Allow me to introduce you to my surviving daughter, Crystal.
She and her sister, Loria were very close;
therefore, I find it appropriate to include a bit
about Crystal's survival since Loria's death in this web site.

Crystal and Kevin had mutual friends and met during
a spring break trip that Crystal and Loria
made to Savannah, GA during the St. Patrick's Day holiday
in March 2001.  In Crystal's words, she thought Kevin
was "rude" to her during their initial encounter
and Kevin found Crystal to be "cute".
Somehow, they atoned those first impressions
and continued a dating relationship when they returned
to school after the holiday trip.

Their relationship continued after Kevin's graduation
from North Carolina State University in May 2001 and
they admittedly spent every stolen moment together.

Loria's death occurred on September 9, 2001.

On September 19, 2001, Kevin moved from North Carolina
to Overland Park, Kansas to begin a new job.
Crystal and Loria had been college roommates,
therefore after her sister's death,
Crystal withdrew from the fall semester at NCSU
and returned home with plans to return to college
(somewhere) during the following semester.

Kevin and Crystal continued their relationship long distance
via telephone, seeing each other only once during
each of the months of October and November 2001.

During early December 2001, Kevin flew back
to North Carolina for an early holiday visit with his family
and to see Crystal.  On December 7th, he came to our home
and asked for permission to marry our daughter.
Being so recent since the loss of Crystal's sister,
I was concerned that they may be
"holding onto each other" because of that reason.
They both assured us that it was "love".
So their engagement began later that same evening
with Kevin's official proposal of marriage.

Crystal and Kevin initially planned a very small wedding
for immediate family only, but after a change
of mind in January, Crystal and I began planning
for a much larger wedding in a church setting.
They had set the date for March 2nd so
there was a lot to do in a little bit of time.

We set about searching for a caterer, florist, cake maker,
site for the reception and the all-important dress.  We mailed
invitations and Crystal anxiously awaited RSVP's.

My Mom was hospitalized in late January
and passed on to heaven on February 5, 2002.
Crystal had always been a loving granddaughter
to my Mom and we were crushed that she would not
be with us to celebrate Crystal's wedding day.
Mom had always considered Crystal to be her
"little Chrissy", and we had so badly wanted her
to be there with us for that special day.

Although very difficult to do, we continued with the
wedding plans as originally scheduled and everything
went somewhat smoothly until the Tuesday prior to
the scheduled wedding date.  On that day,
the husband of our cake maker called to inform us
that his wife had been hospitalized and we'd have
to make other arrangements.  I quickly set out to find
someone else to do the job and had successfully
secured a replacement the following day.

When Saturday, March 2nd arrived,
I experienced so many different emotions.
Loria was gone "forever" from this life and
I was close to "losing" her sister.
I was so saddened that Loria couldn't be here
to stand up for her sister and to celebrate one
of the most important days in her life,
but I wanted to be the best Mom
that I could be and insure that Crystal
had the beautiful wedding that she deserved.