Blog - Page 2 of 5 - If You Give A Girl A Homestead

Day 1: 2020 Trip

Day 1: I am thinking what was I thinking!!??😂 Today was the longest stretch for the first three days of our travel and it was looooong. Georgia and Alabama was pretty uneventful other than getting ten minutes down the road and a guy telling me the door to my electric was flapping in the wind. Shortly after crossing the Mississippi border another gentleman flagged me over to tell me my spare tire cover decided to fly away. Aaaaaand. Even though I thought I was going slow (well below speed limit) I had a tire blow right after crossing into Louisiana. Thank God for the sway bars I had put on my truck. I had been staying in the right lane so it was easy to pull over and limp along to the exit. I had been warned by numerous people that a blowout was not a matter of if but…

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June 21, 2020

Happy Father’s Day, Jeremy

Today is the first Father's Day my kids spend without their dad. I am not sure if they even realize it is Father's Day. I will probably be sure to bring it up because maybe with our day of travel and it being a distraction, it won't feel as awful? Maybe it will help getting this first out of the way When we knew Jeremy was going home on hospice, I was sitting there talking to him about the things that had impacted me about him, the things I loved about him. I shared with him how I was proud of him and the father he had been. That our kids would never doubt for an instant of his love. A little while later when I asked him what he would want to me to share at his memorial service, he said with a smile, "That." So below is the…

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June 21, 2020

About the Homestead / Daily Life / Travel

A Mountain Called Grief

A week or so after Jeremy’s memorial service, I decided I needed to take the kids to the mountains for a hike. It was something that Jeremy and I loved to do. He loved the mountains. When it came to vacation time, he would have opted for the mountains rather than the beach every time. I tried to make our big vacations at the beach, but weekend getaways were in the mountains for him. Hiking didn’t happen too much over the last 14 years, just because the littles were, well, little. Our hikes or rather walks were usually easy when we ventured out as a whole family. We were just starting to come to the age with all the kids that we could do little more adventurous hikes because they could keep up. No more having to carry anyone halfway through our excursions or listening to an excessive amount of…

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May 11, 2020

About the Homestead / Daily Life

Grief

I get asked a lot how I am doing and I know some of them are not just a polite, “How are you doing?” but rather a “Dee, my heart hurts for you guys and I want to make it all better for you in some way and I don’t know how. And I really want to make sure you are OK” type of how are you doing? I know by social media appearances I am doing OK. I am getting up every morning and I am getting stuff done. I am posting the successes and the happy moments. But I am not posting how that every morning even if I don’t see it coming, I cry. Or every night, I am sure to have some tears well up. And that there are several times during the day that I am hit with it all and I crumble. I see…

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April 16, 2020

About the Homestead / Daily Life / The Animals

Isolation

I have had so many thoughts going through my mind lately as I have been home, trying to stay busy as the world is mentally and physically spinning from the COVID 19 pandemic. I have had a few people contact me and tell me that they are so glad that we had Jeremy’s service when we did, because it was after that weekend that things started ramping up. I have to say though, that I am more grateful that sick Jeremy was spared this. I think about how I no longer would be allowed to take him in to his procedures or be with him through his treatments or even stay with him in the hospital. I know that would have killed me and honestly him too. I know how important it was for him to have me with him. I was his voice, quite literally. I knew how to…

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April 2, 2020

Jeremy's Cancer Journey

Thank You

All the guests have gone home and today I am trying to figure out what life is going to look like now. No worries. I am not demanding a lot of myself and am taking it easy but still realize that there needs to be some normalcy for the sake of my kids. What normal looks like? I have no idea. We are taking this week easy and will get back to school and activities next week but in the meantime I am trying to get my ducks in a row. First, I want to give a big shout out and thank you to my dear friend, Leslie. She came down from NY a few days earlier than everyone else and jumped in and took care of so much for me. She was my list maker and enforcer. She even had on her list, “Keep on task.” I feel like…

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March 3, 2020

Jeremy's Cancer Journey

Hope

I was talking to my sister a couple weeks back and she made reference to her cancer five years ago. She said that hers really hadn't been that bad especially compared to Jeremy's. I stopped her and told her that all cancer is bad and shouldn't be minimalized. She agreed but then said that all cancer is bad but Jeremy's has been cruel. I had to agree with her. His has been very cruel. It hit hard and fast and has been relentless and destructive. We knew from the very beginning that he was facing a formidable opponent. We are continually met with shock and dismay from people ( mostly medical) when they find out that Jeremy was just diagnosed in September. The destruction of the type of cancer he has is shocking. But despite what it has been doing to him, Jeremy has fought hard... Fought hard to gain…

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February 18, 2020

Jeremy's Cancer Journey

February 16, 2020

Thank you everyone who has sent messages and words of condolences. For the notes and cards that have been showing up in my mailbox. To say I feel lost is an understatement. Fighting alongside Jeremy the last five months against cancer has been hard, but walking with him in his last few hours of his life was the hardest thing I have ever had to experience…giving him permission to leave but not wanting him to go. I have always said to him throughout this whole illness that when Jesus calls his name, to not worry about me and the kids, I wanted him to listen to Him and GO. Wanting him to find peace wasn’t hard, but just knowing what that meant was extremely hard. But despite all that hard, I was given a gift in his passing. I know when he heard Jesus calling his name and I know when…

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February 18, 2020

Jeremy's Cancer Journey

Watch

There hasn't been much change with Jeremy. They are still giving him a wide spectrum of strong antibiotics to try to kill whatever infection is going on. Hopefully, tonight he will get some uninterrupted sleep. I wanted to share something that's been on my heart for the last couple days but very much so today. I've shared how I felt like God gave my heart the word Trust before Jeremy was diagnosed. But after he was diagnosed, I felt He gave me the word Watch also. I wanted to add words to that word...like, "Watch what I can do," or "Watch how l will heal him." But I felt a catch in my spirit. No. It was only one word... Watch. There was no promise of healing in that Watch. But there was a promise. I just didn't know what that promise was. I knew what I wanted it to be. I've gone back to that word many times, remembering…

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February 9, 2020

Jeremy's Cancer Journey

Back in the Hospital

Same hospital, new view. This week Jeremy has been overall not feeling well and really weak. Long story short, we ended back up at the hospital yesterday morning because he has some sort of infection going on. They think it's a complication due to the procedure he had done last week but still waiting for more information. So for now he is hooked up to fluids and getting a broad spectrum of antibiotics. It looks like he'll be here over the weekend as they try to get his infection under control. I personally think he just likes being here just so he can see his IR team more. 😉 We joke that they are his IR wives because they take such good care of him and always come find him to check on him even when he's not in their care. They keep us smiling.

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February 8, 2020