Merrill Jay Brown 1917 - 2011

I will admit that I've been putting off doing this post.  It's intimidating to feel like you have to do credit to a person's life in something as trivial as a blog, but I know I have to say something, so hopefully the writers' block will subside.
    
Merrill passed away on Saturday, February 19th, in his home, as a result of advanced colon cancer.  His death was something of a shock to our family.  During our last visit, he seemed to have improved so much.  He had been holding off the cancer for years, and seemed (to us) prepared to do so for many more months.  Of course, in family prayers, we would always ask that Granddad not suffer.  In many ways, it's a blessing that he didn't have to linger.  That wouldn't have suited him.
    
I've known Ryan's dad for about ten years now.  To me, Merrill has always seemed a man whose every motivation, at it's core, was in giving to others.  He was certainly a workaholic - he never retired - and spent little time in leisure.  I think work was simply what made him happy, and he did it so he could provide for others.  He provided for his family, certainly, that was his first priority, but he seemed to always be giving things to friends, employees, or acquaintances at the doughnut shop.  Often these were items he acquired at job sites, that he knew (or assumed) people would enjoy.  He was very stubborn in doing things his own way, and nearly always carried with him a sort of unimpressed sense of humor.
    
The kids loved (and still do love) their granddad.  To my kids, Granddad was doughnuts.  He was trips to the wrecking yard to ride on forklifts, and hours spent playing on enormous castoff amusement park slides.  He had things that were both scary and wonderful, like the office skeleton toy, his dogs, and his bird.  Visiting Granddad was an adventure to them.  
    
For my husband. . .  well that would be presumptuous of me to try to sum up Ryan's relationship with his dad.  But I know he taught his son to work hard, and to care for his family.  So much of who Ryan is has been shaped by the influence and example of his father.
    
I combed through our pictures to find our favorite moments with Merrill.  I think they do a good job of expressing what he meant to us.
   

Connor's First (Unauthorized) Solid Food at 5 1/2 Months

     

   

     

     

     

     

     

       

Granddad Meets Baby Elise

     

  

  

  

     

  

  

  

  

    

  

  

    

    

  

   

   

  

Human beings are not temporary.  We are too complex and too conscious to be here by accident.  We are eternal, and children of a loving God.  That's what I believe.  And I take joy in that, even when sad things happen.

Winter Hayward Trip

Late in January we went up to Ryan's parents' house in Hayward.  Due to his father's health problems, Ryan had spent the previous weekend there, and I was concerned whether a family visit was appropriate.  It turned out to be a great experience, though.  
      
Our first morning there, I was half awake when I heard what seemed to be loud turkey noises coming in our window.  We went outside to investigate, and saw a flock of huge wild turkeys on the hill behind the house.  I guess this is a new thing, since Ryan never saw a wild turkey growing up, but it was pretty awesome.  Those birds are not small.  By the time we had the kids up, and found the camera, they had flown to the other side of the fence, but you can see one behind the chain link in these pictures.  The kids spent hours that weekend climbing all over the hill, with no serious injuries.
     

      

You can see the turkey just above Elise's head.  No, I don't mean Connor

We saw the turkeys fly across the canyon later, which surprised me.

Ryan spent his childhood exploring these hills.

Two weeks before our trip, Ryan's dad had a pretty serious fall.  While at the hospital, he was diagnosed with advanced colon cancer.  That wasn't a total surprise, there had been rumors of cancer, and his health had obviously been going downhill, but having to face the reality of Granddad's mortality was a bit of a shock.  (*Ryan wasn't comfortable with me posting this information initially, so I edited the post to remove reference to cancer.  I have since restored it to the original version.*)  The family currently has a health aide there to help him when they can't be at the house, and we were lucky to see him improve quite a bit while we were visiting.  Of course, the problem with improvement is that he wants to do things that just aren't very safe in his current condition.  In these pictures, Alex (one of Merrill's employees) is taking him out to do some work-related business.  Ryan's dad still works full-time running a demolition business at the age of 93.  Wow, huh?
     

  

    
I got Ryan a bike rack for Christmas, so we gave it a try on this trip, and the kids were able to ride their bikes on the private road.  It's the perfect little-kid bike path.
       

Bomi and Elise

      
Monday afternoon we went down to Children's Fairyland in Oakland, which is supposedly the place that inspired Walt Disney to create Disneyland.  It's a little bit run-down and old-fashioned, but that was what made it so awesome.  Luckily, we've been reading nursery rhymes a lot this year, and most of the other stories were familiar, too.  The kids had a great time, with the exception of the carousel.  The attendant there told Elise she was too short to ride a horse, but was welcome to ride on a bench.  It was so, so sad.  We had a hard time not laughing at her.  At the end, we watched a wonderful puppet-show production of "The Gingerbread Boy" (but forgot to take pictures.)
     

Mad Hatter

A Griffin?

Each kid got a cute plastic key that activated voices in the displays.

Steering Captain Hook's Ship

Climbing on Captain Hook's Ship

Train Ride

Oh, she was mad.  And sad.  We promised her a cookie to fix things.

We spent a lot of time at the house, visiting with Ryan's family.  Evan and I had a cold, so we tried not to be near Merrill, but Ryan and the other kids were able to spend time with him.  I'm really glad we went.
   

Doing "Walk Like an Egyptian" on Just Dance 2

     
On the way home, we stopped at the home of Larry Loos, one of Ryan's old scout leaders and family friend.  He gave us a frozen pheasant he had shot himself, and showed off his gun collection (at Ryan's request, I wasn't terribly interested.)  The kids also got to pet horses and throw frisbees for their dogs.  
   

     
Somewhere in the middle of farm country we stopped to tend a fussy baby, and Ryan took the kids on a walk into some kind of empty field.  It was a good way to wear off energy, but they came back coated in thick muddy clay.  Both the kids had fallen down at some point (of course), and everybody's shoes had to go into grocery bags.  Here are my three tough guys showing off before we left. 
       

My Boys

Fun at Home

So, every year I give myself permission to buy $100 of emergency preparedness stuff.  This year, I finally bought one of those cheap little wheat grinders everybody has, so that my pitiful stash of wheat might be useful for something in an emergency.  Anyway, Connor decided this was the coolest toy ever invented. When I finally insisted that we had enough cracked wheat, he pouted in the corner.  It was pretty good, actually, after I figured out how long it needed to be cooked (a long time.)   Don't feed it to your kids three days in a row, though.  Just sayin'.
    

   
One afternoon we decided to see which kinds of nuts squirrels would eat.  The kids piled acorns, pistachios, walnuts, and almonds, I think, on a flat rock near our oak tree.  It turns out they eat everything.
    

    

   
Right around January 2nd, our little guy Evan figured out how to crawl!  I think he's my first baby to really be a crawler - the others rolled and scooted mostly.  It was so funny how hard he had to concentrate at first, but after a few days he was scurrying around like a little bug.  Now I have to baby-proof everything again.
    

   
I've started a tradition on New Year's Day (or near it, since I usually forget) where I measure the kids on their growth chart and take a picture.  This was our third year, and Evan's first mark on the chart!  Measuring him standing up was a little tricky by myself, but we managed it.