Tag Archives: grieving and growing

When There Are No Last Moments…Grieving and Growing

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All this chatter about Brittany Maynard makes me sad. Not just for her–although I have found myself praying for her so often since hearing her story–but for everyone in the conversation. So many hurting hearts. So many dealing with tough, tough choices. But what makes me so sad about this talk of “death with dignity” is that it assumes that cancer is taking your choices away and there is a way to wrestle control back from it and be in charge of “the end” yourself. I can see where you … Continue Reading…

Thoughts of the End of Summer…the Daily Farm Adventures {62}

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I came across this quote on Pinterest the other day and just loved it… I’m still struggling a little with keeping my camera in hand this year. But I find that my eye is still…trained?…prepped?…to see things that I would have missed before. I find that this farm life has shown me to appreciate things I wouldn’t have thought to like before. To see with new eyes. To be inspired by things I would have completely passed by. Like buzzards… I always associated them with death before, and that is … Continue Reading…

I Think Perhaps I Will Write Again

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I think perhaps I will write again. I think perhaps I have words again. I think perhaps I have missed the weight of my camera in my hand. Perhaps it is a lie that a “smartphone” can meet all our needs in one neat little device. Perhaps there is a need for more than one lens. Perhaps there is a need for time, a need to find time, a need to slow down the moments and run our fingers through them as they flow by. Perhaps there is a need … Continue Reading…

There Is a Price…the Daily Farm Adventures {54}

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I can’t seem to get back everyday words after everything that’s happened the last couple weeks. After losing Grandma Koeller, and facing some lingering demons of my own, the end-of-the-school-year fervor and fuss (K5 graduations, spring concerts, field trips, sports tournaments, etc.) and then the transition to summer fun…it’s all just left me…tired. I have heavy thoughts and words that go with them, but little to offer about book lists or baking projects or summer picnics and popsicles. I find myself sitting in the truck in the driveway…looking over the fields … Continue Reading…

What I Should Have Said…Grieving and Growing

Walking in High Cotton Posted on by 4

It has been a long journey in few days–up to Wisconsin and back from my great-Grandma Koeller’s funeral service. As I walked through the doors of the funeral home, of the church, of the cemetery…I thought of how, as you step through, you carry everything of your own past with you. In those moments, when you should be contemplating the life of a loved one, it’s the weight of your own life that is the one most heavy to bear. As I said before, grief is not about loss, it’s … Continue Reading…

In Which I Quietly Survive…Grieving and Growing

Walking in High Cotton Posted on by 5

This space has been quiet lately. Silent really. My family has been gathering around my great-Grandma Koeller’s bed and waiting for the Lord to take her HOME…and I just haven’t had much to say about that. Or about anything else, really. This isn’t a daily deals blog, or a food blog, or a homeschool blog–it’s just a LIFE blog and when our LIFE is quiet, the blog is quiet. I don’t really have much for “evergreen” content (as they call it in the blogging world)–words that matter in any space or … Continue Reading…

It Still Hurts…Grieving and Growing

Walking in High Cotton Posted on by 8

I’ve been writing a lot about the farm and lambing lately. And then I took a few days off because we had snow and I was busy keeping up with the kiddos and catching up on work from days out of the office. I don’t talk about it very much, but I do work full-time outside the home and trying to be all there when I am home, means the paperwork can really pile up when I’m off for a few days. So when I sat down to write a … Continue Reading…

Finding Christmas

Walking in High Cotton Posted on by 2

How was your holiday this year? Ours was beautiful. And it surprised me.  Let’s face it, Christmas isn’t always easy for a lot of folks. The first few years after losing my parents, our children were very young and I was desperately sad and our holidays sort of coasted along…our kiddos enjoyed themselves but I never really did. And when it was over, I never really felt like we’d had a “real” Christmas. I never found the joy and excitement that we always had “going home” for Christmas in years … Continue Reading…

Thankful Thursday…On Grief and Coping and Digging Deep

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  Today would have been my Dad’s 55th birthday.  Sometimes it gets very hard to be thankful always in the past tense. My heart hurts so much it’s hard to breath and reality starts to get a little mixed up. I start remembering great things from the past and suddenly I find myself looking forward to the future…then there’s this horrible, wrenching shock when I have to remind my heart and mind that that will not be the future. There will be a future–but that won’t ever be part of … Continue Reading…

Spring Pastures…On Grieving and Growing and Mother’s Day

Walking in High Cotton Posted on by 4

Well, we solved our car problem and picked the munchkins up in our new-to-us SUV on Friday afternoon. On Saturday, the Ladybug said, “I bet this car feels small to you momma. But not to us, because we’re used to driving in the “Zu-Zu.” We like it.” Then on Saturday I went out to run errands which the crew and we got to spend a few hours at the bookstore. Oh the drama of the bookstore! {smile} We like to occasionally take them out to the bookstore to spend some … Continue Reading…

May 2013–National Motorcycle Safety Awareness Month

Walking in High Cotton Posted on by 3

Well, it’s May. My least favorite time of year. Every year. No matter how hard I try to focus on new flowers and growing lambs and little boy dimples and fresh asparagus frittata..my mind endlessly circles back to those last weeks before that day…  That day, that changed the meaning of all the days that came before. That day, that changed the shape of all the days that will ever come after. That day, that drew a line in the sands of time for our family. That day, that sliced … Continue Reading…

Life’s About Change

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Have you ever heard that Patty Loveless song, How Can I Help You to Say Goodbye? {Warning–it’s a total tear-jerker.} I caught it on the radio the other day after a long, long time and it just brought me to a complete stop in my tracks. “Momma whispered softly, time will your pain. Life’s about change and nothing ever stays the same…” I tend to fight change. Well, that’s a mild way of putting it…tend to…seems to imply that occasionally I embraced change. That I don’t always fight it, hate … Continue Reading…

10 Ways to Break Out of the Grief Cycle

Walking in High Cotton Posted on by 1

I shared yesterday about a recent family grief and how hard it can be to set the pain aside and go back to your daily life. In the words of an old Reba McIntyre song, “But oh, that sun is blinding me as it wakes me from the dark, I guess the world didn’t stop for my broken heart.” And truth be known, I guess I’ve grown enough the last couple years to find that soothing. There’s comfort in knowing that God rules and that every human tragedy along the … Continue Reading…

Grieving and Garden Fences

Walking in High Cotton Posted on by 7

We’ve been out-of-town for several days, up north for funeral services for a shocking and unexpected death in the family. We got back late this past weekend and my heart is just so tired and hurting. I know what it’s like to get that call in the middle of a perfectly normal night. I know what it’s like to rush to the hospital and there’s simply nothing you can do. I know what it’s like to be surrounded by people trying to help until you feel like you’ll suffocate and … Continue Reading…

Be Tough, Be Brave, This Holiday!

Walking in High Cotton Posted on by 4

How was your Thanksgiving? We spent time with my sister and my grandparents, and Mr. Fix-It’s grandparents and oodles and oodles of time with our crew. It was lovely that we got to be together and have some fun together, but it wasn’t one of those holidays that will go down in anyone’s book as a magic family gathering. My grandpa was in the hospital recovering from colon surgery and we had to visit him there. (And he couldn’t eat any food, so we couldn’t even take him a plate … Continue Reading…