Celebration of Life for Dad

It's been almost a month since my dad died. I still can't think too much about it. I'm not ready to face that reality. I tiptoe around it and think of other things as hard as I can. I'm not ready to look through pictures and reminisce. I will be ready, and I love to hear stories, but not yet. Michael was gracious enough to ignore father's day for me. He opened a couple of presents in the morning for what we called "special Sunday Funday" and then we just worked on unpacking the house. I owe him a special day later on. He's the best husband ever.
I did want to put some pictures of my dad's celebration of life here on the blog, though. It was a beautiful party, held on the Sunday of memorial day weekend. We used marigolds as a theme and Tiffany and Mom and I planned a party help us celebrate dad. Tiff made us shirts that said "Lucky Girl". We had ice cream and cigars and scotch on hand, Dad's favorite things. We put out tons of pictures and asked guests to take them with them. We had tibetan prayer flags and Catholic candles and a native american blessing, because Dad always claimed to be "an ancient Christian Buddhist who believes in Navajo". Friends and family stood up and told stories. Friends played the piano. We all had a toast to Willie Nelson's "Moment of Forever". It was beautiful and wonderful and exhausting. After the guests all left, the family gathered in the living room and we watched the slide show Tiffany and I had spent hours making. Then we all gathered in the kitchen and ate ice cream out of the carton- just like dad would have wanted us to do. We went outside and swam and told stories and were together. It was just the right thing to do. It was perfect. I miss him so much.