Good-bye, Good-bye, Good-bye

Two posts in one month! Man, I'm on top of things.

It was a week filled with Good-byes. Sunday, we had our best friends, Randy and Twila over for lunch and then their daughter and her family joined up with us for dinner. We had Twila's favorite for lunch: roast and potatoes (and all the trimmings) and dinner was my favorite, cheese fondue with white chocolate amaretto fondue for dessert. This was our big "last hurrah" at Eric and Julie's. I bawled when they left. (I'm such a baby.) But my bawling was cut short when RC ran his truck off the driveway. We really need to get some reflectors so that people stop doing that.

Monday we went to take some left-over fondue yummies over to Gradma's and shared a Memorial Day dinner with her and my Aunt Marlene. It was lovely, but while I was fixing dinner, I saw on the news where the husband of a friend of mine was found dead the previous morning. What do you do about that?! The first thing you want to do is call and check on her, but then reality sets in that she wouldn't want yet another phone call. So I just prayed for her a lot. My friend is now left to raise three boys on her own. The oldest is 13 years old and is severely handicapped. She's going to continue needing prayer. Her name is Lisa, if you'd like to pray for her.

Tuesday, Ethan moved on to Webelos in scouting and we said our last good-bye to his den leader and her family. They are moving to Knoxville soon and that was probably the last we'll see of them. They are such a nice, sweet family. Liked them a lot.

Friday, I woke up and went to Twila's to help her load the truck. Worked my tail off for 11-1/2 hours. Packed that truck up tight! Then said good-bye again at about 10:15 last night. Bawled half the way home. (I'm such a baby.)

So now it's Saturday and what are we doing? The boys are having one last play date with some friends who are moving to Montana next week. Then we're going to take them back to their house where they're having a reception for some friends to say a big good-bye to everyone.

This is all on top of the fact that Ethan and Seth's school is splitting next year and just less than half the school is going to be there next year, so they'll be losing a lot of friends to that. (Well, Ethan will....Seth's not much on the friend thing yet.)

But we're all still together and busy as ever. We have each other. Life is good!

Three Months is a L-O-N-G T-I-M-E!

I haven't posted in over three months and so much has happened.

Shortly after my last post, on February 19th, I held my mother in the Zephyrhill's Hospital ER as a kind doctor with a good bit of an accent told her that my step-dad hadn't survived an apparent heart attack at their home. It wasn't for a lack of effort. Apparently, the EMTs worked pretty hard to get him back. My mother had tried CPR prior to their arrival, but God's timing was apparent to us and we have been comforted by the knowledge that He knows better than we do.

We held a memorial service (of sorts) for him a couple of nights later at a Japanese Steakhouse in New Tampa called Kado. It was a lovely time. That was all the memorial service he wanted. It was really good for my mother not to have to endure a traditional service. It's hard enough to get through those things, but it's nigh unto unbearable when you're not a people-person anyway.

It has been quite a time getting used to the fact that I won't see him again. I can't imagine the road my mother is on. They were married for 28 years and she had been his primary caregiver for about the last 12 years, since his heart attack at age 50. So, all at the same time, she lost her best friend and someone who depended on her daily. She has had time to adjust to the fact that they probably wouldn't "grow old" together, but there is just nothing that can prepare you for the emotional and psychological implications of losing someone so close to you.

So Mom packed up and left for Maine on May 1, as is her custom. She was talking about us flying up there to visit this summer, which I would love, but the airfare is looking quite steep, so she'll probably be coming back down for a visit at some point. She's leaving for Alaska to stay with my brother and his family for a while in October. I'm a little jealous of that, but one day I'll get up to Anchorage for a visit and a little tourism.

I found out this week that I'm sort of 'standing in' for our Children's Pastor when he goes on vacation in June FOR THREE WEEKS. Only on Wednesday evenings. My preschool duties preclude me from being able to work with K-6 on Sunday mornings, so I get the easy shift, at least. I don't know what they're going to do on Sunday mornings. But he's only missing two of those, I think.

Rachael turned 2 and Seth turned 6 in April. Ethan becomes a Webelo Scout at the end of the month. He is 9. Time is flying! Flying! Just flying! Rachael had a lovely birthday party at home on a Sunday afternoon. We kinda did it a little backwards because it started at 3:00 (I think), so we had cake and ice cream first and the presents. Then those who wanted/needed to leave left and everyone else stayed for a lasagna dinner. It was lovely.

Seth had a party thrown together at the last minute. We ended up going to Chuck E. Cheese and playing around on a Tuesday (school) night. It was easy and fun and we were done. Since his birthday was actually on a Wednesday, we gathered all the kids around at church and they sang "Happy Birthday" to him. I think that might have been the high-light of his birthday. You should have seen his face light up! He was so cute!

My Bible Study finished up yesterday. We're starting to plan for next year and get the children's crafts together. We don't have a host church for next year yet, but we're praying that God will show us the place He has prepared in His perfect timing while not allowing us to freak out too much with our necessarily limited vision. We're studying Luke next year. I like him. We studied Acts a couple of years ago and it was good. (Luke is generally accepted to have written much of Acts.)

Eric became a Manager (officially) at Verizon a couple of months ago. I think it was in February. We celebrated by going off for a lovely weekend at the beach ALONE together. Then on the following weekend, we took the kids with us to Disney World's Magic Kingdom. Both trips were absolutely perfect with lots of great memories!

Thanks to the help of my friend Namon, we got the garage clean enough to park our van in it. It looks like an actual garage that a real person would claim now. The plan is to have a yard sale once school is out. I hope that actually happens because I have lot to get rid of.

My BFF Twila is planning on moving to Texas at the beginning of June and I'm going to be bummed, but God is smart and has me busy all summer long so I can't stew in my sorrow like I'd like to. Well, nix that. I don't know if I'd really like that. But I would like to be a tad less busy. But I guess if I *really* wanted to be a tad less busy, I would be. Oh well....all this work with children is supposed to keep me young.

Here's the basic plan:
Kids out of school June 4
Leave for North Georgia Camping trip June 5-9
Summer Camp for K-6th grade at our church - Week 1 - June 30-July 3
Fourth of July (and my Grandma's 86th Birthday)
Youth Camp with Eric's kids from church (about 15 of them) July 14-18
Summer Camp for K-6th grade at our church - Week 2 - July 28-August 1

I think that gives me two full weeks in June and a couple of days in July to pretend I'm a stay-at-home mother of three. But I'm sure something will come up.