The First Day of Spring

Today is the first day of spring and it has been a glorious day. Daniel came home early from work, so he decided to get some much needed yard work done. I say much needed because it has been bothering him for a while now and we have been out of town so much that he hasn't had time to get out in the yard and work. He loves getting outside and doing yard work. This afternoon he did some digging in our flower beds out front. On one side of the flower bed in particular we tend to get an exhorbitant amount of weeds. He also wanted to dig down into the beds a little bit to make it deeper for mulching purposes. Patsy sent me some beautiful hibiscus plants from QVC for an early birthday present that Daniel is going to hopefully plant for me tomorrow. They just came in yesterday. They don't look like much right now, but they should start growing soon after we get them in the ground. One of them can grow to be as tall as 6'. The shortest one is 3' and the others are about 4 1/2 '. I can't wait until we get them in and they start blooming. The blooms are about 12" in diameter. Bud is going to come over tomorrow morning to help Daniel in the yard. We have a massive mess of azaleas that have overgrown in the backyard and Daniel wants to get that cleaned up. Who knows what else is growing in that mess.

While Daniel was working in the flower bed this afternoon I thought it would be nice to take Taylor outside and us just enjoy the beautiful weather that we are having. At first she wanted attention from her daddy, but then she just started running around and playing. At one point she was digging in a little hole in the driveway. She sat there for at least 30 minutes digging with her stick.

Taylor has become quite independent and does not mind very easily, especially when we tell her to come. She had ventured down to the shed and would not come out when I called her. I was afraid that she would get into something that could harm her. She continued to talk back to me, so I spanked her bottom. I carried her back up to the driveway and she went straight to Daniel. I explained to her what she did that was wrong and that she needed to obey Mommy and not talk back to me. We made her apologize and then I got a kiss from her. A few moments later Taylor was playing with a broom and was hitting one of the bushes with the end of it. This would not have been a big deal, but Daniel had previously seen wasps in the bush and was afraid that there might still be some in there. At first Taylor said "NO!", but then she did the funniest thing. She gave herself a spanking and said, "Obey." We cracked up laughing, which, in turn, made Taylor laugh. We told her that was right, that she did need to obey. Maybe we are getting through to her afterall.

After all this I went inside to start dinner. When I came back out I found Taylor digging in the dirt in the flower bed, but this time she didn't have a stick. She was grabbing dirt with her fingers and eating it. I wish I had gotten a picture of this, but I didn't have my camera handy and all I could think about was getting her cleaned up and giving her something to drink to wash all that dirt out of her mouth. YUCK! The crazy things kids do.

Taylor's Musings

I may have mentioned before that Taylor has gotten good at saying "no" but doesn't say "yes" much. Well. recently she has started saying "okay". Sometimes she will talk to herself and say something like this: "Listen to Praise Praise? Okay, listen to Praise Praise." Today I was getting her a snack. First she asked for cheese, so I gave her some string cheese. She asked for more cheese, so I asked her if she wanted fruit treats. After that she wanted more fruit treats. It was getting close to dinner time, so I didn't want her to eat too much. I asked her if she wanted Cheerios and she said "no", then I asked if she wanted gold fish and she said "okay" in the sweetest little voice.

We got Taylor a new Praise Baby DVD for our trip to Greensboro. She has already been learning the songs on it and have been singing along with the video. There is an arrangement of All Night, All Day and Jesus Loves Me on there. I had already been teaching Taylor Jesus Loves Me but she has already picked up on the other part too. She amazes me how quickly she learns. One of her favorite songs is Holy, Holy, Holy. She knows most of the words to the first verse and it is so cute to hear her reciting it. She can sing the whole first half of the first verse on her own without my help. She might miss a few words here and there, but she gets the gist of it.

Taylor has also learned to count to 10. Lately she likes to just say 8-9-10. One time I was trying to get her to count 1-2-3 and she said 8-9-10 instead.

Yesterday she said "why" for the first time. She likes to stick all her fingers in her mouth and sometimes comes close to gagging herself. I am not sure why she is still doing this. I don't know if she is still having reflux problems or if she just thinks it is fun. When I told her to take her fist out of her mouth she asked "why". It surprised me at first because she had never done that before.

A couple of weeks ago we were in Albany shopping and decided to take Taylor into the pet store to run around a little. There were some chihuaha puppies and she looked straight at them and exclaimed "pig!" We laughed so hard before we finally told her that they were puppies and not pigs.

Although Taylor's speech is getting clearer and clearer there are still times that I have a hard time understanding what she is saying. Every once in a while I will have a breakthrough and figure out what she is saying. It is fun to see her learning and growing though.

Grandma's Funeral

This weekend was Grandma's funeral. I don't know why, but I have not been that emotional about it. It's not that I didn't love my grandmother because I loved her very much. Perhaps the older I have gotten, the easier it has been for me to deal with death. Perhaps it hasn't really hit me that she is gone. Although she went down quickly, it was harder to see her in the state that she was in than to let her go. She is in Heaven now with a glorified body and none of the pain that she had here on Earth.

We drove up to Chattanooga on Thursday night after Daniel got off work and spent the night at my parents' house. We decided to go there first instead of driving straight to Huntsville because there is no easy way to get to Huntsville from Americus and we would have been driving all night. It is about a 7 hour drive, but you have to understand that with a toddler and a pregnant woman in the car we have to make stops every 2 hours at least for potty breaks and time to stretch our legs. The next morning we decided to hang around for a while and let Taylor get a nap before heading on down to Huntsville. We figured that we would have plenty of time to get to visitation because they were on Central Time. We had breakfast at Chick-fil-A and then took Taylor over to the play area at the mall to expel some energy. While at the mall we took her to one of those walk-in beauty shops to get her hair trimmed. By the time we had lunch and got back to the house to get Taylor down for a nap it was after 1:00. We had planned to leave around 3:00 our time, but it ended up being closer to 3:30. We still had to eat supper and get checked into our hotel room and changed before going to the visitation. I was not going to be rushed and get flustered. I knew that we would be late, but we ended up being almost an hour late. I felt bad about it, but not many of the people coming for visitation knew us anyway. The visitation was from 7:00 - 9:00 our time and we had thought about leaving early to get Taylor to bed, but we decided that we'd better stay the whole time since we were late. It wasn't going to hurt Taylor to be up late this one time.

I never know how Taylor is going to be around a lot of people she doesn't know. She could either be really shy and clingy or she could be wild and running all over the place. When we finally got to the funeral home (we had to call for directions because our GPS wouldn't find it) Taylor was a little clingy at first. She went to Grandmommy (my mother) immediately. She held her a while and showed her off. Taylor also sat in my Grandpa's lap for a little while. I was glad that she did that. He really gets a lot of enjoyment out of the great-grandkids. After Taylor warmed up and more people started leaving Taylor acted as if she had free reign of the place and started running around everywhere. I couldn't keep her contained. My sister's family had already left, so Taylor was the only little one there. She followed me into the bathroom and after that it was as if she had discovered a new play area in the hallway and the lobby. There weren't that many people there by this point, so I didn't try to stop her. I pretty much just tried to keep an eye on her so she wouldn't get hurt or run out the door.

I was really impressed with how friends came all the way down from Chattanooga to support my family. My parents' Sunday school teacher came to the visitation. He prayed with them and while they were praying Taylor came and stood right in front of them and looked up waiting for them to notice her. She then sat down in front of them still looking up at them the whole time. I wish that I had gotten a picture of it. It was almost as if she wanted to pray with them. The pastor who married Daniel and me came to the funeral with his wife. That really meant a lot to see them there.

Once visitation was over we were going to just go back to the hotel room and go to bed, but Daniel was concerned that Taylor was too wound up and wouldn't go to sleep. (We had never stayed in a hotel room with her before, so we weren't sure how she would do with us in the room. We have slept in the same room, but we would always leave the room while she went to sleep and then sneak back in later). We decided to go to Grandpa's house and visit with the rest of the family for a while before going back to our room. I was glad that we did. It gave me some time to be with my family. We don't get to see each other as often since we are spread further apart now. At one point we all ended up in the living room in kind of a circle and Taylor was in the middle of the floor - the center of attention. She was doing sign language and singing songs for everyone. She LOVED all the attention. I think she is going to be a lot like me in the fact that we are both shy around people we don't know well, but once we feel comfortable we really like being around people. I am not one who likes the center of attention though. I do think she gets her energy from being around other people and I am the same way.

The funeral service was on Saturday morning. As we were getting ready I was already regretting letting Taylor stay up so late the night before. It was almost midnight our time by the time we got settled in bed. Taylor did sleep a little later than usual, but every little thing would set her off and I was afraid that she would be grumpy the whole day. My only hope was that she would let me hold her during the service and she would cuddle. Well, I was completely wrong. As soon as we got there around the rest of the family she perked right up. It was like she went into performance mode again. She was happy and running around everywhere.

The service itself was quite formal and suited Grandma very well. She was a very educated and intelligent person and enjoyed trained musicians. My grandparents had just started attending a Methodist church closer to home, and Grandpa loved the Music Minister's voice, so he asked him to sing. Chris has a beautifully trained baritone voice. I was a little bit disappointed that Grandpa hadn't asked my sister and me to sing, but it was for the best because I got sick on the way up and wouldn't have been able to sing a note. The funeral was held in the chapel at the funeral home. The family was kind of backstage behind a wall where no one could see us. This was nice because I knew that we wouldn't be able to keep the kids still. Alicia and Darrin's kids did pretty well. All the kids made a little noise, but that is to be expected of small children. Rebekah did start to walk toward the stage at one point, but I caught her and told her to come back to her seat. She looked a little bit upset, but at least she complied. I didn't get much out of the service because I was so worried about keeping Taylor quiet. Toward the end of the service I was trying to get her to whisper and she did right the opposite. The preacher was praying, so Daniel scooped her up and took her out through the flower room which was also backstage. At the end of the funeral, they closed the curtain and the family walked out the stage door to the hearse. Daniel was already outside with Taylor. I had Daniel's keys and Taylor's shoes in the diaper bag, so Daniel had to put Taylor in my parents' van (which just happened to be unlocked) because she was wanting to get down and walk in the rain in her tights.

Grandma was buried in a crypt on the outside wall of the masoleum. I don't know how many of you have ever been to an internment service at a masoleum before, but it is pretty nice. I assume that most masoleums are pretty similar, but this one had a little place in the middle like a chapel with pews. Since it is made of stone, everything echoed in there. This part of the service was fairly short. If my memory serves me correctly, Chris opened with a hymn, the preacher shared a few words, and then Chris closed with Blessed Assurance. This was probably the most memorable part of the entire day for me. When the preacher prayed and started speaking, Joshua yelled out, "AMEN!!" It was so cute and timely. As Chris was singing Blessed Assurance I wanted to sing along, so I just mouthed the words. Taylor must have been watching me because she starting singing along. The longer the song went the louder she got. It seemed like at the end she was singing at the top of her lungs. I couldn't help but laugh. Everyone thought it was so cute. I don't know how Chris kept his composure. He has small children though, so he knows how they are.

After Grandma was buried we all met back at Grandpa's house for lunch. We had a nice time together as a family until we all went our separate ways. Daniel and I went back to my parents' house in Chattanooga to spend the night again. Taylor was afraid that we were leaving Grandmommy and Granddaddy for good, so we let her ride with them. I was so surprised when they told me that she slept almost the whole way home - and that is a 2 hour ride. She needed the sleep since we kept her up so late the night before. On Sunday after lunch we came home. Taylor did pretty well for most of the trip. I can't complain. She does a whole lot better in the car than she used to. God has really answered prayer in that respect. I think we all pretty much crashed when we got in. Daniel and I are still recovering from all of the traveling. It has worn us out. We are glad to be home though and are not planning to go anywhere for a long time. Now it's time to concentrate on The Day He Wore My Crown - our Easter musical.

If you are interested, my sister posted my Grandmother's obituary on her blog.

Final Homecoming

Grandma went home to be with the Lord this morning around 4:45. She will be greatly missed, but I am grateful that she is finally in heaven instead of suffering in her mortal body here on earth. It is hard to believe that it has been about a year since we discovered that she was sick. It all started with a fall that landed her in the hospital. Her body had started stiffening up and she was receiving physical therapy but not making much progress. She went on from the hospital to the nursing home to continue her therapy. Grandpa finally made the decision to bring her home and she continued to make a slow but steady decrease in her ability to function on her own. We went down to Huntsville to see her when she came home. She was having a hard time getting around and feeding herself. Her hands wanted to sieze up at times which made it difficult for her. At that time she could still communicate with us.

I can't remember for sure, but I don't think the doctor's were sure of what her condition was. She had been diagnosed with Fibromyalgia years ago and had struggled off and on with depression from it. It wasn't until they got her medication regulated that she did much better. I can remember times of going down to see them that she would have to go back to the bedroom to take a nap. I guess all of the people around got to her at times. When she went into the hospital the doctor thought that she might have Parkinson's disease. This seemed to make sense at the time because some of the symptoms can be similar. Later on they realized that it probably wasn't Parkinson's but some kind of Parkinsonism. They finally diagnosed her with Lewy Body Dimentia. This caused her to gradually lose her memory and her muscles to stiffen.

About a month ago I took a trip to Chattanooga and my parents and I took Taylor down to see my grandparents. I am so glad that we made that trip. It was hard to see Grandma declining like she had, but I know that she could understand what we said to her. She coudn't hold Taylor or really interact with her, but at lunch she was really watching her and I think she got some enjoyment out of her. I am glad that Taylor got to meet her great-grandparents. I want to make more of a point on taking her up for visits to see Grandpa. We don't do that often enough - even if it is 7 hours away. It will be harder with a new baby, but I think it is important.

So far, everyone in the family is doing really well. My sister is probably taking it the hardest right now, but we all grieve in different ways and in our own time. I think that Grandpa and Daddy and the rest of the family did a lot of grieving this week while they have been down there watching her and waiting for her to pass. I am sure that they are all exhausted. I have heard that the weeks to follow are the hardest - when it all sinks in and life changes. So much of his time for the past year has been taking care of Grandma, so it will be difficult for him at fist. He has already mentioned that he wants to get involved with the senior's group at his church (he recently joined a new church closer to home) and he wants to do some more woodworking which has been a hobby of his for some time. He is a very determined man and I know that he won't be idle.

The funeral is scheduled for Saturday morning, so we will be leaving Thursday evening after Daniel gets off of work to drive up to Chattanooga and spend the night before going on to Huntsville on Friday for the receiving of friends. Grandpa requested a closed casket. I think that he doesn't want the family remembering Grandma in her current state and he is mostly worried about the great-grandkids. Rebekah, my 4-year old niece, would be most affected by it. Taylor and Joshua are too young to understand.

Some prayer requests that I have are to remember the family as we go through the grieving process. Also, pray for the little ones as we travel. My sister's family doesn't have far to drive, but we have a little further to go. Also pray that they would do well at the funeral. We didn't have to take Taylor into the last funeral. God was so faithful and worked out all the details for that and I know that He will do it again. We will be staying in a hotel room in Huntsville on Friday night - which we have not done with Taylor before - so I am hoping and praying that she will sleep well. I know that those of you who have small children (or who have been in a similar situation) will understand what I am talking about. We have stayed in the same room with her before, but it was always a situation where we could put her down, leave the room, and then come back after she was asleep. We may just have to sit in the hallway until she goes to sleep. I know that again, God will work out all the details. I just have to trust Him. Thanks for your prayers.

My sister posted some memories of Grandma. Click this link to see her blog post.

Gladness for Mourning

We are in Greensboro this week. We drove up on Wednesday and will be heading back home on Sunday. Patsy's mother passed away last Saturday and we came up for the funeral. Patsy is Daniel's step mom. I know that she would have understood if Taylor and I had not come since it is such a long drive, but I felt like it was important for us to be here for her. I am glad that we came too. I actually ended up singing for the funeral and Daniel was a pall bearer. The only concern about the whole trip was how Taylor would do. We were concerned about the car ride and, once we realized that we were both going to be participating in the funeral, there was the concern about what to do with her during that time.

God has been so faithful. I prayed about this trip before we came and I have been seeing God answer my prayer. On the way up here Taylor did so well. I even bought some new videos to show her just to keep her occupied, but we didn't need them until the last 2 hours. It took a total of 11 1/2 hours to get here with all the stops we made. Most of the time Taylor just listened to Praise Baby and colored. Daniel had a great idea in bringing her crayons and coloring books. It has been a hit!

When we had the receiving of friends on Thursday night I talked with the funeral director and he told me that his brother's wife would be able to watch Taylor for me. That was such a blessing! When I met her Friday morning I liked her instantly. We took some toys and a video for her to watch. All Daniel had to do was to show Tricia how to use the DVD player and Taylor automatically reached up for her to hold her. Taylor did so well during the funeral. That was such a burden off my shoulders.

Taylor has also been napping and sleeping really well while we have been here. Tomorrow we are heading home and I just hope and pray that she does as well on the way home as she did on the way up. The trip home always has been more difficult in the past.

On a side note, my grandmother has not been doing well. Yesterday she did not eat all day and didn't want to get out of bed. She has Lewy Body Dimentia and has been going downhill pretty fast. She's had a nurse's assistant for 8 hours a day - 5 days a week for a while now and has recently started receiving hospice care as well. When the hospice nurse came out to see her yesterday he said that with her not eating and wanting to stay in bed that she probably will not last much longer and that the family needed to come down. He expects her to go within the week. My grandfather has been taking it really hard and is hurting right now. He has really demonstrated how much he loves my grandmother in everything that he has done for her. He tries to get her out of the house every chance he gets. He even bought a handicap accessible van for her. I am sad for him, but I don't want to see her suffer for a long time. She is being given morphine for the pain that she does have. My prayer in all of this is that God would somehow give the whole family peace that she has a true relationship with Him. My grandparents have been religious people, but some of the things that they believe just does not line up with scripture and I have often wondered if they have truly accepted Christ as the Way, the Truth, and the Life. That is what concerns me most. I cannot see their hearts, so I have to accept what they tell me about their faith and that they have been saved.

Taylor's First Snow

This past Sunday we had our first snow in Americus since we have lived here. I have always been skeptical whenever I have heard anything about snow or flurries or anything in south Georgia. It just doesn't get cold enough, and even if it did snow it wouldn't stick to anything. Well, Sunday morning as we were getting ready for church it started snowing flurries. I was so surprised considering the day before the tempurature had been in the 70's. It was truly a sight to behold - even though it didn't stick to anything. At the end of the service our pastor announced that we wouldn't be having any services that evening because of the weather. I thought, okay whatever. Well, again, after lunch it started snowing and this time it was a little bit harder - more than just flurries. We got in and got Taylor down for a nap. While she was sleeping the flakes got bigger and it really started coming down and actually stuck to the ground and the trees for a little while. It was so beautiful! I wish I had gotten a picture of it. Who knows when we will get another snow again. By the time Taylor got up from her nap it had slowed down quite a bit and most of the snow that was on the ground has melted. We took Taylor outside to enjoy the snow, but I am not sure that she understood what was going on. Like I said, it was just flurries at this point, so it wasn't much different than rain to her. Here are a few pictures we got of her playing outside all bundled up.

Taylor didn't have any gloves so we had to put some of mine on her.