Saturday!!!!!!!!!!

Hi Katie girl. Here's a pic of Kelsey and Zoey for you. It's Saturday morning. i just woke up. it's memorial day weekend. yay! three days off work. it's been raining here for a full week. it doesn't usually do that unless we have a hurricane. we needed the rain, but enough already! i don't have to go back to work until tuesday. then i work that one day and the next day i fly to wisconsin to see kelsey, zoey and kayden. i am going for the anniversary of your death. we (kelsey, dad and me) are going to spend the evening together. i want to look at pictures of you and remember you. not that we don't remember you every day, but i mean actually schedule the time to do so. you know? i mean...every day you are in our thoughts. you're actually my first cohesive thought of the day...every day. but i don't get the pictures out and stuff. the last time i was in wisconsin, your dad let me go into your room and pick out some stuff of yours to keep. he's keeping your room just as it was. black walls with red flames. lol. he's fixing the holes in the wall though. ~smirk~ i took your red beaded lamp, your marilyn monroe poster, a picture that you drew, the poem you wrote, "airport bars", and your shell necklace that you bought when you were in california visiting tom. i wear the necklace sometimes. i want to go back and look through the rest of the stuff, but we had kayden with us and it was cold and stuff so we didn't stay very long. your dad is living there again and fixing the place up. frankly, you and kelsey trashed the place. you two were a couple of wild ones. (i have NO idea where you got it) hehe we miss you, Kate. kelsey and i were talking about you the other night. she is doing so good, katie. its like she has a real family with aaron, kayden and zoey. her apartment is really cute. she's not partying. she gets up early every day and takes care of kayden. and when i call her, aaron is doing homework with zoey and she's cooking dinner and kayden is playing in his office. my heart just fills up. i hear laughing and talking in the background. and she sounds happy. and here's the bummer. why couldn't we have that with you here?????? you would have loved it. my sisters are involved with her and the kids. it's like....a family. none of us have ever really had that. i was talking to judy the other night...and i never thought i'd hear these words come from my mouth, but it's like...my strength comes from the relationships i have with my family. you are still a part of it. i just wish we could have gotten you an apartment too. and seen you spread your pretty butterfly wings and fly. stay with us kate. we do not ever want you to think that you are not a part of it. ugh. i don't know...sometimes...i just ache to have you here. i'm going to go out for a walk this morning and i hope i see a butterfly or a dragonfly. you can come to me anytime. anytime. i miss you, sweetie. love, your momma. Katherine katie Fernihough

The Last Time I Heard From You

Hi Katie. Well...I'm already at work, but until I talk to you, I won't be able to have my head in the game. Today, May 20, 2009, it was one year ago that was the last time I ever heard from you. You texted me to let me know how many days you could take off work to come see me. You told me not to call because you were at work, but you could take 10 days. And the best part of the message, was, you go..."Hi, its KATIE. (all caps) my KATIE. ~smiling~ That was you, Kate...all caps. One of the gazillion things we love about you. I still have that text on my phone. I've saved it to the sim card, but I don't want to change phones because, somehow, it feels like...I don't know....like your life energy came through that phone and its the last touch i have of you. this morning on the way to work, i came up on a car accident. one car was smoking and no one had stopped yet, so i pulled up to see if they needed help. there was a young girl sitting smushed in a car and a big red truck that didn't even look hurt. her airbags had gone off. i walked up to the car and peeked inside, cuz i was scared of what i might see. she looked at me. she was just a very young girl. i went over to her side of the car and pulled her door open. it was all smashed in. she was bleeding on her face but she was awake. i asked her if she could move and she was just shivering. i was able to get her out of the car and took her over to the curb. i called 911 and squatted down beside her. i just hugged her. so weird. she was 21. she asked me to call her mom and when she gave me her phone, her mom's number was momma. :-) just like you and kelsey call me. i waited with her until the ambulance came and when i left, i kissed the top of her head. i could just sob right now, but i'm at work. no one seems to really know what to say to me. i don't blame them, but i'm so sad. it seems like no one cares, but i KNOW that that isn't true. it's just that they don't know what to say. it's uncomfortable and i want to talk about it. i want them to hear me. i miss you SO much. i want you to come back. everyday isn't like this. i think it has something to do with it being almost a year. god. i love you, kate. wish you were here. love, momma.

Your Nephew

Hi Katie! Here's the picture I promised you. This is your nephew, Kayden. Isn't he CUTE!!! He looks so much like Zoey did at his age. He's about 5 1/2 months old here. He's almost 7 months old now, but I haven't seen him. I'm going to be up there on the 28th, so I'll take more pictures then. I just downloaded 288 pics, so I have lots to show you. A whole bunch of our sweet Zoey. She misses you so much. Whenever she talks about you she says, "My Aunt Katie." It would just break your heart. She loves you so much. When I go up to visit her, I'm going to show her how to write to you here. She can draw you pictures and put them on the computer for you. I think it will help her to have a place to come to to talk to you.

It's Sunday night already, so it's back to work tomorrow. I've never understood why the week lasts so long and the weekend is SO short! Oh well. Right now, I'm just really glad to have a job. I work at a company called Mojo Interactive. It's where I worked that first time you came down to visit me. Remember? You went to lunch with Sean and me??? I went back to work there about 5 months ago. I like it. We went to a party at my boss's house last night. Celebration for reaching our sales goal. Consequently, I laid around most of the day today. So anyway...I just wanted to show you Kayden. He got his first haircut today! lol. Kelsey said he was a good boy. She's doing so good, Kate. She has her own place and is going to counseling. She's such a good mom. She gets up every morning with Kayden. Zoey is there every weekend and Wednesday night. She's trying really hard to get her back. She misses you so much too. I'll put some pictures up of her in the next few days so you can see her. She's so beautiful, just like you. I miss you, baby. I love you. Sweet dreams. Momma

Angels

Here is a pic of Katie and Zoey asleep in the back seat of my car. We had just left Disney. My angels, Katie, Kelsey and Zoey. (and my little devil, Kayden)

Out for a walk

Hi Katie. It's Saturday...YAY!!!!! It's beautiful here this morning. I'm going out for a walk/run. The day that your Dad called me to tell me about your accident I was out for a run. I was up to about 3 miles a day. I was feeling good. I always use that time to wake up and think about stuff. I had resolved to really take control of my work and be "all I could be...blah blah blah". When I got home, there was a voicemail from your Dad. It was 7:30. I was like...uh oh...this can't be good. He never calls me. I called him back and he told me. It felt like an electric shock went through my whole body. I curled up on the floor and called to Kam. He was still in bed. The only thing I could think of is that I had to get home and I couldn't stand the thought of being cooped up in an airplane for three hours. It was intolerable. Since then, I've been having a really hard time getting back to running. When I go, I'm afraid that when I come back there will be a message on my phone. I know it's irrational. Lightning doesn't strike twice, but still...it makes me not want to go. Once I tried taking my phone with me, but that was creepy too. I think in some wierd way, I associate running with that day. Now that I realize it, I'm determined to overcome it. So I've been going everyday. UGH. I'm SO sore. Sometimes, when I'm out there, a butterfly or dragon fly will follow me...or really more like lead me. It will flutter along in front of me. I always think of you. I like to think that that's you encouraging me to push a little harder. I wish you were here. I wish this had never happened. I don't want this blog to be a whiney sort of thing, so I'm not always going to talk to you about how sad I am. But I want you to know that I miss you and I will NOT forget you or go a day without thinking about you. When grandma betty died, I was a little sad, but not for long and I never think about her anymore. I don't miss her. I gotta tell you, it scares me that that could happen with you. I talk to Judy about it. She says no way. That will never happen and I don't need to be afraid of it. I worry that I'm just sort of a cold heartless bitch and only concerned with myself. In the weeks following your death, I promised myself that I would be the mom to you that you would be proud of. I would handle this with grace and dignity and always be there for you. So anyway...that's it. I'm going for my run...UGH..haha... Maybe a butterfly will come see me this morning (hint, hint) :-) I'm going to mention your name everytime I post. I want this to be optimized on the search engines so that when people search your name, they will find Katie's Place. Katherine Katie Fernihough. love, momma

The Tree

Hi Katie. I haven't been here in forever! I couldn't find it! But now I've written the url down and I can put more stuff on here. So much has happened over this year. You have a new nephew. Kayden. He's named after you! He looks just like Zoey!!! If I ever take the time to figure out how to download the pics from my camera, I'll load some of him on here. I wanted to tell you about the tree. The Tree. Your tree. Everyone has signed it. This winter I went to an art festival and bought this really pretty (and very cool) metal sculpture of butterflies. Kelsey, Kam and I took it out to the tree and Kam bolted it way up high so it would be there all winter. On your birthday we took a red feather boa and draped it around the tree. We let 23 balloons go into the sky for you. We stood in a circle and sang happy birthday to you. Later that night, Kelsey and I brought you a bottle of wine and poured it around the tree. Anyway (good lord...so much to catch up on!!!) the man that owns the property that the tree is on...he took all of your stuff. None of it is there. Your dad went to his house to find out what happened to it and he said that he threw it away!!!!!!!! I can't even believe anyone would do something like that. So we don't have your stuff anymore. I'm so sad. I want people to know that something happened there. I want them to think about it just a little when they drive by. The state of Wisconsin doesn't allow road side memorials. (of course...I checked as soon as I found out) The only thing they MIGHT allow is for us to adopt that part of the road and dedicate it to you. We would then be responsible for cleaning a two mile stretch of the road there 3 times a year. The sign would have your name on it, but we wouldn't be allowed to put flowers or anything there. So here's the deal. I'm going to go visit this man when I go up there for the anniversary of your accident. I'm going to ask him if he will let us put flowers there. He evidently was pissed about the beer bottles being left there. If he says no, I'm going to do it anyway, but he'll probably throw them away as soon as he sees them. But that was the motivation for me coming back here. I will have evidence of you in this world, sweetie. We will remember you. Everyday. Even if it's not on here...we're thinking of you and we miss you. I love you, katiedid. Dad even asked for the url for this page...but I didn't know it. ~shaking head~ you know how I am. I'll figure out my camera this weekend and come back and load some pictures. Bye bye for now. AWWWWWWW....squeeeeeeeeeeeezzzzzzzzze. xoxox, Mom