It's Harder Than I Thought

When Grandma passed away on Wednesday morning, I had a decision to make.  Would I go BACK to Georgia for the funeral or not? 

If I hadn't just been down to say my goodbyes to Grandma, I would have gone no matter what.  Originally, the visitation and interment were going to be done in one day (and there is a 3 hour drive between the two cities) and it could have been as early as Thursday.  I didn't find out until almost lunch time on Wednesday that the service would be on Friday.  By 3 on Wednesday I found out there was a visitation added on Thursday night.

We had just gotten home late Monday night.  The drive was 15 hours give or take each way.  I had already missed a "week" of work and I get NO paid time off because I am only part time.  I couldn't fathom spending another 30 hours on the road - especially alone and crying part of the way.  And by the time I knew what the plan was?  Well, I would have had to drive all night to make it in time.  After working all day.

Plane tickets ranged from $620.00 (from the local airport where there was a layover involved) to $1078.00 (from the larger airport that is a 2.5 hour drive away and non-stop flights).  These were prices that were from a search engine and not bereavement fares - I know that could have knocked the ticket price down a little bit.  But a call to Del.ta on Tuesday in some pre-planning had let me know that bereavement fares weren't available on all flights.

And then for some reason I checked the weather report.  There was a winter storm that was supposed to be rolling in that would be bringing freezing rain/snow to my area and thunderstorms/tornadoes to Georgia.  And the layover airports for the cheaper and more convenient tickets were in cities that were also in the immediate path of this storm (Chicago and Detroit).  In fact, Chicago had already cancelled over 200 flights for Wednesday.

And then I would still have had to figure out the airport to funeral home portion of the trip which was probably going to consist of renting a car just in case my flight was delayed...

After quite a bit of deliberation, I decided that I would not try to make it.  I couldn't fathom spending that much money on a plane ticket to get stranded in an airport in another city AND STILL miss the funeral.

I felt peace with this decision.  I still feel like it was the right choice.

But remembering my Grandma all by myself while sitting at my desk and attempting to work has been harder than I thought it would be.

I wore the earrings and necklace that she had given me not too long ago.  I pulled up her obituary online and have kept it up on my second screen for the majority of the day.  And during the time the service was scheduled for, I took some time to sit quietly and remember her.  And I have cried A LOT today.  Crying about it by yourself is so much harder to do than when you have a loved one close by.

My mom called me on her cell phone and left the line open so that I could listen in on the grave side service.  My brother gave a lovely memorial speech and included memories from all of our family members and some of Grandma's close friends.  The preacher said some lovely words and scripture.  It Is Well With My Soul was sung by a lovely man from the church I grew up in.  And everyone joined together to say the Lord's Prayer and to sing a verse of Amazing Grace.  I also had several family members contact me throughout the day to tell me that they loved me and they knew I wished I was there.

It was so nice to be able to participate in some way even though I couldnt' be there.

22 Months Old

Dear Carder,

The last month has been quite a month developmentally for you and your personality is just blossoming.

We just got back from a trip to Georgia and you were awesome.  Other than the fact that you didn’t act scared when you saw Great Grandma Gin Gin, my proudest moments were when you recognized Grandma and Grandpa from a distance and ran right up to them and gave them big hugs and kisses.  I know that it melted their hearts and made them so happy.  (Thanks, FaceTime!)

Your combination of words is getting more and more frequent and your vocabulary grows every day.  I can’t even keep track of the number of words you are saying.  You are beginning to work on your colors and although you repeat the other colors, everything is yellow.  I like to point out things that are actually yellow and ask you their color so I can tell you that you are right.

My favorite change in your vocabulary this past month is that “Da” became “Daddy” and “Mama” turned into “Mommy” about a week later.  Like all things that change, I miss hearing you yell “DA” as you run across the room to your Daddy to give him a big hug, but “Daddy” melts my heart into mush just the same.

You love to count – from the number of dogs on a page to the number of Easter Eggs in your basket.  You say “Help Mommy” and point your finger at item after item as we count them.  Right now you don’t touch items in a particular order and you may count something more than once, but you recognize the one item to one number correlation and move your finger a single time with each number.

You love to sing and your favorites right now include “No More Monkeys” and “Old MacDonald”.

You love to read and this past month your favorites have been the “Llama Llama” books.  You love balls, trucks, and blocks.  You love to rough house with us.  You love to go downstairs to play basketball – or just to walk the stairs.  You love to laugh and be tickled.  You close your eyes and pretend to be asleep (including fake snoring) and it cracks me up.

You love fruit (raspberries are your fave right now), hotdogs, sweet potato fries, and teriyaki carrots.  Can ketchup be considered a food?  If so, add it to the list.  You recently discovered how to “dip” food and I have seen some strange things go from the ketchup into your mouth (the strangest were lasagna, pancakes, and waffles). You recently started eating cereal from a bowl with milk in it.  Sometimes you use a spoon or fork but your favorite tool is still your fingers.  You still don’t like to drink milk unless it is from our glass and not yours. 

The terrible twos are in full swing at our house and I get hit in the face numerous times each day when you have to do something you don’t want to do – like leave playtime for a bath or dinner.  Time outs are currently our weapon of choice and we will see how that goes.  At least the biting out of anger seems to have subsided…

You are – quite literally – my sunshine and I love you!

Mommy

Goodbye to My Grandma

My Grandma died at about 12:30 this morning.  I am so very, very sad.

My Grandma hadn't been doing so well in the last several months.  Hospice had been called in about 2 weeks ago but we were originally told that it was for palliative care and her death was not imminent.  Within a matter of a couple of days, Hospice changed their minds and said that it could be anywhere from 1 to 2 weeks before she passed away.
 
Thankfully, we were already planning a trip down to Georgia.  We shuffled our schedules and left 2 days ahead of our original plan and drove south.  I had the opportunity to visit with her for 3 days in a row.  I was able to tell her that she was the best Grandma a girl could have hoped for and how much I loved her.  I was able to tell her that being able to see her made my whole trip worthwhile.  I was able to let her see Carder one more time.  I was able to say goodbye.

Grandma made the best roast, the fluffiest mashed potatoes, a perfect fried egg, delicious fried okra, and a pretty mean pumpkin pie.  You could never visit her house before 2 pm and not get fed breakfast.  She was kind of a messy cook, though and I won't ever forget the time she fried the cord to her mixer while trying to make okra and mashed potatoes at the same time one Thanksgiving.

I can remember Christmases where somehow she always knew the perfect thing to buy for me (like a Caboodle or a Pink Ice Ring or a warm scarf and socks right before we moved to Michigan).  She always said my name with laughter in her voice and a smile in her eyes.  She loved flowers, her dogs, beanie babies, and collector dolls.  She had the most radiant skin and didn't look even close to her age.  When my Papaw passed away, she made sure that everyone got a little something special to remember him by.  She wore pants that picked up "everything but money and a man".  She was a very special woman and I will never forget her.

I hope that I let my son know how wonderful his Great Grandma Gin-Gin was and that he grows up thinking as kindly of her as I do, even though he only knew her a short time.  I will always remember that when Carder saw her in her last days, he joyfully said "Hi Gin Gin" and blew her kisses.  She was so happy when she heard his voice in the hallway and she ever so slowly raised her hand to blow him kisses back.  He didn't cry even though she looked nothing like the woman he knew.  

Grandma - you may be gone but you will never be forgotten.  I love you.

The Shop-O-Rama

One of Carder's favorite books lately is "Llama Llama Mad at Mama" by Anna Dewdney.  In this rivetting tale, Llama Llama goes shopping with his Mama and throws a major tantrum because he is tired of shopping.  But after some intervention by Mama, Llama's attitude turns around and he happily helps Mama finish the shopping.

Lately, every time we need to go to the store, I have called it the Shop-O-Rama and have asked him if he can help me like Llama helps Mama.  This has really helped cut down on our mid-store meltdowns.  (Thank God because there is probably not anything I dread more than the meltdown in the middle of the grocery store where onlookers just shake their heads at you because of your poor parenting skills...)

This week, I forgot to get 2 items when we went to the store on Saturday.  Derek had to go in to the office, so after solo parenting my way through Church, I decided to run to the store to pick up the things we forgot.  We normally shop at a big box chain store because their produce is much better and their prices are less painful on our budget.

But since we only needed 2 things, I decided to pay the higher price for the convenience of the smaller parking lot and store.  Carder loves this store because they have huge buffalo heads mounted in the front and the back of the store.  They also have some kid sized shopping carts.

This trip, since he is getting to be such a good little helper and has been doing pretty good about staying close when walking in a store, I let him push the cart.  He felt like such a big boy pushing his cart and groceries around the store. He excitedly pointed out apples and bananas.  When I told him what was next, he would repeat the item as we walked toward that section of the store.  Adorable...

When we were done, I asked him if he would like for Mommy to pay for his groceries and he said, "Yes."  Smart boy.  Get Mommy to pay for your food...

He enjoyed pushing his shopping cart so much that he didn't want to leave the store.  Once I convinced him to check out, he pushed his cart over to the little carts and put it back where it belonged so that it would be there for him the next time we came to the store.

My Little Shopper - Looking up at the Buffalo Head

 

 

Catching Up

Newsflash - I suck at blogging.

I'm Playing Catch Up with my Blog Posts.  And if you want to know JUST HOW BADLY I suck at blogging, I have been working on this since New Years Eve.  I still have about 4 posts in draft format that I need to finish, but if I don't post this "Catch Up" post now, some of my readers (if I have any left at this point) will never get through all of the links I have embedded here.

Some of these were posted days or weeks ago and you may have seen them if you read new posts through Google Reader.

But, I am a tardy poster who is OCD about things being in consecutive order.  And so that I don't lose the ability to follow a timeline when I look back at my blog, I have nackdated the postings and I am going to add this post with links to some of the back dated posts I am adding in case you missed them.

You can read about Carder's first trip to the Zoo this past summer and our trip to Georgia back in October.

You can read about how we spent Thanksgiving 2012 here.

You can read about our  Christmas Cards, Carder's first visit with Santa, and our first time making Sugar Cookies.  You can read about how Carder was sick at Christmas - AGAIN.  And if that isn't enough of our Christmas for you, you can read about how we celebrated Christmas with the In Laws and Christmas 2012.

You can read how we spent New Years Eve 2012.  You can also read about how Carder has been missing the excitement of the Nativity at the Church accross the street from us.

And if you are interest in how we spent our random days, I have plenty of other catching up for you.  You can read about Carder's first Phrases and how many words he can now say.  We have been having a lot of winter fun lately - Snowballs, snowshoeing, and walking.  You can also read about how he ended up looking like Robin Hood, how he got stuck in his bookcase, and how I discovered a new way to keep Carder busy.

If you feel so inclined, you can read about how my iPhone Died a horrible death back in February.  We also did some very productive vehicle shopping in February as well.

I promise to try to do better in the future...Oh, who am I kidding???  Better late than never, right???

Need A Better Pregnancy Test??? (Updated)

Today, as I was eating my lunch at my desk, I scrolled through an MSN article about some of the weirdest tech devices out there.  Imagine my surprise when I saw that there is a USB Pregnancy Test!!!

The description would have caught ANY infertile's eye - "Tired of trying to decipher if there is one line or two?  Take out the guesswork with this USB device to measure HCG levels..."  Okay, I am paraphrasing a bit - but not by much.

Of course I couldn't resist clicking on the link to read more about this device.

Apparently it costs $17.99 and it comes with 20 test strips (so at less than a dollar a pee it is even a better value than those dollar store tests...) and I am sure that you can order replacement strips but I didn't research it that far.  It will test for both pregnancy and ovulation.

What I found most interesting about this device - though - was not the fact that it would take the guess work out of reading the tests (because by now we are all PROFESSIONAL LINE READERS, right?).  What I found the most interesting was the following:

While most home tests can detect a level of 15-50 mIU/mL of hCG, the enhanced methodology of the USB Pregnancy Test Kit can detect 5-50 mIU/mL, and will show you the exact concentration via its friendly onscreen interface. In addition, the LCD display on the device itself will light up and show you the symbol of a baby, no baby, or multiples and your Estimated Delivery Date based on the concentration of hCG, hCG-H, and LH in your urine.

 

WHAT?  It will show you a concentration as low as 5?  And will show you the level in NUMERIC VALUE???

No more freaking out prior to the initial beta draw.  No more freaking out about whether your level is rising or not because you can't tell from the second line (or the word "pregnant" or "Not Pregnant" staring back at you).  If this thing really works, you could know the answers to your questions... 

Even though we aren't TTC (and aside from the fact that our chances of conceiving naturally are like - I don't know - 0%), I am completely tempted to order this.

If anyone reads this and orders one, please let me know if it works because I am totally interested!  I need to know!

(This is not a paid advertisement and I am not endorsing this product as I have no personal knowledge of whether or not it works.  But I wonder if another ALI blogger who is cycling could get one for free if they blogged about their experience???  Just a thought?)

EDITED:

The first commenter on this post decided to click on the "Buy It Now" button and was greeted with a message that this is an April Fool's Joke.  Apparently MSN either thought this would be funny or they didn't check out their gadgets...

Regardless, I found this LINK that touted the April Fool's Joke.  Apparently ThinkGeek wants to know if people would actually want this product.  I don't know whether to tell them that this would be a great product for a fairly large population of people or to tell them this is a cruel joke.

What do you think?

 

Walking In The Snow and Ice

This winter has been quite cold.  We have had plenty of snow, but the wind has been blustery and has kept us from enjoying the outdoors as much as we would have liked to.  We have gone outside and taken a few walks around the neighborhood as the weather has allowed.

These pictures were on February 16th.  We pulled Carder in a sled for a while, but then he decided he wanted to walk.  He walked for about half of the walk - which was quite a few blocks!  He had a great time walking through the snow with us!

 

 

There have also been other times that the weather was warm enough to take a nice walk, but the ground wasn't cooperating!  Some warmer weather followed by freezing weather led to the sidewalks and alleys being sheets of ice.  We gave it our best shot, though!  We ended up deciding that it was too icy to go far.  But we had to take pictures because Carder was wearing the snowsuit my In Laws got for him last winter that was way too big at the beginning of this winter...