Thankful Mom of Five, Adoptive Mom of Two Ukrainian Beauties and Bereaved Mom

         Today I am thankful that I had lunch out with three good friends.  We went to First Watch Daytime Café. I had never been there before, and the food was really good! It is always nice to connect with friends! I prefer to go to lunch with a small group.  With 4-6 people, you can see and hear everything.  Two people were not able to come.  Our group is called "The Twigs." I think my friend Nancy coined that term for us.  Everyone in the lunch group is so nice. We are all bereaved moms, it is something that makes us alike in many ways, yet we are also all different. Somehow, not sure why, it is easier to share highs and lows with other friends who know how low life can  get to. I guess that is why someone chose that name for us.      We have a text group so that we can share good and bad days. It's nice to be with people who get "it." We know our lives will always be filled with grief but we can help each other through the grief. We talked about how gr

     Monday, February 26 Today I am thankful for today's daily Bible verse.  Galatians 5:22-23 22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.        Even if one doesn't believe in God or Jesus, the messages are good. We should all feel and share joy, peace, tolerance, goodness, gentleness, self-control and faithfulness.  I try to think of how God could forgive people who have done terrible things and ask for forgiveness. Then I think of parents and,  almost anything our kids do, we can forgive them. There are certain acts that I think are unforgivable. For me, murder is unforgivable, because none of us can change death. I will never forgive Dr. Glunk, but everything else isn

        Today I am thankful that a popular music star, Demi Lovato, has brought "mental health" out of the shadows and into the forefront as an important topic. She suffers from mental illness, she is bipolar. Mental Illness is a real illness and many people in America live with it and deal with it everyday. Millions of Americans face the reality of living with the illness.  Family and friends also are impacted by the mental illness of family members.   Someone close to me has suffered with PTSD from their childhood experiences. It is very painful for that person.  A lot of bereaved moms I know also suffer with PTSD. Sometimes therapy works, sometimes medication, and sometimes both things are needed. I know a lot of bereaved moms who suffer from anxiety and depression.  I am glad that Demi thinks it is important to  try to heal the emotional wounds of the survivors of the Florida school shooting.  Mentally ill people don't get better on their own, they need help.  Peop

HAPPY BIRTHDAY NANCY!!!!            Today I am thankful for spending time with my close friends and with my book club.  It was my friend Nancy's birthday so the regular crew of four took Nancy to dinner. When I am with these three other women I have so much fun!  We spend more time laughing than we do eating! The gift of laughter is such a precious gift, it is priceless! And we all love food! We start off catching up with the serious side of life and then we move on to the funny part of our current and past life.  We all grew up basically in the same time period.  We were all obedient, respectful children.  When our parents said jump, we said...How high?  None of our kids would be jumping if we said to jump!  They'd say not now or I don't feel like it! Carol and I are both former teachers and we laughed about the idea of arming teachers! We'd be afraid that our students would overpower us and take the guns from us.  Also, we have both worked with crazy teachers that

       Today I am thankful for a lazy rainy  Saturday. I love to listen to the rain on the roof and on the windows. I especially love to hear it on our camper roof when we are camping in the woods. I wasn't as fond of listening to it on our tent!  Today I slept in until 9:30, then took a long hot shower and got dressed.  I watched a few rerun episodes of  Law and Order SVU. I love that show. Later Dan and I went out shopping and to run errands.  We were in no hurry to get anything done so so we just went to the cleaners, CVS and then to the mall.  I had a Macy's sharing card.  If you pay $25 during the holiday shopping period, you get back a percentage of what you spend  I think it is 10% but I am not positive about the percentage back.  I shopped at Macys and bought a few shirts and pants.  Dan went and got take-out Chinese food.  Then we went to Big Lots and purchased lots of junk stuff we didn't need at all.  We bought lots of kitchen stuff like dish towels, sponges,

     Today I am thankful for all of the angels I have on a shelf above my couch.  Most of the angels came from my sister-in-law Pennie.  They are all in memory of Amy. She sends them at Christmas.  The middle doll is the AMY doll from Little Women.  I had that long before Amy died.  The doll dressed in blue is an AMY doll from Ashton Drake.  Most of the other angels up there are from Pennie.  Pennie lost her young adult sister many years ago so she knows that the grief is forever.  I so appreciate that she never forgets about Amy. Some of the smaller Willow Tree angels I have been given by friends or I purchased over the years. Today Dan and I cleaned them and cleaned the shelf.  I hope Amy can see them. Some of the angels are musical and all of the musical ones still work  On Amy's anniversary date two years ago, I purchased a large Carousel horse about the size of the Amy doll for Amy's grave.  There were nine smaller carousel horses with it.  I gave one of each of the c

           Today I am thankful that other people also have "senior moments" like I do. I was supposed to meet a friend for lunch today.  She is usually there ahead of me and I am never late. She also is never late. I am anal about being on time and so is she.  We were both teachers so I guess that is part of our  teacher mentality.  I called her after ten minutes and she was friendly and chatty. I asked her if she was coming and she asked "coming where?" I said to meet me for lunch.  She totally forgot and was apologetic.  I told her it was fine and really it was.  I am glad that I am not the only one who has had a senior moment!       Last summer I arranged a lunch date with two high school friends. I even came home one day early from camping for the lunch.  I remembered it the day before but that day I got up and cleaned and did other stuff and totally forgot!  It was not even a blurp on my radar screen! And I really wanted to go!  I felt so embarrassed an

     Today I am thankful that I had lunch out with my friends Kathy and Maryann and her husband Tom.. They belong to a bereaved parent group that I also attend.  Maryann lost her daughter and only child to an aggressive form of breast cancer. Her daughter left behind three wonderful children that Maryann is helping to raise. Maryann  totally believed Olivia and my psychic reading.  They all know I am a skeptic. Kathy lost her son, who was  also her youngest child of 8, to the disease of addiction.  Addiction is such a powerful disease. Some people think that addiction is a choice, it is not.  It is a choice to take the drug the first time, but one's brain chemicals change with drugs. No one grows up and says I want to be an addict. Sometimes people get addicted because they have been prescribed powerful opiates after an accident or after surgery.  And they can't get off the drug because their pain is so great  And then they start buying the drugs on the street.  Buying stree

     Today I am thankful for the Valentine's Day gift from Dan.  We were watching TV a few weeks ago and the ad for Finishing Touch Flawless facial hair remover came on a commercial.  Dan asked me if I would ever use anything like that and I said maybe.  I don't even remember the conversation but he did.  He got it at Ulta but it is probably available at Walmart, Target, and Kohls.  I used it for the first time today and it works great! It is only about $20.  I am always plucking unwanted hair and using cream hair remover for my upper lip.  This is painless, simple and easy to use. Sometimes the product puts endorsements on the box.  Some endorsements are funny.      On the back of the box it says Dermatologist Approved. Which dermatologist???  Approved for what or whom??? What age, what gender??? It also says..........HAIR WILL NOT GROW BACK THICKER GURANTEED.  How do they know?? What if it does grow back thicker??? It also says...BUILT IN LIGHT lets you see even the finest

         Today I am thankful that my best friend Priscilla is OK.  She fell down a few steps inside of her house.  Fortunately, she had her cell phone in her hand and called her friend who lived close by and had her spare key.  After a trip to the ER, she found out that she had no broken bones! I am so happy about that.  Priscilla lives alone so she could have been seriously hurt and just lay there.  About ten years ago, I fell down on the steps in my house, probably I fell down about 10 steps, I was carrying too much laundry at the time.  I remember sitting at the bottom of the steps and thinking OK, now what do I do?  I just laid there in pain and eventually fell asleep.  When I woke up, I felt sore and had a few bruises but I was OK. The older we get, the more careful we need to be. I am now nervous walking on ice, I am always afraid that my ankle will twist.  My sister and I both have weak ankles! I am just so thankful that Priscilla is OK and was checked out by the ER near her.

        Today I am thankful that Olivia and I had a reading with a psychic.  I don't know if I am a bona-fide believer but I never want to miss an opportunity to try to connect with Amy. Last Mon. night Olivia, for the first time, went to a bereaved parent meeting with me. I knew a psychic was coming but I didn't really hold much stock in psychics and I have never been read in a group setting.  This psychic had been to one of our meetings before and I was never read by her. When Olivia and I walked into the meeting, the psychic was already there sitting at the table.  Olivia and I sat down and my friend Carol said hi Colleen and Olivia.  Then the psychic said she had been hearing the name "Olivia"  all day long.  Then psychic then went on to read other members. Soon she stared to read Olivia, who is a big believer.  She said, there is an Amy or Amanda who is coming through. The she said that although Amy never met Olivia she had a strong soul sister connection with

    Today I am thankful that CVS marked their Valentine candy to 50% off.  I bought a few bags, not that I even need one bag! I love KitKat bars and Reece's peanut butter cups. How can anyone go wrong with chocolate, peanut butter and wafers? There is no downside to the taste! Candy seems to taste better when it is 50% off.  For some reason, my brain thinks I can eat twice as much when the candy is 50% off! My dad use to always take me to the store to buy candy when it was marked down after a holiday.  He loved a bargain and passed that on to me where candy is concerned. I loved to shop with my dad!  Priscilla and I enjoyed watching movies and eating the candy and pizza and popcorn last night. She brought a candy heart that she got at Target's 50% off sale! Sometimes I try to stay out of the stores the week or so following a holiday because I have no willpower where milk chocolate is concerned!

    Today I am thankful that my close friend Priscilla is coming over tonight.  We are going to watch old movies and eat pizza and popcorn.  First up is The Sound of Music! It's always fun to hang out with best friends.  Somehow it makes all the other sad or difficult parts of life easier to take. Priscilla is funny, so it is fun to be around her! Yesterday she watched Annie with her granddaughters.  I love that movie too, hope she brings it. In daily life, it really is the little things that we are thankful for.  As long as your family and friends are healthy, everything else is just little stuff. When we were in Disney World many years ago, we stayed in Disney at Dixie Landings. Every morning we would get on the  bus and be driven to the park. Our bus driver, an elderly man, would open the door and shout out in a happy voice, "GOOD MORNING, IT"S GOING TO BE A WONDERFUL DISNEY DAY!" He was always happy and bubbly.  One morning I said to him why are you always so

     Today I am thankful that my friend Carol, also a bereaved mom, sent me the link to this beautiful song by Brad Paisley. Carol and her husband and daughters started a chapter of Bereaved Parents USA.  She runs meetings twice a month. There are actually quite a few bereaved dads in the group now.  As I am computer illiterate, I don't know how to download it so I copied and pasted the link.  I hope it works. If not, go on youtube.com and type in the name of the song and Brad Paisley. You'll be glad you did!  It's a heart wrencher of a song but it is beautiful. The music, lyrics, and video are so touching. I would be really thankful if someone cold tell me how to copy and paste a link from youtube.com     Don't hold your breath about the link working, to save time, just go to you.tube.com       https://youtu.be/yYHT-TF4KO4   Brad Paisley - When I Get Where I'm Going I did copy and paste the link and it worked!       The video starts off showing the name AMY

          Today I am thankful that I had lunch with my four bereaved mom friends. We meet the second Wed. of each month.  Usually we have more people but a few had to drop out for different reasons and some had to work and some were sick. It was really nice to be a small intimate group.  We discussed the book Proof of Heaven by Dr. Eben Alexander, a neurosurgeon who had been pretty much of an agnostic before his near death experience.  We are all on different levels of belief in the book.  I felt good after I read the book, it gave me hope in an afterlife. Another mom thought it was all false and totally unbelievable and poorly written. I just love being with these friends.  There is an unspoken bond between bereaved moms  We get "it" and hope no one else we know ever gets it.  In the last week, I found out about the death of a young woman who went to elementary school with Amy. Her younger sister died three years ago, how does a family survive that? I don't think ther

        Today I am thankful for Planet Fitness! I never thought I'd say something like that because I hate to exercise!  But at Planet Fitness, I get away from everyone and everything. I don't like to admit it, but I think I actually feel better after I go there.  I also always sleep better at night when I exercise during the day! I take my book and my headphones and read and listen to the news while I walk on the treadmill. Don't get me wrong, it isn't like I spend hours there.  I walk on the treadmill for thirty minutes and cool down for 5 minutes and then I am out of there! Sometimes I am meeting my sister after the gym and she asks me when we will meet and I say exactly 35 minutes after I get to the gym!  From the first minute to the last minute, I hate the exercise but I know it works. I never knew how long 30 minutes was until I timed myself on the treadmill.  It is a fricking LONG time! I am so glad when it is over but I am glad that I make myself do i

   Today I am thankful for my Kitty Valentine from my friend Debbie's granddaughter Brielle. I always get a warm heart hug feeling when I open a package from Debbie because I know Brielle made something for me. I have not been disappointed yet! Debbie's dining room table has become a craft hub. Brielle tells Debbie that she knows I love her crafts and they can't mail a package until she makes something for me!        Brielle loves to do crafts and she is quite good at them as you can see! Brielle is about 5 or 6.  Debbie is also a bereaved mom and I am so glad she has Brielle in her life because Brielle is so joyful. Debbie's son Pete and my daughter Amy both died in 2001 as teenagers. We hope they are together, along with the children of my other bereaved mom friends.        And Brielle shares her joyfulness with me! She sends me her crafts every holiday.  I really look forward to her crafts.  My daughter Amy loved to do crafts too so I think seeing Brielle&#

      Today I am thankful that so many friends and family reached out and commented or emailed or called about Olivia's accident. I felt so much love for Olivia.  Olivia has had a hard childhood, then had so many back issues and surgery with complications, and still has pain and then an accident on top of all that.  This poor kid never gets a break.  She lives with constant back pain.  She is planning to attend cosmetology school in April but I don't know if her back can take it. She was supposed to start in Feb but her back pain was not managed at that time.  She also developed spasms from the epidural shots she got in her back.  She was so sad when she couldn't start school in Feb.          It is so nice to know that people care.  It makes a huge difference in life to have caring people in it. Olivia is OK and that is the main thing from the accident.    Dan and I went and cleaned out the car.  The sight of the condition of the car made me catch my breath and f