When I was born my parents lived in Logan, just a few blocks from my Grandma Louise. Then my parents moved to Hyrum, just a short drive away. During that time, my grandma used to take me (and then my siblings) on Fridays so my mom could have a day to get things done. Isn't that amazing? What a blessing to my mom (who had lost her own mom several years before).
When we moved to the Salt Lake area, we still spent lots of time with my Randall Grandparents, going up to skate, can veggies & make applesauce, getting perms and haircuts, and spending Thanksgiving and Christmas eve there.
I admired my grandmother. She sewed amazing clothing, for me. Her box of Barbies and Kens was legendary! She crocheted amazing clothes for the dolls. They each had their own slot in the homemade box. The smell of Barbie plastic brings back memories of playing with those dolls!
I lived with them for 2 quarters of college before my mission, and for 2 after. It was a time where I realized just how alike my grandma and I were (in ways that didn't necessarily make it easy to live together at times).
During that time she served as the Relief Society President. I remember her getting out a TV tray and her Visiting Teaching route notes and the phone. She was her own VT supervisor and coordinator. She spent hours making sure that her sisters got visited and that the visits got reported. Since I am currently serving in this same calling I feel close to her as I work on Visting Teaching--although I have a wonderful team working under me so I don't have to do it all!
She wrote me letters every single week on my mission. She added $5 cash, every single week. I saved up that money and bought lots of things that I needed. And her letters were delightful. Full of the everyday things, weather, activities, and full of love.
My favorite story from one of her letters I think captures everything about my grandma's attention to detail, love of work, stubborn determination and resilience. She was cleaning the windows in one of her upstairs bedrooms (the yellow room, I think). She needed to clean the outside of the window. So she lifted the lower half of the window and sat down on the sill facing the house. Legs inside, body outside. She carefully lowered the window so she could clean as much as possible. Then, satisfied with her cleaning, she went to lift the window back up to climb in. It was stuck. She had lowered it enough that one of the pins had caught. She tried calling to Grandpa Kay, but he didn't hear (probably absorbed in the garden or with his video work). So, she just starting contorting her body and pushing her arm up inside as far as she could to see if she could reach the pin to release the window back up. Eventually, after a long time, she was able to reach the pin and release herself. As I read the letter, I could almost hear her laughing at how funny it must have looked if any passerby had seen this body of a 70+ year old woman hanging out of an upstairs window.
I love you Grandma. I've been praying you could go back to your husband and a place where you'll remember again. Until we meet again--I'll try to be the kind of woman that you were.
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| She was there for me from the time I was born! |
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| Christmas Eve was always a special time in Logan. We would do a little show. She always watched appreciatively. |
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| She sewed many clothes for me. My favorite memory were the "butterfly" shirts. I don't think I have a picture of those. |
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| Libby wearing the dress pictured above in 2009. The slip that goes under it was Libby's favorite clothing item for about a year. She wore it all the time we were at home. |
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| My grandma gave me perms a couple of times a year until Junior High. She wasn't a pro, but learned the craft just for her granddaughters. |
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| Grandma and Sarah Louise. |
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| I'm truly thankful for my Aunt Arvae who spent the last few years taking care of my grandparents. What a wonderful daughter! |
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| This was the last time I saw my grandma. She was smiling and delightful. |
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