Mom's 60th

Well, we got together and threw Mom a surprise 60th birthday party. We rented the Hawthorne banquet center and I secretly contact her coworkers, church friends, and the family and we successfully surprised her. DH took some photos which you can check out on his flickr site.

Above is the photo board I put together for the party. It was hard to narrow down the photos to use. I scanned them into the computer and DH cleaned them up and rotated and cropped, then we had them sent to walgreens for printing. It was fun to look at and see how Mom's hair had changed...many, many times!

Below are the black and silver gift bags that I used as table decorations. I glued a photo of Mom to each side and stuffed them with tissue paper, weighted down with a can of tuna and we tied black and white balloons to each one.

I'll post more photos if I can get DH to release his iron grip on them!

Grandma's Obituaries

Here are the links to my Grandma's obituaries in the Washington Missourian and the Connecticut Post:

http://www.emissourian.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=20244206&BRD=1409&PAG=461&dept_id=33075&rfi=6

http://www.legacy.com/ctpost/DeathNotices.asp?Page=Lifestory&PersonId=123090440

Grandma Elizabeth M. Ploskunyak

Grandma_B&W
Originally uploaded by dehmystic

Born: May 27, 1926
Bridgeport, Connecticut
Departed: January 17, 2009
New Haven, Missouri

The wake for Grandma was held this evening at Antioch Christian Church. It was nice that the family all gathered together to have time to pay our respects and grieve. Several picture panels from Grandma's 80th birthday and also a new panel that my cousin created were brought to the church. It was great to look over the photos and point out our favorites and talk about the memories, not just the ones with Grandma but these led to other stories and discussions about family and times. Very therapeutic.

There were quite a few people who came by to pay their respects, mostly church friends, or coworkers. One special person was Grandma's friend from the nursing home, Betty. She and Grandma spent time together and performed together in skits, went on trips that the home would arrange and play bingo or fold towels together. It was great that her son was able to bring her out to the church.

On Monday, I head to the hospital at 7:30 for my Thyroid scan then on to the funeral at 10:30am. We're passing on a meal at church and just the family will head over to the Szakals for sandwiches, drinks, and our usual family get together game of dominos.

I'll have to break away at 1 and head back to the hospital for another scan. Not sure what the plan will be after that. Possibly back to the Szakals....we'll see how it plays out.