First Responders

Days of our Lives.....not the soap opera, but rather, this blog. It was meant to be a journal of this new journey of ours. This journey, where life as we knew it came to a screeching halt back in February.

And then this season of one holiday after another hit me. Bam. Roger loved holidays - any holiday. He especially loved it if it meant a special meal or some kind of grand treat.

Though I have never been a big one for the Halloween craziness, other than enjoying a typically full moon that time of year, Roger counted it as his October calendar date to stock up on his favorite candies. Chocolate - or peanut butter and chocolate. Protien, you know.

It seems that the holiday goes on forever sometimes. For the town party and costume parade, Emily put on her bunker coat. We discovered that she had grown a bit and now had high-water bunker pants.  Jacob dressed as the infamous.....Jacob.  (I call him yah-kob ....the infamous Hebrew)    And of course, every good firefighter needs a good fire dog.  OK, greyhounds are notoriously scared of very loud sounds and things startling them, but Iron was a good sport.

Kristin gets seriously into the action and likes to them their family adventures. The plan was for everyone to be first responders. October 2014 brought the big EBOLA scare to the world, so......Kristin and Jim were first responders on the Ebola front. Emily stuck with her 'mini-me' plan - little Ro-Ro and Jacob had planned to wear a bunker coat with Iron in one of Roger's tee shirts....with the fire dept logo, of course...and maybe some white powder and black spots.

Florida's October brought an unseasonable heat wave so there was no way that Jacob was going to suffer heat stroke and miss out on candy.  He decided that one thing that first responders like to do is eat and the other is that they work hard, sweat a lot, and have to keep their potassium balanced. This called for him to become a banana. (Potassium) and for Iron to turn into a hot dog.
Keep that dog away from the grill!


Like we always seem to do, we made it through another holiday. When we stop to think about the fun Roger brought to any celebration, it makes it hard to sit and mope around ....even though we still miss him terribly

Roger's Lesson:
Life is not always fun and games. If you don't enjoy the fun times, though, you will forget what fun looks like when you face the hard times.  Hang in there with family and anything you do will be fun.

Yes....that is definitely the way he lived.
And I'm sure he would be thrilled that I bought out the peanut butter cups in his memory.  And I don't even like peanut butter....or chocolate!

He liked them cold and crunchy!

And after all, first responders have to keep up their energy.