My sweet Aunt passed away rather unexpectedly a few weeks ago.  It was a shock at first, but as the weeks have gone by my heart just aches.  My Aunt wasn't just an aunt--she was The Aunt.  She had no kids, she was never married, and it was just my dad and her in their family, so we were Her family.  She was always there and I still have a hard time wrapping my head around the idea that she is gone.

I was privileged to write her obituary for the paper, as well as speak at her funeral.  Both were more difficult than I could have imagined, but it was such a fun, positive thing thinking back on her life and the memories that we shared together.  Even now, I can still hear her sweet laugh in my mind.  I am really, really going to miss her.

The day of her funeral was absolutely gorgeous.  She was buried in the Salt Lake cemetary: about as high up on the hill as you can go.  The view is breathtaking.  I think the last time I went up there, possibly, was after my grandmother passed away 10 years ago.  I promise myself that I am going to get up there more often.

My whole family came together (which is hard to do as lives get busier and living locations expand further apart.)  My Aunt would have loved it.  It was the first occasion where my niece and her family were able to meet Bean and Boy and we were able to meet her little girl, M.  I hate how weddings and funerals are really the only things that will force us to drop our plans and come together.  Again, I am promising that this will be different.  I love my family and it felt so good to be with them all again.

Bean was super-shy for about the first day and a half, but then, 2 hours before they flew back home, she finally warmed up and started playing with her second cousin M.  She loved that this little baby was able to play with her (a sign of things to come in our own home when she realizes she can play with Boy, I hope!)   M and Bean are as far apart in age as my niece (M's mom) and I.  It was a flashback for all of us!  She was very sad when they left and asked me if they can come up and play again for next Valentine's Day. 

We ordered beautiful flowers for the funeral but, when it came time for the interment, the funeral director highly recommended not leaving them at the gravesite (which is tradition.)  He said that they would either freeze or become deer-food, so they delivered a crapload of flowers to my parents' house.  My mom said we were each taking them because she didn't want her house being the funeral parlor.  I've never seen a floral arrangement so big in my life--it didn't look that big in the picture when I ordered it.  I had 2 kids riding home in the backseat of my car and S had to go straight to work, so I crammed this arrangement in the front passenger seat of my car.  It looked like a jungle had exploded.  It made it home safely and, while my home ended up smelling a bit like a funeral parlor, we were able to enjoy their beauty a little bit longer...

S offered to clean up my Aunt's condo, which has proven to be no small task, but if anyone can do it: S can.  I went over a few days after my Aunt's funeral to look around at his progress and found a music box on her dresser which played an old Carpenter's song.  I opened it and burst into tears.  It's those little things that I think are hard when someone passes away.  Her birthday would have been next week.  I think I'll build a puzzle in her honor.

The Beginning of the End

It's no secret that S started finishing our basement last year.  I think we kind of looked at completing the whole thing as a long term (i.e., 5-ish years) goal, but we got the construction bug once again early this winter and, well, we'll have it finished (hopefully) this year!

One of my top 5 "must haves" when we were looking at new homes was that it had to have a gas-fireplace.  I missed not having one when we were in our old home.  I wanted a place to hang Christmas stockings and the ease of flipping on a switch and having instant-cozy was oh-so appealing.  Ironically, our home lacked about 4 of my top 5's, including a gas fireplace.  We got a new contruction house but it was move-in-ready which means "as is."  We decided that we would put a gas fireplace in our basement when the time came.

Late last fall S started introducing the idea of a wood-burning stove to me.  At first I was, like, "no way."  Where's the switch I can flip on?  You really expect me to build a fire?  They are so dirty!  Where do I hang Christmas stockings?  And so on...  The day we went on my birthday date was a blizzard.  We stopped by our friends' house; they just happen to have a wood burning stove that was installed recently and they just happened to be burning it that day and it just happened to be AWESOME!

So my feelings began to change just a little bit.

Then Hurricane Sandy hit and I was suddenly thinking, "what would I do in the wintertime if there was a disaster?!"  Gas would be the first thing shut off in, say, an earthquake making a gas fireplace useless.  Then I thought about power going off in cold situations and not having a way to stay warm.  Then I thought about the flat stove top serving as a cook-top in a pinch.

I told S immediately that I thought we should get a wood-burning stove.  Immediately.

Ironically, S had been researching installation of said stoves and it turns out that they are, well, very expensive.  The stoves themselves are pretty reasonable, considering the high-quality construction these days (making them so efficient that you can even burn them on red-burn days.)  It's the triple-wall piping to exhaust the fumes/fire/whatever that is so expensive.  And we have to essentially run it up 3 stories.  So S said that maybe we should just do a gas fireplace instead.

We were back and forth for awhile but when it became utterly, beyond bitter cold earlier this month I think we were both convinced that, despite the cost, this is what we should do.  After all, you can't put a price on some things.  So S went and bought a stove.

Here it is.

And it's going to be awesome.

The basement is framed out.  The heating ducts are in place.  The electrical work is run.  S is amazing; once again, he did it all himself. 

Stay tuned for more pictures of our basement transformation.

It's going to be awesome.