Goodbye Grandma Jones

This past Friday, September 19, 2014 my grandmother passed away. The picture below was the last time I saw her in June 2013 before we came back overseas for our 2nd term in Botswana. When I learned the news of her passing, I was grateful for her long life she led, but the immense guilt hit me immediately. I feel guilty for not being there for my grieving mom to comfort her and get to mourn with the rest of my family at her funeral. I so wish I could be there but the fact that it would take me 30+ hours to get there and around $2000 just for me to fly there just makes it impossible. This is one of the hardest things about living overseas is missing family and not being able to properly say goodbye.

If you knew my grandmother Jones she did not show her love physically very often...I knew she loved us but when I was younger it was rare to get a hug from her. When I was in my teens I determined every time I went to see her I was going to hug her hello and goodbye and tell her how much I loved her. This became a natural thing for us to do after some time and she even initiated the hugs. She even wrote me letters here in Africa telling me how much she loved me. I am thankful for the time the Lord gave us with my grandmother. She was very loved and will be missed greatly!!