6 months

Today marks 6 months since my beautiful girl went to heaven. Six whole months without her. Six months is half a year. I don't know, it just feels like such a big thing. I miss her so much. I never will stop, but it's not destroying me daily and for that I am so thankful. Funnily, after I posted an update two posts ago, I started off on a rough patch. That's what grief is these days, going along with life and suddenly you've hit a rough patch. Might be a day, might even be an hour or it may last days or a week. Usually for me, it won't stick around longer than a week. It's really strange though, there are things that I might think would trigger a rough patch but don't and then things that just hit me out of left field! I had a dr appt about a month ago where the dr was not outright rude or mean but her comments and her overall attitude regarding Grace and her death was just so surprising and when I think about it, I am surprised that it didn't just set me off onto a rough patch but I was fine. Then the other week I saw a woman pushing her baby in the same carseat/stroller combo we have for Grace, that we never got to use. Now, THAT was hard. THAT did make me cry like a baby. In my van. At the park. Grief is strange.
Anyhow,  I mentioned helping other CDH families. In memory of Grace's 1st birthday, March 27 I am collecting items to donate to CHERUBS for their Hope Totebags. CHERUBS is a wonderful support for CDH familes and babies. When you sign up as a member with them, they send you a Hope Totebag, many people get them while still expecting but since we didn't know Grace was sick until she was born we got ours a month or so later? A Hope Totebag is a canvas totebag with the CDH awareness ribbon on the front and it is filled with things that are useful to us CDH families. Though the things are useful and great, the sentiment behind sending each new family this gift is wonderful. The bags are filled and funded by donations. Each item donated has a sticker on it that says "donated in memory of" or "donated in Honor of".
Since I won't be spending money shopping for birthday gifts or time planning a party, I'm spending my time and money to donate in her memory and if you'd like you can help!
Items collected are:
*Travel sized lotions
*Travel sized hand sanitizers
*Travel sized tissues
*Chapsticks
*small journals/composition books
*small baby blankets, any material but wool
*baby hats/booties/mits
*disposable cameras
*baby hand/foot mold sets
*small picture frames
*refillable water bottles
*small holders for a lock of hair
*onesies/front snap baby shirts
*small teddy bears/stuffed animals
CHERUBS also includes wristbands and a CDH baby book and some awareness pins.
Here is a link to the Hope totebags site. http://www.cdhhope.org/wishlist.php
I will gladly drive up to an hour to pick up any items you wish to donate! We will collect until March 15th to give me enough time to sort and box everything up to send it to get to North Carolina by her birthday! Feel free to call or text or email if you'd like to donate! Thank you SO much!
(419)450-0120 or miranda.j.hall@gmail.com