Little Knit Hats

 I made my 7th little knit hat for Jason's 7th Angel Birthday coming up next month.  It is a tradition that started when I was pregnant with him.  On conference weekend I was knitting a little hat for Janessa's grave, but, it came out way too small.  When I saw that hat, I had a really weird feeling looking at it.  4 days later I miscarried Jason at 12 weeks along in my pregnancy, and I ended up using that little hat to wrap the collection jar in--it fit it perfectly and was my last way of hugging and holding my little baby.

Every month after my miscarriage, I would knit a little knit hat in remembrance of Jason and then I hung them on the fence around his memorial stone on his first angel b-day.  They then became a part of his prayer flag.

Since then it has just become a yearly tradition to knit a hat for his angel birthday.  I've also started collecting matchbox cars with his angel age on them too.  I don't do this for any of my other angel babies, it is something that is just unique to Jason <3

6 Months

 Today it is 6 months since Janessa's angel b-day and it is

6 months until her next angel b-day and

this year it also marks that we have been living in this covid-19 pandemic for 6 months because everything fell apart in the world the day after Janessa's 10th b-day.  Ironic that in her 10th b-day year I have had to relive all the panic, stress and anxiety that I had of all the newness of grief my first year with all the newness of life in a pandemic!

I just really want life to go back to normal.  I want her next b-day to be pandemic free!

We went out and decorated her grave for her 1/2 b-day and then did our traditional crazy family sock picture.  People don't really understand why these crazy sock pictures are so important to me, but, for me it is the only way to have a sort of family picture and still include Janessa in some sort of family tradition.

Finding Our Yard Again

 Last year when we ended up destroying our entire back and side yard to add on an addition to our house I had no idea what a dirty, yucky mess I would have to endure with my yard for next 18 months!  It was overwhelming!  We ended up redesigning our entire backyard.  We had to move our garden, destroy our slide play center, remove damaged trees, redo the entire backyard sprinkling system, put up privacy fencing because our yard went up in height by 3 ft so it was awkward seeing directly into our neighbors yard, and we had to put in new grass.  We finally got grass at the end of August and now our yard is complete except for a little gazebo/play slide center in the corner and a shed on the side of the house, but, that will happen later.  It has been a lot of work!

BEFORE

AFTER

Last fall we worked like crazy trying to redo the sprinkling system, but, the winter months were quicker so we had to just be content with covering up the sprinkling pipe and work on smoothing the ground and getting grass in the spring.  It was yucky having to deal with the dirt and mud all through the winter and spring months!

During the winter we turned our attention indoors and worked on finishing up the new addition basement.  When spring finally arrived we set to work building the garden boxes and putting new boards in.  We got delayed smoothing the grass when we checked the sprinkler system and discovered that we had more broken sprinkler pipe on the side yard that we had to redig up and lay new sprinkler pipe for.  By the time we got everything fixed and ready and the ground smoothed out, it was the end of May, but, when we called to schedule the Sod there was shortages so no one had any until July and we didn't want to lay sod during the hot summer so we opted to wait until fall and endure another summer with dirt and mud!  We busied ourselves planing new trees and a garden, building new privacy fencing, and we opted to try grass seed in the front area and part of the side area.  They have done okay, but, not the greatest, but, we opted to not lay new sod there just let it grow and hope for the best.  My joy for the summer was to let some sunflowers grow in the dirt!

Happiest moment when the truck arrived with our sod!!  Finally we have grass again--didn't realize how much I had missed the color green!  It is so nice to have a yard again 😃

September Angel Birthdays

Happy Angel Birthday

to All Angel Children celebrating

birthdays in the month of September!

YOU ARE LOVED!

YOU ARE MISSED!  

YOU ARE REMEMBERED!