My life has been filled with wonderful moments with my Mother.  It is very difficult to pick just one and not thousands to share with her loved ones.  One that I am very fond of took place when I was 18 years old. 

     I was leaving home for the first time and it was very difficult for Mom, although she was very excited for me, she was not ready for me to leave.  As I was walking out the door, she tucked a letter into my suitcase, telling me "Just something for you to read later".

     Mom had written me the most beautiful 4 page letter summarizing many of the different emotions she had throughout my upbringing.  From the first time she saw me, and knew that she would never let harm come my way.  My first steps, my first day at school, and many different events in my life were all included in this letter. 

     Her letter reminded me that I would always be her GEM (my initials), or as she put it, her precious jewel. And how I would tease her that my initials for the first few years of my life were GEJ, where she would tell me even then she knew I was her gem. 

     Her letter also told me to forever follow my dreams, and to always see the color in life, and to always treat people with respect, never be bigoted, and with kindness I can captivate the world. 

     Yesterday while going through a private scrapbook of my things at her house, I found the letter and read through it again, this time however it was different.  I realized that this letter was actually filled with all of the beautiful things and characteristics that she gave me during her life.

     My sister Tonya and I will always know how blessed we are, that she was our Mother.

From day one Chance was grandmas dog. He went everywhere with her. When we would go out to eat she would even sneak food in her ourse and come home and give it to Chance. He was always found under her chair or recliner. He loved her.

When we were gone long mounts of time, when we returned he would run streight for her. When she took him outside he would lay under her outside chair.

When she was dionosed with Cancer he knew something was wrong. He spent extra time with her.

On the day she passed he tried and tried to get up on her hospitle bed. He finally got up there, and he got restless so they were gonna take him down. They said "no he's grannys dog." He layed with his face to the door. Then he layed with his face to her face. It wasn't 5 minutes after he did that the she passed. HE WILL FOREVER BE GRANDMA'S DOG!!

One of Mom's dreams was to visit the Alaskan wilderness. So in October 2010 Gary and I started planning and saving to take her with us on a first-class cruise to Alaska. After the 2010 holidays we booked our cruise, airline tickets and hotel reservations. We spent the next few months planning our shore excursions in Alaska and Canada. By March 19, her birthday, we were all set and ready to go. On June 9, 2011, the three of us would fly together from Des Moines to Seattle, have dinner at the top of the Space Needle, and then board our ship, the Celebrity Infinity, headed for the North Pacific Ocean.

Gary's sister, Tonya, took Mom shopping for new clothes to wear to the formal dinners aboard ship. Mom got her first U.S. passport so we could ride a train through the Yukon Mountains into Canada and for our visit to Victoria, British Columbia. She got her camera and warm clothes ready to explore the wilderness. She was most excited about catching a glimpse of the migrating humpback whales and seeing an American bald eagle.

In April we got the devastating news that Mom was really sick. She was diagnosed with an aggressive cancer affecting her colon, liver, and kidneys. Our trip to Alaska became even more important to all of us. She told her doctors about our upcoming cruise. She said to them, "Fix me so I can go to Alaska with my son!"  

The doctors did their best to schedule her treatments around our trip. We revised a few of our plans to accomodate her condition.  We hoped and paryed that we'd still be able to get her to Alaska and we thought we were going to make it. Unfortunately, on Friday, June 3, just one week before we were to set sail, her condition deteriorated and she was unable to travel.

Gary and I were ready to cancel the whole trip. But Mom insisted we go without her. That's just how she was -- always making sure everyone else was happy. She never put herself first. Not ever in the seven years I knew her. She wanted us to go and have a good time, take lots of pictures, and then come home to share tales of our adventures.

So we went. Gary brought along a photo of Mom and him from last summer's vacation to Lake of the Ozarks. He placed it on the bedside table in our cabin. If she couldn't actually be with us, she was with us in heart, mind, and spirit. And everyone we met on the cruise heard about Doris Higgins and her dream trip to Alaska.

On Saturday, June 18, we returned to Des Moines and drove directly to the Wallace family reunion at Lake Ahquabi. We set up a laptop computer on a picnic table to show our photos and share our adventures. Mom was very proud of Gary. You can see how happy she was -- look at her smile while he's sharing stories and pictures with her and his Aunt Shirley at the reunion. 

I know it really meant the world to her that Gary had fulfilled her lifelong dream of seeing Alaska. In the end, she experienced every part of her dream through her son's eyes.

When she was in the hospitle one of her nurses told her to turn around and she shook her butt at the nurses.