Flashback Friday...Our Circle of Strength and Love

This week.

It will forever remind me of the glue that began and continues to hold our family together.

Mom and Dad.

We speak of their strength and know that our circle of love started and grew from their lives.
It was their influence that made us the people we are today. It shaped our morals and instilled in us a love: for God, for them and for each other.

I wrote yesterday of mom's great desire to live and fight the good fight;
and yes, Mike, even as I typed out my story about talking to Levi about his great-grandma, I also thought I could have told him about the other fighter, who at such a young age endured horrors unspeakable and survived, never forgetting how lucky he was to be alive.

It was their faith, their spirit, their genes, who they were.
And we are the benefactors.

But listen.

It was because of you too.

Someone, and I can't remember who, once told me that mom had said that if she lived to see her kids (us 6) graduate from high school, she would be happy. I thought, really? It seemed like such a small goal, seeing that I drove her to several of her GRAND children's graduation ceremonies. (Hence, why I was so determined to get that picture of your kid with mom and dad).

Yes, my family.
Look at this picture...it was also, because of you.

Each and every one of you is what gave her the will to fight so hard to live.
And I know that these days, Dad might often seem somewhat lost...but now and then, I see that will to fight in Dad's when he focuses in and recognizes a face he knows and loves.

Yes, they were the original glue that started this circle that held us together.
But as the Good Book says...they reaped what they sowed.
They sowed love and strength to us and in the end...they gathered and still gather love and strength to run the race to the end.

This week.

It will forever remind me of the glue that began and continues to hold our family together.

Directions to here:
We are so dang blessed!