Nanny's Funeral - Wednesday, 9/26/2007

Nanny's memorial service and funeral were beautiful. The preacher that led the services did a wonderful job describing Nanny. He spent some time talking with family to get an idea of who she was. The only thing that bothered me slightly was that he mispronounced Nanny's name every time he said it. Nanny's name was "Alene" pronounced like you would the man's name "Albert." PePa often called her "Al." My other grandmother's name was "Aileen," and he pronounced her name like it was spelled that way. Nanny probably would have corrected him! Other than that, though, his words were moving. It was sad yet comforting at the same time to know she is at peace in Heaven. Right before the service began, PePa handed my mom Nanny's wedding ring. This was emotional for all of us because Nanny always wore that ring. When I think of Nanny's hands, hands so beautiful because of all the love she shared with them, I always see that ring on her hand, whether she is cooking, doing dishes, shelling peas, working a word find, or embroidering something for a family member. She often spoke about how she would be giving that ring to Mom when she died. I hated to hear her speak about that because it made me sad to think of Nanny dying, but you could tell it was very important to her that Mom have it. She told so many stories about her ring, how they got such a good deal on it and how much she loved the white gold and the setting. It was hard to see it off of Nanny's hand, but I will always remember Nanny's hands.



This is the program from Nanny's memorial - Tammie said they chose this picture because the chair reminded them of Nanny's chair she sat outside in at their home on Lake Livingston. Nanny would sit outside almost every evening to relax. I love their choice; Thomas Kinkade is my favorite artist. I have over 20 jigsaw puzzles of his paintings, and one of my most prized possesions is an authentic print I have of one of his paintings Dan got me for my birthday a few years ago. It brings me joy in my heart just looking at his artwork. He is the "Painter of Light". Nanny was truly a light in our lives in this world, and now she is a light in Heaven shining her love down upon us...






This is a picture of some of the roses from Nanny's spray that draped her coffin. It was the most beautiful flower arrangement I have ever seen. I kept one rose for each of my children; they are drying upside down in my kitchen right now. Dallas found the butterfly on one of the other arrangements and wanted to keep it:


Afterwards, we went to lunch with some of the family to Luna's Mexican Restaurant in Baytown. We sat outside on the patio and enjoyed talking, especially about Nanny and our memories of her. My mom and her brother Mark were there plus his 3 kids Bryan, Tammie, and Alicia who was there with Bryant also. Catherine and Amber were there, and so was Dan and Dallas (We had all 4 kids with us at the viewing the night before. Dan's mom kept Savanna, Bailey, and Noah for us. We gave Dallas and Noah the option to come to the funeral.) Colby & Terri's daughter, Amie, was there also with her husband, Travis, and thier daughter, Gracie. It's so weird how so many of us have 3 year olds. We could start our own playgroup! Nanny would have loved to see them all playing together.

Here is a picture of my mom with Uncle Mark outside of Luna's. He's giving my mom the bunny ears. Mark is a character! I was especially amused listening to him take his order. He didn't choose a meal but rather told the waitress exactly what he wanted on his plate! We joked that he must have been flirting with the waitress or slipped her some cash because he got his meal 10 minutes before anyone else did!

I'm glad we all went out together. We had fun; Nanny would have liked that.