Gram's Place

  I don’t know, but I think I might just have the only story this interesting in blogosphere.  At about 1:30am this morning, we heard a loud boom.  I jolted up and said “WHAT WAS THAT?” Then said “Go check honey”. We both kind of shook our heads and bit and tried to listen if it was storming. It sounded to me like someone slammed the garage door. Shawn got up in his pjs and went out to the front of the house.  He walked over to the driveway and was wondering what he had heard.  All of the sudden, he heard some engine revving.  Poor Abbie… he instantly thought “What is ABBIE doing in the garage?”.  Then he saw the garage door was bowed out, and he thought to himself “what did she run into the door?”. As he peeked into the window this is what he saw: Suddenly, cops, ambulance, paramedics, all flied into our yard and wandered over.  He ran over to the other side of the garage (the back side): A young, extremely ineb...

Dear Friend, Why do you come at the WORST possible times? And you seem to just LOVE to hang out ALL….DAY….LONG…. just nagging and nagging and nagging… and just when I think I’ve gotten rid of you, there you are again. And again. And again. I woke up this morning, there you were.  You followed me to work.  I tried to get rid of you there.  I went to lunch at Hy-Vee…. you had to tag along.  I came home from work, thinking I would finally be rid of you, and sure enough, you were at my home too. I don’t know how to politely say you ARE DRIVING ME C R A Z Y.  I like friends… I do… but enough is enough.  You need to leave. I want to have a little peace and quiet.  I am the type of person that likes stillness at times in my life, and your constant presence prevents me from having any peace at all.  We have a rule in our home.  It’s called the three hour rule.  When we are invited to someone’s home, we stay three hours!!!  That’s it...

I was ironing my clothes today… and I used spray starch.  As I sprayed my pants, I realized I needed to add that to the Wal-mart list because it was almost gone.  I wondered how many people have never used spray starch before in their lives… or even ironed.  Then, I started thinking about the movie “Hairspray” and how the mom (a fabulous role played by John Travolta by the way) ironed clothes for a living.  And I wondered… what other things are the jobs of “yesteryear”.  Obsolete jobs that people just don’t do anymore? The milkman, once a necessary job in the USA, is no longer.  The elevator operator…. I never understood why they had them.  Could people really not figure out how to operate an elevator?  The pony express rider…. I wonder how many people have a pony express rider in their family?  The telephone switchboard operator.  They weren’t around in my time, but I’ve heard it was quite a popular job for women. And 50 years f...

My granddaughter is here and I have to say – I could seriously just DIE.  She is SO perfect… SO SO SO SO! 7 lbs 20 inches long sweet beautiful smart perfect Eily Amira. The funniest thing ever… she will always be LuLu to me.  I keep forgetting her name is Eily, I’ve called her LuLu for so long.

She won’t be mad at me for posting this picture of her on my blog.  Why? Because I’m pretty sure she doesn’t know my blog exists… or even actually, what a blog is.  So, I’m going to take a chance and post a non-flattering picture of her on here. Besides, I think she looks beautiful even here. This is Christine. (I almost edited out the shoulder but then realized it would take me a lot longer to figure out how to edit that than it would to write this entire post). My earliest memories of her are on the playground in 6th grade at our elementary school.  That’s where we met. Christine and I shared so much in life for so long.  We have a long list of “firsts” that we participated in each others lives.  First make-up, first boyfriend, first kiss, first fight, first trouble, first sneak out of the house….first lots of things. Our lives have gone different directions, and we have our own families, in separate communities.  But, every now and then, we ge...

Fireworks, hot dogs, apple pie, Chevrolet, stars and stripes, BBQs, sparklers, firecrackers, hopscotch, parades… they all incite similar things to Americans.  Sure, we all add our own versions.  Some add camping, ice cream, naps, vacations.  Others add motorcycles, family reunions, and kayaking. Last night, our family went to our local fireworks display.  It was the first time for our son-in-law to experience fireworks with us.  We’re pretty proud of our fireworks here. We deposited ourselves on the concrete steps of the local elementary school early so we had a good, close view.  Friends and family sauntered in to join us as the evenings display drew nearer… by 10pm our number grew from 13 (okay, not so small to begin with)… to nearly 25 of us sprawled out in chairs and blankets…amidst hundreds or thousands of people in our community…. young and old. At 10pm sharp, the music began and we experienced the sights and sounds of celebration.  For 30 ...