Things that Melt My Heart

A week ago, I was painting and got a message on Skype from my mom. My sis and nephews are still living with her and my dad so she sent me a message from Hunter (the 4 1/2 year old) that said this:


Hunter says: I love you and when I grow up I would like to find salamanders at your house and go all around the world to find lizard and snakes and amphibians.  I love you so big and so wide and i love you like the whole wide world.


As my friend Chrissy and I always say about sweet nephew moments, I melted into a big puddle of goo! I stopped my painting and called them on Skype. It's amazing how I can still play with my boys with just a webcam. Brady (almost 11months) loves for me to sing him 'Little Bunny Foo Foo', which involves a stuffed bunny we have on our end that I hop around the screen and it bops dinosaurs on the head instead of field mice. We have dinosaur finger puppets that Branden uses, and then instead of the good fairy coming down to tell off Bunny Foo Foo, we have the good turtle which also happens to be Brady's favorite. It's so much fun to watch his face light up on our screen.


On Tuesday, we went to the Bible study put on by the church we found. Branden and I sat next to two sweet old ladies (probably in their 80's). I made my introduction and when I said, "My name is Maggie", the woman sitting next to me raised her eyebrows and said, "Your name is what?". Her expression was more of surprise than of confusion and I repeated, "I'm Maggie". She smiled and told me that her daughter was named Mags and I mentioned that all my family and close friends call me Mags. After a few songs, we sat down again and she put her hand on my back as she leaned towards me she whispered, "I had better warn you now, my daughter was killed 14 years ago so I hope you don't mind if I hug you." My heart melted and I could almost cry as she hugged me and I whispered back to her, "Well, I'm a long ways from home so I will take all the hugs I can get".