Happy Birthday Grandma

Today is my grandma's 85th birthday! We are driving down for a suprise birthday party they are having for her. My brother and family are up from Houston and she doesn't know that any of us are going to be in town. Wow, 85 years!! Grandma still lives in the same house that her and Grandpy built probably around 50 years ago. Besides some high blood pressure, there really isn't much that keeps her down. Of course the woman wouldn't tell us if it was anything else...she is "so damn stubborn". OK OK so maybe I know where I got it from now! Let me tell you a little bit about my Grandma........memories of Grandma are so intertwined throughout my life and childhood, there aren't too many memories i have that she isn't a part of. She truly embodies the word "Grandma". Everyone should be so lucky to know the love of, sweet and sometimes harsh, of a Grandma like mine. I used to spend the night at their house all the time when i was a kid. I even went to Grandma's when i had scarlet fever one year so I could get the one on one attention I so deserved feeling so crummy, and of course there I wouldn't get everyone else sick. We have had our disagreements, did I mention Grandma can be stubborn! And she nags, and gets more involved in things in your life sometimes than you would like...but that is ok....that is Grandma. Grandma just wouldn't be Grandma if it weren't for you being able to count on her for those things! Here are some examples....
- when we called and told grandma that we were getting married, se replied with a sobering, almost dissappointed "how are you going to survive on your own" - "we'll Grandma, we've been living together for over a year and haven't gone hungry yet"
- I think maybe just in the past year - and I stress the MAYBE - that I can keep my kids alive and healthy. As soon as you walk in Grandma's door she is trying to cook you something, well the same goes for the kids. I can tell her they just ate, or are going to in an hour so I don't want them to eat...and 5 minutes later she has them sitting at the table with food in front of them...and if they eat even a bit I get the "See, they were hungry" like I was lying to her or something! lol
- Same things with the babies sleeping....one time we had Turner in the pack-n-play putting him to bed at her house, and he was fussing some...but then she kept goig back and opeing the door to check on him, which of course brought the screaming back full force everytime. I think that each time he was almost asleep, there she would go down the hall. I thought Aaron was going to tackle her in the hallway....needless to say, I thnk that is the last time that we have stayed at Grandma's when Aaron has been with us.
- Grandma told my sister-inn-law at her BABY SHOWER that her kid was going to be ugly! I don't remember how she tried to explain it off - but that was a classic...Grandma isn't always the most PC person!
Things I will always associate with Grandma-
- Cream of Wheat - on a plate, butter and brown sugar....mmmmmm....
-Cream of Chicken Soup - and nobody can even come close to getting it the way Grandma does - and it is only the canned stuff, you'd think we could figure out her secret....of course the more I cook, I think the fact that Grandma uses the all out regular soup and whole milk might have something to do with the difference in taste from my 98%FF soup and skim milk.....
- Grandma's fried chicken..mm mm finger lickin good - and like no one else's
- "Skrimp" - see Grandma is Dutch, and still to this day can't say "shrimp" - I found this out one time when I was probably 12 or so and we went to Red Lobster and I swear it took her 10 minutes to get the waiter to understand what she wanted. By the time it was all said and done we were laughing so hard I don't know that he could understand anything - still have that joke to today.
- growing pains - the literal ones. I used to get such bad growing pains as a kid and remember countless nights of her sitting in my bed the whole night rubbing my legs so I could go back to sleep. And the warm washrags she would continue to bring to me to put against my ears when I had such bad earaches.
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I could go on and on, and maybe I will later, but right now I need to get in the shower so I'm not late to the party. I just want to end with that i love my Grandma soooo much for exactly who she is. I'm so lucky that my kids have been able to learn about who Grandma is for themselves and have the same memories of her as I do as a small child. I know that a day is coming where Grandma isn't going to be here, and I can't even begin to comprehend that in my mind..... so I'll try to get in as many more memories as I can before that day comes. I love you so much Grandma!!