Blooming Gifts

The last week has been...well...a little chaotic and stressful. Since Mom's diagnosis, and most recently the big chemo, we have really had to work together not only as a family unit but as a community to give mom some of the best care out there! Lois E. relayed a valuable thought to me last night on the phone.

"People can't hide their strengths or weaknesses when they're in a stressful situation."

We were really struggling as a family letting our weaknesses and and low levels of tolerance tug at our united effort.With the help of our friends and reassessing what is important we had a good family meeting this morning and got back on the same team. I also recognize what Lois said to be very true, and thankfully so, about strengths. I have learned so much about my father and sister since May and am coming to appreciate that. Do we have our differences? Yes. But they are extremely gifted in areas that I am not, and for that I am thankful.
I am also thankful also that our friends have not hid their gifts as we have been in a stressful situation. We have lately come in contact with some of the best cooks, nurses, prayer warriors, note senders, quilt makers, flower fixer uppers, blog followers and more. Peoples gifts and strengths have been coming out in leaps and bounds.
One of the highlights of this last week has been growth in the wedding flower area. Since I saw and fell in love with Princess Lasertron's flowers, AND got engaged to the fabulous Luke, I've been working toward making some similar flowers of my own...and I've got help! Mom worked on some before chemo took over her brain. Jullie (quilting buddy with a golf pro son)has been working on flowers up in the mountains, and Jennifer and Aunt Maggie started working on flowers the other day when visiting at our house. Since the day of visiting Jennifer has been a flower embroidering machine! It's been fun to see the different designs other people come up with. Inspiration. Its also really cool that all of their loving handiwork will be a part of our wedding!Okay so this picture is a little posed. The Ativan kept her from doing anything requiring fine motor skills, but we didn't want her to be left out of the sewing circle. It was so funny, as soon as everyone was around her, talking, she was able to relax and fall asleep perfectly.

Here is just a sampling of some of the flowers that have been worked on. I've finally got buttons...
and stems on!I'm really having a lot of fun putting the stems on because I get to use my favorite drill trick for twisting the wires all nice and evenly! I feel like I know a secret!Last but not least, Val's friend Kelly gave her a beautiful set of martini glasses and a shaker for her birthday. Val wanted to put her favorite mints in the glass to use it as a dish. Then she thought , take a picture and send it with the thank you note. Then I really liked how much potential the picture had and kind of took over. It sort of makes me happy. I think I like that the mints come in different colors. Shoulda sorted em out and taken a picture of "One In Every Color!"