Dear Mom
Dear Mom,
It's been three years since you died and you've missed so much. I feel kind of stupid writing you a letter - a letter on my public blog that you'll never see - but I find myself wanting to talk to you and I don't have any other way. Sometimes I drive by the cemetery where your ashes are, but I don't feel any tie to it. I know those ashes are not you.
E and L are 5 now and so much fun. I took a picture of them the other day and wow! E looked just like you in the picture. I mentioned it to A and he said he had been thinking the same thing. Their other grandparents take them a lot for sleepovers and fun activities. While I'm so glad for that relationship, I feel the emptiness where your relationship with them should be. They don't know they're missing sleepovers and fun with you, too, but they are.
Lately, L has been showing how much she's like me. Remember how I used to talk about my Halloween costume months in advance? I used to want to discuss next Halloween on November 1 and it drove you crazy. You'll be glad to know that L has been discussing her Halloween costume since last November 1. She is a born planner and is already making requests for her 6th birthday party. It's driving me just as crazy as I drove you.
E is so like you in temperament. She is so kind and gentle and accepting with pockets of stubbornness that catch me off guard. Every night, C climbs into bed with her (since she's on the bottom bunk) and they snuggle up together. They share a pillow and cuddle under the covers. Eventually, I have to peel C out of there with promises of her own pillow and pacifiers, but E always sighs, "I wish she could sleep with me." This is promising, since it's part of our future plan!
It makes me so sad that you've never met C. She's almost 2 and doing all the regular 2-year-old stuff - equal parts infuriating and charming. She calls herself "Sha-sha" and I have to restrain myself from eating her whole whenever I hear her say it. I finished changing her diaper the other day and we started upstairs for naptime, but we had to stop and say bye-bye to everything: "Bye-bye shoes! Bye-bye, E! Bye-bye, L! Bye-bye books!" and on. I know she would adore you and all your silly old lady shirts with the Noah's ark theme or glittery animals. You would be equally under the spell of her blue eyes and pigtails and buck teeth.
A and I are doing well, too, Mom. I know you always said that you couldn't have chosen better spouses for your kids, that you loved your sons/daughter-in-law just like you loved your own children, and I want you to know that your love wasn't misplaced. A is a wonderful husband and father and I know he misses making us laugh, just to watch us silently wheeze together, tears streaming down our faces.
I love you, Mom, and I miss you. I will always love and miss you.

