Urns

Tonight was FCY, so Uncle George, Mom and I dropped Maddie off there.  One of the things we did though was stick around, and that gave several people there that we know the chance to be with Mom and offer condolences.  We were there because on the last day Nana had a caretaker, a sitter essentially, the lady who came into Nana's room went to Free Chapel.  And lo, she had a thirteen year old granddaughter who she thought would greatly benefit from a mid-week church service for young students.  To which Mom and I replied, "We happen to know of a service..."  We've been in contact with the grandmother ever since, and we were expecting the young girl to come tonight so that we could welcome her to FCY, but that might have to happen next week.  Anyway, Maddie enjoyed the service tonight of course, and meanwhile, Uncle George, Mom and I went over to Cheddars to get something to eat, which is never a small amount of food there.  I never have room in my stomach for the order of fries that comes with all the food, so I bring it home and we use the oven to cook it up for Maddie later on.  Which she ate tonight.

We're moving things out of the assisted living place.  Tomorrow we'll finish that up with a moving company, as there's no point in the three of us trying to move all that heavy stuff up the stairs on our own. Might as well pay someone else to do that, and return a good bit of the furniture to the guest room.  That's all tomorrow.  But today was the bittersweet process of cleaning out that room, and Uncle George was there to help with that.

I was at work a good bit today, and I got to also hear about the visit to the funeral home, which had a moment of amusement:  there are duck urns.  To explain, there apparently are different shape urns that the remains of a loved one can be put into.  I've always just thought of a vase or a small marble box.  But there are resin ducks.  Literally, it's a life-sized duck-shape, a decorative decoy duck that you can place on your mantel and oh, it has someone's remains inside.  Uncle George and Mom opted for a nice box with a hummingbird engraved on the front.  But upon further research, I saw that yes, there are all kinds of unique urns out there that I had no idea about.  Even a Death Star urn.

There's a small thermal exhaust port on the side that's somewhat concerning, but otherwise that's a fun tribute for a Star Wars fan.  You learn something every day - I hadn't really thought of anything else that could be an urn, and suddenly we were finding football helmets and even Spider-man.  

Moving on, we were tired again tonight, but we squeezed in an episode of "Monk" because Maddie is hooked.  Mom and I don't remember much of these episodes at this point, so we're feeling like it's the first time we're seeing some of them, so it's fun to go back and see these.

We closed out the day with reading, and with prayer.  Many people have been offering condolences, and we did communicate with Nana's remaining family in England about her passing.  They did all have one last conversation a few weeks ago from the hospital, one over the computer where they could see each other face to face.  That was nice.  We posted the news on social media and the condolences have been pouring in.  A lot of people knew Nana as she kept us company wherever we went for a few years.  She is beloved at the martial arts studio.  There's a chair there that she always sat in, always looking through the window and watching students train and spar.

Everyone is still exhausted from all of this, emotionally and physically.  Got a lot done today, but it's time for rest.