Life in Color Photo

I know, I know. "Amber are you okay?"  "Where are you?"  "I’ve been checking your blog, and I’m concerned."

I’m concerned about me too. Nothing seems to be going right. And that’s hard for an optimist like me to take. I want to be happy and giggly and think about silly things all day long. I want to be crafty and crazy and stay up late exercising my artistic muscles. But I haven’t done any of that. I haven’t done anything blog worthy really. I’ve been working, adding lots of new products (cool ones you can see right here). But that’s about all. And I have been staying up late and having fitful sleepless nights, but not over anything interesting. Just over everything. Everything I have to do. I feel a little better now that I’ve gotten myself to Franklin and updated my planner. I have lists all over the house but I still have a back log of them in my brain. I know nothing will ever be exactly the same, but I keep trying to get there, at least to that place where I feel that I can breath without thinking I should be doing something else.

Okay that’s as far as I got before I had a big fun dinner with Bj, Brent, Luke, and Sciarrino. It was so much fun; chatting, cooking, and laughing like crazy. Bj and Luke went to go check on grandpa and then grab dessert. Just after they left I picked up the phone and it was Bj telling me grandpa had another fall. I went to the store and got him a heating pad, but it wasn’t enough. He couldn’t move his arm at all and we were afraid the shoulder was broken so we had to call 911 because we knew we wouldn’t be able to get him into the car. We got to the emergency room and were shocked to see just how full it was. 60 people waiting in the lobby, and every room full in the back. Luckily grandpa just sort of did something to his rotator cuff and they were able to move it back into place and gave him some pain medication. Then we were rushed out of our room as multiple codes poured into the hospital. Lots of elderly patients, lots of babies and tiny children, and the man who was brought into our room right after us was getting full on CPR. So strange how it just takes one flash like that to make you see the light again. We’ve tucked grandpa in now and we’re back home. It’s almost one a.m. so this post probably doesn’t make much sense. I promise to update more, I’ve felt very disconnected with out my dear blog (and readers!).

Okay thank you, thank you, thank you! We have loved reading the comments from everyone. It is amazing how our friends and family have gathered around us to help so much. I haven’t really had to deal with a very close death like this before, and I don’t know any one who has either, so I didn’t know what to do or what to expect. One thing I’ve learned is that it’s so important to ask for and accept help. On top of a death turning your lives inside out there are about a million little things to worry about. Right now Bj sits beside me on his computer trying to hack into his dad’s various accounts and figure out where to start. Plus all this sadness, the grief, it really makes it hard to function normally. So we wanted to thank all those who have helped us this last week.

Bj’s mom and step dad. They flew down to California with us and ended up staying the whole week with us. Jim drove a U-Haul back to Salem with all of grandpa’s things in it. Kathy’s family in the area, especially her sister Nelda who came and helped back up grandpa were awesome.

My dad and step mom. They let us stay in there place in the desert so we only had to spend one night at grandpa’s house. It was so great to be able to drive back and just crash in a nice air conditioned home (grandpa likes it hot!). Dad thanks so much also for unloading the U-Haul before we got back to Salem!

My mom and step dad. Bill was away on a hike most of last week, so my mom kicked it into super mode, handling Ribbon Jar orders, painting our basement floor (we were mid project when we got the news), and getting things ready for grandpa here is Salem. He loved that his favorite cereal was already in the cupboard when he got here!

Sciarrino. Oh man do we owe her big. Not only did she stay here and watch over the place, but she cleaned up and mowed the lawn as well. She was so sweet not letting us worry about everything, plus we came home to fresh baked zucchini bread and this:

A giant picture from our wedding day. When Bj and I walked in the house yesterday and saw it we just started crying all over again. It seems forever ago already. We love this reminder.

Brent. My brother flew down to the desert, got delayed, came in at one a.m. and got up the next day to pack up and load a U-Haul tailer.  He left early with Jim to drive one of Bj’s grandpa’s cars.

Plus everyone else, the commentors, the neighbors who looked out for me, bringing in all our packages, everyone I meant to get to last week who have been so patient, people who cooked or are cooking for us. Just everyone. Thank you!

And to make you smile, grandpa quote of the day.

Me. "Did you know the first, your grandpa?" (grandpa is the third, and Bj is the fifth namesake in the family)
Grandpa. "No, no he died before I was born."
Me. "What did he die of."
Grandpa. "What is it called when you shit yourself to death?"

LOL, turns out that is called dysentery. William Henry Garrison the first contracted it during the civil war and was sent back up to a Union hospice type place to die. I have 12 boxes of scrapbooks from grandpa to go through. I can’t wait!

If there is one thing I’ve learned in my short marriage, it’s that sticking together and just being there for each other is the most important thing. No matter what, when things go bad, go so wrong you just can’t believe it, you have to stick together. That’s what Bj and I have been doing this last week. Before I tell you what a roller coaster it has been I want to say thank you so much for all your comments. We’ve read them all and it just means so much to us, they give us such strength, THANK YOU!
So right after I wrote that last post we packed up and headed to California where his father and grandpa lived. Bj has an awesome step dad, Jim, that you may have seen in wedding pictures, but Bill was his actual father. He wasn’t able to come to the wedding. We didn’t know at the time that he was very sick. He told us that he had to go to the hospital for some tests on March 26th, and because we weren’t down there we didn’t know that wasn’t actually the case. Bj and his father loved each other so much, but it was sometimes hard for Bj to get a clear channel of communication to his father. What we are piecing together now is that his father had been sick for a few months. We’re not sure exactly why he died, but we are sure that it ended a lot of pain (here is his obituary). Bj’s father was cremated and on Friday we drove him in his Corvette down to San Diego Bay to scatter his ashes in the ocean.

I looked down and it was just okay. It still sucked, it still hurt, but I knew it was going to be okay.
In addition to everything we had to deal with in terms of his father’s death, we also had a feisty 87 year old on our hands. Bj’s grandpa:

After a very long day our 87 year old child is tucked into bed. We are moving his stuff to a bigger room tomorrow. It’s going to be crazy, different, and hard sometimes I’m sure. But I am so thankful Bj gets to have this opportunity to bond with his grandpa, who adores him. He likes me too, tells me how small I am all the time, and that I’m a “character.” He said he was glad Bj married me, and I said I was too.