Papa Radford

Steve passed away on January 6, 2021

That morning, Jon texted the family to tell them that Steve was taken to the hospital again because he wasn't doing well (he had been taken to the hospital many times, but I knew this one was different). Dan left work immediately while I packed up as quickly as possible, so we could go say goodbye. But we got a text about an hour later, saying that he had passed away with just Cathy in the room with him. We missed it. We missed it! We still got in the car. We still had to go to Idaho. For the first time ever, we really dreaded going there. 

On the way, Georgia (3) leaned forward and said, "Papa just told me he's okay." that was the tender mercy we desperately needed. 

The week before he passed, Dan had an impression that he needed to drive to Idaho to give his dad a blessing. He had given him a few throughout his sickness, and we had just been there... but Sunday night right before bed, he had that impression that we needed to go there. Without getting too personal, dan was able to give him that blessing right before we went back to Utah. that was the last time we saw him.

We stayed in Idaho for over a week to get things in order for the funeral, and to be with family. Dan was a huge help to his mom as they made arrangements. We had a lot of happy mixed with a lot of sad. The funeral was beautifully done, and now the song "Consider The Lillies," will always remind us of Steve. We ended our family time at Lava Hot Springs together. 

His funeral was a rough time for everyone, and my kids have not stopped talking about him since. He loved Stori, Sylvie, and Georgia so much. The moment they walked in, they would immediately run to him in his chair. He would welcome them with a big hug, and then when that got too hard, he would give them a high-5. Towards the end, he wasn't always aware they were there, but they still loved seeing him. When we went back and visited 2 weeks after the funeral, the kids ran in, went to the corner spot where his chair used to be. They forgot for just a bit (like we still do too) that he was gone. Later that day, Georgia walked over to the table where a picture of Papa was, and kissed his cheek, whispered to him "I miss you papa." she sat and stared at the picture for along time and was unaware that people were watching her. At least once a day, one of our kids will talk about how they miss papa. Georgia's memory of papa, is when he took her to the park to play. He played tickle tag with her and she laughed and laughed. (all according to her. I hope she doesn't forget that memory). Stori and Sylvie both have memories of going to fun places with him: Jackson, Yellowstone, Utah mountains, Lagoon, parks and playgrounds. They loved when he would take them to get ice cream, and when he would watch cartoons with them. 

We feel pretty lucky that we got to spend so much time with Dan's dad before he passed away; 2020 is not the ideal year to get sick. At first, we tried to avoid visiting him so we wouldn't get him more sick, but he hated that. He was always texting dan wondering when we would go visit. We ended up going almost every single weekend, and sometimes we would go Wednesday night to Monday morning. It was hard to say goodbye each time, because he would get progressively worse each trip. I'm glad he chose to live life with family close. We got to have a 70th birthday party for him in October, and we got to hear some fun stories from him and some of his siblings. He was a great papa, and we miss him everyday. I kind of imagine him and my dad hanging out together watching over us. :) 

Pictures from his 70th birthday party.