My grandma

My mom's mom, Grandma Sonia, passed away this spring and I read the following at her funeral. It's been sad the last few months not having her around. I keep wanting to phone her to ask her advice on this plant or that recipe...  I've finally started to water my plants in honour of her. I hope she would be proud of me :)

When I was a little kid I wanted to marry my grandma. 

She was exactly what you would imagine a grandma to be from fairy tales and really good stories....  You can picture it can't you ? The slightly plump grey haired smiling woman with the aroma of Cinnamon wafting from the house, beautiful flowers adorning her welcoming house, a nourishing vegetable garden in the back and a bag of sewing or knitting beside the fireplace.  My grandma was all these things and more, and in turn she was able to be a slower older version of that to my own children.  She Brought me homemade chicken soup when I was sick, enveloped me in great big hugs whenever I came and again when I left, slipped me spending money just for fun, and even let me win at all the silly games she would play with me.

As I got older I realized that if I couldn't marry her then I would want to grow up to be just like her ( except for maybe the swearing, slightly grumpy and impatient part... But I think if you asked my husband he'd say I was well on the way in that dept too :) we all have our quirks don't we?

As a grown woman, I still enjoyed visiting her, playing cards, hearing countless old stories of her life...  And enjoyed her chiding when I would inadvertently lose my keys just as I was trying to leave.  'Oh Melanie! ' she would say, and then promptly search the house with me trying to find them. ( the last time I lost them I actually had to borrow her flashlight and hunt on the dark driveway under a layer of snow... ) Sorry if I stressed you out grandma,.... I thought it was very fitting that the last words she spoke to me the day before she died were 'don't lose your keys!' As  I was leaving the hospital .

I also loved her discrete way of letting me know that I was in danger of killing the plants she would give me because I would forget to water them....  I would always run through the house trying to water plants if I knew she was coming, or hang my head in shame if I forgot and she mentioned that something looked like it needed water.  How did she manage to keep up with all that gardening, crafting, sewing and cooking?  

What Joy it is to carry in my heart the image of her playing cards with my own children (and letting them win too) and pretending to eat a feast of styrofoam toast and plastic tarts with them.  

Since I got married 15 years ago, grandma was the one who I would try to emulate in most things to do with being a home maker.  I would call her regularly asking for advice on how to cook, garden, sew and many other subjects.  She taught me how to make apple pie, how to can peaches, crabapple jelly, sew a hem, and bake cinnamon rolls.  

She was a wealth of information and I only wish she had left behind a book filled with everything she knew or better yet a phone number... Because google just doesn't come close to the great advice from my grandma....  And it can't help me find my keys either :)

in the words of my very sweet four year old, 'i loved going to her house to play!  And I wish that no one ever had to get sick and die.'

Pray for me grandma Sonia, that I may learn to really love my vocation as a wife and mother, that I will have as much fun doing it as you did.