Russell Neal

As you may have heard, my uncle Russell passed away last Wednesday. He had been in the hospital for 6 days and received a pacemaker on Tuesday morning. He was released to go home Wednesday afternoon and collapsed about 10 minutes after arriving home. Russell was the kind of person we should all strive to be: loving, friendly, non-judgemental, innocent, playful, and just truly loved life! He had Down's Syndrome, so he lived with my grandfather. So our weekend was half-full of funeral and family stuff. Friday night we went to the viewing. Russ looked great! Then the funeral was Saturday morning. It was probably one of the best I've been to; it was very similar to Wanda's (another special needs family member who was the most amazing person! She passed away 9 years ago). My brother, cousin Jaime, and I had a lot of input for the service. We, along with our siblings, spent a lot of time with him over summers and spring breaks. So we played songs that he liked and tried to keep the service pretty upbeat. I swear, I have never seen so many flowers and plants at a funeral service. He was loved by everyone he ever met!

I took a nap Saturday afternoon after everything was over. I guess everything really wore me out. Sunday Brian and I played with our kids a lot. We would have small spurts of work, but overall we just spent time with the kiddos. It was so nice!

Yesterday was a crazy day. It started with my getting up at 5:00, rushing around the house to do everything I needed to do before I left for work, and leaving the house at 7:20 which is 20 minutes late. I felt so defeated! I'll spare you the rest of the details but basically nothing went as planned. I worked hard all day on various things to make something happen only for it to not happen at all! Frustrating. So when Brian asked me to get the boys from school, I was thrilled! I had the best time with my babies last night! Go figure...this morning I barely watched the clock, got both boys dressed, pumped, fed Andrew, got myself ready for work, and I was right on time!