REMEMBERING....

we have a seth trunk in the middle of our living room. it's a trunk with many things that remind us of seth. the kids occasionally put things in there for him - sometimes i find the funniest things (mostly pretty stones that they find that remind them of him). one of the most precious things in our seth trunk for me is his journal. we were given his journal from school that he had written in before he died. i love looking at his little handwriting - he HATED writing mind you....would have MUCH rather been outside playing basketball but he had to do his assignments too. the last entry he wrote were things he was thankful for "i am thankful that we have the bible. i am thankful for mom and dads. i'm thankful for God. i'm thankful for earth"

we've kept this journal in his trunk and have told the kids that whenever they have a memory of seth that they have to write them down. i've explained to them that i don't have alot of memories when i was 9,10,11,12,13 years old - i've forgotten much of that time in my life. i don't want them to be 30 something and look back on their brother and not have many memories of him. oh, i know that they'll never forget seth...but i don't want them to forget how he used to take his leftover food from his lunch box and put it in his locker box so he wouldn't get into trouble for not eating his entire lunch (to which we'd never know, that is, until we started smelling some awful rank stuff in the locker room coming from his locker box!) those are the things that make a brother a friend....i don't want them to lose their friend. so we tell them often write your memories of him down.

i was thinking about that today.....the things that i don't want to forget about our seth - those little things that i will always cherish.

-i want to remember when we were on vacation once and we were on a stony beach and of course he was looking for his precious agates. he ran up to me and had something in his hand. he shyly and quietly said to me "here mum...i love you". he ran away quickly before i was able to see what he gave me. i opened my hand and found this.....




it stays with me in my purse every day. it's one of the things that he gave to me that i will forever cherish



-i want to remember how he still would rock himself to sleep....reminding me of the start of his short life when he had to comfort himself in the orphanage - rocking himself to sleep.

-i want to remember his little smirk of a smile when we first brought him home

-i want to remember the first few nights when we brought him home. he, luke, and caleb were all in one room together. seth and caleb were on bunk beds (seth on bottom) and luke was in a toddler bed. we would find him asleep in bed with luke in his little bed - just trying to find something that was familiar to him.

-i want to remember how he would try and sneak up around me in the mornings - just to see if he could get me to jump.

-i want to remember how caleb taught him how to roller blade.

-i want to remember how he had such a little barrel chest. he had such a football body.

-i want to remember how his 3rd toe would always rest on top of all his other toes - not for the lack of us trying to straighten them back out! we think he must have been squished into too small shoes for the first 4 years of his life.

-i want to remember how he LOVED playing with his cousins. especially light sabers with kyle!

-i want to remember the time when he and i were in his room reading a book and he asked me "mum...God is in Heaven isn't He?" He sure is i replied to which he commented "how do I get there to be with Him?" i told him that all he has to do is ask. "i just gotta ask????" you just have to ask, honey. "i wanna, mum, i wanna" so in that brown cozy chair with him on the arm rest and me in the seat he folded his hands really tight and squinted his eyes super shut. he peeked out of his one eye and quietly asked "i just ask?" you just ask, seffers. after he said his beautiful little prayer i will NEVER forget his reaction. he opens his eyes and looks over at me with a look that a child has after he has just opened a Christmas gift and he so excitedly squeals to me "mum, i feel warm all over!!! i just know He just came in!!" (THAT is my one single most favorite memory of him)

-i want to remember how he loved playing basketball with his brothers and greg

-i want to remember how i would ALWAYS tell him to push up his glasses

-i want to remember in myrtle beach the last time we were there and i was trying to get a nice picture of him and he was just being goofy and i clicked one of my favorite pictures of him...



-i want to remember how he would spend hours searching for agates in the stony area in the back of our house (providentially we had never landscaped that area - we're turning that into our seth garden)

-i want to remember how it took him 1 year to tell us that he didn't like having his bedroom downstairs becuz it reminded him of the bathroom the caregivers put him into at the orphanage when he was naughty (they told him that there were monsters behind the square box on the wall and that if they made a noise or tried to get out the monsters would come and get him - terrible memories for him). we moved him to an upstairs bedroom that week.

-i want to remember how he desperately wanted a friend and was so excited when troy powney invited him over. "i finally have a friend mum!" ( i will forever be grateful to you for that pam!)

-i want to remember his last Sunday school Christmas program when he, grayden hoekwater, and tanner baker were the 3 wisemen and they had these beautifully made kings robes. when they were getting ready for the program one of the boys had the brilliant idea of taking his pants off (i wouldn't be surprised if it were seth's idea). so here were those 3 stinker boys running around with their robes on and no pants - beaming from ear to ear.

-i want to remember how we FORCED him to take one year of piano - THAT was a long year! he didn't like it at all....again, he'd MUCH rather have been outside playing basketball.

-i want to remember how he smelled.

-i want to remember how his fingernails were ALWAYS dirty - as any 10 year old little boy

-i want to remember how he and caleb would play football together in the front yard.

-i want to remember how it felt checking on him at night before going to bed myself and kissing him on the head.

i just want to remember our little boy - every little aspect of him. i don't want to forget what an amazing gift from God he was to us. i want to honor those 5 years we had him. i want God to be glorified in his life even after his death. i don't want to let go. i want him back. i want one last hug, one last kiss, one last laugh. but i have a hope....the reality that i WILL get more hugs, i WILL get more kisses, i WILL get more laughs. oh how i yearn for that day.