Making Time 4 Home

Today has been a good day so far. My mom's good friend, Gayle, stayed the night sitting up with her, so we could all get some rest. We still ran up throughout the night to check on her, but we were able to rest knowing that someone who loved her was watching her...what a blessing that was to us! Mom was in so much pain, that we had to give her morphine last night, but this morning she was rested and decided that she would like to sit up :)  She is now snuggled warmly into my fathers large, dark blue, leather chair, covered up with a quilted blanket I made her years ago, that is covered in pictures of her grandchildren. She is surrounded by pictures of our family, cards, items that dad had given to her....things that make her happy and comfortable....things that make her feel loved.  The girls bought her balloons the other day and they are starting to droop, but every time mom sees them, her face lights up with a smile. She has been calling each of her gr...

Saying good bye to someone is never easy, especially if you know that it may be the Last time you may ever see them, hug them, whisper that you Love them. You want to hold on to them forever and never let go......and then you have to leave...with that doubt in your mind, the whispered lies floating through your mind, taking root, that you were not there enough, that you didn't hug, kiss, or say you loved them enough. It's enough to crush you...enough to make you want to hide away from everyone.....even yourself. This is where we are...my Beautiful Mom is on hospice..and I am trying to wrap my head around that word.. Hospice......such a scary word....its  the knowledge that the end is near, but never knowing when that final day will come.  The past few months we have been making every opportunity to be with her, we knew this was coming, and we were going to make as many memories with her as we could, but there will always be more memories we want to share with her. ...

Christmas comes and goes, and I often look back and say " I missed Christmas" I'm sure I'm not the only one who feels this way... we get so caught up in the hustle and bustle of the holiday that we forget to slow down and enjoy the memories being made. When I was growing up Christmas was THE holiday for our house!! my mom went all out. we had tons of gifts, a HUGE tree, put up on black Friday (earlier if she could talk my father into letting her put it up). it was a magical time in our house. I love the memories I have from my childhood Christmases. My parents would wake us up at 5am and we would run downstairs, in our new jammies to see the living room lighted only by the Christmas tree and all the presents seemed like they were glowing under it. I have two sisters and we each   had our own place for gifts under the tree, and right in front of our gifts would be the unopened gifts from Santa!! They were the 1st thing we would see, and although I knew they wer...

society6.com  That foggy feeling you get when you have been woken up from a deep sleep and you CAN'T fall back to sleep....yep its been that kind of morning.. A little before 6am, I was woken up with an earth shattering (OK maybe not earth shattering, but it was loud) thunder, followed closely by a bright light that lit up my bed room... displaying all the shadows on my wall. Its amazing that even at 36-years-old, I can still get scared of shadows on my wall. I laid there quietly (cause you know that "shadows" can hear you, right) trying to rationalize what I saw. "It's just the bookcase standing in the corner....not some blood sucking creature that is lurking in my room waiting for my eyes to close so it can move closer" "It's the clothes in the closet that are strangely looking like a group of ghost" "That thing hiding and shaking under my blanket at the end of my feet is just my toy Yorkie....not a toe biting fiend...

Snow.......Snow.......Snow...... Its nowhere to be found! Christmas is 8 days away and, while it is cold outside, it doesn't really feel like Christmas in the good old state of Ill. Every morning my 10 year old daughter runs to the front window to see if the snow has started to fall,and every morning she looks at me with a small frown and tells me its "Still not snowing." She is disappointed.....but only for a  few minutes....Soon she is running around the house making plans for the day, she is talking a mile a minute, and trying her best to get her tiny dog Diego, to sit still, so she can take him out for his morning walk. Its not long before her mind turns to all the things that she can do "When" it starts to snow. "Can we go sledding, and then stop for hot chocolate and donuts, like last time" "Can we have a snowball fight,mom"? "I love the snow, don't you love the snow,mom" "Do you think I can build a...

I am so EXCITED to announce that I will be guest posting on one of my ALL TIME FAVORITE blogs, A Wise Woman Builds Her Home http://proverbs14verse1.blogspot.com/  this coming Monday! I will be posting a link when it goes live...Make sure to check out her blog and read my post on "Making Christmas Count!" Merry Christmas Shanna:) 

It has been a hectic few weeks....I have been back and forth to see my mom, spent some long days sitting by her bedside in a hospital room and felt, what I can only describe as, complete and utter exhaustion, creep up on me and grab hold of every aspect of my life.   My house is a mess. Our car looks like I have been living in it for weeks. I haven't unpacked. My poor family has lived off of fast food for the last week, and I'm pretty sure they have forgotten what a home cooked meal tastes like. I was drained, but I was also blessed. We all have those moments when we say something, or argue about something small and then immediately regret it. Usually we can call and fix it by saying I'm sorry the next day. I had such a conversation with my mom, and unfortunately for me, when I called the next day, she was unable to carry on a conversation, and didn't know what I was talking about due to her medications.  I was heartbroken.....I went around the hous...