My Grandmother

Christmas 2009.  My mother, Aunt Lori, Mimi, Aunt Toni, Aunt Sherrie

It is with great sadness that I report that my last living grandparent has, quite likely, only a few days left on this earth.  My maternal grandmother, Mimi, fell and broke her hip on Thursday evening.  She underwent surgery on Friday and has not awoken.  She broke her other hip last year about this same time and recovered very nicely from it but it appears not to be this time.  Her primary affliction is her Alzheimer's but I don't know if that has anything to do with this or not.  My mother, her three sisters, and the rest of the family are gathering in Cape Cod.  I'll be going up with the girls and Ricky (who was planning on coming down here anyway because he's on spring break from his internship) on Friday and Duncan will join us when things become clearer.  My heart aches and my brain keeps replaying all of the memories, especially from my childhood.  I will have more to write at a later time.

Despite the present circumstances, I'm trying to go on as normal because of the girls.  I don't want Calleigh to become distressed so I haven't said anything to her.  This morning we had been planning on going to Hollywood Studios but Duncan didn't feel like getting up earlier than usual and since it is his birthday weekend, I figured it was his right.  It worked out for the best anyway because we ended up at the Orlando Science Center.  We have actually never been there (other than to see a movie once with the pathfinders) so it was all new to us.  Both Duncan and I came away very impressed.  They have quite a few exhibits/areas for toddlers/kids.  We ended up purchasing the annual membership which also gives us free visits to many other museums all over the country including the Boston Science Museum and the Boston Children's Museum which I'm sure we will be visiting in the near future.  There happened to be a chocolate festival taking place there today although that was only of minor interest to us - - although it did make it very crowded.  I'm sure we've now seen it at it's busiest.  Anyway, we did let Calleigh have a little thing of chocolate gelato at the end.  No doubt on our next visit she'll be wondering where the gelato is as though that's part of the museum!  One of the exhibits was made up of skeletons, brains, and other part of the human body.  We were able to point out to Calleigh the bone on her arm that popped out and then Duncan explained how the bones make the skeleton of the human body, etc.  She seemed to be pretty intrigued about the human body or at least the words because when we got home she kept repeating "human body" and then started asking us where the human body was.  Duncan said that he was a human body, and that Mommy was, and that Calleigh herself was a human body.  That was just too much for her and she shouted quite loudly, "I'm not a human body.  I'm a kid!"  But then she thought more about it and said that she was a toddler and a girl too.

What is more fun than playing in water?  

Running beneath the "street" in the kids' play area.

Crawling under a tree.  Don't worry - - Aubree was removed before the escapade.

This simulated a hurricane.  We thought she might be scared but she loved the wind!

Little Aubree got to do something fun too!

Last night Ron and Elaine came to over to babysit so Duncan and I could to out to celebrate his birthday.  We had planned to meet David, Yully, Megan, Tiffany, and Anthony at the Cheesecake Factory but with an hour and fifteen minute wait, that idea was quickly nixed.  We ended up at the Olive Garden instead but still enjoyed ourselves (and really, I'm sure we could have gone anywhere and enjoyed ourselves just for the mere fact that we could eat without having to worry about entertaining the kids).  Afterwards, Duncan and I swung by the Cheesecake Factory to get some cheesecakes to go (we had gift cards) and brought them back to the house.  Even at 10 pm, there was still a line of people waiting to be seated.  That place does some good business I say.

Question:  How can you tell that you spend a lot of time with your kids?
Answer:  When you say something to your husband and it sounds like this, "Hold the oven door open so I can get the pizza out Munchkin."  Ha!

I must say that I feel somewhat awkward writing these things when there is much sadness in my family.  I only write as a possible diversion for an untenable situation.  My heart is with my family.