Thursday, January 17, 2013

Thursday, January 17, 2013

Tonight's picture was taken in March of 2005. I entitled this photo.... "have power tools, will travel!" Mattie gravitated to building and creating at a young age. He enjoyed going to Home Depot with Peter and when someone sent him these play Home Depot tools, Mattie LOVED it! It was soon after this that our neighbor gave Mattie a real tool chest with actual tools in it. I still have it and with supervision Mattie could manipulate all these tools.







Quote of the day: Cats are magical. . .the more you pet them the longer you both live. ~ Unknown


As I implied in last night's blog posting, my friend Tina and I have been working on a project. The project was hosting a surprise luncheon for our friend Ann. Today was a milestone birthday for Ann and I have been brain storming this party for months. Though Ann did not want a party, I just felt that given it was a significant birthday, a gathering with friends was important. I also knew that I wouldn't be happy with myself if I let this day go by without acknowledging her. As many of my faithful blog readers know, Ann coordinated Team Mattie when Mattie was battling cancer. If we or Mattie had a need, she found a way for it to be met and filled. Over time, through Mattie's battle our friendship grew. Ann became the person who sat with us through Mattie's scans, as we awaited Mattie's scan results, and a list of so many other countless things. When Mattie died, her obligation to us as Team Mattie's coordinator clearly ceased, but that did not stop her involvement in my life in particular. For a year after Mattie's death, I practically lived at Ann's house. Her friendship came at a significant time in my life and therefore as I told her today, there was no way I could let the day pass without doing something special. 

In the past couple of months, I have reached out to Ann's relatives and friends and with their help I was able to create over 10 collage type posters of Ann's life, I developed a fun fact list about Ann, and also designed a memory book which captured reflections from key people in her life. Needless to say this was a labor of love and one that I wanted to surprise her with. I want to share some photos with you of today's party.

Some ladies were unable to make it because of illness, but we were a solid group of 19!

Tina, Ann, and Vicki!

Ann is a Dunkin Donuts fanatic. So Tina designed this special display for Ann.

Like me, Tina loves flowers and is very gifted with putting them together. I selected Ann's color theme.... gold, silver, and green (her favorite color). Tina and I discussed flowers and I told her that Ann loves lilies, hydrangeas, and roses. So voila, Tina hand picked amazing flowers at a wholesaler and last night, I helped her create these stunning pieces.

Over the past couple of days, Tina and I transformed her house for the party. Tina was very gracious and generous to give me access to her home and I appreciate her efforts and level of support to make today happen. Together we designed the tables, the centerpieces, and Tina convinced me to use real china and silver. So literally I brought my china that I received from my wedding to Tina's house and I used my grandmother's sterling silver. In fact, I do not think I ever used this silver set in my entire married life! I always thought I would save it for the right occasion. I remember as a child that my grandmother served all holiday dinners with this silverware. So she would have been happy to see her silver in use today.

 

 

Tina and I designed three large table center pieces, and as you can see we staged the buffet table before guests arrived. We gave great thought to the food too and Tina came with me as we met with the caterer in person and talked through food. We are both foodies, so talking food is right up our alley. We picked all food with Ann's preferences in mind!

Instead of a guest book, we captured the occasion on a Pewter Platter. This platter came with an etching pen, and literally each guest etched their name onto the tray. It was a real beauty, that had an engraved inscription on it with our wish for Ann.

There was a lot going on with this cake. However its title was "chocolate dream" and it lived up to its name!

Tina designed an impressive bouquet for her fireplace and to it I added a FUN Fact list Poster I designed for Ann.

At the party were several preschool moms who I knew quite well. With one, we shared cancer stories and I landed up crying. There is something about parties that set me off. Especially when people want to know whether I want to have other children. It is a hard topic to answer especially when surrounded by a group of moms, moms who haven't experienced the death of a child. I am always the outlier. After the party was over, I helped Tina clean up and we debriefed about the party. Tina's parents arrived today from out of town and when Tina's mom saw what we did to the house, she was thoroughly impressed. Her comments, feedback, and insights made me feel good, proud, and happy. I could picture my mom saying the same comments. Moms have a way of calling a spade a spade, and telling the truth. As Tina's mom said to me..... "the attention is in the detail, and clearly we thought of everything." A comment that will stay with me forever.