One of the greatest fears after Holland died was that I would forget her. I figured other people would a little bit. People are sad for her death in the moment and then life get busy, people move on. I know that I will always miss her and want to not get so caught up in my own busy life that I forget to include her in them. So we have started a few traditions. Here they are:
1. On her birthday, we let go of balloons with messages written on them. We send them up to the sky at 3:33 p.m. My favorite thing about this is how much Briz loved doing it and how much I hope my future children will love it. We also buy her one present: one that she would like for the age that she would be. We eat cake and sing Happy Birthday.
2. We visit her grave either on the 22nd or the 23rd of the month. Her birthday was August 23 and she died on October 22nd, so both of those dates have special meaning for us.
3. We visit her grave after we get back from a vacation. We always buy/collect some kind of present that will be durable outside and we take it to her grave. We tell her about our vacation. Briz has gotten very good about talking directly to her little sister. She has very frank and funny conversations with her. I love it.
4. The weekend before Holly Day (October 22), we will be doing our Holly Hoop race. We will collect donations for another family who has recently lost a loved one. And then on the actual Holly Day we are going to take the family the donation we received, some flowers, maybe a book about grieving, and just let them know how sorry we are.
5. Christmas Eve at some point during the day, we sing carols to Holland. This year, we might be gone for Christmas, so we will have to think of an alternative. We also watch our videos of Holland on Christmas eve. And then the morning of Christmas, we have a stocking prepared for her and that is the first thing we open. It is generally filled with things that remind us of eternity. She gets her annual ornament in there as well.
A few other things I have done to help me grieve:
- we made a book out of our funeral service. We collected the talks and added pictures.
- Out of Nick's talk, we made a picture book that we read to Briz fairly frequently. It's a story about our family that Nick turned into a little fairy tale.
- We have our Holly Tree out front that we look at every day
- I made a card book out of pictures of Holland and cards that people have sent us over the last year
- Nick is making a blanket (that's right, he's sewing it all on his own!) from onesies that Holland wore a lot.
- We have our Holland display in our guest bedroom. Eventually, when we're ready, we'll move it into a trunk or chest of some kind that we will keep out so we have easy access to it.
I am not trying to do a humble brag with this post :); just wanted to share our world of grieving a bit. It tends to be such a private and isolated thing. I like the thought of sharing it. It's a strange world to be a part of now, but regardless, it is the world Nick and I live in.
I feel like I can never do enough to remember her. I am still constantly thinking of what else I can do. I thought that maybe I could set an extra plate for her at Thanksgiving (does that feel too passoverish? :)). Remembering her in these consistent ways has helped Nick and I grieve. It is still so so hard, but it helps. And anything that can help in my opinion is a good thing (ruling out drugs and alcohol . . . right now anyways).
