The jokes are on me

 

I like nothing better than a good joke.  I told my first joke, inadvertently, when I was barely 4 years old.  My mom was pregnant with kid number 6 and we were discussing names for the new baby at the dinner table one evening.  Everyone had such good ideas, so I looked around for inspiration.  Aha! “I know what we can name the baby!  We can name it refrigerator!”

I hold high value in the ability to tell a joke well.   Timing is the most important part and second is brevity.  Short and sweet. 

I was driving home from a trip with my grandson about a year ago when a magic moment happened.  We passed by the Budweiser bottling plant!

 “Cam, do you know how they make Budweiser?”  

“No.”

“They send him to school.” 

Yuk yuk yuk.

 

Oh, here’s another one!

 Q: What’s brown and sits on a piano bench? 

A: Beethoven’s last movement.

Hehehe!

 

A quick one:

Q: If you’re an American in the bathroom of an international airport, then what are you?

A: European!

 

And one for the road:

Q: What do you call a pig with 3 eyes?

A: Piiig

 

~GG

Church baby

We go to a very small church near our house.  Ladybug is the only regular attendee under the age of 4.  Thus, she is the official church baby.  The outpouring of love for our little girl has blown us away. 

 

When we first began attending, she snuggled as far into our arms as she could and would not let anyone else hold her.  Then she discovered that if she laughed, people laughed back and she started to open up.  She loves sharing laughs. 

 

Before too long, people started giving her small toys, books and treats.  Just because they wanted to.  At Christmas, a bag of toys was placed anonymously on our porch.  Her newfound friends didn't desire credit.  They just wanted to bless her and us through her.  At Easter, they delighted in watching her hunt eggs and pointed out ones she missed so they could watch her put them in her basket.  

 

There is not a single person there who doesn't adore Ladybug.  At a recent fellowship time, I had her walk across the room to me to show how she's getting steadier on her feet.  I wasn't the only proud mama in the room.  It was as if everyone was watching their own daughter/granddaughter take her first steps.

 

Thanks to this deluge of love, Ladybug has come out of her shell.  As one woman says, always with a smile, "She's such a distraction, but in a good way."  She will walk to the ends of our pew during services to see who is around.  The woman who sits in front of us on Wednesday nights tries to coax Ladybug to come sit with her.  Sometimes she does.  Most Sundays, she plays peek-a-boo with the man who sits behind us.  She plays the piano after services with one of the elders.  The youngest daughter in a family of 4 kids has adopted Ladybug as her little sis and Ladybug is entranced by her.  They can spend ten minutes just touching each other softly to see how the other feels. 

 

Our daughter is thriving in this love.  We are so blessed to see such a beautiful example of God's love in the way our fellow churchgoers embrace "their" church baby.  If we would welcome each new person into our fold as Ladybug has been welcomed, how quickly would the world be transformed?

~MM

Things change

Instead of a current post, here's something I wrote a few months ago:


After 33 years, I am no longer married.  Sadly, it was never a complete union, where 2 souls completed each other.  There’s enough blame to be shared by both of us as to why it finally broke completely, but God has been merciful in the way He has revealed things to me.  A little at a time, with His loving arms around me, He has hugged, carried, patted, held and led me through this surreal time.  Most of the time I feel like a small child, reaching up to hold my Father’s hand, trusting that He knows where we’re going, and knows which path we need to be on.

My 4 grown children and my 3 grandsons have taken this family transition amazingly well.  There was some initial angst, then they settled back in to just being.  They look to me for steadiness and a listening ear, like they always have, and they seem to accept the reality that daddy/grandpapa is not able to be there for them.  I tell them it’s God’s job to work on each of us, and that He will send whatever circumstances we each need in life to make us more like Him.  He is a good God, and He knows us so well, because He made us.

Peace reigns in our home now.  Right now, it’s a Saturday morning, and I’ve got the three grandsons for the weekend, as I do most weekends.  Caleb (6) and Evan (7) have been pretending intensely for hours.  They are in sync with their role playing, and go from one pretend world to another without missing a step.  Cameron (11), who lives with me, is off on his bike, finding his homies for some Saturday fun.  He’ll pop in and out and boss his little brothers around, or share some of his vast knowledge with them.

So many verses have jumped off the pages of my Bible lately.  I printed and framed Psalm 4:8 above my bed, because “I will both lie down in peace and sleep; For You alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety.”  And Zephaniah 3:17 fills me with such joy - “He will rejoice over you with singing…”  Wow!  The God of heaven sings over me!  The Psalms were my daily companion for weeks, and the Book of Hebrews is such a comfort.  I’m reading Proverbs and Ecclesiastes for wisdom and perspective, and I have a couple of devotional books that feed my soul.  God is so good!

Doing it the hard way

Because my house will probably pop up in many future posts, I thought I'd tell you about it.  This way my Porta-Potti references and washtub woes will make sense.  My house is a work in progress. It was mid-remodel when the previous owner passed away unexpectedly and we snapped it up at a great price. We know it's where God wants us to be. I make a point to remember that as I adjust to the various make-do measures we're taking until we have our finished masterpiece.

 

Because we've chosen to be a one income household to keep Ladybug in full-time parent care, our house will be a steady source of new projects for the foreseeable future.  It takes a lot of time and money to remodel a home. We're limited on both but especially on money. Which is fine.  It's just part of life. 

 

Our septic went out shortly after we moved in. It caused a big leak under our toilet when we flushed. Not cool. The floor has to be ripped out to fix the aging fixture that the seal screws into (that's my in-depth understanding of the situation), so for now, we have a Porta-Potti graciously loaned by my grandparents who don't have their camper anymore and were just storing it in their garage. It turns out replacing a floor costs money.  For some reason, we can run the shower as much as we want without problems but if we use the bathroom sink for more than basic handwashing and toothbrushing, it backs up and floods our bathroom. I'm thankful we can use the sink at all.

 

Our kitchen was an empty room but now it has our fridge, my beloved hoosier cabinet which doubles as my pantry and some shelves. I do all our cooking on the shelves and hoosier cabinet with a hot plate, a toaster oven, a few slow cookers and a bread maker. In a Green Acres-esque fashion, I can only run 2 cooking appliances at a time. The coffee maker can usually be snuck into that mix without throwing a breaker as long as I don't also run the space heater in the kitchen.   Did I mention central heat and air is the next project?  Thankfully, our previous house didn't have a working oven so I'm adept at toaster oven meals. Plus, there are only 2 1/2 of us (Ladybug thinks my plate is her plate) eating meals so we don't need tons of food at one time.

 

Our floors are concrete and half removed linoleum.  They're not pretty but they're as functional as any other floor. One of the blessings of a slab foundation!

 

We've mostly adjusted. My main heart rebellion is being content filling plastic wash tubs in the bathtub to do my dishes. This is not easy with a small child who thinks she needs to "help" with everything I do.  Still, it's better than a kid who prefers watching tv to helping her mama.  

 

It's not my favorite way of life, but you know what? I wouldn't do it differently, at least short-term. God is teaching us a lot about patience, endurance, and trust in His will.  God's plan is never wrong. (But hopefully it includes a kitchen sink soon!)

 

Is there anything in your life that you don't really like but you know is making you a better person? Go ahead and get happy over it or it's just going to make you miserable until you do. As Granny Girl says, you've got the same clothes to get glad in. It helps to think of all the great stories you'll get to tell when you're old. And if you're already old, you can start right away!

~MM

Having a spell

I am a speller, always have been.  I remember the first words I learned to read: “See Spot run.”  If I have ever seen a word in writing, I remember how it is spelled.  It’s just how my brain is wired.  A misspelled word will jump off the page to me like an incorrect number will to an accountant.  If you ever see a misspelled word in my blog, I humbly apologize.  It’s a typo!!!

Anywho, what brought this to mind was an advertising email I just received from a linen store.  The subject line was “Peak Inside.” (This caused pain in my brain!)  Now, I can see misspelling there, their and they’re, but peek?  Oddly enough, I saw another homophone of peek misspelled just yesterday.   An interoffice communication suggested we peak someone’s interest, instead of pique.  (sigh) 

I have actually seen brake for break in a blog, by an actual writer!  And there’s the ubiquitous your used instead of you’re.  Ok, I’m on a roll (not role) now.  Hardly anybody knows how to leave the apostrophe out of its.  I understand the confusion on that one, but the apostrophe is only for the contraction it’s.  It is, I promise.  J  If you’re speaking of something belonging to it, the spelling is its.  In its possessive form it’s spelled that way.

My first instinct when I see a misspelled word is to think a little less of the intelligence of the person who wrote it.  But then I remember that I often get numbers wrong.  I know that makes me appear to a numbers person like I’m not quite intelligent, and I really am.  Really.   So, I try to overlook the mistakes that are obvious (to me only), and see what the writer is trying to say.  Sometimes I succeed.  

Granny Girl's daughter introduces her family

My husband, whom I'll call Coondog, and I have a 1 year old girl that I'll call Ladybug.  She has completely changed our lives.  I lost my job in the city shortly after returning from maternity leave and that spurred us to finally make the big move to the country that we'd talked about our whole marriage.  We wanted to raise our little girl where she had room to roam and clean air to breathe.  It had taken me a couple years to decide that I wanted to live in the country but it's always been Coondog's dream.  Now that we're here, we all love it.

 

Coondog was born to live out here.  He always felt hemmed in in the city.  Now he starts each day looking across green fields at wooded mountains.  That view is half of why we bought our house.  He loves exploring just to see what's there.  One day, he turned a corner around some trees and came face to face with a buck.  I've seen many deer since we've moved, but never a buck.  He said it was so cool at just stare at one for awhile as it stared back but then it turned and disappeared into more trees.  Talk about communing with nature!

 

Coondog stays at home with Ladybug since we wanted to keep one parent home and I found a job here first.  They have all kinds of outdoor fun.  They take long hikes in the woods and bring home lots of "treasures" in the form of rocks.  Give Ladybug some rocks, sticks and dirt to play with and she's a happy camper.  I accepted long ago that her clothes will not stay clean for more than 1 minute after we walk out the door.

 

All in all, it's a good life and I'm so glad I share it with my Coondog and Ladybug.

 

-Mama Mabel

Introducing GG's Daughter

I am the country mouse to Granny Girl's city mouse.  You can call me Mama Mabel.  I won't be using my real name because I live in an area where everyone knows everyone else's business but no one wants everyone else to know their business.  It's a little funny really.  Since I work as an accountant and know private information (which I wouldn't tell anyway), I don't think people would be comfortable knowing that I blog and I don't want to lose clients.  I'm still the new girl to town and have to earn everyone's trust.

 

After a great childhood that convinced me I would always want to live in a big city, I packed up with my husband and our little girl and moved to a very rural community last year.  I now drive 25 minutes to a nearby town for work each day, unless I get stuck behind a log truck, then I get there in 30.  It's a beautiful drive and doesn't take any longer than my old commute in rush hour.  One morning, I ended up behind 6 cars on my way to work and realized that was rush hour here.  I almost laughed out loud.

 

My house is surrounded on 3 sides by cow pasture.  It's doesn't smell bad like you would think and the cows are pleasant to watch since they're some of the most laid back animals you've ever seen.  Our dog is pretty sure he is a cow too and will spend hours trying to get them to play with him or just lounging in the grass as they chew their cud. 

 

I've never lived in the country before so you can go through the adventure of learning this life with me.  We're going to put in a garden (my first ever) as soon as the weather cooperates and I'm going to learn to can produce to eat in later months.  As always, I'm approaching it with boundless optimism that it'll just all work out.  I continue to think this way because it always does, just not always in the way I want it to.  I've already had many surprises about how life is different here and look forward to telling you about them as we go along

Donald and Olene

I come from a large family.  Not Duggar big, but big.  My parents have 6 kids.  You can't really call us kids any more, but you know what I mean.  Anywho, the folks live in Branson, Missouri. They're hard working, God fearing, salt of the earth kind of people.  A couple of years ago my dad had a stroke, and that changed their lifestyle completely.  He had worked full time until a few months before he turned 80, and then he had stayed busy working on the house, yard, and cars. He was never idle.  

Now my mom is never idle.  The little 4'10" lady is the full time caregiver for a nonambulatory stroke patient.  She uses a hoist with a sling on it to haul my dad out of bed and into his wheelchair.  She feeds him through a tube, and cooks treats that are easily swallowed for the times when he decides to eat.  She gives him his regimen of vitamins and meds on schedule.  And she does it joyfully.   Every morning she wakes up and says "This is the day the Lord hath made. I will rejoice and be glad in it."  And she does!

We kids each do what we can to help.  I have a brother who lives close by, and he services their car, drops by to check on them, and will run errands.  A sister who lives a couple of towns over spends days and nights with them in the weeks when she's not travelling with her singing evangelist husband.  She helps with the meds and feedings, and provides wonderful company for Mama.  A brother who lives in Texas goes to see them as often as possible, and helps with any financial or legal issues they may have.  A sister who lives in Texas goes to see them as often as she can, and spends her time there visiting with Daddy, and helping Mama with housework and feedings.  I call several times a week, and go whenever I can.  I'm not much help in the caregiving, but I do laundry and cooking, and go shopping with Mama.  I was able to get some time off work a few months ago and drive my mom to west Texas so she could go to her brother's funeral.  It was the first time she'd left Daddy overnight, but they both coped well.  He had a caregiver there, and he talked to Mama on the phone several times.

My 23 year old nephew lives with them.  He grew up in Branson, so he feels at home there. It's good to have someone there in case of an emergency.  He mows the yard, goes to the store for them, and helps Mama haul Daddy around with the hoist.

Their other grandkids do what they can. They call and text, and message Mama on Facebook. She's quite the computer whiz.  They bring those precious great grandkids to Branson when they can afford the trip.  One of their granddaughters is an accountant, and she does their taxes for them.

Yesterday, my daughter called me and said she had talked to Grandmama and Grandmama sounded really sick.  I called the sister in Missouri, and she said she was on her way to check on her, and would spend the night and go with her to the doctor today.  I started to worry, thinking about worst case scenarios.  Then, I thought of all the miracles God has wrought in their lives.  He has provided so bountifully for Daddy's care, and for Mama's provision.  He has given each of us talents and gifts that we all use together to keep the family going.  He has all of us in His loving care, and will work everything together for our good and His glory.  I texted my sister today, and she said Mama was much better and didn't even have to go to the doctor.  God is good!

Car Shopping

Cousin Judy is in town today.  She’s seriously pondering getting a little Toyota Yaris like mine.  We’ve taken many a road trip in that little car, and they’ve all gone smooth as butter (except that one time we ran over a freshly killed deer going highway speed).

So, we went to the place where I’ve bought my last two Toyotas, because they’ll do anything to make a deal.  We had the test drive, then went to the little tables where they fawn over you and call you “Miss” Gayle and “Miss” Judy.  The man asked Judy, “How much do you want to pay a month?”  And armed with the knowledge of how much I pay a month for my similarly priced Yaris, she replied “$225.00.” He immediately nodded and agreeably said, "$250.00.”  Judy countered with a straight face, “$227.00”

The two salespeople we worked with tried every trick in the book.  They started high and ended low.  They made wild promises.  They were in turns insulting and fawning.  Did they truly think they could bully her into buying a car with such obvious tactics?

We left them guessing when or if we would return….. then went shoe shopping.  :-)

A Day Off

I have a day off tomorrow!  It took a Herculean amount of work to get enough done at the office so I could have the day off without anything vital being left undone.  But I did it, worked though lunch, worked a half hour past quitting time, and I was out of there!

So, what am I going to do on my day off?  EVERYTHING!  Clean out my closet, organize my home office files, clear out the garage, do the grocery shopping for the weekend, go to the car wash, return a blouse at Kohl’s, and then go to a birthday party for one of my friends from church.  The perfect day off!

Cousins, and double cousins

I have a ton of cousins.  35 first cousins on my mom’s side, 3 on my dad’s.  But wait!  2 of those on my dad’s side are also on my mother’s side.  (And no, we’re not from Arkansas.)  Here’s how it works: my mother’s brother married my dad’s sister, so their kids are my double cousins.  We share almost as much DNA as siblings.  

My two double cousins are Chuck and Judy.  Those names just go together, don’t you think?  Anywho, Cousin Judy is one of  my most favorite people on the face of this earth!   She’s crazy fun, and finds the funny in everything.   

Although we weren’t particularly close as kids, we’ve become the best of friends as grown ups. We like the same TV shows.  We repeat the same movie quotes (except she knows way more movies than I do).  We text dancing reviews to each other during Dancing with the Stars.  We go on road trips.  And, we both think the Road Kill Menu that can be found at Dick’s Five and Dime in old town Branson is the funniest written document in the whole wide world!  You’ll just have to go there and buy one and you’ll know EXACTLY what I’m talking about.    

Hence, the name

April 8, 2013

So you ask “Where did the name Granny Girl come from?”  Glad you asked.

When I was a little girl, my grandparents would sometimes take me traveling with them to see Aunt Liddy (really Lydia, but we called her Liddy) in Oklahoma.  She was my grandmother’s sister, and just as short and round as my grandmother.  She was a funny old lady, who never put anything away in the same place twice.  Her little house was a treasure trove of clutter.  She was very emotionally invested in her soap operas, and in the small town dramas she could see (and comment on) from her front porch chair.  I just loved Aunt Liddy!

Aunt Liddy had grandkids, or they may have been great grandkids, nearby. We would drive out to have supper at her daughter Leema Glenn’s house, and those kids would run up and hug Aunt Liddy and call her Granny Girl.  I went home and told my parents that when I became a grandmother, I wanted to be called Granny Girl.

Flash forward many years.  At the age of 43, I became a grandmother.  I had very mixed emotions, because the baby was my oldest son’s, born just 3 days after his single daddy turned 20.  The mom stepped out of the picture, so my boy brought his newborn home for Mama to help him raise.  I still had all four of my kids at home and was working full-time.   I loved the baby more than life itself, but I didn’t know if I had the strength and stamina needed to raise another child.  

When my parents came to see us and meet their first great grandbaby, they walked in the door and said “Hello, Granny Girl!”  Hearing those words, and remembering the joy that passed between Aunt Liddy and her grandkids when they hugged her and called her Granny Girl helped me turn a corner in my attitude.  I decided to go toward the joy, and lean away from the feelings of being overwhelmed and exhausted.

That sweet baby has grown into a big, burly 12 year old boy.  He’s musical, smart, athletic, handsome, sweet and helpful.  And he calls me Granny Girl!  (Unless we’re in public, and then its “Grandmother.”  He is 12, you know.)

Hello!

April 7, 2013

New era.  I will actually commit to blogging, no matter how it looks, not waiting any longer for everything to be perfect.  Yay me!

I've been wanting to blog for a long time, but just couldn't seem to kick it in gear.  Then my daughter emailed me last week and she really wanted to blog with me, so I'm going to do it.  This could start a whole new blog genre - the mother/daughter blog!  We also want to include writings from my mom.  She's a hoot, you'll like her.

My daughter lives in rural Arkansas with her husband and baby girl.  She works in an accounting office in town, and her hubby takes wonderful care of the baby while she works.  They just bought their first home, and it's not quite finished.  I'll let her tell you about that.

I also have three sons.  They're not going to join us in writing the blog.  They most likely won't even read it.  Fine with me.  That way I can talk about them and they won't even know.  Ha!

So, my kids are all grown, ages 22 - 32.   After more than 30 years of marriage, I am recently divorced.  Now THAT could fill a few hundred pages, but I won't put you through that.  I live right smack in the middle of the DFW Metroplex (did you know that word was coined by a local journalist and is used only when speaking of the Dallas/Fort Worth metropolitan area?).  My 12 year old grandson lives with me.  His dad (my oldest son) is single, and works in the oil fields of south Texas.  He works 3 weeks, then comes home for a week.  He has 2 younger sons who live nearby with their mom and stepdad.  I go pick them up almost every Saturday to spend the weekend with me.  We ALWAYS have homemade cinnamon rolls for breakfast on Sunday.  The first boy awake gets to have the biggest cinnamon roll.  It's the law.

So if you're keeping up, I have 3 sons, 1 daughter.  And 3 grandsons, 1 granddaughter.  Generational symmetry.

I hope my writings will encourage and inspire you.  I'm just a sinner saved by grace, living the life God gives me. Nothing ever happens that isn't for our good and His glory.  I'll try to always be honest and open in what I write, sharing the blessings and lessons of life.