Missing Mom

 A lot has happened since my last post, Mom went in for a routine procedure and her heart stopped, they got it going and transported her. She seemed to be doing okay in hospital but she passed the day after my birthday unexpectedly. This has been so hard for me to take, she has lived with jim and I for 11 years and needed my care 24/7. She was my Mom but I also was her caregiver, It's been 3 month and 9 days and I still feel lost, I miss her so much. One of the things that hurts (this may sound odd) but it's when I walk out the door and don't say Mom I'm checking on the animals be back in 10 minutes or grocery pickup be back in 30 minutes. Hope one day I can walk out my door without the ache I now feel.

No matter how Mom felt she always had a smile,, I wish I could say love you one more time.

Past and Present

So glad April is over, seems like I am always looking over my shoulder thinking let nothing bad happen, I am sure most everyone has a month or a day they dread? I lost my grandfather and father in April, my grandfather (I was his power of attorney) when complications from a surgery occurred I was the one that had to turn off the machine.  I think this was hardest decision I ever had to make, looking back I think it was that much harder because I had to do it alone, I was the only one that could make it. My grandfather had a living will and it said never to be put on a machine because (he said) he did not ever want to put me in the position of turning it off, but things happened so fast the hospital put him on without (I guess) looking at his records. They informed me that once he was on the machine it reverted to the power of attorney and that person had to remove it and of course that was me. I almost wanted to say and now you are looking at his living will.....My father didn't have a living will and when complication happened the hospital wanted to put him on the machine (they said) long enough to run tests to see if they could find what went wrong, they did not find the cause but they said he was brain dead and the machine had to be turned off. This decision (with Dad) was between my 5 siblings and I, this may sound odd but it took a lot of stress off me knowing I was not doing it alone this time. With my grandfather the stress of what I had to do put me in the ER but with dad it was just the gut wrenching sorrow of loosing a very important love in my life. I could almost feel the distribution of the decision with dad resting on the shoulders of all of us not just mine, if that makes sense? My grandfather passed 10 years ago and Dad 4, both within a few days of Easter. I hope one of these years I look forward to April again, it was/is a time of family get togethers, BBQs, church events, it all still goes on around me, I just cant seem to get the same "feeling" I used to get. I hope soon it will be like that again without the pain. Sorry did not plan to post the above, I just sat down to post births and it happened...
On to the farm :) We had two births in April

                                       Bella had a girl

                              Snowball also had a girl

When looking at all three calves the other day my daughter laughed and said they look like the ink was slowly running out....

PickyPaw

Its hard to believe its already been a year since dad passed away. He is the man walking with my grand-daughter to the tractor in the main picture on this blog in case anyone ever wondered. We all miss him very much, I have come to realize over the last year even though a very important person in your life is no longer with you physically... mentally and emotionally they still are. Very few days have went by over the past year that I did not think "what would dad have done in this situation", or "dad would build it this way", or "dad would agree with us this year on planting an extra garden", or when I am looking for a tool "where would dad have put it" or when a calf is born... wanting to tell dad (he loved to name them). He also loved to give his grand-kids (all five generations of them) nick names. Off the top of my head... my eldest daughter was Molasses, her daughter was Peanut and her son was Corkey. My son was Jake The Snake. My youngest daughter was Taylor. My niece Misty was Missy and my other niece Tracie was Tracie-I-Catsass-Nye (what a mouthful). Her daughter was Hop-A-Long and her sons were 'ol Kenny and Frog. My niece Mindy's son was Popeye and her daughters were Apple Butter and Jack. My niece Keshia was Skeeter and my nephew RJ was JR. There were so many, if I actually stopped to remember them that would be a blog all by itself but those were the ones easiest to remember. My father was one of the most selfless men to ever walk this Earth, as was his brother who passed on just a few years before. When I was four years old, my father let me pick out the bees he was raising from a catalog. Of course, I accidentally picked a type that was also quite venomous. I got into them once and had the entire swarm attack me. There was so much venom in my system I developed a life long allergy to wasps and bees as a result. Then, when I was 10 I got into a wasp nest by accident. They were stuck in my hair and my father ran to me and placed his hand in my hair between them and me while he pulled them out, while he got stung as a result he kept me from getting stung at all. He then took me to my mother to calm me down. I certainly would have had a deathly reaction if my father hadn't run to my rescue and taken precautions for me at his own expense. That was the kind of man he was, he would do that for anyone. All the grand-kids called him "Picky Paw", he was always light-hearted and joking. Although it was usually at the expense of the individual he was joking with. When my kids were young they would fight about who had to sit in front of him in my van when we would go somewhere together because he would undoubtedly be tugging on their hair all the way, while blaming it on an invisible monkey or something of the sort. My eldest daughter has drawn up a bumblebee she is getting tattooed on her shoulder in his memory because one of her first memories as a very young child was the game he would play with her where he would walk by and lightly pinch her then blame it on a bumblebee, never hard enough to hurt. Just hard enough to annoy her, which is easily done anyway. She got him a bumblebee keychain when she was about five that said something along the lines of "World's Greatest Grandpa" and it was still on his keychain when he passed away seventeen years later. He barely ever said "I love you" but it was through things like that (keeping the keychain all those years) that we all knew he undoubtedly did. When my daughter was going through cancer treatments at the age of seventeen he did tell her "Love you too" when she hung up from a call to him and she immediately had to call me and let me know he had said it... to rub it in. He meant the world to all of us. My grand-daughter Sidney was only three when he passed away and she still talks to him "in the sky" and makes wishes on stars for him to come back. My grandson Riley identifies him in pictures and he was only two. I hope they don't forget him. Thanks to Facebook I have seen how often the rest of our family still talk about him. It's always the small things, like the nicknames and reminiscing about his fascination with playing the same Johnny Cash cassettes over and over. There was his poker games that he made everyone get in on every time we got together and all his bottle of Jack he hid for his "night cap" thinking we didn't know (he didn't really drink, just a light jack and coke or hot toddy before bed to help him sleep). We miss him every single day, all of us. Because of this, he will never really be gone.
We love you Husband...Dad... Picky Paw... PaPa George... always

Dad with my grandson Riley a few months before he passed

Lytle L. George
Born:
June 5, 1920
Passed Away:
4/1/2010

Lytle L. George of Bourbon, Missouri passed away at Saint Clare Hospital, Fenton, Missouri on Thursday, April 1, 2010 at the age of 89 years.
He was born at Granite City, Illinois on June 5, 1920 to the late Edward and Della (Litton) George. On April 8th 1941 he was united in marriage to Virda Smith at Steelville, Missouri. They made their home in the Sullivan and Bourbon areas the majority of their lives. He was employed as a carpenter with Cy Dace Construction Company and retired from there after many years of service. Lytle was known as a strong family man who loved his many grandchildren. He enjoyed hunting and fishing, making up songs to sing for the grandchildren and family get-togethers. He was raised in the Pentecostal faith and attended Greens’ Branch Church.
He is survived by his wife Virda of the family home; two sons, Dave George and wife Mary Ann Cain of Bourbon, Missouri, Don George and wife Sharon of Camdenton, Missouri; four daughters, Wilma Pratt and husband Don of Waynesville, Missouri, Linda King and husband Jim of Leasburg, Missouri, Pat Bunton of Leasburg, Kim Bell and husband Jim of Bourbon and Betty and Wayne Weppner whom he loved as his own; a host of grandchildren, great-grandchildren, great-great-grandchildren and great-great-great-grandchildren; a sister Irma McMillion of Cuba, Missouri; many nieces, nephews ; other relatives and friends.
Along with his parents, Lytle was preceded in death by a son-in-law, Elvin Bunton, two brothers, Freeman and William George; six sisters, Nettie Stroup, Rosetta, Evelyn and Savannah Geroge, Myrtle Stroup and Kate Immekus.
He was buried as he lived. In his pockets were... a tiny bottle of Jack Daniels (for his hot toddy when cold), a knife to cut his hay, his keys, coins to play cards with... and wearing his overhauls with his favorite long sleeved shirt over long johns with his hat and his boots.
In his casket was a lot of things made by his grand-kids and his blanket as well as a picture of him with my grand-daughter (he was her best friend) and a copy of the poem "Grandpa's Steps". 
Just before the casket was closed we had my nephew Rusty tuck a single bullet (and the previously mentioned Jack mini-bottle) in his pocket. It was how he had spent hunting season for the last ten years. My dad loved to tell stories! He said mom had decided he was only allowed to have a shell in his pocket and not in the gun because his eyes weren't what they used to be and she said he would end up shooting himself by accident! This was another one of dads long tails, truth be told he knew his eyesight was not good enough, but he still liked to go through to motions. They were married one week shy of sixty-nine years.

Loved Missed Remembered