Rachel Part 2 - Sister's Retreat

 A few days before Elaine was to finish her time as care taker, we got the brilliant idea of having a sisters get together.  We figured that since Elaine and I were already there, the only one missing was Sheila.  So the minute we proposed it to her, she was on a plane and we all got together for a few days.  It was just some time that we would have with our sister Rachel - just us girls.  Because of the shortness of time, we only did things close to Rachel's house and nothing that took too long to do so that Rachel wouldn't tire too quickly.  Here are a few of our sweet memories.

After the wedding reception for Jennifers daughter, we snuck home a few of the empty bottles of Sparkling Cider for some funny pictures.

The last picture taken of us girls - in Rachel's backyard, with our sweet mother.

This was taken when Rachel announced she would not being doing chemo anymore and they were giving her no more than a few months to live.

This and the above pictures are of mom trying to teach all of girls how to knit a potholder for Rachel that we had all knitted some part of. Mom was so patient with all of us.  Comical, to say the least.

One thing Rachel wanted us to do was go and have pedicures together.  I have only ever had one other pedicure in my life, and that was when my daughters made me go before we went on our family cruise years ago.  And my mother has been even longer - she has NEVER done it.  She and I are most alike in that we do NOT like people touching our feet.  All the rest of the girls have pedicures and massages frequently.  I have never been so uncomfortable while being pampered.  But mom and I decided since it was Rachel, we would force ourselves to join in the fun.

We sent this picture to our families and made them figure out who's foot was who's.  My family got mine wrong.

Us girls at the wedding reception of Jennifer's daughter Sophia.

Most everyone liked the black and white of our photo.

Chillin' with one of my besties.

Our last night together before watching Pride and Prejudice.

As most sisters do, we had a few tense moments of either misunderstandings, lack of patience, difference of opinions or just difficulty in expressing our feelings and emotions.  Because we are all experiencing this loss together, we find unity in loving our sister Rachel.  But because we all mourn differently and have different relationships with Rachel, there were moments of regretful actions or comments.  I'm hoping we have learned from some of those moments, that life is way too short to harbor ill feelings or hurt feelings.  Overall, the time together was memorable and most likely the last for Sheila.