Fond Farewell

Yesterday afternoon the kids' great-grandpa died. We had them for the weekend, so their mom called Todd to tell them, which means that we got to help them begin the grieving process. Grieving is definitely a new thing for them. They have only had one great-grandpa that they have known die previously. Ironically, they were with us when we found out about that grandfather's passing, as well.

For anyone who knows me, I am no stranger to the grief process. By the time I was their age, I had already been to my fair share of tragic funerals. Now that I am older, I have lost even more people who I have been extremely close to. Because of this, I know that the worst part of death is missing whoever has left, not getting that last conversation in, knowing that you can't just pick up the phone anytime and call them up anymore. (Thank Heavens I am Mormon and believe in eternal families. I can't imagine how much worse death could be.)

Our way of helping the children deal with this process was by writing notes to their great-grandpa, tying them to balloons and the kids let them fly up to Heaven...or at least out into the open. It always helps when you put something down on paper. It becomes more real. It also helps you to believe that the person you are missing can read what you have written, or at least knows how you felt about them.

The kids wanted us to take some pictures of the process so that they would have the memory...either that, or our camera-ready natures have rubbed off on them. Either way, here are a couple of the pics we took. Oh, and the photo-shopped one is not my best editing job, but it sure it hard to work with balloon ribbons.



...and I had to add Austin's homemade punching buddy (drawing courtesy of Kailey) created from a spare balloon.