Posted on

Sometimes

Sometimes I start crying for no apparent reason.

Sometimes I feel so normal it kind of sickens me.

Sometimes running helps.

Sometimes nothing helps.

Sometimes I just want to call and chat.

Sometimes I just chat anyway.

Sometimes I see red hair or a dark grey SUV or hear that ringtone and forget entirely for just a fleeting moment that she’s gone.

Sometimes I can laugh at a memory.

Sometimes that same memory has the complete opposite effect.

Sometimes I’m grateful for everything that was.

Sometimes I’m just pissed as hell.

Always I miss her.

Always I love her.

Posted on

October So Far

2So now that October’s almost over, I’ll catch you all up on what’s been going on. Our school carnival was originally scheduled for D (diagnosis)-day. It was cancelled due to the flooding and various road closures in our area and obviously, as everything unfolded, we wouldn’t have gone anyhow. So it was rescheduled about a month later and we met up with our friends to have some carnival fun. It was a bit bittersweet to go … Mom had hoped to go with us and she would have loved it.

3They did something new this year. Last year the food was pizza in the cafeteria, but this year they invited a few food trucks onto the blacktop and we could buy dinner from them … and the PTA got 15%. It was great fun.

4Nothing active about this – I just enjoyed the colorful kids shoes laying on the lawn (while they went through the obstacle course).

I left a little while in to go check out a townhouse with my sister and missed about 45 min of the carnival and since the sun went down, many good photo-taking opportunities. The kids had a great time and played almost all of the games.

Saturday, we went out to Anderson Farms. We were invited by one of Ben’s classmates and as much as I hated to give up (another) big chunk of my weekend, most of our friends have kids Tabby’s age, not Ben’s and it was important for him.

6The kids were thrilled to get out to “the farm.” It’s much more of an enterprise, of course. They had concessions, games, food, etc. Our friends had gotten a “private” campsite and we got to cook dinner around the fire and migrate back to it whenever we got cold throughout the evening.

7They had some really cool pedal cars that the kids got into. I was amazed how well they were both able to keep up with kids twice their size/age. And Matt and I got to take a turn on the adult-sized version.

The people who invited us were as nice as could be and we really clicked with them and thoroughly enjoyed the evening. Ben and his little buddy especially enjoyed the DJ they had later on for the teen crowd that came out for the haunted corn maze. They danced their little 4-year old butts off. It was hilarious and adorable.

Poor Tabby coming off a long day  including 1.5 hours of karate, was tired early and wanted to just cuddle by the fire. Eventually we had to head out and both kids were asleep before we turned onto the main highway.

8Sunday we had another jam-packed day. We spent the morning around the house, working on re-oganizing Tabby’s room. Then we headed off to run a couple of errands and went home to put on costumes and head out to a party. On the way, we stopped by to visit my grandma. We wanted to see her and have the kids show off their costumes. Unfortunately, we were running late so it had to be a quick visit.

9Some of our camping buddies had a great Halloween party. They had great food and planned tons of fun activities for the kids – apple bobbing, donut (on a string) eating, candy-corn relays, etc. They have an awesome backyard and the weather was amazing. It was a very good way to spend the afternoon and early evening.

Posted on

Camping Catch-Up

1Life has been moving along. I’ve really been intending to do lots of things … but I find between work (where I’ve been playing catch-up) and lots of other things, my energy is pretty drained by the end of the day. I’ve been doing good to get dinner on the table and keep up with the family. I think there’s a bit of depression in there, honestly, but I’m allowing myself to be a bit off right now. I don’t have to be super woman. It’s OK. Anyhow, back on topic.

We had two great camping trips this fall that I haven’t talked about. The first one was a group trip (they’re all groups, but this was a BIGGER group). We had 6 campers (pop-ups, hardside campers, an RV and a teardrop) plus a family of tent campers. It was a great site.

Across from where we parked the trailers was a huge hill and about 2/3 of the way up was an abandoned wooden corral that the kids took as their fort … and at the top of the hill …

2A gorgeous view of the lake and the mountains. Then just a quarter mile away

3The lake! Where all the kids, both the dogs and a few adults took a chilly dip.

The kids ran feral. We rode bikes. We played Cards Against Humanity. We saw a wedding from afar. We got rained on. It was easy and fun and nice.

4The next trip just a few weeks later was very different, but no less fun. It was, however, a bit chillier. We saw flakes falling down as we headed up on Friday night, but by the next day it had warmed up and got pretty nice.

5We went for the fall color, but there wasn’t a ton of it available. It didn’t matter though! It was still beautiful weather.

6We were a Mueller State Park and the staff there put on some fun activities: paper making and a nature hike. We also went on quite the long hike of our own.

7My dad and sister joined us, but somehow we didn’t get them in the photos. We didn’t do so well overall with photos this trip. This was far more about the feeling for me … very restive and nice.

And thus ends our epic camping season. It was a decided success and we’re anxious to start panning for 2014.

Posted on

Grammy Stories

DSC_0037

 

My mom was the queen of reading – but not in the sense where she’d read every “classic” book or constantly had her nose in a book. No, Mom’s reading always centered around interacting with kids. From the time we were small, straight up until we were either too cool or too busy (probably the later), Mom would read aloud to us every night. Dad did sometimes too, but mostly, it was Mom’s thing, particularly as we got older and we could listen to “chapter books.” Mom read us loads of series: Anne of Green Gables, Little House on the Prairie, All of a Kind Family, Indian in the Cupboard. She would read a few chapters and then we’d beg her for more and usually she’d let us have at least one more. She loved it as much as we did.

So when the kids were born, we started reading outloud to them every night before bed. And my mom did too. And where we, the busy parents frequently only had time for a story or two, at Grammy’s house, bedtime stories were practically unlimited. Mom would go to the library nearly every week and load up her Jefferson County Public Library tote with as many books as it could hold. She found books that we had loved when we were little and completely new authors that we’d never heard of. And when the kids latched on to a particular favorite, chances were good a copy would show up on their birthday or under the Christmas tree, signed “Love, Grammy.”

After Mom died, I worried that since the kids are so young, particularly Ben, they might not remember her in the vivid, technicolor way that I remember her. That thought terrified me. She was an amazing, wonderful, never-to-be-duplicated grandma and I want them to remember her. I wanted something routine to keep her memory going. I wanted something that was essentially Grammy to keep them connected to her. And then I had an idea.

To preserve and honor Mom’s memory, we made a small adjustment to bedtime stories. They are now known in our house as “Grammy stories” and they are read every night that we can possibly manage. The kids have embraced this idea and demand their Grammy Stories nightly. They love to pick out the books that she gave them, remembering, “Grammy gave this to me for my birthday” or “Grammy got this book from the library.”

As I sit with the kids, cuddled up on either side of me, so engaged with the story, I feel closer to Mom than I do at any other time of the day.