December 20th

For today’s Random Acts of Kindness Advent we handed out candy canes at our local community center.

The kids loved it.

And turns out not very many parents are around at the community center, so candy canes were like hot cakes.

Tomorrow we will be…

taking some goodies to our local post office…more specifically Ms. Betty and Mr. Ricky.  They always take such good care of us and love on my little ones.  They deserve some extra kindness for sure.

Also our 13 Months Waiting Art Giveaway is still going on.  CLICK HERE or scroll down to the post below to enter.

Giveaway ends tomorrow night at midnight.

“It makes the calendar feel like a minefield, like you’re constantly tiptoeing over explosions of grief until one day you hit one, shattered by what might have been.”  Shauna Niequist on grief

And today marks exactly one month since my mom passed away…I can’t even believe it’s been a month since I talked with her and loved on her.  Seriously seems like yesterday.

I hate this is in the forefront of my mind every single day…1st thought of the day and last thought of the night and all the while in between.

It was raining that morning and I chatted with my best friend Ashley as I drove early to pick up some facial wipes, waterproof mascara and some cute head scarfs for my mom at Target, before heading to the hospital as I did every morning.

I even had to wait for Target to open.

The night before my mom had her head shaved anticipating the radiation she would soon begin.

Before I left the night before, she asked me to bring her some makeup and some earrings…hence the waterproof mascara…can’t be sporting any raccoon cry eyes.

It was the very first morning she had been “back”…was herself mentally and I can’t say how happy I was to see her sitting up in bed working on her sweet friend Roy’s insulin pump and actually getting it to work.  Roy is a diabetic and mom always took the best care of him.  She had just not been entirely there mentally since her 4 day prior brain surgery, so when Roy would ask her about his pump she would look at it and just push the same button over and over again.  That was hard to see because she was sharp…like really sharp.  But this morning, she was pushing all the right buttons and it was working.  She was back.

Roy brought her Cracker Barrel for breakfast…the Smokehouse Breakfast…what Sol and I had eaten with her at Cracker Barrel just 11 days before.

I crawled up in her bed with her, as I did every single day, and gave her some love.  And then began the sweetest moments with my mom.  She asked me to wash her head.  And I stood there smoothing a cloth over her sweet shaved head.  I cleaned her face with a facial wipe and rubbed face lotion on her skin.  I then did her makeup…even curled her eyelashes.  I put in large ball earrings and little diamond studs in her ears.  She was spunky like that…two ear piercings per ear.

I then slipped a silk head scarf over her head.  She said she loved how it felt on her head.  She was just down right beautiful.

I feel blessed to have had this time with her.  I don’t take any of her hospital time for granted.  Some people are gone in an instant and loved ones are left replaying their last day over and over again…no warning at all.  I feel blessed to have had those 7 days.

I hadn’t left her side for a solid 7 days…there first thing in the morning and left only when she was going to bed that night.  I just didn’t want her to be alone.  Plus, I wanted to be there with her.  I told her countless times that there was no where else I would rather be than with her.

My cousins Jan and Michael had just flown in from Texas.  Jan and mom were very best friends.  I trusted Jan and Micheal and felt comfortable enough to leave to go home and get Josh and the kids to come back and see her.  She was sitting in the hallway of the hospital about to start her physical therapy as I walked down the hall to go home.  She yelled down the hall several times, “I love you and call and check to make sure Roy got home okay.”  I yelled back, “I love you too and I will.”

If I could go back, I would crawl up in that wheelchair and let her hold me.  I would tell her how simply and purely wonderful she was.  I would tell her thank you for being such an amazing mom.  There are a million things I would have told her, but I would tell her most how much my heart adores and loves her.

Not even a minute after I sat my purse down at home did my cell phone ring.  It was Jan telling me not to worry, but that mom had collapsed during her physical therapy and she just wanted to let me know.  As I listened to Jan I heard her nurse ask Jan, “Is that her daughter?”  Jan told her yes.  Then the nurse told Jan, “Tell her to come back now.”  Jan relayed the message, I grabbed my purse and drove like mad back to the hospital.  I remember running through the parking lot and thinking, “This may be a little dramatic…me running through the hospital parking lot.”

I remember coming down the hall to her room and there was a “code blue”…doctors and nurses running down the hall to her room and her door was shut…Jan and Michael in the hall.

And within two hours or so she was gone.  A crappy blood clot.  Just like that.

Life changed that day and so did I.  I’m not the same person anymore.  I just don’t think you can be after loosing someone so absolutely close to your heart.

I don’t think I have even finished mourning the fact that she was sick, let alone that she is gone and that I am not the same person anymore.  It’s hard to “get” that mentally.

To me I seem crazy…I’ve never grieved before, so it is all very new.  Life has just seemed so surreal since that day.  Doesn’t even seem or feel real.  Just fake.  Like a puppet show…other people moving you around and making you go through these motions.

I hate that my blog is a bit of a bummer now.  Not everyone wants to read about grief and some girl’s dead mother, but I just can’t do sunshine and rainbows and unicorns right now.  It’s just not currently me.

But what hope I can write about is that I know…I know, I know, I know I will see my mom again.  I have never prayed for Jesus to come back, but now, well now I pray it everyday.  Jesus take us home.  I petition Him and plead and ask and beg for Him to just come on back…and I wait in expectation…everyday.

I seem a bit bizarre now, but man, I am holding on to this hope…like an anchor for my soul.  Sure and strong.  It’s just all I can do.  So everyday I get up and life begins again.

Lamentations 3:22-24

The Lord’s love never ends;
       his mercies never stop.
 ²³ They are new every morning;
       Lord, your loyalty is great.
 ²⁴ I say to myself, “The Lord is mine,
       so I hope in him.”

Oh goodness how this verse was written for me right now.  So here I am…stuck in some crappy grief and I wish I could only write about how stinkin’ wonderful and grand and perfect life is, but it’s just not.  But “God is good, the world He made is extraordinary and His comfort is like nothing else on earth.”  He is sure and strong and just exactly what I need and ready to handle me exactly as I come to Him.