Babysitter

Christmas  is always spent at grandmas house.  Her house always has Easter eggs  to color and hide.  Grandmas house is the only place to be on birthdays.  Grandma has swings, little swimming pools, and surprises hid away in drawers.

 

There is candy hid somewhere–they know it.  What a fun game!  I tried hiding things in the top shelf in the kitchen, but that had to be stopped when they learned how to climb.
She has nice, smooth white creamy stuff in a jar in the bedroom.  It’s fun to spread it all over faces.  They were sorry about getting it on the bed.
What is this stuff in this little tube?  It’s a pretty color.   Let’s get it on as many things as we can before Grandma finds us.  Our faces, the wall, the living room rug.  We always have a lot fun at Grandma’s.

 

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Well after a few years of this,  Grandma made some new rules!  It’s like this, I told my children, and I proceeded to lay down the law.I will sit with the kids once in a while, but don’t take it for granted anymore.

 

It worked for awhile. I had days to myself. I could go anywhere I wanted to.  I could watch T.V.   I could actually see a movie with no cartoons.  It was heaven.  For awhile.

I thought I might relax the rules a little and decided I could baby-sit once a month.  They say you only remember the good times.  That’s true.  I had already forgotten about all the extra work… and I missed them.

 

Hubby was saying, “Why don’t the grand-babies stay anymore?”   He had always been busy outside the house when they were there.   He was with them after they had their bath and were quiet and sleepy.   When he was ready to watch TV,  they were already in bed.   He thought they were much easier to raise than our own were.  Well, wake up and smell the coffee, dear.

 

Anyway,  as I was saying,  I will baby-sit once a month.  I never was any good at arithmetic.  There are usually four week-ends in a month, right?  I  had four children close by,  my oldest had seen the green grass and moved out of state.

 

If I baby-sat for each one, once a month, that meant I was baby-sitting every week-end!  Again!  Oh, Lord! It only took me a month to figure that one out.
It was about this time that I began talking to myself.  I thought all the stuff about listening to your heart was just emotional,  until it reminded me that my arithmetic was was lousy.

 

Of course the kids thought I needed a rest — I must have looked tired.  They said me and Dad should go out once in a while, dinner or something.

 

Dinner would be nice, I agreed, but who would watch the babies?

 

And getting the right space between these paras is giving me trouble too!  Darn technology.

 

Empty Nest

I used to dream about the time my children would all be grown and married.  I would have the house all to myself. I would have an extra bedroom for my
company, if I ever had any.  I would have a sewing room or an office that
belonged to me.

I would know where everything was. Everything would be in its place. The
house would stay clean.  I would have to do laundry only once a week.  Oh,
sweet dreams.  We do have our fantasies, don’t we?

Well, the oldest married and left home.  It’s a good start.  My second did the same.  My third said he liked to live at home.  Thought he may stay for a few more years.  My fourth married and things were looking up.  All right!

By the time my fifth and last child married and left home, my fourth had moved back in with his wife and baby.  Now that was the sweetest baby you could ever see.  She didn’t like me though.  She cried when I held her.  She cried when I didn’t hold her.  She cried in daytime and the night.  Colic, they were told.  She’ll be better when she turns two months old.

Yeah Doc, but I think it is contagious, I seem to have caught it.  And I had lost my sewing-office room too.

Well, they finally got it together and moved out again.  Things were moving along pretty well.  My second had given me my first grandson.  He was wonderful!  He liked me!  I loved to keep him for the few hours his mother left him with me.  She always picked him up when she said she would, and he never spent the night after giving it a try once.  (Mom forgot to bring his blankie and we both mourned it all through the long, long night.)  A perfect child.

I enjoyed taking him and Miss Colic places when they were a few years old.  They always went home when the day was over.  Things weren’t too bad then.  I still had number three at home, but he had met a likely match and I had hopes.  Yes!  Number three is married!  They got their own house and everything!

Is everybody gone?  I don’t remember.  Let’s see now.  Yes, I believe they are all gone.

By this time, Number Five had a daughter.  He married a step-son when he married his wife.  So, there are two more grandkids to eat my ice cream and cookies.

Now those kids dearly love their Grandma!  They would spend everyday with me if they could.  They love to spend the night too.  My extra bedroom that I was going to redecorate for company is now the play-bedroom for the grandkids.

Number Four, the father of Miss Colic, now has a son to be proud of.  He likes to visit Grandma when his Mom and Dad have to go out for dinner or things.  They have to do something they would really rather not have to do every week.  Remember, they have two children.  They would rather take the children, but as they explained to me, (which I call buttering up), the children would have more fun with their Grandma.

Of course they would.  In a restaurant they would have to sit still and talk quietly.  That’s no fun.

After a few years of this,  Number Three gave me another grand-daughter.  Oh, isn’t she sweet.  And doesn’t she have good lungs.  A couple of years later, bet you can’t guess. a new grand-son from Number Three.

NEWS FLASH!
a baby boy from number two.  he’s a BOOMER!
10-19-2000

Another NEWS FLASH.
Any guesses?  Number 5, another boy child  7-24-02.

This is it!
But of course it wasn’t.

Driving Lessons

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Do you remember learning to drive? I remember Daddy teaching me to drive. I don’t know what kind of car we had, but it had a lever under the dash that he called the choke and it was black. I remember him telling Mama that I could stop on a dime.  I understood that to be good. I guided it down the road and loved when he told me to “turn here”, I just loved turning corners.   Mama didn’t look like she was having much fun though. One day I was taking a lesson at home, all by myself without permission.  Somehow I backed up when I was supposed to go forward.  Kind of zigged when I should have zagged, you know. Yeah, you’ve been there.  Anyway, I rammed into the house.  Backwards!  It sure surprised me!  Mama didn’t think that was very funny either! Funny, I just thought of something.  I don’t remember any more driving lessons. Do you remember the car you used to have? The one you had to crank to start? I remember poor Mama cranking on that thing for the longest time, and it just wouldn’t start. When I think of the cars we had then, I always remember how they smelled. I can still smell them if I think about it.  I know now it was probably carbon monoxide. Isn’t that what its called? The stuff that comes from the exhaust pipes that can kill?  Probably why we kids always went to sleep when we were in the car awhile.

	Normal everyday doin’s of country folk who didn’t miss the ’stuff’ they never knew, and the kids who wondered how city kids ever had fun.

Opinions

Opinions are a dime a dozen, and we love to toss them around like penny candy.  That’s usually all they’re worth, but occasionally a diamond is found.  I think though, because opinions are abundant and free to everyone, we don’t value the ones that differ from the ones we already hold.