A Year of Gratitude - Birthdays and memories of Mom

This week is about birthdays and my saying goodbye to mom

 March 23!
Since I love my new "quiet inspirations" Friday  going into the weekend,
I am celebrating/remembering a few days early this week.

Happy Birthday

to you

Happy birthday

to you

Happy Birthday,

Happy Birthday,

Happy Birthday to Jo-Anne and Aunt Marcia
Friday, March 23.

This was then

Easter Sunday in front of my childhood home.

Our fathers always bought us corsages.

This was last month at Sand Key, FL

Jo-Anne and Al graciously treated us to a wonderful lunch with a view one never gets

tired of.

Should I dare to say we have been friends for 61 years?
Gasp!!!

NOT POSSIBLE, but she was 4 and I was 5 when her family moved next door to mine.

Happy Birthday my special friend!
Your happiness is such a blessing!

Then another birthday......

Happy Birthday 84th to Aunt Marcia

If you follow my blog you probably have seen this picture,  I so love of it of days gone

by in my parents back yard.

BTW that is Jo-Anne's house to the left!

Aunt Marcia is second from the right between the birches, reaching out to my cousin

Gordon, who just happens to be born on my birthday!

We were the first two grandchildren and both born the same day, 3 years apart!

Marcia is my mom's sister-in-law,

my Uncle Bud is sitting in the stripped chair with Gordon.
After my dad passed away and mom would not move to Florida
My Aunt Marcia made sure Mom was well taken care of in the nursing home.
She was always more than just a sister-in-law.
I thank her for all the years of caring for both my mom and dad
when circumstances prevented me from moving back to New York state.

Many of you prayed this week for my Aunt Marion,
mom's younger sister, as she had her first surgery at 87!

she has her arms in back of her head sitting next to the Coca-Cola cooler and me

finding a cold drink, hehe.
At last report, she is doing well.
I thank you for all your prayers and beautiful thoughts for her recovery.

Then, three years ago on March 23, 2009
my mom passed away.

Mom and Terry having supper in her room.
She loved having guests.
Sometime after dad passed away
early 2002 or 2003

Oct 15th, 2008, my last day with my mom.

I believe this was mom's high school graduation picture.

Mom with me on steps of my grandparents home

(my childhood home would eventually be right next door)

Mom and Dad just a few months before he was sent to the Pacific

during WWII

they were at a Coca-Cola party that day.

Don't you love dad's shoes!!

My parents were the love of each other's lives.

They took care of each other all their lives.

When dad fell in March 2000 and went into a nursing home.

less than 2 months later, mom signed herself into the same nursing home

(she could easily have been in assisted living, but she wanted to be with dad)

They were waiting for "their room" together......

Finally it came and they spent their first night in "their room".

The next day dad was taken to the hospital........never to return to the nursing home.

9 years later as her body was shutting down and all of us here in Florida

knew we had no time to get a flight to Albany, NY to say goodbye,

my precious cousins sat with mom in the hospital that morning.

She was mumbling incoherently, heavily on morphine

then she became quiet....

then, according to those who witnessed her passing....

opened her eyes, and in a loud, crystal clear voice said, "ART!"

and went with my father into paradise........

Having apple cider and doughnuts from the cider mill

in mom's room.

Again early 2001 or 2002.

The day mom passed away I knew HE wanted me to do her eulogy.

If you know me in real life, you know that 4 1/2 years waiting for her fiance in the Pacific during

WWII most likely did something to my mom's mind and heart

so much so that she saw me, her only child, as a "rival" for my father's love, all my life.
and

I have always been terrified to speak in front of a group, but I knew HE would give me the words.

As Terry drove, the minister and I planned the service via cell phone

As Terry drove, I composed the eulogy, prayed, redid it, prayed, redid it.......

until at last I did not hear His voice......I knew it was finally the words HE wanted me to say.

HE gave me the beautiful poem....

"Footprints on your heart",

 and I spoke of my mother's love to everyone else,

 the

footprints she left on so many, many hearts.

Mom had touched so many lives with her quilts, her needlework pictures,

her afghans, her work at the rummage sales in church, and volunteering as financial secretary
of their church in the years before dad retired.

She gave so much to so many.

HE gave me the words and the pride in my mother as a human being who touched others.

At the very end, I looked over to the casket and my heart exploded

with the most incredible love for my mother......

a love that washed away the last drops of unforgiving in my heart.

I love you Mom.

My gratitude's today are family and friends.

Always the Grace of the Lord in my life.

From my heart to yours, may your day be blessed.

Lynn