Advice from Mom

 Mom had a lot of advice and I’ll try and remember some.

1) SS = sit straight, stand straight.

2) If you don’t have something nice to say, don’t say anything at all.

3) If you’re bored, that could mean that you’re boring if you can’t find anything to do.

4) Decorating a room is great, but clean it first.

5) Take everything to God in prayer. He loves to answer prayers.

I’m sure there is more. Mom was a wise woman.

DONE WITH QUARANTINE!!! I'M OUT OF HERE!!!

 Well, not out of here as quickly as you'd think...  I DO work from home.

BUT!!!!  I have a booster shot this afternoon and if all goes well, my bestie's birthday tomorrow.

I thought for sure my quarantine would last until Saturday but then was on a DUO call with Maddy last night and she asked how Bible study was. Ummmm ...  MOM!!!  IT'S DONE! and YAY!

and to think... If I'd only known a couple hours earlier I wouldn't have turned down a supper invite with a couple friends. sigh.  Oh well.  I got some sewing in last night and am ALMOST ready to show you what it looks like.

In the meanwhile... I finally got around to do my mid-month bills yesterday and when I got done with that I was feeling all powerful (poor but powerful) and started sorting off the many many things that got stacked on my desk in the last several months.  

There are days when I work remotely from my telecommuting desktop and don't see my office for weeks at a time.  And when I do, I wonder why I even work out there in the cold office off the garage.  SURE there's a heater, but it's downright cold until it warms things up.  and it contains a bulk of my fabric stash.  Sluggy knows that...  

So yesterday was THE day.  For at least making a start.

LOOK what I found!!!

An ice scraper wedding favor from a college friends wedding in 2004.  hmm..  I suppose that means more snow is coming.  I also just heard she's retiring after this school year.  We're too young for that!

I also found THIS in my mom's handwriting!

My mom sewed so many things but it must have been after I went to bed.  I don't remember her sewing during the days...  It was for my youngest sister and was SO cute on her!

I can't find a picture of her wearing it so here is the next best thing.  She's the youngest.  I'm the one on the far right holding up a book.

Anyway, back to work.  Have to figure out a few miracles before the end of the day IF I survive my booster...

A weekend ending in tears

On Thursday, Robb was out of town and Leon and I did a garbage run over my lunch.  He didn't wear shoes all day...  AND he wasn't planning on getting out of my minivan.

Until after the dump, we stopped for lunch and parked at a hotel to eat our lunch.  I happened to check my email and found that someone on Freecycle was offering an exercise gym machine!!!  It had been available for almost 20 minutes and since we were still in town, we drove over to see if it was still there.

SCORE!!!!

I already have a BoFlex in my garage under a bunch of stuff, but Meri had said she'd like one in her garage.  I'm sure SOMEONE would make room for it!  No weights with it, but that's ok.  We'll pick some up.

Without tools, it wouldn't fit in my minivan, so we drove back to town with the hatch up and it sticking out just a tetch.  Meri was warned ahead of time to get her garage open and it was.  So I backed up to it.

that was a mistake...

CRUNCH!!!

I backed the hatch door into her garage and crumpled it.  I was stunned. Her garage was fine.

Meri kept asking me "What were you thinking?!" I think 3 times...

Um, obviously that it would fit!!! duh!

When I got back in the car, Leon pointed at the side mirror and asked me, "Were you looking through THOSE mirrors when you backed up?  Because things are closer than they appear."

LOL!!!  He cracked me up with his seriousness!  What a sweetheart!

BUT in all seriousness...  it doesn't close now.

I straightened up the garage enough to back it in and there it sits.

My 3 week old minivan (well, it's a 2010...) without even the plates yet on it.

Robb thinks we can pound it enough to get it to latch.  I'm skeptical.

We're pricing out powder blue liftgates online.

YUCK.

And Robb will contact our car guy this week and see if he even wants to touch this.

YUCK.

So the exercise machine wasn't ALL that free...  Robb pointed that out.

On a slightly happier "spending money" moment...  A friend of mine was selling her late mother's sewing machine and sent me a message.  She's the one who gave me all of her mom's fabric stash a few weeks ago.  And since her husband is a car dealer, she knows how to sell...  

"Take it for a spin! and then make me an offer."

Okey dokey!

I got it all threaded and plugged in and all it would do is sew backwards.

Have I been sewing wrong ALL these years??

(That was actually a thought of mine for a split second.)

(these new fangled machines...)

I dug in the instruction manual and found how to turn off the reverse but then it just sewed in place and balled up under the fabric. SHOOT.

I pulled it all apart and gave it a good cleaning with q-tips and tweezers.  There were plenty of dust bunnies and lint tucked in under the feed dogs.

Adjusted the tensions and it sews like a dream now!

Whew!

After googling and asking my ASG friends how much I should offer, I came up with an amount and she accepted. DONE.  It's mine.

Oh!  I got the button-holer all figured out on my Janome and got Meri's button holes into the blouse.  I forgot to take it along with me to this morning's workout for her to try on... SHOOT.

On the 4th of July, we had Leon's brother, Finn, here with us.  But they were being brothers...  so the fireworks in our backyard was cancelled.  

There was flack.

"But TODAY is the 4th of July, NOT tomorrow!!!!"

Um... neighbors have been shooting them off all week, tomorrow night will be fine.

And it was.

Early in the evening last night, Leon and I did some smoke bombs.  

What a deal!  A whole $.85 for a few seconds of purple smoke under my tire!

Although $.59 was totally worth it for a few seconds of a puppy pooping!

The one that shot out a parashoot was a winner also.  Afterwards, it made lots of additional jumps into the living room, off the deck, across the room.  And had lots of things tied/taped to it already.

 When it got dark, Robb and I were already in the middle of watching Eurovision so Ryan and Leon went outside and did the alien firework as well as a few others that require darkness to appreciate.  I'd have liked to have seen how the alien one did, but just heard the "pop pop pop" sounds.

Oh well.  With any luck, our town will do fireworks NEXT year.

AND last but definitely not least, today my mom is celebrating her second birthday in heaven.

I miss her.

Weekend - dealing

On Friday night and Saturday during the day, I did a TON of sewing at a sewing workshop with my ASG group.  I completed 2 shirts for me and 1 for Meri.  I totally screwed up on Meri's shirt, but I'm saying it was intentional.  All in all, I got 9 hours of uninterrupted sewing done!  

But the next couple days were pretty tough.  On Sunday, my eyes leaked a lot during one hymn in particular and then randomly throughout the rest of the day.  I knew the anniversary of my mom's death was coming up, but for some reason thought it was later in the week.  It was actually Monday, yesterday.  

It hit me hard then too.  I know it will get easier as time goes by, but sometimes the memories are really strong and I remember things vividly.  I really don't want to forget either so here I am, stuck.

Someone on Facebook posted this series of pictures to demonstrate pain from grief.  It is SO true!

And that silly ball is really playing PONG against the button this week.

Rear View Mirror

Weekends in the rear view mirror.

For such a somber event, we were all pretty upbeat and cheerful for the drive to Nebraska for my Mom's graveside service.  We ended up having Leon's little brother, Finn, with us for the adventure.  He and Meri got on great.  Leon, Maddy and Matthew hung out in the "way back" and Leon showed off his Lego Star Wars game on his ancient Ipod.

I mostly visited with Robb, worked on funeral thank yous and took out some stitching from some zippers that I salvaged from some of Robb's old shorts that he was throwing away.

 We arrived first at the cemetery and waited in the van.  It was COLD, wet and windy.  It's always windy at this cemetery.  2.5 sets of my grandparents are buried out here and I was only able to put a rose on one of their graves before frost bite was kicking into my bare legs.  Slacks and boots would have probably been a better choice to wear...  

The tent blocked some of the wind and most of the rain, but I come from a big family and we couldn't all fit comfortably, so some stuck out on various sides.

The reason the graveside service was 1.5 months later was so that grandchildren who couldn't make it to the actual funeral could make it to this.  And so that the weather would be better.  I'm almost thinking it was warmer in early March!  But who knew?

Matthew was gracious and helped be a stand-in pallbearer for it.

The service was short but poignant.  

And Beautiful Savior will always make me cry now.

Afterwards, we all drove to another town about 20 minutes away and filled the entire back party room of a Pizza Ranch.  So good to visit with them all.  I got to hear all about my brother's trip to Florida.

Mental note: Buy the strongest and most waterproof sunscreen I can find...  The Florida and Bahama sun was not made for lily white Iowa skin.  He and his girlfriend were peeling pretty good.

On the way home, the kids crashed within 10 minutes of being in the car again.

It reminded me of this photo that I took within 10 minutes of getting in our rental car in Ireland.

Kids are so sweet when they're sleeping... :)

Finally got home after almost 4 hours in the car and our company for dinner (brother-in-law and his wife) arrived 10 minutes later.

Yep - Lisa helped me get some of the food cooked while Robb manned the grill.

After dinner, Maddy helped Meri get all dolled up for a "Porch Prom" that she was attending that evening.

I KNOW!  I'd never heard of a "porch prom" either!  But it was Prom night at our local high school and Meri has graduated so she wasn't going.  Neither were a lot of her theater friends that own a house close to the high school.  So they had a party on the porch, watching and mocking the high school kids as they arrived at the high school for their grand march.  Meri was upset that she couldn't make anything but after hitting up the local convenience store, went to the party bearing chips and cheese dip.  She didn't get back until 2 am and I think she had a great time.

Ellie, Duke and Reedus were all under one roof again for the weekend.  They were excited and as crazy as ever to be together.   The people left back at the house on Saturday had to deal with it.  Not us.   Ellie promptly dragged the food dish to the bathroom and slept behind the bathroom door all day.  She can be moody.

Duke left with Maddy and Matthew on Sunday morning and Ellie stuck around until last night when Meri got done with her community play practice.  And suddenly we're just down to Reedus, who is snoring not so softly under the table as I type.

Teen Challenge arrived at the auto repair place this morning and picked up Meri's car.  Well, it's not hers anymore.

Oh!  My niece from LA came to the burial and brought my fabric that I had gotten in LA in February!  Now I have bunches of fabric to sew with again!  Not that I was running out or anything, but it's great to have fresh material when browsing through my stash and dream about what I could make out of it.  Jen, Meri and I looked through and came up with some ideas already.

Anyway, that was the weekend.  Everyone is back to their own homes and I'm scrambling to get work done today so I'll get a lunch time to sew.

How was your weekend?

Jumbled thoughts

Maddy and Matthew will be here tonight!!!!  Meri made a momentous decision about her future plans!!!!  Leon let me calm his wild hair that dried all stupid from his bath last night!!!!

Things are crazy around here...

My mom's burial is tomorrow.  I know... the funeral was last month, but since a few grandchildren couldn't make it to the funeral, being in the middle of the week, and it was so cold, the actual burial was held off until now.  

The tombstone is in the works but won't be done until this summer and we'll visit it again.

So we've got a full day tomorrow and it will include Leon and his little brother too.  

I've got the car dvd player worked out with some movies set aside to go, as well as some snacks.  

Wow, I miss Mom.

From Laughter to Tears in 60 seconds

My dad...  I love him so much.

My sister sent out a note the other day telling a couple stories about him recently.  

Dad had really been wanting to see the new Clint Eastwood movie, The Mule.  So my nephew set it up for him to watch.

Two hours later, he came into the kitchen and declared, "It's over but I have YET to see Clint Eastwood..." 

I could actually hear that in Dad's voice.  Similar to when he caught me after I switched radio stations in the car from country to rock and roll, "This music sounds like a strangled calf!  GET back to my station!"

That was weird.  Melanie went to check it out and found that Dad had somehow hit the button when changing the volume and had switched the movie to "Aquaman".  

NOT a Dad movie at all! lol But he watched the WHOLE thing.  

So they started up The Mule and he continued on with his movie binge.  He was probably pretty tired of movie watching and didn't enjoy it as much as he'd expected.

The next story she told was that Dad was laying in his recliner humming while Melanie rocked her grandson to sleep.  Suddenly he stopped and said, "I wonder what Connie is doing right now!"

Melanie told him that sh'es probably singing in the choir or leading it.  That would SO be Mom!

My niece piped up and said that she's probably teaching someone piano lessons. :)

That would SO be Mom too.

Whatever she's doing, she's been preparing for it all her life and is having a more than fantastic time.

Hello and Goodbyes

I got back home late on Saturday and was drained.  On Sunday afternoon, we picked up the boy and took him and his neighbor friend out for dinner and a movie.  The Lego Movie 2 was showing in the next town.  And that had been his birthday party plans all along, so the Birthday that Never Was Happened.

Finally!

The boys had a great time and I actually enjoyed the movie!

Meri helped me fill our bulk salt and pepper shakers for the funeral dinner.  

For something that I was dreading doing, it only took 5 minutes...  We also collected roasters, drink dispensers, table clothes and I found 40 yards of black tulle leftover from Meri's grad party.  I cut it into 10-11 foot lengths and got enough to use as the table runners for all the tables.  

My family is the epitome of the DIYers.  One sister took charge and came with a car loaded down with food and to-do lists.  Another rented the hall, another and my brother organized appetizers.

The viewing on Tuesday afternoon and into the night was a wonderful remembrance of Mom.  Meri arrived with me early and helped me hot glue all the photos with me onto the coffin  lid.  I accidentally backed into her while she was holding the hot glue gun and got a glob on my back.  That stayed with me all day...  

My sister and her husband had put together a great slideshow of Mom's life as well as the 50 year anniversary video done 11 years ago.  

I saw so many friends and family that I hadn't seen for over 40 years in some cases.  And they all had wonderful things to say about Mom.  The pastor gave a brief sermon and then handed the microphone to whoever would like to say something.  My nephew stood first, then an aunt, and the passing of  the mic kept going.  Meri kept wanting to stand up and go next but someone else always beat her to it.  So I stood up with her and we both went.  Meri had a sweet story to tell about how Mom always made each of her grandkids feel special and about the infamous tea party under the dining room table.    I told about how Mom could talk to ANYONE and find a connection of some sort.  I told about how when Mom came with me to one of my church functions and met the oldest member of our church, Marie.  Mom asked where she was from and Marie told her the town in Northern Minnesota.  Mom said that her father's first church as a minister was there!  And Marie remembered coming home from college and meeting the new pastor and his young wife and their first little baby, my mom.  

So yep, my mom knew everyone.

My best childhood friend, Valerie, told how my parents had stopped to buy sweetcorn from Val's family when she was 4.  My mom talked with her mom and invited them to church.  A few months later, Val and all her siblings and family were baptized and her siblings and my siblings were all about the same ages and became close family friends.  She and her brother came to the viewing.  

The passing of the mic lasted almost an hour.  Lots of hugs and tears later.  Since the church is a smallish one and Tuesday evening already was standing room only, there were concerns of space for the actual funeral, the viewing evening was for everyone, family and friends, but the funeral the next day was mainly for family.  We're a big crowd!

Leon had a blast with all his boy cousins, but especially my nephew, who is around his age.

EARLY the next morning, my sisters, some nieces, nephews and even my brother's "girl" friend (they don't label things...) met at the hall and got the tables set up, food started and everything organized for later.  

And then we filled up the church yet again with just family.

My oldest sister and her son.

You can see the hand print quilt in the background.  It will be buried with Mom.

My dad gave her a kiss and said Goodbye.  Oh my...  

The funeral director hustled all the immediate family upstairs for a quick prayer before the service began.  Wow, there were a lot of us.  Then a final goodbye to Mom as we walked back in.  Two other sisters and myself walked in with Dad and sat with him throughout.  It was a beautiful service.

Afterwards, we walked with him outside as the oldest grandsons carried Mom out to the hearse with a crowd of the younger ones following.  Then we hustled over to the hall and prepared to feed almost 200 hundred people.    

The internment will be in another month or so.  The family cemetery is out in the country and several grandkids weren't able to make it to the funeral, being the middle of the week.

So this will be perfect.

 I have no pictures of the dinner as we were pretty rushed.  Lots to do...  But suffice it to say, everyone got food and a place to sit.    There was only one extra table left unused!  Amazing!  I finally sat down with Robb, Meri, my brother and his girl.  Ryan had been sick that morning and had missed the funeral, but he put in an appearance at the dinner and then went to sleep in the car.  

Afterwards, everyone stuck around and helped clean up and pack up the cars.  We came away with a huge tray of fried chicken and a large bag of grape salad.  We've been thawing one bag at a time and it'll feed us for probably another day or so.  Ryan's been making tacos.  

My mom had a great send off.  

There are no more tears in heaven, so I know for a fact that she's not looking down on us.  It would break her heart.  She's having a wonderful time and I just have to wait to see her again.

Wanting Memories

Wow, it's been a while!  Not a lot of sewing done...  And neither Meri nor I got into AGT.  But that's ok.  The odds were not in our favor.

But I've been spending every Saturday and the odd night during the week over with Mom.  So this post will be hard to write.  

Last week, we were on a lot of Facetime calls with Mom and Dad, and various siblings.  The time was close and we knew it.  Mom had been unconscious most of the week already, but we used our facetime calls to sing to her, pray with her and let her know that we loved her.  

On Friday morning, after two of my sisters and my dad had been with her 24/7 for a good chunk of the week, they were all exhausted.  I couldn't bear the thought of Mom being there alone in case she passed away and no one was there.  I dropped all and went.  I figured I'd still have my afternoon meeting from the nursing home and talk to my boss about work stuff then.  I brought Dad some lunch and after we ate together in front of Mom, I went to my meetings.  

I explained some work stuff to my boss and asked his advice.  He said, "Where are you?  Why are you there? What are you talking to me for? Your parents need you.  Can't this wait until later next week?"  Well, yes it can!  I was feeling too responsible and felt it needed to get discussed.  My priorities were a bit skewed.  I have a great boss.

So I spent the rest of the day talking with Dad. 

Found out about his best memory with Mom (their wedding day) and we even watched a little Jeopardy after supper.  But then Dad was tired too and I knew that recliner was not going to cut it for him for the night.  again...  So he went home.    He didn't want to but knew that he needed sleep.  He was planning on coming back at midnight but accidentally took his sleepy pills at bedtime and wasn't going to be able to drive until 3am, upon which time, he finally fell asleep.

Somewhere around 4am, I decided what was the point of trying to get any more sleep.  Every time I woke during the night, I watched an episode of a dumb dumb show that I've got queued up on Netflix and then I was able to get my mind clear enough to sleep a little bit longer.  The recliner was positioned in such a way that if I threw my hips out on the right, I could relax on a pillow and still have my hand on Mom's arm.

Around 6am, I started playing Youtube videos for Mom to listen to.  Mostly choir videos that Meri and Maddy had performed in.  One especially took my breath away as it reminded me of her a lot.  It's below.

I ran out of videos and after the nurse checked her vitals around 7:15, I asked Mom (without expecting an answer) what shall we do next?  Shall I read to you?  I found her tattered and worn Bible sitting on the bed stand behind the recliner.  I got comfy, took Mom's hand and started reading from John 1:1, which is the loveliest passage that I could think of.  

In the Beginning was the Word.  And the Word was with God and the Word was God....

and I just kept on reading.  Mom's breathing was in the background as I read.  As I got about half way into chapter 6, the feeding of the 5000, I suddenly realized that I wasn't hearing Mom's breathing anymore.  Up to this point, she was waiting about 30 seconds between breaths, but as I stopped reading and looked at her expecting her to take a deep breath, I realized that I may have missed her last.  Oh Mom...

She left this life doing the exact thing that gave her life meaning.

I knew she wasn't there anymore but she was getting reacquainted with her parents and meeting Jesus face to face in heaven.  I know I should be happy for her and I am. 
But there are still a lot of tears to go with my family and her memories.  

I messaged my siblings first and a sister brought my Dad over within 10 minutes.  Two other sisters arrived about the same time.  The aides were great and brought us coffee while we had our last visiting session with Mom present (but not).  Dad was hit the hardest of this group.  He had wanted to be there when she passed.  And even though he's had a good long time to prepare for it, it still shocked him anyway.  That fact added on to the fact that he'd had about 3 hours of sleep in the last 48 hours, wasn't good for him either.  His doctor prescribed him something strong to get some sleep that afternoon.    Poor Dad.

Eventually we all said our goodbyes to Mom and left her in the hands of the aides to get her ready for the next step.   And I headed home to get my family ready for a funeral.

And I'm wanting more memories with my mom.

Semblances of Normality

A break from the California stories to get caught up on life in general.

Last week was Valentine's Day!!!  My sweetheart sent me roses..  Aren't they beautiful?

They're still blooming and lovely. I'm pretty lucky...

Leon needed a box for his Valentine's Day party at school, so he called Dibbies on my flower box.  Mine came in the mail.  Pretty convenient for Leon!  He initially said that he didn't want to decorate it, but changed his mind after I cut out the opening.

His party was a lot of chaos and fun.  He got a bunch of candy to get loaded up for the weekend with.

On Saturday, Robb, Meri and I headed for my hometown to see Mom and Dad.  Mom gets carted around in a wheelchair now, much to her disgust, but it's saving her some energy.

She doesn't leave her room much anymore, but we were able to take her down for coffee and visit in the activity room.  Meri did her hair while we talked and I remembered that Mom always loved for us girls to do her hair for her in years past.  She secretly hoped that one of us would be a hair dresser.

Much like my secret hope that one of my kids would end up as a chiropractor...

Oh well.

I loved my pics with Dad too!  He's going through a lot right now.  

Our time with Mom is getting shorter and sooner than anyone is comfortable with.

Any siblings available have been getting on FB messenger facetime app with Mom and Dad every day for the past week.  I don't know why we didn't think of it earlier.  It's been great and Mom can see everyone.  What an awesome invention!

She asked, "Now who is paying for this call?"

Um.. no one.  It's free!

20 years ago, this was all so futuristic!

We got home late afternoon on Saturday.  On Sunday, after church, Robb and I went to pick up Leon and we treated him for lunch at a Burger King with a play land.  His kind of joint!

Then he played in the snow in our yard for much of the afternoon.  

Only coming inside to switch out frozen gloves.  

A neighbor kid invited him over to play in the snow too and they had a great time until they had a fight.  It's all fun and games until it's suddenly not.  Boys...

 These are the same boys who played in the neighbor across the streets yard after getting off the bus last Wednesday...  I won't tell the neighbors who messed up their side walk and pristine yard...

I'm pretty sure they don't read me.

Leon wanted ice cream for dessert and so after googling for a bit, we found a recipe to make snow ice cream with ingredients that we had.  It turned out really good and he enjoyed it for about three bites.  Robb and I finished his off while we DUOed with Maddy and Matthew.

This is the snow that we accumulated over the weekend.  YUCK!  It's SO deep and our driveway isn't even to the pavement yet.  The snowblower wouldn't go that close as it's packed down really good.  We're supposed to get more this weekend.

If nothing else, Leon is LOVING it.

Anyway, that's what I've been up to since getting back to the frozen tundra that is my home.