I Can Do It By Myself

Kaitlyn will be four in about eight days. I remember the day she was born. We were out in the yard, picking dandelion bouquets, anxiously awaiting word from my son – to find out if we had a new little boy or little girl.

My granddaughter came into this world with a head full of black hair – much to my approval. She is the spitting image of myself at about three, in fact I recently showed her a picture of myself and asked her “who is this?” to which she replied, “Kaitlyn”.

In the last year, Kaitlyn has gone from a toddler who needed help reaching the sink to wash her hands, and help getting dressed, to a little girl whose favorite line to me as of late is, “No, Grandma, I can do it by myself.”

“Do you need help getting your jeans on?”
“No, Grandma, I can do it by myself.”

A few minutes later, I hear sobs coming from the bedroom. Seeing big crocodile tears, I ask, “what’s wrong, Kaitlyn?”

“I can’t get the snap, Grandma.”

“You did a good job getting your jeans on by yourself. I’ll help you with the snap. Those snaps are hard to do!”

As this little girl becomes more and more independent, I rejoice – seeing her take pride in the abilities she has attained. Next thing I know, she will be telling me to let go of her hand as we cross the street or to let go of her on her two-wheeler. Letting go. It will come all too soon.

In the meantime, we celebrate this little girl and the place she has found in our family and in our hearts. Our family is a circle of love that will never end and Kaitlyn is a part of it.

Until The Cows Come Home

It seemed that my seventeen year old son was constantly testing my unconditional love for him. Whether it be a call to the principal’s office (the principal was my boss, mind you), or something he clearly did without thinking first, what sticks in my mind is the fact that he literally begged me to allow him to stay out later than his set curfew of midnight. It seemed that most kids in his class had no curfew at all. Unbelievable. Too bad. I told him time and time again – there is nothing someone your age can do between midnight and 2:00 a.m. but get into trouble. He still complained, and tried in every way to twist my arm. As a compromise, and after calling several of his friend’s parents to survey them, I did extend his curfew by an hour. This brought him home while I was usually up anyway with his baby sister at her 1:00 a.m. feeding, which in the long run, worked out well to my advantage.

Our middle child, age 15 at the time, soon found himself in the possession of his learner’s permit. In a short while I would have two teenage boys on the road. Eewww. This time around, I lectured about the dangers of being called to the principal’s office. I forewarned him of his mother’s wrath him by telling him that he had better never behave in a way that would warrant my having to type a letter to myself from the principal. This seemed to work. In fact, I eventually ended up telling him, “it’s Friday night, please go out with your friends.”

A year later, out of the blue, my husband bought a herd of dairy cows. Not for the love of dairy cows, mind you - but I think it was to give our boys a reason to go to bed early at night – and not stay out until the cows come home.

Milestones

My dad would not think of letting me use training wheels. But his promise of a new bike when I mastered the art of riding a two-wheeler was enough incentive for me. I think I borrowed a second hand bike that my cousin had used the year before. I can’t actually remember learning to ride it, but I can remember the trip to town to the North Star station to get my new bike. It was royal blue. I remember riding it all day and into the night, back and forth in the yard. Up and down the driveway on the south side of our house that led to the neighbor’s. I remember riding until the sun went down. I definitely remember riding until my behind was so sore I couldn’t ride anymore. Certainly worthy of a milestone.
Enter graduation, marriage and the birth of our children. Classic milestones – boring!
When Mickey was four she started pre-school. Since I worked in the office at school, I simply took her to work with me every day. At about a 7:45 every morning, I would escort her to wait for the shuttle bus to the elementary school. We had a routine, and she would not permit me to leave without giving her a hug and a kiss when she got to the bus. Imagine, hugging and kissing your mom in front of fifty other little kids! I knew that this would not last forever, but that I would cherish it as long as it did.
At bedtime one night, Mickey asked if we could just talk for a while. She turned to me and said, “Mom, I just want to be your friend forever.” I hugged her and said, “me too”.
I’m glad I celebrated these milestones when I did … Mickey is thirteen now – and you can imagine I am not the only one she’s thinking of hugging …although she is still one of my best friends!

My Mother

My Mother will turn 77 years old in a couple weeks.

She has not had an easy life, by any means. Mom fought a battle with polio at age 25, which left her unable to move her legs ever since. She and Dad married in 1958, despite her disability. She gave birth to and raised three children, all while wheel chair bound.

Mom would not brag at all about her life, nor take credit for any of the accomplishments she made. She sewed almost all of our clothes, making me a special winter coat, red with fake fur trim on the collar and sleeves from an adult coat she salvaged and recycled. Mom was always an artist at heart. I have a collection of oils she painted in the 1960’s. She also dabbled in pottery, doll making and quilting. Each of her grandchildren is kept warm with a hand made quilt from their Grandmother.

Her hands are too feeble to do quilting anymore. Her eyes are too weak for painting. Her mind is failing with every passing day. It seems as if she is much older than she is. Mom is aging right in front of my eyes.

As life makes it’s circle, I find myself taking care of my mother in some of the same ways she cared for me. Making sure she eats well, takes her medicine and gets to doctor appointments. Making sure she has flowers to see out her window and someone to visit with on Sunday afternoons.

Glancing into my mother’s eyes, I see her younger self – aching to get out, wishing to live life a little bit more like she did ten years ago. Glancing into my mother’s eyes, I see my own mortality – and my daughter being left with the same burdens I am now.

Except, they are not burdens to me at all. I love my mother, and love is never a burden.

I Hate To Rake

Today was one of the first days we have had sunshine and a temperature above 50 degrees since, well – probably since last October. I grabbed my winter jacket before heading out the office door for the short drive home. No need to actually put the jacket on today. A few tenths of a mile out of town I noticed my neighbor raking the lawn. Oh no. The “r” word. Everyone is doing it. Everyone is talking about doing it.

But I hate to rake.

Thankfully, when I get home, Chrissy, my 5-year old granddaughter, is there to meet me at the door. Her dad comes in the house to grab a snack too. After some small talk, Chrissy declares to her dad that she is ready to go home. Unfortunately, he is not done working so he tells her that they cannot go just yet. So as to avoid a scene with my darling granddaughter, I nonchalantly say, “Good, then we can go outside and rake a little.”

Did I mention that I hate to rake? Here is where a grandmother’s love surpasses all understanding. Here is where I dig out the big person garden gloves, and also the little person garden gloves. We don our jackets to protect us from the wind and go outside to get the rakes. I take the big one and she takes the little one.

We journey over to the flower bed behind the house. I roll the dead Christmas tree off the tulips and iris that are popping up out of the ground.

“Chrissy, look – there are tulips coming up! Oh, don’t step on them.”

“I won’t, Grandma. But I can’t get this rake to work right.”

“Let me show you how. Oh, but you’re standing on the tulips. You’ve got to move your foot just a little.”

“Grandma, how about if I just look for the painted rocks and you rake the leaves out of the flowers?”

“Okay, Chrissy, that’s fine.” She quickly finds four of them and places them in protective custody on the sidewalk.

“Hey, Grandma - (she points to the rain gauge she sees in the garden) this is almost empty. Do you know that it used to be full?”

“Really. No, I didn’t know that.”

“Yeah, it elaporated. And then after that happened it went up to the sky to a cloud and it turned into gas.”

“Wow, you must have learned that in Science class!”

“How did you know that, Grandma?”

“Because I know that evaporation is something kids learn about in Science.”

“Grandma, do you think we can put our rakes away now and go look at the trees?”

“I think that would be a great idea. Let’s put our rakes in the shed.”

We quickly walked to the garden shed, put our rakes away and headed over to check out the little red maple tree in the yard. I pointed out the buds on the tree and we also saw some sap running down the trunk. Next we walked to the big pine trees bordering the edge of the lawn. I told Chrissy that these trees were about this tall (using my hands to designate about 12”) when Mickey was born – which was thirteen years ago. I looked up towards the sky and marveled myself at how tall these trees were – thinking how fast time had gone in those last thirteen years, and how I had lost track of just how tall they were. How can time go so fast?

Our last stop was to find some pine cones. Chrissy and I walked to the little Norway Spruce tree in the front yard and found a bunch of “baby” pine cones, then also picked up a couple bigger ones and took them into the house. She remembered right away that I have a basket on top of the cabinet by the coat rack filled with pine cones. She added the cones to the basket. Aside from the ones she added, all the rest of the cones are from the decorator’s aisle at Wal Mart.

Chrissy doesn’t need to know that. And she doesn’t need to know that I hate to rake. She just knows that her grandmother loves to spend time with her. And look for painted rocks. And talk about Science.

The Gum Grandma

When I was about eleven years old, I remember my dad’s cousin stopping in to visit. Unknowingly, “Grandma” Sally had started a very innocent routine which involved asking my little brother if he would like a piece of gum. Once five year-old David caught on, Sally could barely get her foot in the door before being hounded by him to dig in her purse for gum. There was no “Hi, Sally”, just “I want some gum.” My mother was totally red-faced, wishing she could find a corner to hide in. I realize now that although the feeding of this sweet tooth addiction threw all the knowledge of the manners my parents had taught him right out the window, Sally probably didn’t mind a bit.

My granddaughter, Chrissy, went through a tough time when she was four, not wanting to leave my house when Mom or Dad was ready. This left Mom and Dad, who already had frayed nerves at the end of a long day at work, with little patience for a screaming child. When her Dad threatened to “ground her from coming to Grandmas”, I knew that I would have to quickly think of Plan B. Because I knew for sure that it must be almost impossible to be grounded from visiting your grandma. Or it should be.

I decided to suggest to her parents that instead of punishing her for bad behavior, we reward Chrissy for good behavior. Her mom’s job was to give Chrissy a call on the phone when she was ready to leave work. This was Chrissy’s cue to put her toys away and get her shoes on in anticipation of Mom’s arrival. Chrissy would then be given a sticker to put on the calendar and rewarded with a piece of gum for following Plan B. This was an instant hit! I don’t think Chrissy ever ended up leaving my house without a piece of gum. We don’t use Plan B anymore, because Chrissy knows that “when it’s time to go – it’s time to go.”

I never thought I would someday be the Gum Grandma. But both of my granddaughters frequently raid my purse for gum. And neither of them has ever been grounded by their Dad from coming to Grandma’s house. Plan B. It worked very well.