I Heart Grandma Barb

Reposting this entry in memory of G.Barb.  5/26/12

Grandma Barb is Bill's paternal grandmother. She's 89 years old and lives alone. I might add that she lives alone in the same house on the farm that her husband's family settled close to 100 years ago. G.Barb likes to share the stories about the horrendous state of her house when she "came home" around 1940(ish). There was no running water, no electricity, nothing but an outhouse (a 2-seater--she's proud of that fact), and a few cows that had roamed through the rooms. She's lived in this house a long time. She raised two kids here, was married for 60 years here, and can tell a million stories about all of the things in life that she's experienced here. Personally, I think I've heard all of them, though she's been known to surprise me with a new one on occasion. (My all-time favorite G.Barb story is about how she and her mother-in-law snuck down the the local brothel and wrote down the license numbers on all of the cars parked there. She was proud of that one!)

I love Grandma Barb. Since my own Grandmas died when I was young (one when I had just turned 13 and one when I was 19), I've always been so thankful for her place in my life. I was so happy to have a Grandma available when Bill and I were married, when I had my first baby, and at all the other milestone moments in life. She was always there, wearing her brown and orange (she LOVES the color orange) pantsuits, Coty Wild Musk perfume, and sensible brown shoes. Always offering a listening ear, maybe a little advice, and usually a funny story pulled from her own experiences. Always one to cry at happy and sad events, G.Barb likes to say that her "bladder is behind my eyeballs." I love that one.

Grandma Barb has a fiery tongue. I've seen her tell people off in such a way that if there were awards for such things, she would be the Grand Champion. Flipping the bird at bad drivers? Oh, yes. Very much a G.Barb thing. God help the person who would mess with any of her family. Bill and I still laugh when we think about her favorite chide at his childhood sporting events: "Hey, you kid! Watch it!" And my all time favorite, "You rummy car!"

Something else we love about G.Barb is her incredible collection of figurines. Holiday figurines, animal figurines, ugly figurines. You name it, she probably has a figurine to represent it. Through the years she has shared some of these treasures with my figurine-loving girl. When we travel back to Oregon for a visit, you can often find Madeline talking with Grandma Barb, discussing all sorts of important things. Sometimes they visit for several hours, just sitting and talking, occasionally eating one of her chocolate chip cookies or always-present Drumstick ice cream cones. This has always struck me as a bit unusual, a preteen (and later teen) girl who would take the time to willingly visit with her elderly Great Grandma. I really think they both enjoy it.

As we were putting the seasonal decorations around the house this past week, we rediscovered many of our G.Barb treasures. Each one reminds us of her and the many, happy times that we've had together.

These are our seasonal favorites:

This pumpkin was certainly from the Dollar Tree. Nothing special, but G.Barb has one just like it.

Mr. Ghosty. He made the precarious trip via the USPS. His candle holder was broken during shipping, but we still love him.

My favorite, albeit unnamed, squirrel. This screams Grandma Barb to me. Madeline believes that this might be her first G.Barb original.

A Really Old Dress

This is a dress that my Grandma made for my Mom. My Mom was to be the flower girl in her sister's wedding (her sister was 20 years older than she). I believe she was about 3 years old at the time the dress was made. Without divulging my Mom's age, suffice it to say that this dress is over 50 years old, but under 70 years old.

Every girl child in our family has had their picture taken in this dress. Starting with me, then Alison, Rheann, Madeline, Victoria, Hannah, Olivia, and now Sarah. The dress is getting more fragile with each wearing. the seams are dissolving a bit and the fabric is yellowing with age. But it's still a beautiful dress, made entirely by my Grandma's own hands. It is truly a treasure.

Many of the portraits of this dress were taken by a good, childhood friend of mine, and are absolutely exquisite. However, this friend lives in Oregon and, alas, I live in Virginia. This time, the portrait would have to be created by someone else. And where, in Southside Virginia, would I possibly hope to find a source for such a beautiful picture? Why, WalMart, of course! Like any good local girl, I had my baby's picture taken at WalMart. Eric, please forgive me.

Isn't she cute, though?

Madeline's Birthday

The cake.

After blowing out the candles.


More cake.

Birthday dinner table. Fondue, veggies and fruit, bread,and Dr. Pepper.

Now just waiting until the 24th, when she ventures out to Oregon.

Am I Really THAT Old?!

The need for consolation this morning (I'm the mother of a 15 year old child, people) caused me to create a play list made up of all sorts of music that I loved back when I was 15. I cleaned up our breakfast dishes, helped kids with school work, baked a cake, and generally felt really old whilst listening to Erasure, The Go-Go's, and Depeche Mode. Good gracious, when I think back to myself being 15, it really seems like forever ago.

Hey, Brent! You still have that convertible VW? I sure could use a ride in it today.

My Bad Luck

On the eve of Madeline's 15th birthday, we're hoping that our string of bad luck has come to an end. I hesitate to even mention the possibility of an end so as not to jinx myself, but I'm also trying to be totally optimistic. Yeah, good luck with that.


We're busy with birthday preparations around here right now, having just returned from Madeline's annual birthday celebration in Roanoke Rapids, NC. Every year we make the trek to this dying town to eat Crazy Bread at Little Caesar's Pizza, drink coffee at Starbuck's, and peruse the aisles of Walgreens. We TOTALLY know how to have a good time. Madeline will be jetting off to Oregon in a few weeks (this is what she wanted for her birthday) so I think our celebration at home will be pretty low-key. I don't exactly remember what I got for my 15th birthday, but I do know that it wasn't a plane trip across the country. Lucky kid.

About our bad luck: In the past few weeks we've had two cars die on us. And one of them wasn't even ours! My van's transmission failed the first week my parents were visiting here. All of our plans to visit Norfolk's Naval Base and Jefferson's Monticello flew out the proverbial window. Thank goodness my parents were here and I wasn't left without a working vehicle. And their AAA membership allowed my van to be towed to the mechanic at no charge. I won't even tell you how much a new transmission will cost, but suffice it to say that most of the cars I've ever owned have not been worth as much as the new transmission. All of the other cars combined, that is.

And then some friends generously lent us their pickup to use until my van was fixed. During my weekly trip to the bank on Friday, an unnamed child accidentally bumped the 4-wheel drive switch on said pickup, which resulted in our inability to get the vehicle out of 4-wheel drive. It was 8:30 at night, we were 30 miles from home, and we were stuck in 4-low. There might have been a really poopy diaper too. With no extra diaper or wipes in my possession. It took us over an hour and a half to limp home at about 30 MPH, driving the entire way with our hazard lights flashing. Jon was crying hysterically. I assumed his concern was for our safety, but then he blurted out, "Daddy's going to get fired!" (We borrowed the pickup from the family that Bill works for) Now THAT was funny.

Then there was the day last week that Jon was attacked by our rooster, Big Herb. This was a traumatizing experience for poor Jon. Now, Big Herb did not come to us on purpose. When we bought our baby chicks this spring, we were assured they were properly sexed and that we would end up with 8 lovely laying hens. Well, as the summer progressed, one of the hens grew a little larger than the others, and started to make funny noises in the morning. Jack, who feeds the chickens in the mornings, thought this hen was choking on her food, and thus, the reason for the funny sound. Can you say, "Cock-a-doodle-doo?" Big Herb grew more aggressive by the day, attacking anyone who ventured too close to his ladies. He attacked me, he attacked Bill, and he attacked Jon. That was the final straw. Big Herb is now residing in my freezer, waiting until the next cool evening prompts a craving for chicken and dumplings. Or more like Big Herb and dumplings. Personally, I think that the remaining hens are a little relieved to be rid of that rooster. He had only one thing on his mind.

"Bill's Problem -Pet Euthanasia" business was further dispatched last week when our vagrant, feral cat returned home after many years of freedom. Not sure what the exact cause of his injury was, but he now resides under our big pine tree, free, at last, from pain and suffering.

There was also a nasty burn from the lawnmower on Sarah's knee, a shower drain that backed up, and some really awful weather that threatened to blow our roof off. But I think that's all over now.

Hopefully tomorrow will be a great day, and the start of some better times. We can't believe that 15 years ago we were looking at our baby girl for the first time and being completely awestruck by the miracle. Now THAT was a great day.

Here's a Few

A hand-turned walnut bowl that I found at a garage sale for $.50. Just needed a little beeswax polish. Used to hold napkins on the kitchen table.

Vintage breadbox found at the local fleamarket. Jack has been telling me forever that we needed a breadbox. How does he even know what a breadbox is?!

Sarah, wearing a dress that my Grandma made for my Mom a LONG time ago. I wore the dress on my 5th birthday. It was seriously short on me then, and I seem to remember having a heck of a time getting it over my head. Sarah thinks it's "cute."


Today I renewed my driver's license online. As in I did not have to go to the local DMV and stand in line forever. In fact, the renewal notice said that if I wanted to get a new picture taken and renew at the DMV, there would be an extra charge of $5. Just for coming into the office. One more thing to love about the internet.

End of the Summer

And I finally have time to write again. This summer has been a whirlwind of activity, between baseball that went on F-o-r-e-v-e-r, hurricanes, a visit from Grandpa and Grandma, and a broken car. Oh, and let's not forget to include the killing spree that Bill went on. Yes, life has been so full these past few months. With the days getting shorter (the days don't really get shorter, just the hours of daylight--I kind of hate it when people say that the days get shorter. A totally misused statement.) I'm ready for everything to fall into a new rhythm. One that is slower.

Camera is charged and ready to go, so I'll update with new pictures very soon. If you can believe it, I have very few pictures of our summer activities to share. Even though the camera was with us every place along the way, I seldom took any photos. That's a bad habit.

On another note, have you seen Pinterest? You have to check it out. It's an easier way to bookmark ideas and images onto a virtual pin board, rather than continually adding favorites to your favorites bar. Love, love, love it!