It's a Wonderful Life

What a wonderful life we have. This week I have heard and seen quite a few of my
grandbabies. They all are so precious to us. If I were ask what one thing in your
life do you cherish most? Besides the gospel of Jesus Christ, It would have to be my wonderful family. This week facing major surgery for the first time in my life would have been so much harder without my family's support! My sweet Gramps has been so kind and of course my kids are great, and the grandkids really are grand. And they call them great grandchildren because they are the greatest of all! How blest I am to have such a big family. It is so wonderful to watch your children become grandparents. Heavenly Father knew what we would need most in our lives, especially as we grow older, it does not matter where you live, or how much money
you have, but if you have grandchildren that love you, you are rich.

Another thing I cherish are my wonderful friends, friends are those who love you when
you are at your worst. I am also lucky to have a boss who is our dear friend.

Now having said that, I will share a quick story! I had the wonderful pleasure of
living with my grandparents in the summer!(aand weekends in the winter) My grandparents were getting on in years and so from time to time, one of their 6 kids would send them money, almost always Mama Kees would open the envelope with the money and sit for a minute and get up and address another envelope to which ever other child that was having a hard time and put the money in the envelope and send it on. Did she and Daddy Kees need the money, yes, but she wanted the greater blessing, and the money was a means to helping someone else. Did she ever sit down and teach me to be "giving" no, I saw it in the way she lived each day. And my Daddy Kees would grow the biggest garden in Lincoln County Mississippi and give away more produce than anyone else. What a wonderful Life!

My quote for the week: "Treat a man as if he were the Savior, and he will become like Him"

Precious Memories

Last week I shared some of my memories of you grandchildren and most of you knew who I was talking about. This week I want to share some of my memories of my kids when they were young. See if you recognize your parents. At 3 1/2 they were going to preschool 2 days a week and the first day I was going to give a check to the lady that picked them up and they said, "I am a big _____, I can take it myself.", "they didn't have any boys, 'no', I replied. "Well, I guess a girl will have to do, I'll love her anyway." The next episode involved two of them...I had gone shopping with Lou and Ma-Maw and although I had never left the kids with anyone, Monnie and Lou insisted that I needed a break so they brought "Punchy" over, Ma-Maw's maid of 10 years and all was well or so I thought. Punchy met me at the door saying "they are the worst chllin I ever seed" because they had gone under my Christmas tree (I had wrapped all the adult gifts and had that out of the way or so I thought) and had unwrapped each gift...one playing Santa and the other opening and then seeing they were not for them the unwrapped them all. When asked who they loved the best, this one would say, "I love all two both of you". "I see your hiney so bright and shiney...", a song this one had learned at achool (not from their teacher) and proceeded to sing out as I thought they were going to sing a church song for my Aunt Audrey. "Somebody stepped on somebody's toe...(not wanting to hurt my mother's feelings when she accidentally stepped on their toe). "I hadn't been born yet"...all about a picture on the wall or lack thereof. "Why aren't you playing with the others", my friend asked as she brought be dinner after I had been in an auto accident. "Because my mother is my best friend and she plays basketball with us everyday!" "You have worms", I explained to this little one as I was examining her in the dark with a flashlight..."Oh no," she exclaimed, "Are they the kind you go fishing with?" "Can dogs go to heaven?" this little one asked. "I don't know, I don't think so", was my reply. "Well one good thing", they replied. "They won't go to hell either." (You have to remember this was long before we ever heard of the church.) There are so many more but there isn't enough space to write it.

One of my favorite quotes is, "Live so that others that know you but don't know Him will want to know Him because they know you."

I love you each one!

Remembering the past...noting the future

I could not let this day pass without remembering my youngest grandchild. On Sunday afternoons, I can still hear "where going, I get my shoes, I go you" I am most grateful for those Sunday afternoons and building towers, and playing the "prophets game" and his version of "scrabble", you see we did not exactly go by the rules, but what fun we had. Puzzles and Noah's ark are all wonderful memories, as are reading stories and watching as he played on "his computer". I am grateful for my memory. And it is my prayer as long as I live I shall always have it for it brings me many wonderful hours of pleasure, much like rereading a wonderful book, you know the outcome, but you read it anyway because it gives you such pleasure to recall the joy and laughter of those wonderful times in your life. And there are no more wonderful times that those spent with children and grandchildren! Thank you, Jean and Jeff
for letting me have such a big part in Noah's life. And thank you, Noah for the wonderful joy you brought to us all and the joy you will bring again!
Now I can recall memories from each of you, see if you can recognize yourself. here goes!

Sneaking up to eat a sandwich when everyone else is asleep, catching dollars out of my clolthes dryer, the youngest one, to the 2 older ones. "don't cry, mommy and daddy are on a honeymoon, they'll be back", remember my saying "this is a special stuffed toy just to help you thru this procedure, and when you feel scared, you can talk to it", "look, my scriptures are just like yours, they even have the same words on the same page", watching Monk with me when no one else would, "I can't like that, and shoes, shoes, eat, eat!", "I don't see no bird"!, "tumetimes Grandma missed de turn", throwing rocks in the back yard, then measuring to see whose was the longest throw!, new pajamas each hospital visit, not hallmark but handmade by ---. watch ing The Sound of Music, a pink heart shaped dish that I still have, gathering up socks and putting them in a basket(more times than one), every old dog has his day, eating what you wanted then putting it back on the tray!, visits to the library, remember the one where you did not get any books, but many times stopping at Macdonald's on the way home for guess what? "I suck my thumb, but I don't let the teacher see, how about you, does your mom care if you suck yours? " and so the conversation continued as they had a "group thearpy session on thumb sucking! "are you my real grandmother?" "I didn't know that you had a grandmother in North Carolina?" and many many more! I love them all and cherish them beyond anything you can imagine, and now as I watch my daughters as grandmothers, it gives me wonderful pleasure to hear all the neat things my great grandchildren say! as Bob Hope(those of you who do not know who he is he was a comedian) would say, "thanks for the memory" and soon there will be a new baby on the horizon and maybe it will be a sasy fras too!

Teaching Old Dogs

This blogging is hard to do! Of course it is hard to teach old dogs new tricks. And we are certainly
old dogs! ha! I can think of a million things to say until I sit down at the computer. This past
month has bee interesting. We saw all of our children, We saw quite a few of our grandchildren, first at Patti's graduation and then at the beach. They are all growing so big and so grown up. We had an opportunity to see Kim's new house, it is so her. I loved it.
Coming back to work is not fun after being off for a week, course my boss would not work at all if I did not make him!
We are excited that Em had fun on the treck! What a great experience. We are praying for Jeff
to soon find a "better" job and that Andrew will be "back" to his old self from the back pain!
I have 3 tomato plants that are about to bite the dust. but i just keep on watering! talk to you later!

I'm new to blogging...

Okay...Jean helped set up my new blog and I am just learning so everyone needs to be patient with me. I'll learn more as I do more!