Adjustable Spirit

My grandmother, MaMa, went to be with the Lord May 14th.

She was 87 years old and due to be released from the hospital after a bout of pneumonia the day she died of a sudden heart attack.

My aunt Connie said it best when she said the doctor told her she could go home on Tuesday:

"We thought the doctor meant home to her apartment, but he meant HOME home."

HEAVEN.

I have a fabulous family of deep faith.

Our family reunions always included singing of hymns and lots of talk of "our friend Jesus".

There is no question where my grandmother is right now.

She is home.

But oh, how she will be missed.

I am 43 years old and still had a grandmother until a week ago.

I don't feel like I have the right to complain about grief when I know people my age who have lost their parents

BOTH OF THEM.

And here I sit with the absolute privilege that my husband knew both sets of my grandparents.

They were at our wedding.

PaPa, me, Monte and MaMa at our wedding 17 years ago.

They prayed for Monte when we thought he had cancer in our first year of marriage.

My grandfather, PaPa, hugged and told Monte he loved him every time he saw him.

Monte never got that from his own grandfathers

so he treasured it from mine.

My girls knew their great-grandparents, great-great-aunts and great-great-uncles.

We won't even get into 2nd and 3rd cousins.

Over and over at MaMa's funeral we heard stories of how she just took people in.

Made them her family.

She was honestly an aunt to many

but took in more where no blood relation existed.

You know, it was before my wedding that I was told that two people who had always been in my life were not blood related to me.

I was shocked because they had always been there, 

at every family event.

I spoke with the only one who is still living of the pair this past week.

Joe asked if he could call me and stop by when he was in our area.

I was so touched

and I couldn't say yes fast enough.

I haven't had a grandpa in almost 11 years

and Joe was one of the many that my grandparents took in.

And he is paying it forward to fill in the gaps for me now that they are gone.

And bless his heart,

I'm going to let him.

My mom, Joe and Aunt Connie.

The stories of my grandmother and grandfather were aplenty this past week as we gathered to honor her.

Knowing she is not only with Jesus now

but also once again with my grandfather.

These stories told of how MaMa mothered everyone around her.

How she could gently advise you with a "Oh, Honey" with such gentle grace that you didn't feel lectured.

How she quickly adjusted to being a farmer's wife 

driving tractors

dealing with cows

and chickens

and mice (that she despised and feared)

and an outhouse

with a quick and easy proficiency

as if she didn't grow up 

with the conveniences of being in town 

with indoor plumbing.

The farm.

Her brother Barney talked about this "adjustable spirit" at the funeral. 

How it was the best part of her.

Like when she had to start dialysis.

It was tough.

And just wiped her out some days.

But she "adjusted".

The doctors told my mom and aunt that most people her age would only be able to withstand dialysis for about 5 years.

MaMa endured it for 11 years.

She had this ability to take what was given her

and be better for it

not beaten by it.

And laugh about it along the way.

She was so funny.

And could sing!

There are certain hymns that I cannot sing without hearing her voice and smelling the inside of her small church or tasting the flavor of the butterscotch Lifesavers she'd sneak me to be good and sit still during the sermon.

One time, when my McDaniel was just a toddler, MaMa and PaPa drove over to see us and got McDaniel a balloon.

McDaniel's little hands lost hold of the balloon in a parking lot and MaMa took off like a deer chasing that balloon into traffic practically getting hit by a bus.

I looked at my grandfather in amazement and he just said something to the effect of,

"Let her go. She won't be happy until she gets the balloon back."

When I was about 9 or 10, I got to spend a rare few summer days at the farm with my grandparents all by myself.

Coming from a family with 4 kids, this was a rare treat.

They had an ENORMOUS garden that we would tend to most evenings. 

MaMa decided to teach me which end of a red chili pepper was the hottest and to never eat.

She bit the opposite end of what she had just told me was the hottest

and preceded to take off 

like a rabbit on fire 

to the garden hose.

I had never seen MaMa run that fast before

(until the balloon incident 20 years later).

MaMa sputtered and moaned and prayed out loud a bit as she guzzled water from the garden hose

with me watching her wide-eyed and open-mouthed the whole time.

Finally, she just laughed and laughed and laughed saying,

"Boy, was I wrong!"

I don't eat red chili peppers to this day.

She could make chicken and noodles and macaroni and cheese and yeast rolls that would make you cry

and her sugar cream pie was the stuff of angels.

She was never quite happy with the way I made her sugar cream pie (even though she worked with me and wrote out extensive instructions).

One Thanksgiving I made the pie and she pointed to it and asked with a teence bit of confusion,

"What is this?"

She wrote out the instructions for the pie all over again, walking me through it out loud

all the while my brothers looked on in laughter.

Me and MaMa in her kitchen. 

All of those wonderful dishes were served by her church after the funeral.

They were good but not quite the same.

My mother commented how odd it was to be in a fellowship hall without my grandmother in the kitchen doing the cooking and serving.

She was such a doer.

Always planning a party

decorating a table

crafting centerpieces

teaching Sunday school

sewing a costume

writing out a card.

Hhmmm…

sounds a lot like my mom and aunt

and me 

(minus the sewing part).

My mom, MaMa and Aunt Connie. All cut from the same cloth.

Yesterday as I helped with a surprise birthday party

decorating tables

crafting centerpieces

and making MaMa's macaroni and cheese,

I felt so incredibly blessed to have MaMa's blood coursing through my veins

and the legacy of her faith in Jesus beating in my heart.

She lives on.

And I will see her again one day.

10 Favorite Things

I have never done this before

even though it is very popular in the blogosphere

you know, to list some of my favorite things.

Not Oprah style

I am not giving anything away.

Although, that is popular in blogland too--giveaways.

If you have actual sponsors

and more than 20 people who follow your blog.

But quite frankly,

I usually just hit delete when I see a post about a giveaway.

I don't have the storage and/or counter space for an orange Kraftmaid mixer

and as much fun as I think I could have with a Silhouette machine,

my practical side says,

"You don't need that."

Funny though,

my practical side was pretty quiet when I recently purchased 

1) a rusty old food scale

(see how I transitioned right into my 10 favorite things without getting too far down the rabbit trail?)

L-O-V-E!

  and 2) 5 silver spoons and 5 silver forks.

It was important to me at the time.

I found these treasures at this great little shop by my girlfriend's house. They have an AMAZING collection of vintage dresses labeled by decade.

80s

Ellie looking a little
"Toddlers and Tiaras".

Then she got stuck in another 80s beauty:

Ellie didn't panic so she doesn't take
after me.

Luckily, my friend Sumita was there to help because I was too busy laughing

and taking pictures.

 The 60s are alive and well at this store.

I LOVE this on McDaniel because:
1) It fits like a glove.
2) That peacock color is awesome.
3) It is LONG enough for her 6 foot tall(ness).
 Can you hear
the "Hallelujah" chorus?

Too bad the dress was $125.

I know! 

I found this scene in progress.

Apparently trying on vintage dresses makes one overheated.

3) Going to vintage shops with friends and family DEFINITELY counts as one of my favorite things.

McDaniel bought an old milk bottle with her own money.

Love that!

We went around the yard in the rain clipping flowers from our yard to fill it with

which she put together into this:

She thought it looked like her hair which is
why she is hamming up that face.

The bouquet included tulips, lilacs, some white blooms from a bush that I have never been able to identify, and then spider grass.

Which transitions nicely into my next favorite thing:

 4) This is my dwarf lilac tree that Monte brought home for me 7 or so years ago. 

Isn't it adorable? 

Can't you smell them? 

Lilacs always remind me of my grandmother.

She'd always cover her lilac bush with a sheet 

whenever there was a cold snap in the spring.

(Hello, it is the Midwest. 

There is ALWAYS a cold snap in the spring.)

5) This is my phlox in bloom. 

I bought them in a clearance section of a garden store years ago half-dead. 

I am so happy they could be nursed back to life.

They are coming!!!

6) My peonies are budding and the ants are doing their job eating away the layers so they can bloom.

Can't. Wait.

Peonies always remind me of my grandmother too.

I have pink and white peonies.

But only the white are fragrant.
(Are you yawning yet? This is getting boring. Sorry.)

A white-pinkish viburnum at church.

Smelled amazing.

A Korean spice viburnum at my friend Beth's house.

Smelled a lot like a lilac.

It was on her patio by this fragrant bush 
that she introduced me to another fave:

7)

Oh. 

My. 

Word.

The fun we have had with this little iPhone app!

It changes your voice to sound like you have been sucking on helium

or turned into one of the Chipmunks.

It is ridiculous and hysterical.

I can't figure out how to get some of our videos uploaded on this post.

 So I am going to need you to imagine what Monte and I sound like singing

  "Close To You" by The Carpenters

and 

"Muskrat Love" by Captain and Tennille

but as Simon, Theodore and Alvin.

Beth also introduced me to another iPhone app called Heads Ups.

8)

It is a cross between 25,000 Pyramid and Charades.

You use your phone to give clues to others whose job it is to get you to guess the right answer.

The kicker is, they are being videoed by the phone you are holding up to your head.

Pretty funny stuff.

Especially when my family was trying 

to get me to guess flying squirrel. 

I can't wait to play this with a big group.

9) Pear Chobani Greek yogurt. 

You guys, there are actual pear chunks in the yogurt! It is so good.

("You guys" or just "guys", is the Midwestern version of "y'all".)

10)

Sparkly Green Earrings by Melanie Shankle is just fantastic!

The best book I've read in a while and the kind that I didn't want to end.

I laughed out loud yet teared up with the sweetness of how she writes about being a mother. This girl has a writing style that makes you feel like you are talking to her on the phone.

She has a blog called The Big Mama Blog, which I enjoy very much as well.

So go get this book! I am giving away copies for Mother's Day.

Wait. When I say "giving away" I don't mean "giveaway". 

Happy Mother's Day!

The Indignity of Parenthood

After I dropped Ellie off at school this morning,

I saw a dad standing on the corner by the school wearing a long-sleeved t-shirt COVERED in neon orange, pink and yellow child-size hand prints.

Kinda like this but NEON. With WAY more pink.
And long-sleeved.
I like details.

My first reaction was,

"Awww, that sweet dad is honoring his daughters 

(obviously daughters:  neon pink was involved) 

by wearing that shirt in public."

Then another reaction quickly followed,

"Dude, man up! Have some dignity!"

The dad was hole-punching the kids' passports who walked or biked to school.
(The school promotes a Walk/Bike to school Wednesdays.
Ellie is in the 5th grade and therefore feels "over it". So I drove.)

Then I felt bad again and was back to the,

"Aww, he volunteered at school AND wore the t-shirt that obviously was gifted to him by his daughters. 

So. Sweet!"

Then I saw that he was standing next to a tandem bike.

I went right back to,

"Seriously? You are going to stand there with a pink hand print shirt on in front of a tandem bike--wait, is that a basket on the bike?! Dude…!"

I know.

I know.

I know!

(I never say dude. Why did I  "thought judge" it?)

Good thing the light turned green because there was ALL KINDS of "thought judging" going on from the Manvan.

Thought judging.

You know, the judgements I would NEVER say aloud

good Christian woman that I am

(ahem)

but have no trouble open-hand slapping 

the poor dad with 

in my mind.

I felt convicted as I drove home and thought of all the ways that Monte and I have traded dignity for parenthood.

I actually started chuckling as I thought of SEVERAL examples:

•Like when I was at my sister-in-law's wedding rehearsal dinner sick from the early stages of pregnancy with Ellie and McDaniel, just 3 years old at the time, decided to put little tiny braids 

all over my hair while everyone ate. I was too tired and ill to say no and it kept her occupied. 

Then, everyone became very aware of my "do" and started laughing.

Dignity--gone!

Or the time

•McDaniel was an infant and we met Monte at the mall for lunch and she did one of those 

"explosive poops" all over her outfit and his silk tie. I ran to buy her a new outfit and he went 

to change her in the family bathroom. I came back to find that he had filled the sink 

in the bathroom with water and was soaking his silk tie in it to clean it. 

I left to go buy him a new tie so he could get back to work.

How do you go back to work after you have been 

explosively pooped on?

You trade in your dignity, that's how.

You know, the Lord didn't even let me pull into my driveway before flooding me with example after example of my own parenthood indignities.

Speaking of floods:

•Many years ago we had a leak, right over the piano in the living room, that came from 

the bathroom upstairs. The plumber discovered that there was a clog in the bathtub pipe 

due to a little plastic doll that McDaniel had shoved down the drain--no doubt to see if 

her bathing suit would change colors. Remember that girl from the Fisher-Price dollhouse 

whose bathing suit would turn red in heat and pink in cold? The plumber didn't even have 

the tact to "thought judge" me. He judged me right to my face,

"Well, if you had been watching your daughter in the bathtub, ma'am, you could have saved yourself a lot of money!"

Watching her?! More than likely I was in there with her and a boat load of bubbles and other toys.

How quickly the tables can turn!

The Lord was faithful to smack me with the plank in my own eye as I sat there judging the speck of sawdust in that dad's. (Matthew 7:3-5)

But here is the thing:

It isn't sawdust at all. 

The crazy things we are willing to do for our kids.

I'd do all those indignant moments over again.

•I'd line up to get the crazy Jamaican braids.

•I'm sure Monte would sign up to get explosively pooped on.

•And I'd still let McDaniel bathtub play with the Fisher-Price doll with the cool temperature sensitive bathing suit, even though I knew the drain cover wasn't glued down anymore.

The same is true, no doubt, for that dad this morning

wearing that neon pink hand print shirt

standing in front of his tandem bike

that may or may not have had a basket.

God bless him.

Energy Balls

I don't often have recipes that I get asked to share.

I like to cook but am not super great at it.

Baking is a disaster for me.

Too much math.

Can't wing it.

(But I like to wing it).

Disaster.

I am not always so good with instructions.

Back to my recipe…

I was looking online for something high in protein to feed the girls for breakfast.

They were getting WAY over English muffins and turkey bacon.

We needed something else.

I found this at:

Cutest name ever.

Ali calls them "No-bake energy bites". 

Around here, they are Energy Balls.

Here is what you need:

That's it! No sugar either.

•1 cup dry oatmeal

•1/2 cup chocolate chips

•1/2 cup peanut butter

•1/3 cup honey

•1 tsp. vanilla

The original recipe also calls for:

•1 cup toasted coconut flakes 

(don't like coconut at our house)

•1/2 cup ground flaxseed

(don't know what that is, so why am I going to eat it?)

I always double the recipe because they are gone so fast!

Except for the chocolate chips. I don't double them because we like to keep the Energy Balls in the freezer and chomping on a frozen chocolate chip can be ouchie.

I mix all the dry ingredients first.

Look at me taking pictures and feeling like a Foodie.

Let me just say, that this stuff gets STICKY! I have some tactile issues with being sticky.

Don't get me started on maple syrup 

and why I barely allow it in my house.

But I push through my issues for this recipe.

It's that good!

Look at me getting all sticky in spite of my issues.

I form balls out of the dough. Not too big though, these guys are filling.

I put them in a container that can handle being frozen. 

Ours is our Tupperware Disney princess container we've had FOREVER.

I layer the balls using wax paper.

I stick them in the freezer because just chilled in the fridge makes you feel like you are eating raw cookie dough.

Not that there is anything wrong with that.

But it can get a bit weird first thing in the morning.

And the girls do eat these for breakfast

and an after-school snack

and they are awesome smooshed in with some vanilla ice cream.

I just ate 2 while I typed this post.

Other ideas to add instead of chocolate chips:

•raisins

•dried berries like cherries or cranberries

•chopped almonds, pecans or sunflower seeds

•other chips like butterscotch or dark chocolate.

Enjoy!

Shadowing Day

My oldest daughter, McDaniel, is in the 8th grade.

The school asked that each of the kids go to work with one of their parents for a Shadowing Day.

They had to ask a series of questions of their "shadower"

or would it be "shadowee"?

And they had to write an essay about their experience.

McDaniel was VERY excited about going to work with Monte.

She got all dressed up and couldn't wait to sit at a desk with a phone and a computer and play secretary

(she and Ellie have been doing that for years).

Right away she didn't like how early Monte wanted to leave for work.

So the day started off grumpish.

See the happiness squirting out of her face?

Monte got to work and realized that he was being audited.

That day.

Yep.

Happens every two years and it just so happened to be the day of Shadowing Day.

The sweet old guy that normally handles Monte's office audits retired.

His replacement was humorless and less sweet.

So McDaniel got shut away in a windowless conference room with a computer.

For an hour and a half.

She wrote a 467-word essay about her experience.

And then texted me.

A lot.

After the audit, it was lunchtime.

And as it turns out, a Cabela's just opened right by Monte's office.

Being a lover of all things Duck Dynasty and camo, 

McDaniel REALLY wanted to go check it out.

Here are the pictures I was sent:

That is a look of "Oh my goodness, this is so
heavy!" not a look of "Look! It's Bambi--
let's shoot it!"

She REALLY wants this. Apparently, a camo 4-wheeler would be
all the rage in our suburb--no where near a woods.

Monte thought this was hilarious. 

A long time ago Monte told me that farts would always be funny to him.

I will give you some time to let that sink in.

I am not sure why this came up but probably a response to my being appalled at just how bathroom his humor can be.

So the fact that he found this t-shirt funny is no surprise to me.

The fact he took a picture of it and sent it to me is a bit baffling but nothing to keep me up at night.

The fact that I came home from tap class last night to see that he had posted it to his Facebook page completely floors me.

But I am choosing to still be grateful that he didn't purchase the shirt and isn't walking around town living his life wearing it for all to see.

I am a glass-half-full kinda girl like that.

Back to Shadowing Day…

Lunch helped McDaniel forget the slow morning but did not prepare her for the even s-l-o-w-e-r afternoon.

Because what Monte didn't get done in the morning due to the audit,

he HAD to get done in the afternoon.

Which spelled more alone time for McDaniel in a windowless room.

So she FaceTimed me.

A lot.

But I had stuff I wanted to get done too,

and quite frankly, the iPhone puts like, 10 years on my face.

And it was depressing.
And I just couldn't stand to look at me anymore.

So when Ellie got home from school,

I let them FaceTime.

But even Ellie got bored after awhile.

McDaniel's take away from Shadowing Day?

"People who are in charge, 
sit a lot and tell a lot of people what to do."

"And it is exhausting."

Monte explained that is why he sometimes likes peace and quiet when he gets home after a long day.

Before

After.
I will explain the 4-foot fish pillow later.