thoughts of fun-loving babies

shared by Marlo R. Beall, her sister

Cindy loved kids. In college, she was involved with several activities mentoring kids, including Bruin Partners and UCLA UniCamp. In high school, she taught CCD/Sunday School for preschool kids at our church, and she often worked as a babysitter for families in the neighborhood.

There are also a lot of cousins in our family, more than 30 of us, and all first cousins. Since our parents are both the first born in their families, my sisters and I are on the older end of the cousins spectrum. So growing up, we always had younger cousins to play with; we would often babysit them and we changed a lot of their diapers.

Just over a month ago, we were blessed with a wonderful new addition to our family. Carla and Mike had a baby girl named Michaela Trinity. With a newborn in the family, it reminded us about how Cyn would often say that she thought babies... were... kind... of... boring. It's a funny, endearing and silly sentiment. She would say that "babies don't really do anything". She enjoyed them much more when they were at least one year old or so, when they were more interactive.

Nowadays, I think that Cyn plays with babies a lot more than she used to. Many people believe that when babies start to randomly laugh or smile, it could be because they are being entertained by the angels that only they can see. I believe that. So I am quite confident that Michaela, along with her older sister and older cousins, have had their fair share of fun times playing with their Tita Cyn.

thoughts of our Tita Cyn

shared by Andrew Beall, her brother-in-law

On May 30, 2003, Marlo woke me up in the very early morning, and not long after we were headed to the hospital in Santa Monica to deliver our first child. At 2:24 pm, a beautiful baby girl entered our lives. It was a great day and one that I'll obviously never forget.

But one memory that I have from that day that I think of often, is the drive from our apartment to the hospital in the early morning hours. Marlo and I were finalizing names for both a boy or a girl. We didn't want to find out before the birth what we were going to have, so we were excited to soon know. We weren't quite decided on what to do if we had a boy. But it was pretty much finalized if we had a girl.

It means a lot to me that my daughter Cynthia is named after her aunt Cindy. There is just about no better role model a person could have than Cindy. Sometimes after someone passes away, people tend to glorify those that have died. What I find very nice about this blog is that it is all true.

Cindy was all of what people have written and more. At some point when they are old enough to understand it fully, I'm looking forward to sharing this blog with Cynthia and her sister Ava. I want them to know their Tita Cyn. I want them to know who she was. From the small moments like she and VJ switching necklaces before prom, to the big moments like when Cindy won her student government election at UCLA.

But I know that Cindy would also want Cynthia to be her own person. I want my daughter to be free to forge her own path. I believe that she will have many of the same qualities of Cindy, but her personality will use them in different ways.

From time to time, I like to look at Cynthia and tell her that she has angel's wings and then playfully dust them off with my hand. She is my angel. And what is great is that I know she's got her very own angel watching over her. I love you and miss you Tita Cyn!