Final Resting Place

"Laughter through tears is my favorite emotion." Dolly Parton, Steele Magnolias

This morning we buried Mallory. She has a beautiful resting place beneath two shade trees. The cemetery is quaint and is in Old Carrollwood. Our immediate family gathered and our dear friend, Chris Basham led a meaningful service. He encouraged us to keep our mind on those things above and not to fall into Satan's trap of the "should of...could of....would of...'s".He reminded us of the comfort that Mallory is not living by faith anymore, but by SIGHT. The whole service maybe lasted 20 minutes, but it was so meaningful. I loved the intimacy of the service and having it on a separate day was VERY nice.
The last few days have been going as good as they can. Jordan and I continue to wade through this new storm and try to understand the process of grief. I find myself happy beyond belief that Mallory has a new set of lungs and is dancing all over heaven and then just like that I am crying in the middle of Target! I went to the grocery store yesterday and burst into tears when I saw the lady ahead of me get out her coupons! Mallory, the dealbloodhound, would have appreciated the lady's frugalness. Jordan and I are so appreciative of your prayers. We are so aware of the body of Christ and how sweet our dear friends have been.

"Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, or even entered into the heart of man, all the things the Lord hath prepared for them that love Him."

Raw

Hi dear friends,
I am really not ready to write, but just in case you are all being diligent "readers", I thought I would just tell you what you can pray for.
1. Pray for my sweet husband, Jordan. He misses Mallory so much and is going through a roller coaster of emotions..
2. Pray for me that I can be the wife that he needs to be during this time.
3. Pray for my sweet, dear mother in law, Karen, and precious father in law, Brian. Oh how their hearts are aching.
4. Pray for Whitney, Mallorys' best friend and dear sister.

The days ahead are going to be so rough. Pray that we keep our eyes on Jesus and the promise of eternal life only made possible by having a personal relationship with our Savior. We are comforted by knowing that because Mallory accepted Christ into her heart, she is in heaven and we will see her again. We are kinda like zombies today....going through the motions.....what will this new normal look like?
Thank you so much for your prayers, emails, texts, flowers, donations, and friendships. We are so grateful. Blessings to you and your family.
The Codes.

Memorial

Mallory’s memorial service will be webcast thru the church website in real time at 11 A.M. Within a couple of days it will be in the archive and available for later viewing.

To access . . . www.idlewild.org and on the home page on the right side in red is “worshipcast”. Click on this.

Her story lives on

http://www.golfweek.com/news/2009/nov/10/former-florida-star-code-dies-25/

Already a Legacy.....

As most of you already know, my sweet sister in law, Mallory was ushered into heaven yesterday evening. We have already received phonecalls from the Times and Tribune which will most likely run her story tomorrow However, We were just notified that there is already something on the web about her death. It is obvious that Mallory's influence reaches beyond Tampa. We hope that you will feel led to celebrate her life with us at Idlewild Baptist Church this Thursday evening from 6-9 for visitation and the funeral will be held at the same location on Friday mid morning, at 11am. I can't possibly thank you for all your prayers, warm wishes, scripture verses, phone calls, text messages, facebook posts, etc. We are so grateful for the body of Christ during this time. Her obituary will run for two days in the local papers. We are hoping to get a "live" feed for her funeral so that out of town family members and those unable to come to the funeral will be able to witness the celebration.
All my love,


http://www2.tbo.com/content/2009/nov/10/local-golf-standout-mallory-code-25-dies-after-lon/news-breaking/

Mallory

Yesterday afternoon, my sister in law, Mallory was found unconscious and barely breathing by my Father in Law, Brian. She is at St. Joseph's hospital here in Tampa. Mallory is on a ventilator and the doctors seem to think that she is in septic shock, which is a massive blood infection throughout the entire body. The entire Code family would appreciate your prayers. If you don't know Mallory or the background of her illness, you can google her, there are lots of articles and even interviews where you can get a better glimpse of what we are dealing with. Mallory came over on Friday afternoon to give Finley her birthday present, a cute elephant shape sorter from Target! I am grateful for our time together and for Finley being able to spend some quality time with her Aunt Mallory. I will try to update as best as I can. Please know that we are believing in God, trusting in Him, and the plan that He has for our Mal.

A Huge Celebration for our Baby Girl:

A party starts with a great invitation. It gets your guests excited. I love invations! Their job is to give your guests an "idea" of what to expect at the party, so I take a long time to choose the perfect invite. Sometimes, I just go to my favorite stationery shop and browse the aisles just seeing what catches my eye! It can be quite addicting. In this case, I had to forget about my favorite invitation and go with something more affordable. Jordan and I had decided that Finley's first birthday would only be primarily family and maybe a few friends would stop by for the dessert. I also had a very limited budget that my sweet hubby gave me. I was able to stay within my budget and the things that I just really "wanted".....my mom bought. So a budget with a tiny bit of "grandma;s" help turned this day into an awesome celebration. I bought the invitations off of Vistaprint. http://www.vistaprint.com/

I think I paid 3. 50 cents for 20 invitations. Ridiculously cheap. I added a rhinestone for some added bling!

I wanted to have the birthday at my mom and dad's house. I love the house that I grew up in. It holds such wonderful memories for me. The key to this party was that I pretty much borrowed everything from friends and made all of the decorations. Mom and I and my friend, Darla, put up the tent early Thursday morning. That was an experience in of itself because mom is 4'11 and I'm 5'4....so having Darla, who is 5'9 was a great help~ We just laughed the entire time while we put this thing up.

I made the flower pom pom outs of tissue paper. I totally copied this idea off of the many entertaining blogs that I follow. It is such an inexpensive way to add "fun" to your party. In fact, there are tons of people on etsy that make a living just making these! Crazy, huh? Again, mom had all the tables and chairs and tablecloths so I didn't have to purchase or rent any of those things.

We even decorated the front porch by attaching pink bows to the lights and topiaries.

Mom and I had a cookie lesson this past Wednesday. Whitney, my SIL, and my MIL, Karen, joined in on the lesson too! We had such a fun time in the kitchen being girls and Whitney did an incredible job on her "Africa" cookies. Here are the ones that I made for Finley's party.

The plates and cups were bought at a local grocery store. They were on a table at the end of summer for like 80 percent off...so they were actually cheaper than paper plates! My mom is the one who stumbled across the sale and called me immediately to see if I wanted them. Of course, hello....PINK and GREEN! I learned a fun tip from a blog....attach a scrapbook embellishment on plain plates that go with your theme to add to the table ambiance. The cupcake is attached at the top of each plate. I used cupcake and polka dot scrapbook paper for the place mats....(super cheap and again adds to the theme easily). I adorned the tables with pink and green jewels. You can find a variety of shapes, sizes, and colors at any local craft store. I love BLING and it makes the table girly and feminine.

We also made rice krispie treats in the shape of a cupcake and dipped the top half in chocolate! They were so yummy!

I stole this idea from people on etsy too! I took a variety of pink and green scrapbook paper and cut it to 5x 7 pieces, then took the paper and cut the letter cards to a 4x7. I made the letters through microsoft word....just chose funky fonts, enlarged them, and printed them in altenating colors. Then hung the banner with ribbon.

I made these delicious miniature cupcake pops. I got the idea from another blog: Bakerella.com They were so much fun to make! They were the tastiest things ever.

The food table had one major centerpiece that I borrowed from my dear friend Eryn! She also lent me her fabulous cupcake tablecloth. I just simply added a "1" candle to the top of the cupcake to personalize the occassion.

I made the cupcakes too! I bought the cupcake toppers on etsy from a store called Seven Cupcakes!

Of course we had the birthday flag flying and one of my favorite purchases, the inflatable cupcake. It was perfect and the best part is that it came with THREE different signs:one blank, one that just says Happy Birthday, and the one below. This , I hope, will be something that Finley and our other children will look forward to seeing each year on their special day.

We decorated her high chair with pink bows, of course! KK bought her the adorable birthday hat a long time ago and I've said it for this special day. It says "Baby's 1st Birthday".

And here she is!!! The Birthday Girl had just awakened from her nap, so she wasn't very smiley yet! Isn't her outfit so cute!? I got it off of etsy! It was pink gingham with a cupcake holding 1 candle and her name ont he bottom! So adorable!

Family: Scott, Whitney, Aunt Beverley, and Cousins Julie and Jack.

Raquel, JP, and the Code Family!

Papaw, KK, CDaddy, Maki, and Javen

Finley is looking at Beckham in his carseat!

Finley eating her birthday meal...McDonalds! :)

Special Moments:

The whole day was wonderful! I had so much fun planning her first ever birthday. Finley brings so much joy into our lives and I can even imagine all the new and wonderful things that we will experience with her. We have much to be grateful for.