Thursday, October 2, 2008

Less than one week has gone by

and we've had another loss in our family. My grandma Martin passed away yesterday. She was 88 and suffered from Alzheimer's. In a way I'm glad she's gone - she's no longer held to the limitations of her illness.

I just wanted to share a couple of my favorite things about my grandma from when I was a kid.

FAYGO. On any given day, at any given time, you could go to my grandma's house and find an assortment of Faygo pop that would rival most grocery stores. And we could drink as much as we wanted.

Chop Suey. My grandma made the best chop suey EVER.

Fried taco shells. If we had tacos, my grandma would fry flour tortilla shells in oil just long enough to make them a little crispy, but still flexible enough to wrap. YUMMY.

Lipstick. In the "pink" bathroom (my grandma made the main bathroom in her house pink, with girlie accessories, while my grandpa got designated a small "man bathroom" near the garage), my grandma had this lipstick holder. It was a pink poodle, and it held a whole bunch of lipsticks. I would spend HOURS in that bathroom trying on lipstick. My grandma probably wondered how on earth she went through so much toilet paper. You know, since I had to wipe off the "evidence" before I came back out of the bathroom. I couldn't find any pictures online of the lipstick holder, this was the closest thing I could come up with. I wonder whatever happened to that thing anyway?!?

Her sense of humor. My grandma was pretty wild back in the day...and she was always one for a laugh. One year at our family reunion she did (what she called) an Indian dance on top of one of the tables (after drinking some "fire water"...LOL). Yeah, I doubt too many kids can say that about their grandma.

I'm thankful I got to have her around for so long. It's not every person in her thirties that can say she has all of her grandparents. I was fortunate to be able to say that until last night.

5 comments:

Beck said...

I'm sorry about your Grandma :( I'll be praying for you and your family!

Devin said...

Goodness Julie!

I truly am so sorry. I am fortunate to still have my Grandma (the one I posted a couple of pics of a couple months ago) but she is going downhill very quickly (healthwise). I enjoyed reading the memories, and it prompted a few of my own memories from my childhood of my Grandma too--thanks for that.

I will be praying for you--I know any loss is hard, even is she is in a better place now.

Shelly said...

oh so sorry to hear of your loss!

12-arrows said...

Oh Julie I am so sorry. . . .you have some great memories of her and I loved reading them as it brought back some great memories of my grandma! Blessings. . . love you!

Jenny said...

That is one of the most beautiful tributes I've read. I'm sorry for your loss but I'm glad to know more about your grandmother and the special bond you had with her.

-Jenny