Finished the front cover of her book….still have some pages to go. It’s after midnight, and that’s when I can do this now because her naps this week have been so short, and I think it’s because she has a stuffy nose that wakes her up. She has NEVER been sick and I’m still not qualifying this as sick because the doctor said not to bring her in, she’s fine, could be teething related, etc. Anyway…with her awake more, I get less done, but that’s just fine by me because I love to be with her. So, here’s the front cover:

And another page…I know I repeated the pic on the cover, but that might very well be my favorite shot of her. Top 5 at least. And the pics on this page…oh, my heart aches! I love these pics and almost didn’t want to put them in so as not to “cheapen” them with scrabooking tchotchke…so I kept it simple. That face! That baby! She’s growing too fast!!!

I’m using this post to put my dad up on a pedestal for a moment… because I think anyone who has ever seen him “at work” whether it be a coworker or a patient at “his” hospital (I think that hospital belongs to him) knows that he has a gift for what he does. I worked at Beaumont for four years and know what people think of him. He is amazing…and after 25 years, he continues to inspire all those he works with to make a difference…to remember what they do. That it’s not just a job…it’s helping people–real people–during the most traumatic moments of their lives.

He is part of a leadership conference on Monday for Beaumont’s three hospitals…there will be 800 people there including doctors, nurses, department managers, CEO’s, etc. For his “reflection,” he asked me to do a DVD to this amazing song. The lyrics are so incredibly poignant and inspiring and together, with the photos…well, you’ll just have to see. It’s only three minutes long. If I worked in healthcare, I would watch this and be so inspired to rededicate my career to people…to go the extra mile. (P.S. I snuck a picture of Lainey Love in there…see if you can find her!) The song is amazing…”Make Me an Instrument of Your Peace” by Olivia Newton John.

Oh, and the photo of the man with the dogs? My dad visits him every day…he had just retired and was ready to move up north and ended up in the hospital. He’s in kidney failure and has been very sick. After being down and depressed for days, my dad arranged for his dogs to be brought up to the hospital and brought to his room. Look at his smile! The last photos of the Indian hands held together was a wedding he arranged. The woman was a patient and was very near death…she was going to miss her daughter’s wedding, so my dad along with some other staff arranged a small wedding in the surgical intensive care unit so that the mother could see her daughter get married before she died. He even had the cafeteria make a wedding cake. She died a week later but got to see her daughter get married.

Click this link…there’s three slideshows…it’s the one that says “Beaumont.” Disregard the menu that says “Brian and Natalie”….I forgot to change it from a recent wedding DVD I did!
http://www.photodex.com/sharing/viewshow.html?fl=2957842&alb=0