set free and I felt it in a very real way. No longer shackled to the body that had been steadily breaking down, allowing her less and less memory, comfort, mobility, use…

She has a new body now and she is with my Dad, her own parents, all the brothers, sister, in-laws and friends that had preceded her in death, and she’s in a place of no more sorrow, no more pain, no more tears, face to face with her precious Lord. How can I feel anything but joy that she has been finally and wholly set free?

About a week after she passed, I got another call. My aunt, the younger sister of my dad and center of his large family (there were seven of them) had unexpectedly died of pneumonia. Because a large number of my cousins were already planning to come to my step mom’s funeral they arranged things so that both services were held the same day in the same cemetery. My aunt’s graveside service was held at 10am and my stepmother’s at 1pm on a Saturday, the last day of January.

I mention this because my cousin who was arranging my stepmother’s funeral pressed very hard to get that day, which was only two weeks after her death. Why? Because every important date in the history of my dad and my stepmom’s relationship is in January. They were both born in January, they were married in January and both of them died in January. So it seemed right the funeral should be in January…

We drove to California on the Friday before (with Quigley!) and came home on Sunday.  Our son came up from San Diego with our granddaughter, and it was great to have the chance to see them, and also to reconnect with cousins I hadn’t seen for years. I felt a little nervous about it all beforehand, but it turned out to be a wonderful, beautiful day.

And the minister who officiated at my stepmother’s funeral got the Gospel in loud and clear, both at the chapel and even more clearly and directly at the graveside service. I was quite pleased by that and I know my stepmother would have been as well.

 

 

 

 

An Unexpected Hiatus

Well, I did not expect to be away from blogging for over a month, especially after I finally managed to get everything here into at least a semblance of working order. Clearly, though, that is exactly what happened.

My life has continued to roil with chaos ever since the washing machine died, my computer crashed, and my hubby retired. “Highlights” include the sink stopping up over Thanksgiving, the heater breaking, followed both of our cars, one after the other (in one case I was drafted to tow the broken car home from where it had died in a parking lot 3 miles away), all of this happening within a period of about two weeks.

Then it was time to get ready for Christmas, which progressed fairly well, until I started on our annual Christmas letter, had it completed, edited and approved only to be defeated once again by Windows 8.1/Word 2013 when, at the eleventh hour I hurtled headlong into indecipherable weirdness involving not the insertion of photographs into the document, but the attempt to move them afterwards. Heaven forbid you should do that, because once you try it’s over. And since it was close to midnight the night before we were to leave for California, I had to give up and finish it after we returned.

First we went to San Diego, a whirlwind three days full of memory making.

Lily has grown so much! She’s walking, running, climbing, talking in full sentences… soooo cute!  Christmas eve we spent on the beach in near perfect weather. (Click on the photo for a bigger picture.)

IMG_1808 (2) (1024x785)

Who are these people? My husband, me, Lily, my son and his wife, their live-in housekeeper/ helper/friend, the two boys, their dog Joey and, of course, Quigley, barking as usual

The day after Christmas we headed up to LA to visit my 92-year-old stepmother who, despite her advanced years still skunked me in dominoes!  It was great to be able to visit with her, but toward the end of the time we had to spend there, our late nights, early mornings and activity packed days caught up with us as we both developed what turned out to be either the flu, or one of the worst colds either of us have ever had. Not only were we coughing, sneezing, hacking and blowing, but we were completely exhausted.

We were twelve days recovering… all of which is why I haven’t been able to get a blog post up in almost a month!

She’s Walkin’

Well, I didn’t get my photos downloaded and ready as soon as I expected. Yesterday I spent putting stuff away, washing clothes, talking to friends and lying around, zonked. I did get the pics transferred from camera to computer but that was about as far as it got.

So I’m a day later than I’d planned, but better late than never. Here are some highlights from our summer trip to San Diego to visit little Miss Lily.

And her parents of course!

First day: Lily’s Ice-chest assisted walking

Our Next House! On Coronado Island, right near the dog beach!
Hahahaha!! We wish.

Who’s at the door?

It’s DADDY!!!

 

Fun at the Beach. (Note Quigley is expressing his opinion, too. He loved the beach.)

Last day — Sheee’s Walkin’! Look out now, parents.

Traveling Again

I’ve been away from my office and desk and well, Arizona altogether for the last week. It’s been something of a milestone in that for the first time I also managed to put up some blog posts, even though I was away from my computer. (I’m from the Jurassic age and do not have a cell phone, let alone an ipad.)

Anyway, much thanks to my son and daughter-in-law for allowing me to post from their computer.

I haven’t yet uploaded the many pics I took while away, but will do so tomorrow and then figure out which I want to post. There are sooo many good ones to choose from.

Lily is walking now. Only three steps at a time, but all on her own. If she has someone to hold her hands she’ll walk all the way across the living room, dining room, into the kitchen and back again. Two little teeth showing. Big blue eyes. Bright, happy smile. Wrinkly nose… Cuter than ever.

DS and DDIL (that’s Flylady lingo for “Dear Son” and “Dear Daughter-in-Law”) were in the midst of moving from their previous location to a new larger place two lots up the street. Hubby and I (and Quigley) stayed in the older, smaller house and we all spent a lot of time walking back and forth (partly because the washer and dryer were still in the smaller house and they have lots of diapers to wash… plus that’s where the computer was! ) Hubby left on Monday, and I stayed an additional three days, then flew back this afternoon.

So, as I said. I’m tired. This pic from last winter expresses it perfectly:

First Visit with Lily

Well, we left last Friday for San Diego and our first visit with our new granddaughter. We spent Friday evening, all day Saturday and a brief bit of Sunday morning with the new parents and Lily. She is very cute. And sooo helpless. I’d forgotten how helpless we are as newborns. Although, at a bit over a month old, Lily’s not quite a newborn any more.

I think the parallel with a baby Christian is more apt than I ever did before. Lily can’t yet hold up her head, her arms thrash about, she can’t walk, can’t sit up, can’t roll over. Can’t really understand language. All she can do is eat, make messes, look about and be cute for a few moments, then cry and fuss and sleep and start the cycle all over again. The main thing she does, though is eat. And grow. And learn.  She’d have a hard time driving a car, or doing surgery! In fact, it would be impossible. So it is with the Christian life. Too often, as new Christians  I think we expect to be able to do things early on that only come with time and spiritual maturity.  Yet, when we look at a baby, we see there is literally no way she could do what she will be able to do when she is grown.

Well, I have been wiped out for two days now, and have done little more than put away trip stuff and basic morning routine. I expected that on Monday. I didn’t expect that today. I’m hoping tomorrow I’ll be a bit more energetic — enough to actually get back to work on Sky. Tonight I had already given up on the idea of getting a post up, but suddenly I had a window of time and an unexpected burst of energy.  So here are a couple more pictures.

Lily and the Sleep Sheep

Proud Grandparents