Grandma's Visit & Thanksgiving

As I've mentioned before, my mom came home in November for a two week stay while my brother had his surgery. It was great to see her. And it was great to see how much other people love her. I've realized as I've become a mother that my mom has always had her own personality and friends. Somehow I never realized that growing up and so it is neat to really recognize my mom as the wonderful lady she is and not see her only as my mom.
Our time with mom was quite limited because she did come home to help run back and forth to the hospital and take care of Stephen and Shara. So we enjoyed some really simple moments with her. One of the things us Blunck girls look forward to when we are together is exercising. And I guess it rubbed off on Karl, so he joined us for a session of yoga.

And since mom was in town, I volunteered to host Thanksgiving so family could come visit with her. It was fun planning the meal with Shara and then getting everything set-up for our feast. Shara made these super cute turkeys for each place setting. Just a side note, Shara was so delighted with how they turned out that she couldn't eat hers. It sat on our counter for a few weeks so she could admire her work...until Phillip swiped it. That boy has got a sweet tooth out of this world.

And of course, mom, being one of the greatest hostesses I've ever known, helped to make things look especially nice for our meal. Thanks mom!

Phillip was insistent that we have our picture taken on Thanksgiving day. When he first saw Grandma at the airport he was rather shy. But he quickly warmed up. When mom walked into the house and started commenting about items she had forgotten about, Phillip quickly piped up and informed her that they were his things. "Grandma, those are my cups." "Grandma, that's my couch." Mom started laughing... Don't worry, we are already talking with Phillip about the day when we will move into our own home and have our own belongings again.

Miss Rita helping in the kitchen Thanksgiving day. She is such a delight to all of us. I've called Rita my peace baby. Shara nicknamed her "My ray of sunshine on a rainy Oregon day."

Rita warmed up to Grandma pretty quickly and even let her feed her breakfast. Unfortunately, Rita started walking just one week after Grandma left, so she missed that exciting event. But it was fun to share those first few steps with Stephen and Shara.

As you can see, Phillip really warmed up to Grandma and was constantly asking her when she was going to come back. Just the other day a few friends came over and were asking about Grandma. Phillip grabbed them by their hands and took them over to the refrigerator and pointed to a picture we have of mom and dad with about 100 of their missionaries and explained "That's grandma and grandpa. They take care of 200 missionaries. They are in Peru."

According to Karl: "Grandma is fun. She is nice. I love her."

Our best attempt at a group shot.

Taking mom to the airport and saying good-bye was hard. Can you tell that I bawled my eyes out the night before? Like I told my mom, I wouldn't cry if I didn't enjoy you and dad. But I do enjoy my parents tremendously and so it's hard to say good-bye. In fact, I'd cry as I would head off to every semester of college. As a family we joke about Lynette being a mamma's girl, but I guess I am too.

It was hard to say good-bye but I'm grateful that I can share my parents with all their missionaries. They have always been such a blessing to me so I know they are a great blessing to them as well.