College Tours #8, #9 and #10

I'm so grateful that college campuses have started to reopen again for tours!  Me, Julia, her friend Ally and her Mom took a road trip to Connecticut to tour three colleges.  

Stop number one was Quinnipiac University...

What a GORGEOUS campus!!

Such strange times...

It's a beautiful wide open campus surrounded by hills and lush greenery...

The nursing building is about 15 minutes away on another gorgeous campus.  Because of Covid we weren't allowed to go inside.  That was a bummer but there's a virtual tour on line so we can still check it out...

Boy it was HOT!!  After our tour we had an early dinner at the Cheesecake Factory.  We did some shopping at the mall and then went to our hotel to relax and play some fun games.

Today we toured Sacred Heart University for a second time.  We were once again so impressed by the gorgeous campus and the state of the art nursing building.  The grounds are impeccably clean and so well maintained.

This picture of Julia at the orientation cracks me up.  We had to sit in these socially distanced spinny chairs...

Just look at these brand new buildings...

Amazing....

Green and lush and beautifully maintained property...

A glimpse into Julia's future as a NICU nurse...

Their nursing building is simply AMAZING.  It is literally a replica of an actual hospital floor...

After the tour we stopped for some homemade cookies....YUM...

and then made our way over to Fairfield University...

and eh...it wasn't great.  None of us were impressed at all.  It paled in comparison to the other two campuses and it is way more expensive!  Go figure!!

We were so hot and sweaty and hungry at the end of the tour.  So we decided to stop in Mystic on our way home to have some ice cream for dinner!

I love my girl!!!  I simply adore being with her.  We have so much fun together.  And I'm just so incredibly proud of the amazing young woman she has become.  Her future is BRIGHT!!!

New equipment

Someone is ready to start playing hockey again in their new equipment...

Glasses

More Vineyard

Grieving

Sometimes what you need to see or hear is put before you at the perfect time...

MV

Julia and Annie...

Amoreena

Cuteness overload!! My sister's new puppy...

Almost every picture was blurry because she never stops moving!! 

So adorable!!

Precious memories

My siblings and I have been cleaning out my Mom's house the past few months and we've been finding such wonderful precious things.  She literally saved EVERY card given to her...even all the cards she had bought over the years that she never gave to anyone (haha)...every picture she took...every picture given to her...every gift...just everything.  Needless to say it's been so hard.  I miss her terribly and really don't like being in her home without her there.  Here are just a few of my favorite pictures we found.

My Mom (on the right) and her best friend Lorraine.  She was the sister my Mom never had...

Just look at how gorgeous my Mom was!!  And how skinny!!  This was one of her favorite pictures and I know why!  Wow!!

And I found this adorable picture of me and Sandy!!  I don't ever remember seeing this before!  We were about 30 in this picture.  I do remember my Mom loved Sandy's hair cut so that's probably why she kept it. And of course she loved Sandy like we all did. She looks gorgeous in this picture...

Oh boy...I got a good belly laugh over this picture.  My Mom and I are EXACTLY the same age in this picture right now!!  Too funny!!  I just can't wrap my brain around that.  And to think that at my age right now she had four adult children and a house full of foster kids...and I have two kids still in high school!

And this is Tricia, who lived down the street from us as kids, and my foster brother Glenn (her boyfriend at the time).  They had such a sweet romance.  I just mailed her a bunch of pictures today that my Mom kept of her and Glenn including this one.  Glenn lived with us the longest out of all her foster kids...I think off and on for about five years. We all loved Glenn.  Sadly he passed away at just 25 years old.  He and my Mom are buried together.

And here's Glenn again with my other foster brother Steve.  Sadly he died too at a very young age. My Mom had so much love in her heart for all those kids and did her best to give them a safe and happy home.  

And she was forever a teenager with THE best sense of humor.  These are some things I found and wanted to keep. They sum up her personality perfectly...

I found this message to me taped onto an old VCR tape. Totally her sense of humor...

And a few of my favorite cards that I had given her over the years...

Yes we did!!  No one could make me laugh the way she did!!



And this sums up my love for her completely...

And on that note...I think I'll go cry some more because I miss my Mom terribly.