Catching Up With The Curtis Family: Grieving Our Loss

The last few days have been filled with much grief and sadness. Last Wednesday, my Aunt Vicky passed away from a seizure after fighting bacterial meningitis the last couple of months. This was fairly unexpected as she had been at home for the past couple of weeks recovering and making substantial gains. While my heart aches, I feel truly blessed that I had the opportunity to spend so much time with her over the last several months. With this tragedy, many out of town relatives returned back to Fort Wayne to attend the funeral. Many of whom I hadn't seen in years. The funeral was a beautiful celebration of Aunt Vicky's life that also had Matthew and Casey's friends doing the "Cupid Shuffle". It was exactly the way that Aunt Vicky would have wanted it. There are so many memories that I will never forget, but a few are the huge smile that lit up whenever she saw you. You always knew it was coming from deep within. The lake will never be the same without her standing in her nightgown making her infamous fluffy pancakes, even though we are all grown up. Our memories will last a lifetime, but she will be sorely missed as we begin to experience "firsts" for awhile.
On Saturday evening after the funeral, I had everyone (and I mean everyone) over to my house for pizza, drinks, snacks, relaxing, and visiting after the long day. We were finally able to meet Kaleb (Dirk and Karen's baby) for the first time as they made the trip up for the funeral. Below are pictures from the last few days...

The Ostermeyer's