Okay, the good things: The facility was very large, so there was plenty of room for folding chairs and people.  Brighid’s dances didn’t begin until 12:30, according to the stage schedule, so we didn’t have to leave the house until later.  That gave us plenty of time to get up to the Expo, which was…

First, let me say that I will never attend an outdoor feis in the summer again if I can help it.  I mean it.  Honestly.  Brighid was so hot and drenched in sweat, and we took the whole family out because it was going to be a great day to wander about, enjoy the Celtic…

Not how most moms describe their brand new infants, but as a panicked mother to a child with a head who’s head circumference is a bit on the small side, it’s words like this that are coming to my mind.  If her head doesn’t catch up, what will the kids call her?   Will she…

Yesterday was the day that we took my father’s ashes to the cemetary in Yeadon, PA to have him “inurned” in the columbarium that he and my stepmother purchased a few years ago.  We always joked that it looked like a mailbox, right down to your name plate on the front.  I have never been…

Have I mentioned how my life is never dull?   Have I mentioned that there are times when I WISH I had one of those June Cleaver kind of lives, where there is no yelling and screaming at your kids, no toys all over the house, no weeds in the yard, and no policemen on…

My father’s Memorial Mass is later this morning.  I have just finished stapling together all of the booklets for the Mass, and Brighid and I worked on a photo collage Thursday night to display at the visitation and the Memorial.  All I have left to do is print directions for the funeral director to give…

After a fitfull few hours of sleep – from about 6:30 until 9:30 – Ann phoned to tell us that we have a meeting with the funeral home at 2 today.  My dad wanted everything done on a Saturday so no one will have to take off from work to attend.  We have to find…

John Joseph Bilbrough, my father, grandfather to my three beautiful little girls, devoted husband, loving brother, took his final breath at 12:45 this morning.  My stepmom, Ann, was with him when he took that last breath, and I was notified shortly after the nurse in hospice pronounced him dead.  I arrived at the hospice at…

My dad is a funny guy in an odd sort of way.  He has a huge stockpile of jokes – all of them old, most of them told time and again – but that’s not what makes him funny.  Funny are the comments like “I was born on a Friday.  I know because we had…

The hospice nurse told Ann this morning that my father was at the beginning of the end.  I thought that was a week ago, but apparently not.  One of the other nurses put the stages towards death as Itchy, Bitchy and Twitchy.  In the very beginning, your skin gets very itchy.  They have been rubbing…