Catching Up...

It's an understatement to say I love, love, LOVE the return of fall.  The golden sky, the cooler temperatures, bright leaves swirling in the air...it's dreamy, I tell ya.

I've been feeling inundated with LIFE.  What else is new, right?  I sound like a broken record.  But every once in a while, I can't keep all the balls in the air in this juggling game that is my reality and things come crashing down.  Something always has to give.  At the present moment, Travis has been working really long hours...so this leaves me to manage daycare/preschool drop-off and pick-up by myself each day.  Typing that out sounds far less dramatic than it really is...add in all of this Minneapolis road construction, a job that I have to make it to in a timely fashion, and kids that are less than cooperative...I'm very slowly losing my marbles!  So, we're down to making sure I'm covering the bare necessities.  Get my kids to school/daycare in the morning.  Check.  Get myself to work on time.  Sometimes check.  Pick the kids up.  Check.  Feed kids.  Check.  And that's about it, folks.  My house needs a good deep-cleaning.  I desperately need to get back on track with my work-outs.  You know, for my mental health.  I have 4 piles of clean/folded laundry on the floor in my bedroom that I've been living out of...classy, I know.  But it's how we do it these days.  Gettin' by.  Sigh...

That being said, life is good.  It's been a tough year...but we made it this far and it's only going up from here, I'm sure.  October 6th marked one month since Trav's brother passed away.  One month of not being able to see or talk to or laugh with Jesse.  Heartbreaking.  Still.  My birthday was a hard day...see, Jesse was always an early riser and he was typically the 1st person to call or text me, wishing me a great day.  And it was just sad knowing that I wouldn't be getting to talk to him that day.  I still have the last text message he sent me on my phone.  I can't bring myself to delete it because, I don't know, it just seems so final.  I like seeing his name there, even though that text message was sent to me on May 30th....and he just slipped away from there.

   
I went up to visit him alone on Wednesday, September 4th because I just knew I needed to "have my moment with him"...you know, the moment you don't want to have with anyone.  Where you tell them how much you love them and you hold their hand and you let them know how much they mean to you and how much you are going to miss them.  I'd been holding back from saying what I wanted to say to Jesse because I didn't want him to think I was giving up on him.  But that week was different and we knew our time with him was short.  So I went there and I sat alone with him.  I held his hand and just sat there and listened to him breathe.  I tried to hide the tears that were streaming down my face.  One of the nurses came in and I helped feed him a few bites of pudding.  By this time, he was having difficulty swallowing, so a spoonful of pudding was challenging for him to get down.  I fed him a few "bites" of his water...liquids were no longer being given because he could aspirate, so he had this gel/water mixture.  He got tired fast and so we turned the lights down again and I sat on his bed by him.  His eyes were closed, but he could open one of them just a little bit.  And so I told him everything I wanted to tell him...and I told him how he was the best uncle ever and how Marley and Jax were going to miss him so much.  I said, "Jesse, will you promise me one thing?"  And he looked at me. I asked him, "Will you promise that you will ALWAYS watch over Marley and Jax for me.  That you'll keep them safe?"  His eyes opened, he squeezed my hand, and he shook his head yes.  Ahhhhhhh.................when I left, I kissed him and told him that I loved him and that I'd see him soon.

The next evening, Travis picked his mom up from hospice so we could all go for a walk together.  He told Jesse how much he loved him and said, "Sweet dreams, buddy.  See you tomorrow."  And Jesse passed away in his sleep at 3am that evening.  I like to think that Jesse felt as though everything was "buttoned up"...he knew his mom was going to be taken care of, he knew how much he meant to Marley and Jax and that his purpose in Heaven was going to be important. He was finally READY to go...

Crazy as it is, life just moves on.  We keep plugging away.  Thankfully, the kids keep us busy and happy (sometimes crazy happy) and they are constant reminders of all that is so good about this life.  Marley is thoroughly enjoying preschool at Blessed Trinity.  She's learning so much and is spunky as ever.  Greets all of her "friends" by name when they leave each day and loves all of her teachers.

 
Jax is in the throes of TANTRUMVILLE.......aaagggghhhhh!  When will it end????  He's still a mama's boy and he's super verbal, insisting on doing everything by himself.  "No, I do it...." is all I hear now-a-days.  I guess I kind of forgot what it's like to have a 2 year old!

Ok...quite the meandering blog post there.  But hey, when I'm feeling frazzled, I usually take to writing as an escape.  And so there you have it! 

Wishing you all a lovely fall weekend!

XO!

Stevie