Reflections of the last week

Reflections of the last week

07/23/2006 11:25 am
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The previous two entries are from Helen's funeral.



Chris was in the trio with Mom & Helen. She always written a poem for our family - Mom, Aunt Annie.



Pastor Dravneek has always been close to Helen. Since he now lives in NC, he was unable to make the funeral, but wrote some info to be read.



Portions of my blog from July 17 also got read. When the Pastor got to the portion where I mentioned Helen influencing my life, I lost it. I think it echoed throughout the church. I was laughing too. I expected to cry, but not lose it and have it echo throughout the church!



Monday, we cleaned out her room - It's amazing how much stuff you can get in half a hospital room! We made two trips to Salvation Army, one trip to Vincent & Joanne's to deliver Helen's lift chair, and then loaded (I mean loaded) the Jeep with boxes - we had to leave 2 boxes behind at Vincent & Joanne's for them to bring down. We couldn't see out the back window when we drove back.



When we went through Helen's clothes, I knew either one of two dresses was the one that she wanted to be buried in. Yes - she let us know what dress to bury her in. One was the dress she wore to our wedding (short sleeved) and then there was one - long sleeved, that she had made. Since she was SO skinny, we went with the long sleeve one.



The viewing hours were nice. Helen looked like she was in her 60s and not 92. Her hair looked nice and the dress looked good. They put a hanky in her hands to cover them up - even the funeral director was shocked on how skinny she was.



It was great to see my cousins and people from church that I hadn't seen in forever both at the viewing hours and at the funeral. My cousin, Kathy, and I talked about getting together to do scrapbooking or the family history. She has an interest in both also. It sounded like my other cousin, Carol, is also intested in the family history, so maybe we can get some stuff written.



I also got to spend some time with two "distant" cousins - Marge and Theresa. We aren't really sure how we are related, except by a last name, but we talked about figuring it out.



I actually got to spend some time with my brother, Brett, who I haven't seen in two years. He came alone, so time was well spent.



Wednesday afternoon, Dan and I went to the cemetary. I told him - time to meet the family! It was nice. I hadn't been up to the cemetary in a long time. I also got some information that I don't think I have for the family tree.



Dan also got to see the church where I grew up. It was kind of nice to let him see more of Hornell than usual.