A Day on the homestead

What is a typical day for me? busy...especially the three weeks leading up to the first day of school. I will go through everything we own and donate or throw away things we dont use. Then I will wipe down all the walls and wood work and windows. I leave no stone dirty in this house. That way we have a nice fresh start to the school year.  Here was my schedule for today.
6 am woke up
6 to 730 i cleaned out my lady bugs closet, went through  my moms shoes and put them away. threw out the trash before the truck came.
730 fed kids breakfast and ate mine
8 am did a craft with the kids
830 did dishes and wiped down kitchen
9 am put baby down for nap
10 am made strawberry jam
1130 made lunch for kids
noon folded laundry
1 pm put both babies down for nap
1 to 3 checked emails, entered contests and pinned on pinterest
3pm snack time
3 to 430 colored with the kids
430 to 500 played outside with the kids and weeded the garden beds
5  to 6 made and ate dinner
6 to 730 more outside play, more weeding
730 to 8 bathed all 3 kids, put on pjs and read a book.
now Im back to emails, pinterest and blogging, I did a lot of tidying up after the kids through out the day too, But this is our typical day. 01 02 18

Learning About My Mother

This time of year has been hard for my family and I ever since 2010. Its the time where my mom got seriously sick, and we had started to allow ourselves to believe that she wasn't going to recover. It was around this time, she had planned to go see the Phillie's with my oldest son Talon. She doted over Talon, her first grandson, tremendously. She loved him so much. So when she called to tearfully tell me she was too sick to go to the game, and that we should just take the tickets and go with someone else, I told her no, that she had to go, we could make it work. I did not want to believe what she was telling me. She told me more firmly that she could not go. And how all she wanted was to go there with him, but she was just too sick and weak. Not knowing how to cheer her up, I told her not to be sad, there will be another game. I think I was the last person to really believe that she wasn't go to make it. Even as we took her off of life support a month later, on September 13th, I stood by her side and said to her, I would see her tomorrow. I just believed that she would start breathing normal again, and that she would miraculously survive this horrible cancer. She did not.
Summers have never been good for me, If I could, I would just skip from spring to fall, (my two favorite seasons) and sleep through summer. However I cannot. From the summer I lost my friend to cancer, to the summer I lost my mother to cancer and each summer in between that things have just never looked up for me. I am not sure why I have bad luck in the summer. But I am determined to set things straight. Next summer I vow, to the Gods, that I will have a good summer. There will be no mishaps, no mistakes made, no people I love dying or turning on me. No hardships whatsoever. But for now, I grieve for my mother. I relive these days two years ago, all the last times i hugged, kissed and talked to her. I think of all the questions I have still to ask her. I had so much more that I wanted to learn about her. And I might never know. I have been going through her clothes, for now its all my dad will let me take of hers, and since they all smell like her, I am happy to take ALL of her clothes. As I put them up in my closet, and remember all of our memories we had while she wore this dress, or that shirt, or that skirt with those shoes....I realised I'm learning things about who she was by what she wore. She was so darling! She has the four of the same shirts just in different colors, and the same shoes in different colors. Each outfit had a reason she bought it, a certain intention. It showed her character.  A lot of who she was. Even her pajamas. I cannot express how much I wish she was still here, wearing these clothes, but since besides my memories, this is all I have of her, I will search her clothes for all the answers to the questions I wish to ask her, and hope that they will tell me the story I am trying to read, without the author. I will use them, to keep her alive. I miss you mom. Everyday. 01 02 18