The Funeral

 Yesterday was Grandpa's funeral.  We left in the morning, drove over the mountains and arrived at the church building a little over an hour before the funeral started.  The church building was sadly locked, and the weather was sadly below freezing.  But the kids' legs were needing some exercise, so we did laps around the empty building.  People showed up to bring food for the funeral, and we offered to let them leave it in our van so they didn't have to hang around.

Sometime after Grandma and her entourage arrived, someone with keys found their way over and let us in.

While Grandma, Aunt Linda, and my mom set up, we found the restrooms and changed into our church clothes-  Ryan by himself in the men's room, and the four girls and me in the ladies' room.

I got to give the eulogy, which was first up on the program.  Janelle sang, my mom, Nichole's husband Jake, Nancy, and my Grandma spoke.  It was a long funeral, but how do you do justice to the life of a man who lived over 90 years and touched so many.

After the funeral, the ward provided us a nice spread of fruit and vegetable platters, and desserts.  Those of us with small children let them run around crazy in the cultural hall (well, within reason- they had all done well sitting quietly during the funeral).  I was accosted by people claiming they knew me, and I had to dig deep to remember names.  My old dentist from when I was in elementary school.  My mom's friend from before I started school.

Grandma put together a whole display of pictures of Grandpa's life.  There were three different poster boards, and a 3 ring binder of pictures either Grandma drew/painted, or pictures of his jewelry pieces.

The flower display was reminiscent of Denmark's flag.  We each got to take a carnation home.

And on a rather unrelated note- driving through the mountain pass made our minivan filthy.  This was after heading west, with the trip back home still ahead of us.

You are greatly missed, Grandpa.