Friday Progress

Last stack of thank you notes.....
for now. 

I'm starting to feel like I'm making progress getting things accomplished at home finally. It's slow going and I haven't gotten everything on my list done, but still it's getting there. The things that made me feel most accomplished today are getting the laundry caught up, getting the upstairs cleaned and getting thank you notes whipped. That maybe doesn't sound like much but when there are 3 little tornadoes wreaking havoc in your path it takes a little while.

Some of the conversations in the house looked like this today:

• Out of nowhere - when are we going to get a camper mom? I think we should go someplace different this year. It would be fun to rent a boat too. Do you think we can get a camper soon?
• Mom, remember when dad colored water and went to write in Ray and Crystee's snow? That was a good memory I have of daddy. (I'm surprised Aidan remembers that as it was 2 or 3 winters ago. There's an ongoing battle of Vikings vs Packers fandom here. Danny colored water purple and wrote Vikings in their yard.)
• Ainsley - "I went to heaven to see daddy."
• Ainsley - was playing on the ipad with a cat the copies what you say...."My daddy is in heaven. Where's your daddy at?"

Writing Go Vikings in their yard. He later put purple crepe paper in their trees.
And then proceeded to call them and capture Crystee's reaction when she saw it
for the first time. He sure was an ornery fella. 

I've been blessed in the recent weeks to be contacted by others who have experienced grief first hand. Tonight I was able to talk with someone else. It's both encouraging and reaffirming to know that the way I feel is just the way they've felt. They've been able to share what's worked for them to help heal and help their families heal as well. I'm super thankful for these grief battle buddies. They don't just offer the standard it will get better with time - which is the truth. They are able to offer words from the frontline of -it sucks; it's awful; you're doing great getting out of bed and going; I look for distractions (our family does this a lot); the days ahead are hard; there are still random episodes of extreme sadness, etc. 

Tonight at bedtime we talked about how we were all doing with things and acknowledged that we all really miss daddy. Aidan has voiced that he doesn't really like to talk about it. Avery says that he misses him a lot. So tonight before bed we listened to Daddy's voice in Aidan's bear that he has. "I love you very much." Such sweet words that are so very true. Daddy sure did love us and we love him.

Sweet dreams!