Time Warp Tuesday: Gifts

Let’s do the Time Warp again!

Welcome to the twenty-sixth installment of my blog hop/writing exercise called Time Warp Tuesday!

For those not familiar with Time Warp Tuesdays, which I host on the 2nd Tuesday of every month, here is the background of how and why I came up with the idea. If you are here to participate and link up, you can do so with the Linky Tools at the end of this post (or if you have any difficulty, you can share the link to your post in the comment section).

The gist of Time Warp Tuesday is to revisit and share some of our favorite blog entries from our archives and reflect on our journeys since we wrote them.

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The theme for this month’s Time Warp Tuesday is: Gifts

December is a month filled with holiday celebrations for most people, regardless of our faith traditions. Often these holiday gatherings include giving and/or receiving gifts. Choose a post from your archives in which you wrote about one or more gifts that you gave and/or received and what that experience meant to you. The gift(s) don’t have to be connected to a holiday. Then write a new post on your blog about why you chose the post that you did and what has happened in your life since.

Participants can write about whatever you want in your new blog entries. However, for those who might have needed some help and inspiration to get started, here are some questions to consider:

Why did you pick this post? Has your perspective changed since the day you wrote your original post? Do you think you would still feel the same way if you were writing your post today? What have you learned about yourself, your family and your life since you wrote your original post?

Note: Special thanks to Keiko from The Infertility Voice who suggested this topic! If you have an idea for a future Time Warp topic, theme and/or writing prompt, please feel free to share it in the comment section or send me an email. If I choose to use your idea, I will give you credit and link to your blog that week.

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Time Warp Tuesday: Gifts

I have written a number of posts about special gifts that my family and I have received over the years here on my blog. I did this a lot in the months after Molly was born and died, as I wanted to share how we were coping with our grief and loss through highlighting the thoughtfulness and generosity of some of our loved ones. I wanted to write about what these gifts, in honor and memory of our baby girl, meant to me and how having them in our home was helping me to heal.

The post that I chose to revisit this month is about the gifts that Bob, our children and my parents gave me for my 35th birthday in March 2010, as well as some other special and exciting things that were happening in my life at the time:

Happy birthday to me…

I loved getting to reread this post, as it is such a joyful one!

It was nice to remember how happy I felt that day sharing about Mel choosing one of my posts to highlight in her weekly Friday Blog Round Up.

As I told my parents and Bob when I called them this morning to share the news (that is how excited I was/am), I feel like I won an Oscar (at least in my own little world)! I love what Mel wrote about the post and am honored that it spoke to her/that she liked it. I really debated putting it out there, but wanted to share, as it is something we have been struggling with and that has never stopped me from sharing on my blog before, at least rarely.

In recent years I find that one of the greatest gifts that I can receive is for someone to tell me how much they appreciate my writing and why. As I shared in that post, I have so much respect for Mel and her writing, that getting a compliment from her about my words is so validating.

The next part of the post, in which I talked about the awesome birthday gifts that I was getting that year, was also wonderful for me to reflect on. I still remember how excited I was to receive this picture of my gifts:

Four custom-made beautiful (even more so than I ever imagined they could be) bracelets in honor of my two living children, my daughter in Heaven and the three angel babies we lost in December 2004 (due in July 2005), August 2005 (due in April 2006) and November 2005 (due in June 2006). I haven’t been this excited about a piece/pieces of jewelry since Bob and I went shopping for my engagement ring 11 years ago!  I printed out this picture and have been carrying it around the house with me and can’t stop looking at it! Which reminds me of how I couldn’t stop looking at my engagement ring after Bob proposed to me on March 15, 1999!

I had wanted bracelets like that for a while, to honor each of our children (those with us and those watching over us) and to be able to wear proudly on my wrists. A lot of bereaved parents that I had met back then (and still many that I know today) have tattoos as a way to keep their deceased children’s memory close to them always. I considered getting a tattoo in honor and memory of our Molly and Babies Benson. But in the end decided that I preferred these bracelets, which I could wear as often as I chose to.

I worked closely with the designer who custom-made these bracelets for my family to give me to celebrate my 35th birthday and couldn’t be happier, to this day, with how they turned out. I wear all four often and every time I look at them, I think about how blessed I am and how important each of our children are to me, no matter how long they were and/or are with us in this lifetime.

Earlier this month I attended a holiday party with some of my colleagues from where I teach group fitness classes in our neighborhood. One of my fellow instructors commented on how beautiful my bracelets are and asked me about them. I love when that happens and appreciate the opportunity to tell about who each bracelet represents/why they are so special to me.

It is bittersweet to remember that the day I wrote this post, in February 2010, we were going to be celebrating Bob’s maternal grandmother’s (a.k.a. “GG”) 89th birthday. I recall GG’s birthday party that evening, spending precious time with her and how we talked about plans for a bigger bash the following year, when she would turn 90! Sadly GG died that June and never lived to see the next decade of her life. It’s been two and a half years now since GG joined Molly and other of our loved ones in Heaven. During this holiday season, I feel grateful for the gift of Bob and my grandparents (all of whom are now deceased) and the time we had with them throughout our childhoods and young adult lives. I also feel blessed and lucky that all four of our parents/our children’s grandparents are still living and have such wonderful relationships with Sean and Abby.

Lastly, in that blog entry from almost three years ago, I shared a photo of Sean and Abby, reading together in their bedroom, in our old house.

THEN ~ February 2010 ~ Sean (7 years) & Abby (5 months) 

It is surreal to see how much has changed in them and our life since then. We have lived in our new home, in the same neighborhood, for about a year and a half now and our living children have grown so much. Sean and Abby still love to read and play together, though they certainly have their moments when they don’t get along, as most siblings do.

NOW – December 2012 ~ Sean (9 years) & Abby (3 years)

When I began blogging in April 2007, during a time when I so desperately wanted to have more children, I didn’t know if and when I would ever get to use the phrase siblings to describe my offspring or be able to share a picture of Sean with a sister or brother here. So it is incredible for me to recognize today how far my family and I have come since then and how much we have to be grateful for. I echo what I wrote in the conclusion in my post:

Though today has been fabulous, every day that I get to spend with Bob and my two living children is truly amazing! 

I continue to feel extremely blessed and lucky to have Bob and our children in my life. I am also thankful for the gift of writing and getting to use my blog and social media to try to help others, as well as to continue to build a wonderful life for me and my family now that we a done trying to expand.

Thank you for reading and for doing the Time Warp with me this month! I look forward to your feedback about this post, as well as reading and commenting on all of yours.

Please feel free to comment even if you didn’t write your own Time Warp Tuesday post. It is not too late to participate if you are interested, click here for the details.

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The topic for the next Time Warp Tuesday (on January 8th) is: Change

The new year is often a time for new beginnings and changes in our lives. Choose a post from your archives in which you wrote about change. Maybe you wrote about a change that you chose to make or one that happened without warning or intention. Then write a new post on your blog about why you chose the post that you did and what has happened in your life since.

Participants can write about whatever you want in your new blog entries. However, for those who might need some help and inspiration to get started, here are some questions to consider:

Why did you pick this post? Has your perspective changed since the day you wrote your original post? Do you think you would still feel the same way if you were writing your post today? What have you learned about yourself, your family and your life since you wrote your original post?

Note: If you have an idea for a future Time Warp topic, theme and/or writing prompt, please feel free to share it in the comment section or send me an email. If I choose to use your idea, I will give you credit and link to your blog that week.

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For those new to Time Warp Tuesday, here is a quick recap of how it works:

1) Browse through your old blog entries to find one that fits the topic for the given month. The topic is shared at the end of the previous month’s “Time Warp Tuesday” post here on my blog (see above for next week’s topic).

2) Write a new blog post in which you introduce, link to and then reflect on your journey since you wrote the older blog post and put it up on your blog on Tuesday. Please include this link https://bereavedandblessed.com/projects-regular-series/time-warp-tuesdays/ in your blog entry, so your readers can find their way to my post with the list of other participants, in case they would like to read more or participate themselves.

3) Share the link to your new post here on Tuesday and then visit, read and comment on the other blogs.

4) After you have done all of these things, you are welcome to grab the code for the Time Warp Tuesday button by clicking here and put it on your blog. The link will take you to a Google Doc where you can copy the code. If your browser does not allow access to your computer’s clipboard, you can use Ctrl-C for Copy and Ctrl-V for Paste, or use your browser’s Edit menu.

5) Check back here on the 2nd Tuesday of the month to find out the new topic, theme or question for the next Time Warp Tuesday (I welcome your ideas and suggestions) and then return to Step 1 of this recap to participate. Please let me know if you have any questions and I hope to see you back here next month: Tuesday, January 8th (the 2nd Tuesday of the month), when we’ll “do the time warp again!”

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Thank you again for reading, commenting and participating in my Time Warp Tuesday blog hop. Link up below and click through to visit others who are doing the Time Warp! (If you have any trouble with Linky Tools, please share the link to your blog entry in the comment section. Also, please don’t forget to comment on my post here, as I do not have a link to this (my own) post below, but I would still really appreciate your feedback. xoxo

1. Lavender Luz	2. HalfBaked Life
3. Moment in Time