A death in the family and a hole in the wall....

Tonight J's grandma died. She's been going downhill for a few years now, first with various age related health problems, then she got dementia. She's gotten sicker and sicker the past year. J's grandpa, a very healthy, fit, strict military man has been taking care of her 24/7 and we've watched him deteriorate right along side of her. Grandma made grandpa promise that he would take care of her and not put her in a nursing home so he did his best to try and do everything for her, sometimes going for days without sleeping.

I of course got this information 2nd hand from my MIL. See, when J and I found out we were pregnant with B, we weren't married and his grandparents said we were going to hell. They are very strict Mormon and weren't shy about telling us we were going to eternal damnation for having a "bastard" child. And I kid you not, those were their EXACT words. Needless to say it didn't make for warm and cozy holiday get togethers. They wanted nothing to do with me or with the cutest little baby to ever see the face of the earth, at least in our eyes, unless J and I decided to get married. So we didn't spend a lot of time together and it wasn't until about 2 years ago they warmed up to B. Never me, but B became the light of their lives.

There's a whole lot of back story that is too late to go into. Long story short, grandma is my MIL's stepmother. Grandma inherited 3 kids when she married grandpa and she immediately did whatever she could to get rid of those kids. She treated them horribly, hit them, tried to send them away, she even once scratched her neck, face, and scalp all up right in front of my MIL and then told Grandpa my MIL did it! (Can you say PSYCHO? I know you can!) I think she even threw herself down some stairs at one point saying my MIL had done that too. I think my MIL was only 12 or 13 when the stairs and scratches happened. Grandpa always believed her, never my MIL.

No matter what issues and problems I have with my MIL, she has selflessly given a ton of time to take care of this woman, who has continued to be a nasty nightmare to my MIL even through her dementia. She's held on to the "hatred" for my MIL even when her mind was too far gone to remember who she was or how she got there. My MIL has been driving 45 minutes (one way) to grandma and grandpas house to help with housework, yardwork, errands, whatever they needed almost every day for the past 3 or 4 years. They knew grandma was dying, we even thought she wasn't going to make it the weekend my BIL and his fiance were getting married last month. Tonight we got the call that she was finally gone. We just hope grandpa can stay strong and not let himself slip away after grandma is buried. He's wrapped his whole life around grandma since she got sick and I don't think he remembers his life without the constant care of grandma. Please keep grandpa in your prayers. Well, my whole extended family could use the prayers about now.

So much else happened today but it's getting too late and I need to hit the sack. I'll leave you with the wonderful sight I got home to tonight...


My sister calls our puppy 'Miss Peebody" for obvious reasons. But we may have to start calling her Jaws or something. I guess she got bored and her teeth were hurting her since she's teething so she decided to chew a hole in the freakin WALL. The WALL!!!! I get her little teeth are hurting her and she feels the need to bite something hard, and the million bones and toys we've bought her obviously aren't enough, but why the WALL??!?!? B went through his teething stage also but the kid never took out any plaster!



A closeup of the damage. Down to the plaster!








You can even see the plaster on the carpet where it came off in chunks! What the hell is wrong with this dog? I think she's possessed or something! There's something just NOT RIGHT with her!