This week my family and I put up our Christmas tree! We started by putting on the lights. Then we added all of the ornaments. Something special about our ornaments is that my sister and I have a different ornament for every year in our lives! Each year we go out to find a new ornament that represents what happened since the past Christmas. That's cool right? This year my ornament is a really cool hockey puck that says "he shoots he scores"! My sister's ornament this year is a really neat pair of sparkling tap shoes, since she is a dancer. Christmas is all about traditions that I look forward to every year and that I hope to carry on as an adult. One day I will be able to take all of these special ornaments with me when I have my own Christmas tree. In the end the our house looked so festive with the lights hanging on the mantel and on the windows. The Christmas music bring joy to the house, and the thing I liked the most about the holiday season is family time.
Bad news. I found out a few days ago that my OTHER grandpa passed away while recovering in the hospital after his back surgery. He passed away at the age of 69 and I was a lot more connected in a relationship with my dad's dad than my mom's dad. Never would my family have imagined we would lose two people in two weeks. One of the special things I had in common with my grandpa was hockey. My grandpa played hockey as a young man, and was a big support to my dad and uncles when they were growing up playing hockey. When I became a hockey player, he would always be there for me and give me good advice. I will miss his support but I know in my heart he will always be there. A good thing that came of all this is that there was a lot of support not only from our family but our friends and our community, especially my hockey team. The love and care from everyone was just so kind and generous. I realized now that someone can have many different types of families, ones that you are related to, but also ones that you are not related to, like my "hockey family". I am very sad that my grandpa is gone but I feel he will now no longer be in pain. These past few few weeks may have been discouraging but I know that I still have a lot to look forward to and can carry on with all the support of my many "families".
This weekend was all about family. I went out of town to go to my grandfathers funeral. He passed away just recently at the age of 83. I had lots of happy memories of him. I felt down for a while but then I realized that now he is in a better place. At the service, everyone shared a happy memory about my grandfather which made me remember him with happy thoughts. The service was small with just my aunts and uncles, and after we all went out for a big family dinner. While on our trip we got to stay at my other grandparents house. It was great to see my grandmother and all my other aunts, uncles and cousins. I do not get to see them that often because they live so far away. I also got a chance to meet some great aunts and distant cousins that I had never met before. The great aunts I met were able to share a lot about our family history, and I learned more about my family tree and I got to see some really neat old pictures of my ancestors. I think its interesting that such a sad event can bring all family members together, and I think that is really nice.
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