Santa

It has been a few weeks since we ventured out to the mall.
Mema, and Mom and Dad have all had colds.
Actually, I made them separate dinners for the holiday and took it to their house, instead of
them coming to mine.

Mema still sounded a bit stuffy this morning
when I picked her up, and was in a confused, blah mood.
The mall was just what she needed!
There were tons of little kids playing when we arrived.
They all flocked to Mema too, and all had something to say.
They were telling her where they were going to eat,
who was who's brother,
and how they acted up,
who was riding in the mini van with them,
what they had for breakfast...
waffles and cereal seemed to top the list.
And orange juice!
Then, all of the sudden, all the kids left.
Must have been lunch time.
We had already had our coffee and cookie,
so we decided to walk and see Hilary,
who was working at the Walking Company.

Half way down the mall,
and we stopped in to the Walking Company
for a breather.
We decided to go see Santa Claus.
Hil, of course wanted to come!
So, the three of us hiked to the other end of the mall.
Needless to say, we had our exercise!

There was no line to Santa, so we walked right in.
At first Mema put up a fuss,
because she wasn't dressed for a photo.
But when Santa crooked his finger at her,
she went right over,
with the funniest, shocked, flirty expression.
He patted his lap and she sat right down.
Hil and I gathered around,
and the first picture taken, was perfect!
Mema started to get up when Hil and I went to pay for the pic,
and Santa held on to her,
He wanted to know what she wanted for Christmas.
This surprised her, and she didn't have an answer.
He told her, he would bring her lots of surprises!
Not sure how I feel about this Santa.....
kind of icky, maybe...but Mema was all smiles!

As we walked out of the mall,
all Mema could talk about was how  she never imagined
that she would be sitting on Santa's lap at age 88.
Seriously, all the way home,
she had a huge grin and kept giggling at
what adventures we get into!

I think we will all put green sweatshirts on,
Mema in a red sweater and santa hat...
(she would make an awesome Mrs. Claus)
and get our family pic taken with Santa.

Good times!

school

When Mema returned to South Bend
after spending a few months in Florida,
she began attending Milton Adult Center
two days a week.
This is a place where older folks go
who have dementia, or Alzheimer's,
and need a place to be.
The first morning she was to attend,
Mom went to wake her up.
She was laying in bed with her eyes opened.
"Is it time to go to school?"
she asked.
She hopped up, got dressed, put earrings on,
ate breakfast ans was ready to go!

When she arrived, she got a name tag and signed in.
Waving goodbye to Mom, off she went.

A few weeks later,
it was my turn to pick her up.
She goes from 10am-2pm, Monday and Wednesday.
I arrived a little early so I could observe.
I was buzzed through the secure door, and waited in a room
where I could watch the activities in the next room.
The staff was playing that suitcase exchange game
I have forgotten the name of.
Mema was sitting at a middle table with another woman.
The other woman was facing away from the table.
There were about 25 people in the room.

One lady came into the room I sat in,
and observed me for a while.
I believe she had Alzheimer's,
as she kept trying to get out of the door into the lobby.

After a while, all the folks came into my room for story time.
I sat behind Mema, and she introduced me as her daughter in law.
The young volunteer took a while to find the right book to read,
and when she did, she had quite a bit of trouble
with punctuation and vocabulary.
At one point she came and asked me how to pronounce a word.
No one really seemed to be paying much attention,
and some folks were sleeping.
I didn't see the point of reading a story about Christmas
in early September.

Right before they began their chair exercises,
Mema and I decided to leave.
She told me all about the big lunch they had,
that they had played ball outside on the patio,
and about one lady that didn't speak at all.
Mema felt sorry for her, but said it was better
than the lady sitting alone all day.
She seems to think
that she has been coming here for many months.
Or that she is still at Whispering Pines Apts,
where she used to live.
After that afternoon, I was very upset.
The staff seemed disinterested and inexperienced.

However, Mema just adores going to school!
She has the grandest of times,
eats as much as she wants,
and both she and Mom get to spend some time apart,
which is a real bonus for both of them.
We still go to the mall on Thursdays
to watch the children playing.

We are a little unsure about how much we will go to school
when the weather turns bad,
but I will drive in any weather if Mema wants to get out.
She loves being with people!

Over all, I think this is a very good place for her
to spend a few days a week.
Most of the staff is very friendly, that I have seen.
They have activities planned for everyone.
And Mema really doesn't remember most parts of the day.
She just enjoys getting out, and being with people her own age.

I am sad because she is slowly losing  her short term memory
and repeating herself much more.
She is very healthy and feisty most days.
Some days she seems to be under a cloud,
and doesn't talk much.
I  need to try to get to see her more than I do.

Belle of the Ball!

Mema had a great time at
Mom and Dad's 50th Aniversary Party September 11, 2011
It was held in my backyard
with fifty of their friends and family.
There were the Vanderbosch clan,
the gang of friends, 13 couples Mom and Dad have known
since the first time they lived in South Bend,
and the Whispering Pines friends
when they all lived in the apartments a year ago.

Mema yodeled, danced with Daddy and Moe,
and flirted with Hilary's friend Bernard,
who adores her!
The photos are put in a bit backwards in the time loop,
and there are so many, I don't want to reorganize them.
Just use your imagination as she does the "bump",
gets dipped and kissed....
by the way, she was the one who initiated the kiss!

Some of the expressions on Bernard's face are priceless,
and I really would like to know what she said to get that reaction!

Enjoy.
Mema is!

Delays can be golden moments

Mema left tonight at 8:47 for Florida.
She is visiting her youngest daughter, Donna.
I left the house today at 4:30 to pick her up
to take her to the South Bend Airport.
Her plane was supposed to take off at 5:55.

What a delay we had!

Yesterday I packed her suitcase.
We think she has been throwing away clothing,
because she only had five shirts.
I bought her five more today.
And had to repack her before we left,
because she had gone through her suitcase last night
and re packed.
I also had to sew on a button to her shirt.
Daddy had run across the missing button,
so I didn't have to hunt down a matching one.

Off to the airport we went.
Tons of people were flying Allegiant Air to Orlando.
Come to find out,
four high school wrestling teams, including Penn,
were flying to Disney for a weekend
of fancy televised matches there.
Be sure to watch for them on Wide World of Sports.

Before we even got to the desk, there was an hour delay.
By the time we were through at the desk,
there was a two hour delay.

We walked from one end of our tiny airport
to the other, in search of dinner.
The snack bar was closed....
but there was an eating area through security.

It was difficult explaining to Mema that we had to take our shoes off
without muddling things up with the 9-11 terror attack,
war, bombs in shoes or diapers.

When we got to the security,
I took all her pills and makeup out of her carry on...
that required another explanation.
I put all of our stuff in three boxes.

Then I remembered that she had a pacemaker!




I don't think she really knew what was happening
behind that glass walled room,
but she cooperated with a big smile.
Said, she had not had that much attention in years!
Silly Mema.

Off we went to get dinner.
Grilled chicken salad.
We ment to get carrot cake for dessert,
but we got busy talking while watching the planes come and go.
Funny how much I have missed that simple past time
watching plane arrivals and take offs,
waving to and greeting loved ones,
since 9-11.
It was a real treat.

The announcement came, saying that the plane
would get into the airport at 8:30.
More time to wait!

(This is the pic I tried to take of the two of us!)
I don't think Mema stopped talking for 2 1/2 hours.
I heard stories I had heard before,
stories that were a little bit different than what I remembered,
and new stories about her childhood.
I will retell these at a different time.

Two things stood out for her though.

Grandpa used to play cards, and drink beer,
after work at the lumber yard.
Mema would get in the car and go get him about midnight,
when she thought he had been gone long enough.
Varying phrases of what she said to him,
took place during these retellings.
I think she told me this story about four times!

The other was how very lucky she felt.
Growing up poor, but happy.
Making every moment count.
Wouldn't trade it for the world, her life.
How loved she felt, and these childhood memories,
were the happiest of her life.

I hope others around us
enjoyed listening to her half as much as I did.

They finally called her flight.
She boarded first, and even got to ride up in the elevator!
Made friends with another Dorothy,
who was two rows in front of her.
Hugged and kissed me more times than I can count.
At least three fourths of those times, I initiated.

She apologised for talking so much.
And that she was sorry that I had to wait so long with her.
I should have just gone, she could wait alone.
I told her that this was the best way I ever
could have spent my 26th wedding anniversary!
Any way, us two girls didn't live very exciting lives anyway.
This was a real treat.
And we made the best out of it we could!

I know she will have a wonderful time.
My cousin and his young family are visiting their mom,
my aunt,her youngest, too!
She will be asked to make cookies and listen to stories.
I hope she goes to Disney World and gets a pair of ears.
I pray for unseasonable cool weather!

I don't know what the future will bring,
but am so blessed to have been a part
of this woman's life for five years,
on such a close personal level!

How I love her!
I realise that she is the character and strength
of my family!
We all took her hard lessons
and made them part of our own lives.

So the message is:
If you are delayed,
especially if you are delayed with a loved one,
whether it be in an airport, grocery line, etc.,
take that time and make a memory.
Have that conversation,
ask about that memory,
even if you have heard it before.
It will mean so much to you!
Put that Ipad, Kindle, list, down.
Cherish as many moments as you have!
They are blessed gifts!
If you look for them!

carpet

I don't know what sparked these comments from Mema.
I had been talking about redoing my family room floor.
Didn't know if I wanted hardwood floors or carpeting.

"Whenever anyone knocked on our door at home,
I would tip toe across the floor to answer it.
I didn't want anyone to know that we didn't have carpeting,
but only wood floors.
I was so embarrassed.
I son't know what I thought when they came into the house,
surely they saw we didn't have carpeting then.
I just remember tip toeing to the door."

beginning a flower garden

This is just a side note to the flower blog I wrote earlier.
I guess my memory is getting just as bad as Mema's.
Runs in the family.

During our talks, and especially in spring,
Mema recalls how her mother,
well actually family,
used to garden.
In the spring everyone would head out to the woods.
Shovels and buckets in hand.
Her mom would wander off the paths and shout out
when she found a specimen
that needed to go into that years' garden.
As such, there were far more perennials
than annuals blooming in her early spring garden.

Can't you just picture it now?!~
Mema and her brothers and sisters,
carrying little trowels,
Digging around in the leaves and dirt from the winter.
The boys teasing the girls with fresh worms,
the girls finding small bouquets of wild flowers.

I used to, on occasion,
try this on our walks in the woods with the girls.
It is highly frowned upon now by the authorities.

I love that the early gardens were cultivated this way though.
Such a part of our homemaking history.
Great Grandma loved her flowers,
as Mema says whenever she sees l=nice gardens.

spa days!

Mema went to the salon today to have a pedicure.
We found out that it was her first pedi!
She kept telling Hilary,
"I never knew people had this kind of stuff done to their toes!"

Now, I am thinking,
that surely she must have painted her toe nails
when she was a girl or teen?
But as I hear more stories,
and remember my Grandma when I was a child,
it probably wasn't something she ever did for herself.

She was raised on a farm with many brothers and a sister,
They were not wealthy by any means.
She was married when she was sixteen,
and worked long hours before and after that.

I am so glad that she is enjoying these days now!
When she got home,
she took off her shoes and socks to show Larry her toes.
"Aren't they pretty?!"
She kept wiggling her toes, and looking at them.
This is unusual, because Mema wears shoes and socks all the time.
When I came over, she took her shoes and socks off again,
just to show me!

Last year I took her to the salon for a facial.
Again, she had never had anything like this done before.
She loved the steam, and the arm massage, and all the lotions.
Especially the lip balm.
She kept smacking her lips together all afternoon.

What a lady!
I am so proud to know her!

Plants

I took Mom and Mema to Granger today.
Everyone seemed to have spring fever
and cabin fever at the same time.
We went to a garden store.
We had coffee, after finding someone to find cups for us.
We sat and talked of plans for gardens, and the sun.


We wandered about in the coffee area for a bit.
There were metal bugs for the garden on display.
Brightly painted, huge eyed, one foot tall bugs.
Lady bugs, bumble bees, praying mantis...all types.
Mema fell in love with them.
She giggled and said she could just imagine
looking out of the window or walking in the yard
with their smiling faces greeting her!
I must make a trip next week to buy her one or two.

As we walked into the water garden area,
Mema kept commenting how her mother would have loved it here.

"Oh, she used to go into the woods every spring for her flowers.
Daddy would take his little shovel and a burlap bag for her finds.
We never bought our flowers.
Mother had the most beautiful garden.
She even had a table full of plants in the house.
It was my job, every Saturday to dust those plants.
Every Saturday.
I hated that job.
I think that is why I have always hated gardening.
Omer loved to garden with vegetables, but I never did.
Every year for Mother's Day, one of my kids or a neighbor
would send me the prettiest flower plant.
I enjoyed it until it began to die, then I would throw it away.
Sometimes, the neighbor would plant it outside,
and then I would have to remember to water it.
Most of the time I "forgot", and we had to throw it away then.

I used to have a big spider plant in the living room.
I hated taking care of that, but hated to throw it away!
It was a happy day when it died."

We walked around the tropical plants and Mema saw,
what her mother had called a mother in law plant.
It was a snakes tongue plant.
We looked all through the bushes and trees.
We all had a good time!
Mema loved the little garden critters the best.
The turtles, squirrels, and bunny statues.
I will have to get her some of these as well.

Nice deck chairs are in the plans so Mema can sit outside
when the weather gets warm.
She can watch the birds and squirrels and garden friends.
That is when she isn't exploring the neighborhood, and visiting.

Saturday Night Dancing

...Trying something a bit different...let me know what you think...


It's Saturday, early evening.
All four kids have eaten and are feeling better
after the round of colds has passed.
I am taking them over to Mom's house here in a bit.
She is going to watch them while Omer and I go out.

We usually go out dancing
every Saturday night with a group of friends.
There is a little place in town that we love.

Omer sent me to the beauty parlor yesterday.
He sends me every week.
He just loves my hair in a paigeboy style.
I remember when Mom used to wait up for me
when I was in school.
No matter how late I got in,
she would sit on the bed and put my hair in curlers for the next day.
I've never been very good at styling my hair like she did.
I hope I remembered to thank her.

Last week Omer went to town and bought me a pretty blue dress.
He loves to shop for me.
I am so lucky.
I really hate shopping for myself,
especially with four small children running around.
Blue is my favorite color too.
Soft baby blue.

I am looking forward to dancing tonight!
Omer will wear his cowboy boots and hat.
What a handsome man!
Omer loves to dance,
and I swear he would go without me if I let him!
I can keep up with him until he starts doing the jig.
Then I have to sit down!
We will both have a couple of beers...Omer more than I.

The kids will stay at Mom's and I will run over and get them in the morning.
Dad will probably have made sweet rolls this week,
knowing that the kids were coming over.
I think I'll go early to share some sweet rolls too!

What is that sound?

The one funny I can remember right now,
is the time I went to pick her up to go shopping.
When I walked in, I could hear a squealing noise.
As I searched through the house I could hear it in every room.
Aunt Dot was right behind me,
trying to find the source of this noise too.
Finally, I thought it stopped.
After I helped her in the car, I went around and got in my side.
There was the squeal again!
I then knew it was her hearing aid batteries going out.
We laughed all the way to Mattoon.
She is always such a happy pleasant person.
We love her like she was our Mema too.
Clara Ann

I shared with Clare Ann that Mema still
has some difficult moments with her hearing aides.
The are the new and improved kind, though.
When she puts them in first thing in the morning,
or after Hilary does her hair,
they beep seven times.
That is how you know the batteries are working.
We always know when this is happening,
because Mema stares at the ceiling, counting the beeps.
When it completes its cycle, she gives a little nod of her head,
says "there" and continues doing whatever she was doing.
I love that lady. And she is my Mema!
Thanks for sharing and reminding me of this Clare Ann!

Bobby Holding

I listened a little bit today
while Mema remembered her brother Bobby.

He was an older brother who died when a young teen
of appendicitis.

She and Bobby were best buds.
Their mom gave them two old tubs,
and with sticks,
they would sit under a big old tree in the yard,
and bang on those tubs.
They would sing and yodel all afternoon!
Mema's eyes were twinkling when she was telling me this.

Her brothers and sister would play in the early evening
under the street lights.
They would play hide-go-seek and tag
with the light as their base.

One evening, Bobby just sat by the light post
and would not get up.
His stomach hurt badly.
All the kids were very worried and went for Mom and Dad.
They took him to the hospital where it was discovered
that Bobby had appendicitis.
He later died from complications.

Mema always tears up when she tells me this story.
She says that she was heart broken.
It was a very long time that she played on the tubs
or sang at all, not to mention yodeling.

She still has such fond memories of her older brother,
and thinks of him and her childhood with joy.

"Kids today don't have the chance to play like we did.
They are entertained all the time.
I was so happy playing at the farm,
bringing the cows home when I was old enough,
and growing up in the country.
I was never bored.
Kids just don't know what they are missing."

(As much as I wish I had photos of the Holding children playing, I do not. THe above photo was found on the internet. If you have any old photos of Mema and her family, I would love to share them with the rest of the family!)

Grandpa Holding

We lived in the country when I was a girl.
I loved the farm life.
When I got the chance to visit relatives in the city,
I thought I was big stuff.

My dad's father repaired repaired clocks.
He and Grandma lived upstairs above the clock shop.

Grandpa also loved pigeons.
He didn't race them, or send messages with them.
He just enjoyed them.

Grandpa enjoyed lots of things.
He really liked to play cards.
This was not a respectable thing for him to do though.
Whenever he heard anyone walking up the stairs to their home,
he would hurry and cover up his card game with a cloth,
so they would not know that he had been playing solitaire.

He did not like storms.
He and Grandma lived with us a while on the farm.
I remember being woken up many nights during a storm.
Grandpa would take us all down into the "cave".
I hated it down there!
It was dark and cold, and I was so afraid of spiders.
But Grandpa was more afraid of storms.
I think that's why I am afraid of storms too.

I remember taking Shirley to my parent's home
when it would look like it would storm.
I didn't want to be alone if it got bad.

I would rather it storm in the night time,
after I take my hearing aids off.
That way I don't hear even the worst storms.

summer

As summer is unfolding into autumn,
I seem to be drawn into Mema's memories.
I can't tell you how often she talked about
her summers in the country.

She gets a peaceful, happy look on her face,
as though she is transported back to the
happiest times of her life.
<
"Oh, we used to all walk to town in the summer,
following Dad and his popcorn machine to the park.
He sold bags of popped corn for a nickel.

Bands would play in the center gazebo.
It was always a different band playing every week.
Sometimes school bands,
or just a few people playing a fiddle and singing.

My brother and I would walk a few blocks through town
and buy a huge ice cream cone for a nickle."

(everything seemed to be a nickle or quarter back then in her memory,
and she likes to tell how they turned corners through the streets
to get to the ice cream, as though she could see it in her mind's eye)

"We would get big old scoops in the cone
and walk back to the bandstand,
happily trying to lick it all before it dripped to the ground.

All the neighbors would gather in the front yards,
the kids playing games and racing around.
Every week we would gather around for big reunions of friends.
Sometimes Daddy would sell popcorn, or nuts, or cotton candy.
and even ice cream.

I remember going to stay the week with my Daddy's brother
who lived in town.
Oh, he had a big house right on the street.
It had a front porch with a swing.
I would sit there for hours,
waving to all the passing cars, as if I lived there.
I felt so rich.
We went out to eat dinner every night,
because my aunt didn't cook at all.
She was kind of stingy,
but my uncle was so nice.
They had one daughter,
but she was kind of snooty like her mom,
so I usually was by myself the week I visited.
And I loved every moment.
Having brothers and a sister on the farm,
with chores to do, and noise all the time,
it was a treat for me to visit.
I was the only one in the family
who would stay with them in the summer.

My uncle sold nuts to the vending machines around town.
When ever he was on his rounds, he would stop at our house.
If he was alone,
he would tell me to go get the biggest bowl I could find,
and then he would fill it to over flowing with nuts.
Now, if my aunt was there, we would only get a handful of nuts,
and only if she was in a good mood!"


Mema is living in Florida now, with her youngest daughter.
I miss her so much and miss hearing the stories from her past.
Remembering the summer stories,
makes me wish I had grown up in the thirties and forties,
when times were simple, people were simple.
You didn't have hardly anything,
but you were happy with what you had,
and you made do,
and life was good.

Seeing how loving and wonderful my grandmother is,
underscores that the simple life made her that way.
She was not spoiled with electronics,
shopping, free time to get bored.
I love that little lady!

Ice Cream

While waiting for more children to arrive at the playground in the mall,
I asked Mema if she remembered any of her birthdays as a child.

Oh yes! We would have all the kids come in
and have cake and ice cream and play games.

I asked what kind of ice cream she liked the best.

Any kind.
But my favorite is butter pecan.
I just love all those nuts.
My mom would make ice cream in the ice cream maker.

I asked in February?

Oh yes! She would make ice cream all year around.

Then the children came, and we were distracted.
Every year is the best birthday.

I know she likes ice cream.
Every time I would take her to the grocery store,
she always made a bee line for the ice cream,
even if she had a full gallon in the freezer.
We didn't want to run out of butter pecan or cake cones.

I even try to get her to try another flavor of ice cream.
She may get it, but always saves it for the girls when they come.

A great gift is a jar of those wet nuts you put as a topping!

This lady always says she is not hungry,
but will eat until her plate is clean....
and all the left overs are gone,
if she thinks you will be throwing them away.
And then have an ice cream cone for dessert!
Gotta love being 88 years old,
when you are allowed to be free enough to have dessert!