House Full of Family
June 30 to July 11 was a house full of family for Heath and I! My parents came to visit from 6/30 to 7/6 and then my cousin Amy, her dad, Uncle Mike, and her two kids, Aleah and Ethan came to visit from 7/7 to 7/11.
Both visits were jammed pack full of really fun events. Heath and I got to be tourists in our own town...
July 1: Heath took mom and dad to the Booth Western Art Museum while I worked. Dad enjoyed it for the wonderful history and Mom enjoyed it for the beautiful art. Heath enjoys it every time because he is so proud of his southern heritage and a lover of history. I then met the three of them at a local craft brewery tasting.
July 2: Heath had to work so I took Mom and Dad to visit Millie in Alabama. We took Coalie along for the ride which was a riot as Dad was stuck riding in the back seat with her. Being the Velcro dog that she is, would only be comfortable extremely close to Dad!
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| Look at my parents with their cute dog :) |
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| This garden stone was a mother's/father's day gift from my sister Kathryn. I decided to place it at Millie's resting place until we decide on an actual headstone for her. I absolutely love this stone and was so happy to place it with her. |
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| Coalie bear got to visit her sister for the first time since she last saw Millie in our home. It really meant a lot to me to be able to bring her to see her sister again. |
That evening we went to a Braves game. This is the first baseball/Braves game that Heath and I have been to this year. I am a huge baseball fan but this year I've struggled to pay much attention to the sport. Last summer Heath and I were at a Braves game when I became certain that I was pregnant. I was so certain that I bought a little Brave's shirt that our baby would be able to wear this summer. Heath and I met at Turner Field so it only made sense that I would realize we were expanding our family while at Turner Field. I took a test the next day (Father's Day) that confirmed my suspicions. So here we are going to the game with my parents and I had no idea just how hard this event would end up being for me. Almost like walking into a brick wall, I was struck with jabs of pain as I watched so many cute little families enjoying the thrill of America's pastime with their kids. It was a very painful reminder that I would never get to share my joy of baseball with my daughter. The most painful part of the night was when the Braves did a little commercial break fun that mimicked 'Kiss Cam' only this was called 'Simba Cam'. The tune Circle of Life began to play as I watched the Jumbotron and saw parents hold their babies up to the world as Mufasa did with Simba. This was so painful to see that I had to look away from the screen but ended up looking out into the crowd of hundreds of parents doing the same thing. I completely lost it and sobbed into Heath's shoulder. I think this was the first time I completely lost it in public. I've been brought to tears in public before but never sobbing. This was one of the moments where as a parent of childloss you are completely blindsided by heart-stabbing pain.
July 3: The weather was super cruddy but we decided to head up to Chattanooga, TN to hang out in mine and Heath's favorite little town. We enjoyed good food and drink, walked around art galleries and the Chattanooga Choo Choo, crossed the walking bridge over the Tennessee River and did a little shopping. My parents were pleasantly surprised at how much this cute little town has to offer.
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| Haha, this is 1/2 of where I get my fear of heights from! |
July 4: Again dodging bad weather we spent the afternoon walking around historic Marietta square and in the evening we went to Acworth beach to watch the fireworks. We were lucky enough to have a torrential down pour start right at 9:00pm as the fireworks started. The drenching only lasted a few minutes but we spent the remaining 20 minutes watching great fireworks soaked to the bone!
Our visit with Mom and Dad was definitely peppered with moments of sadness that Millie wasn't there with us to enjoy this family time and "firsts" but overall we had an absolutely wonderful and fun-filled time together.
July 6 Mom and Dad started their drive home while my cousins and uncle started their drive down south.
July 8: Heath and I took the day off to spend with Uncle Mike and the Franks. We spent an amazing day hanging out at Stone Mountain. We hiked to the top which was quite the feat for two little kids and my uncle with two bad hips. The kids climbed around the water gym, we had a ball fight in a barn, rock-climbed and I was convinced to participate in the high-ropes adventure. As I mentioned earlier I am very fearful of heights and feel no need to challenge gravity but if everyone else could do it then I should be able to too. I started out very hesitantly on the 12 foot level, always choosing the route with handholds. Then we advanced to the 24 foot level and with less handholds to chose from I always made the more stable choice. I was then marched up to the 36 foot level where there was only 1 choice...always a scary choice!! It was very, very frightening for me but I did have a little mantra in my head going "if you survived the loss of your daughter, you can certainly survive this safety harnessed height challenge" and I did!! It was actually very fun once all was said and done and my feet were back on solid ground :)
July 9: Heath and I had to work so the group went to the Georgia Aquarium and Coca-Cola for more fun.
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| I'm not as creative as the kids |
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| Aleah is amazingly talented! |
July 10: We decided to take it easy. We started with a museum tour and hike at Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield followed by a day spent at the beach with the world's largest inflatable slide! Heath's cousin Zach and his daughter Aubry joined in which was great since she is the same age as Aleah and Ethan. The kids and the big kids (ie Heath and Zach) enjoyed the slide for a full hour before spending the rest of the time cooling off in the water and taking our kayaks out. We relaxed throughout the evening. The kids introduced me to making garden stones and they made me the sweetest stones for our garden.
I really enjoyed sharing these days with my uncle, cousin and cousin's kids. Some of my favorite moments were when Aleah and Ethan wanted to talk about Millie. Ethan even requested to spend quite awhile looking at pictures and videos of Millie with me. He really enjoyed watching the video of Millie's bath time. It warmed my heart so much to have them ask me about her and express their regrets that they didn't get to meet her because "she was so cute"! Ethan also told me that he was happy that we were planning to have more kids and he hopes to meet our next babies :)
So to conclude Heath and I have to express a HUGE thank you to our family for coming to spend so much meaningful time here in GA and in our home with us. It was such a tremendously memorable and fun time, even if there were moments of sadness.
