Thanks...

Just wanted to thank all of you for your thoughts and well wishes these last 2 weeks. We are now in the process of cleaning out the apartment. It's harder than I anticipated, and I've been taking pictures of her clothes and shoes ( how silly...). I can't take all of them with me and they are so quintessentially her.... all the way down to the light up flip flops...

We went out on tuesday and found a piece of granite to have engraved as her headstone/marker thingy. It was perfect. Like it was made for it's purpose. I will take pictures of it and share when I get it back next week. I am anxious to get home. I hope it will be done by Monday so I can take it to the funeral home and get on my way back home. I don't know if that's good or bad, but I am ready to get this stuff finished. It's hard. I would like to stay and see the headstone placed at her grave, but I don't know how long it will take them to do that.

Nathan and David went back to AL today. Matthew and Connie left super early this morning also. So it's back to me and the two little guys.

So for any of you who have been through this before... what do I get rid of? I can't keep everything, though it's not like she had that much. I guess I'll keep all but the clothes.... hm.

I haven't mentioned much about the service, guess I should. It was lovely. I don't feel like going over it right now, so I'm gonna copy a post from my friend Kristin's blog. Hopefully she won't mind! There were so many lovely tributes to my mom on various friends' blogs. I'm so grateful for my many, many friends!

"""On Monday, we flew down to Houston and back for the funeral of a special woman named Gail. We had the opportunity to have Gail live with us for a year while she was undergoing cancer treatment in Houston. Living with Gail was a lot of fun. She is a vivacious person who loved life.
Gail had a green funeral. I had never heard of this before, but it was truly the most beautiful funeral I have ever witnessed. Gail's body was not preserved and she was not buried in a coffin. Her body was wrapped in muslin by some of her dearest friends and then draped in a beautiful white cloth. I was reminded of Christ being wrapped in muslin by the women who prepared his body. Then as I saw Gail's body lying there draped in the cloth, I couldn't help but think that she was a bit like Maid Marian or Ophelia or some other romatic figure. Gail had all female pall bearers which was also so appropriate for her and her resting place looked like a forest. It was peaceful, beautiful and natural.
Her funeral was very personal with tributes from each of her three children and two musical numbers sung a capella. David (Kristin's hubby) sang one of them and he did a beautiful job. Per Gail's request, there was a jump house out behind the church for the children to play. She made all of her friends promise to jump - and they did. I think the entire day was a great tribute to her and I think she would have really enjoyed it.
Goodbye, Gail. We'll miss you."""

So that's what it was. The bounce house was a hit, and Matthew and I ran out and jumped in it after the service, followed by mom's dear friends. I wished I had been out there during that little ceremony!!!

Anyways, we've been very blessed during the last several weeks. The yayas stepped up and took care of so many things for me, and that made it so much easier for me to deal with her loss and just focus on spending time with her. They even brought me diapers! And my Spring friends were so fantastic, watching the boys for me so I didn't have to worry about them.

Thank you all. And those of you who sent cards and well wishes!!!