Pretty Valentine's!

I am not much of a crafty person even though I think if I had more time I would enjoy it and do it more. Yesterday I remembered that for Dacian's preschool Valentine's party we had to do 23 cards. I could've bought them but the store bought ones seem so dumb so I decided for FHE we would do this fun craft tonight. Last year my friend Jessica made these with her kids and I couldn't wait until Dacian was a little older and he could do them with me. Plus last year he didn't go to school so I didn't need to make any.

I think they are so cute. Apparently you could tie them up with pretty thread and I am sure you could use all sorts of papers but I like the brown one. Dacian had fun embellishing them with these cute heart stickers and he also wrote his name on quite a few of them. They have been practicing writing their names at preschool and I was glad to see he can almost remember how do it it all. He kept looking at the ones that were done to copy and write his name on new ones. I thought that was pretty smart. He even got to write the C and N the right way since earlier they were totally backwards. Lavinia participated too and she liked playing with all the sticker and she put them on the hearts only they were't sticking since I didn't peel them off for her. She made a mess and then cleaned it up and gathered all the little pieces.

Anyway I guess that's all for now. I'm going to bed.

More sadness!

We recently got back from Shane's cousin's funeral. I still cannot believe that she is gone. It was so hard getting the news and also so hard to see her parents and brother completely heartbroken. I was completely emotionally drained by the end of the funeral.

My husband is a quarter native american and his cousin was born and grew up on an Indian reservation up in Canada. She was only 23 and left behind a beautiful 1 year old. She had this autoimmune disease that she discovered having about three years ago. She was able to carry the pregnancy and had a wonderful little boy whom she loved and mother so well.

She was beautiful, kind, smart and all around a wonderful person loved dearly by so many.

The funeral lasted 3 whole days. First the family got together and sang songs, cried and told stories about Meagan and then the next day they moved the body from the parents' house to a bigger building. There friends and family gathered and had pretty much done a wake like the one for just family. The next day, Monday was the funeral. It was packed, and more than 100 people I think stood for almost 4 hours. There was aboriginal drumming, a flutist and songs and dances and stories. Her mom talked about her daughter and that just touched me so much. I can't imagine anything worse than losing a child. At the same time I loved how full of faith they were, truly believing that they would see her again and that she was reunited with other lost family members. I felt peace in knowing that that was true. After the funeral we went up to the family land an hour away on dirt roads up in the mountains to bury her. I am so glad it didn't snow as I don't think we would've made it. It was pretty muddy. At one point the car line stopped for quite a while. Soon I saw a bunch of people on horses. They led the way after that. I think that's another Indian custom but most like it was because Meagan loved horses.

Afterwards we went back and were fed a wonderful meal with delicious fry bread and other goodies. It is truly touching to me how their community is so tightly nit together. They do take care of each other and grieve together and help each other out.

God rest her soul and I pray that her family will be able to go beyond this very difficult time.