Tears, Memories, and an Awesome Tree

Today was all around a good day. Kids made it out the door for school with no complaints. Then hubby and I checked out some homes for sale. Very nice properties with lots of potential. Then we headed to my aunt's house to continue projects. Hubby is remodeling their bathroom and I was starting my photographing and logging all my Grandma's treasures.

Grandma is looking worlds better today. She hasn't been eating well for awhile now and the nurse came yesterday and layed out a strict eating, drinking, and medication schedule. She feels better, talked better, and looked 100 times better than she did just a few days ago.

Today she had visitors. Friends coming by to check on her and see how she was doing. It is so hard for her. Her "old brain" as she calls it is not working like she wants it to. She was telling her friend how nice it is to have family taking care of her now. She started to cry. I hate when people cry. I always have to join in no matter how hard I try not to. So we shared some tears, a hug and a kiss. Love her!

After her company left we started the task of opening treasure boxes. Oh how much fun that was. We only made it through one box today. Grandma tires easily and even though she is just sitting, I think it is mentally as well as physically exhausting for her.

Found some very intersting things in that little box. An old collapsable alluminum cup that was a "prize" in an oatmeal box from long ago, a tool that belonged to her mother that was used to darn socks, an old can opener that she and her siblings used when they were young, and her mother's wooden spoon. I can't wait to see what we find tomorrow.

I had to take a break during the day to come meet my youngest little munchkin as he got off the bus. On the way I captured this beautiful, lonely, little tree.

How awesome is that tree? I have been trying to find the perfect one to do a four seasons series with. I think I found him!

Home not House

We all have a dwelling in which we live. As I started on my own journey, leaving my parents home and finding my own way, I lived in many different places. Apartments, duplexes, rental houses. Then right before my third child was born we bought a house.

It wasn't a big fancy house in the foothills. It wasn't grand by any means, but it was OURS! It wasn't as big as we wanted, didn't have all the features we wanted but over the years we made it ours. Added personal touches, moved walls, tore out old and replaced with new. Changed colors countless times. This was more than a house, it was our home.

I loved my home. I can tell you what was in every inch of that place. Tell you how many colors were on each wall. Tell you how many tears were shed and how much laughter was contained in each room. Where I rocked my little baby, where I soothed the bumps and bruises of the not so little babies. Where I cooked my very first turkey for a group of over 20 and stressed all day that it was going to be a big flop. It wasn't, just like everything else that day, it was perfect.

Then, like almost everyone else, economy hit us. It hit us hard. Hubby lost his job, bank didn't really care, didn't want to cooperate with us. So that house, our home, was taken away. All our hard work, all those memories, now some stranger is going to walk in and make it theirs. I hope that someone loves it as much as we did. I hope they make their own and create as many memories there as we had.

It is not all bad, let me reassure you. In exchange for losing our home in Tucson. Tucson where it is hot 80% of the time, dry almost 90% of the time, and brown and dusty 100% of the time. In exchange for that I get to create new memories in the place where my first memories are from. We now live in Michigan. Michigan where the weather is different every day, where we actually have seasons, where it is beautiful 100% of the time.

It is going to be so different. But we all love it. We will be sharing living quarters with my parents and my sister. It will be tough while we all adjust. But new memories will be made here, more laughter, more tears, and eventually, this house we live in will become our home.