~Live Laugh Love with the Sullivan's~

Sorry that it's been a few weeks since I've posted last, my life has been a bit hairy lately. Since my last post I have started a new job watching a good friends 3 year old son 4 days a week. It's going absolutely wonderfully. He brings so much love, joy & energy into our house giving each day a bright new adventure. I have also finished school for the quarter, have been trying to gear up for Christmas without my smarter then a whip daughter figuring anything out, and then have been halted by the deaths of my step-grandmother and a dear friend of mine.

I feel like I am dealing well with the passing of Grandma Mary. She was 89 years old & lived a good, long life. God knew that she was ill & that it was her time to be with him once again. I on the other hand am not doing so well with the loss of my friend Jamie. She & I grew close way back before Chris and I were even engaged. We were in an accountability group together through our college bible study. There I truly grew to know her heart and the complete in's & out's of her. She was an absolutely amazing woman all around. I shared everything with her, & she with I. It's hard to think that someone you love so much is now all of the sudden gone. I do know that she's in heaven now and loving every glorious minute, but for selfish reasons of my own I wasn't ready to give her up yet.

With God's helping hand I was blessed with a free airline ticket to fly home for sweet Jamie's funeral this last Saturday. If it wasn't for that ticket and the amazing person (who I don't even know) I wouldn't have been able to make it back to Spokane for the service. The pass & all of eastern washington got blasted with an awful snow storm on Friday morning right when I had originally planned on leaving which made the roads extremely unsafe to drive. They also closed down the pass and many sections of I-90 due to unsafe conditions. But with the sincerity and kind heart of a friend of a friend I got to fly for free on Friday night and was there lickity split, no problems at all. And I have to add that Carter was a fabulous flying buddy.

We stayed with Mom and Dad Friday night and then they drove me to the funeral Saturday afternoon. I don't know that I can ever fully explain the feeling that I had when I walked into the church so the best way to put it was that my heart was in my stomach, or maybe it was my ankles... and the frog in my throat was so big that I couldn't swallow at all.

I think I've been blessed tremendously with how my Grandpa Roy has dealt with the heart attacks that he has suffered because he has always made it to the hospital in time and with surgery has had the problem fixed and is here today. So when I heard that dear Jamie who was only 36 had a heart attack and passed immediately I was for lack of better explanation, in complete shock and am still in that state this very moment as I write about it.

So, with everything that has been handed to me lately I feel that it has given me an opportunity to sit back and truly understand everything that I have been blessed with. I am so beyond thankful for all of the gifts that God has blessed me with. I can no longer take any of them for granted because they could be taken from me at any given and unexpected time. Life is such an amazing and precious gift, let's NEVER take it for granted.

My heart is very heavy right now so I am going to stop for now. I am praying that next week's post has a much brighter tune.

~God Bless ~