Every few years, my dad gets to be the lucky guy whose birthday falls on Father's Day. This year is one of those years.
(Me with my dad, 1976)
Happy birthday, Dad! And Happy Father's Day! Everything I know about how to tell a joke I learned from you. And everything I learned about getting lost while I'm driving...I didn't learn from you.
My sister sent this video to my dad. A good laugh worth sharing.
Thirty-five years ago my mama got to celebrate her first Mother's Day with her super adorable three month old daughter.
The back of this photo reads,
2 -3-76
Coming home with Mom.
Some people couldn't live next door to their mom, but I do. I do because I know she'd do anything for me. I do because even if we drive each other a little crazy every once in awhile, it's nothing a piece of pie can't fix.
Living here is coming home.
I love you, Mom
Last Monday, as I was driving Julianne to pre-school, I explained to her that Uncle Don had gone to Heaven.
"He's in Heaven?" she asked.
"Yes, he's in Heaven."
"Can he see us?"
"I don't know," I admitted honestly.
"Can we see him?"
"No," I told her.
Jules paused a moment to think about this.
"Well, we can see him in our hearts. He'll always be there."
She might be four years old, but she's got it figured out.
*
Saturday we spent the day seeing Uncle Don in our hearts.
For me, the hardest part about the graveside service is walking away. It's not the words, it's not the flowers, or the dirt--although the dirt is difficult too, especially so at my grandma's burial. It's leaving.
My aunt and my uncle have been sweethearts since they were 14 years old. More than fifty years of togetherness, and now aunt Jane had to walk away. My aunt hugged me and cried and told me, "It's so comforting to know that God will watch over him even after we leave." It's hard to leave. Even though Uncle Don had already left us, we now had to leave him.
And yet we walked away, the rain pouring down on us, the puddles sloshing into our shoes.
Before the service at the church, family members gathered together for pictures. This was the first time in perhaps twenty years all of the Larson cousins were together at the same time. There have been many times we have been together minus one, but this time we were all there.
There is a long story about why we haven't all been together, but let me just say that this photo is nothing short of a miracle.
From Washington, Idaho, California, Pennsylvania and Scotland, the ten of us cousins were finally reunited to honor a man who had meant so much to us.
As it turned out, every single one of Uncle Don's nieces and nephews were there.
He loved us. We knew he loved us. And we loved him.
Hundreds of people were at the service, filling every seat in the church. People who had worked with Uncle Don, people who had gone to school with Uncle Don, people who knew him and his family. Not only those who knew Uncle Don, but also those who didn't know him but knew his family and his extended family.
My aunt's hairdresser.
My dad's family.
My cousin's coworkers.
The principal from school the grandkids attend.
All there to demonstrate love and support to the family; all there to honor a great man.
The service was beautiful. The choir was lovely, pastors spoke wonderful words, my mom and brother put together an amazing video tribute. Sydney spent the entire service drawing a picture of the creek as it is in the summer and wrote "I will miss Don. I am sad." When she finished she burst into tears and sobbed on my shoulder. Uncle Don was a constant presence at the creek in the summer, and Sydney knows we will miss him so very much.
Yes, Uncle Don will live on in our hearts, and Saturday showed us just a portion of the many hearts that he touched. Yes, we are comforted knowing that he was a man who served Jesus, and we will meet again in Heaven. As the pastor said at the service, "Don wins." He won the race set out before him.
That is, indeed, worth so very much.
And yet.
We just want him here.
We want him at birthday parties and graduations. We want him down at the creek and out mowing the lawn. We didn't want him to leave, but he did.
And now we run without him.
(Photos taken by Sarah.)
I have tried to make it a habit to take lots of photos. Photos of the big moments--graduation from kindergarten, babies being born, finishing a marathon. And photos of the little moments--kids playing, kids eating, kids sleeping. Photos of family swimming, family laughing, family hanging out at the kitchen table. I know my memory isn't perfect, and I want to remember the little--and big--moments that make up life.
And then sometimes a big moment comes along, and it turns out you don't need your camera to remember it.
I remember a warm summer day, late June 2009. I was sitting in the golf cart near the trampoline, my mom and Sarah standing near me. We were talking, and kids were playing. We were waiting to hear news from Aunt Jane about Uncle Don. Uncle Don had suffered what appeared to be a kind of stroke a week before, but after tests, doctors determined it wasn't a stroke. Today we would hear what the doctors thought it was. My mom said, "Oh, here comes Jane," and I turned to watch Aunt Jane walk across the field.
She was wearing shorts, looking down at the ground. She was talking on her cell phone, and from the bottom of her cell phone a little gem on a silver chain glinted in the sunlight. She looked up and saw us looking as her, shook her head, and finished her conversation (with my dad, as it turned out).
"It's not good," she said. And tears filled her eyes.
I remember my aunt talking, my mom gasping and crying, and the words "glioblastoma," "brain cancer," "left untreated, he has three months."
The four of us gathered around the golf cart and wept. I held my aunt's hand, and felt immense sadness for the future ahead.
I saw my brother round the corner of the garage, and Aunt Jane went over to him to tell him the news. I didn't hear what she said, but watched the anguish fill Tyler's face and he leaned his tall 6'4" frame against Aunt Jane's shoulder.
We were all devastated.
*
Aunt Jane and Uncle Don and my two cousins moved to the Family Farm in the mid-80's. They lived in the farmhouse that Ty and Sarah now live in. Even though an age difference of 6 years separated my cousin Donnelle and I, we were rather inseparable for years. I spent hours at her house, went on family vacations with her family, and all in all got to be rather close to all of them. My uncle Don was the one who convinced me that milk toast was good, and he would make it for me sometimes. He was always calm, even when he was teaching Donnelle how to drive. When Donnelle and I got into a car accident, Uncle Don came to get us and was simply relieved that we were okay. No scolding.
He was a good man, my Uncle Don.
*
For twenty months, Uncle Don fought against the cancer. The treatments kept the cancer at bay for awhile, but last fall they stopped working. There were no more treatments. The only thing we had left was prayer. Even though prayer didn't heal him, it did heal part of his family, which was no small thing considering the many years of separation that had gone on. In the face of tragedy, sometimes you figure out what matters the most.
*
One of the reasons I started Soup Night was for Uncle Don. Even though we all live near each other, when the nice weather fades we don't always see each other that often. Soup Night would make sure we would see each other. Soup Night would bring us together, allow us to see Uncle Don, and make sure we saw him, and talked with him, and hugged him.
Last week, we had our last Soup Night with Uncle Don. He had taken a turn for the worse, and could no longer move around or talk very easily. Because he couldn't move, we moved Soup Night to my aunt's house. We would all be together like usual, and we would have the chance to go in to tell Uncle Don we loved him while he was still awake.
I made sure the girls went in to see Uncle Don. It was not going to be comfortable for them, but it was important. Sydney's visit was brief; Julianne wanted to stay a little longer. She didn't know what to say, so I told her she could sing. My uncle Don had a beautiful voice and sang in the choir at church. Jules started singing "Away in the Manger," and those of us in the room joined in, though I admit my voice was broken with tears. From "Away in the Manger," Jules transitioned into "Amazing Grace." Her little voice sang out clear and strong, and my dad's voice soon joined her. I couldn't sing at all, but held Jules tightly to me. After she was done singing, I started carrying her out of the room.
"What about 'when we've been there'?" she whispered.
"What?" I asked.
"We didn't sing 'When we've been there.'" And so I carried her back to Uncle Don's bedside and Jules sang out the last verse.
When we've been there ten thousand years,
Bright shining as the sun,
We've no less days to sing God's praise,
Than when we first begun.
After Jules left, I brought Addie in. My uncle loved babies, and I knew that he would enjoy seeing Addie.
Addie did was she does best: she smiled.
She didn't know to be uncomfortable or sad. She just knew a familiar face, and so she smiled. I handed Addie to Donnelle, who put her on the bed next to Uncle Don. He watched her, and then with some effort, he pulled his hand out from under the covers and grabbed Addie's hand. His hand trembled and shook, but Addie smiled.
While we all wept anguished tears, God used a little smiling baby to minister grace to a man soon to be sitting at the feet of Jesus.
*
We had twenty months to wrap our minds around the thought of losing my uncle, and when the time came we realized that it didn't make the loss any easier or less tragic. We might have had some time, but we didn't have enough time.
Time is exactly what we wanted most, and we didn't get it.
Cancer has taken from us a wonderful man who loved his wife, who loved his grandkids, loved his family. He was only 66, and we are heartbroken.
*
My uncle passed away Monday morning. His wife and two children were beside him.
(Photos by Sarah.)
In all the holiday hustle and bustle (and Nutcracker rehearsals), I totally forgot to write about my MIL's birthday party.
Sharon turned 60 in December, and her friends threw her a lovely party celebrating this milestone. The theme of the party was "Sweet 60," a play on the whole Sweet 16 thing. Sharon's BFF Laurie (hi Laurie!) orchestrated the whole thing, and let me get involved in the areas I am reasonably good at.
First: the invitations, which I was quite happy to do.
Obviously, there was a lot more info on the original invite.
Second: shopping trips to Costco. It's true. I take a list, and can get in and out of that store without going over $100. Be amazed. Be very amazed.
And third: sing.
Now, I'm not an amazing singer, but I would say I can carry a tune nicely and have done my fair share of singing in front of people. And if that tune involves any sort of theatrics? Well, all the better.
As for the song, Laurie's daughter (hi Megan!) rewrote the lyrics to The Sound of Music's "16 Going on 17," and--if I do say so myself--she was fantastically clever and creative. It was quite my good fortune to be the one to sing such a fun song, and I only wish we had recorded the performance. Not because I was so marvelous, but because the reaction from Sharon's friends was priceless. Several of the lyrics were totally inaudible because everyone was laughing so hard.
I thought I ought to share the lyrics here because they are just too good to waste on a one-time birthday song. Enjoy!
Sung to the tune of "16 Going on 17"
We're here today
To stand up and say
Happy birthday to Sharon
Let's start with this class
Please lift up your glass
And say salute to Sharon (to Sharon)
You were in your 50s, now on to your 60s
Grandma, it's time to think
Discounts galore
In every store
Now that you are on the brink
You were in your 50s, now on to your 60s
There's lots to look forward to
Handicap parking
And young people barking
They're sick of repeating to you
Totally unprepared are you
To join the senior class
Diapers and aches will soon ensue
And dentures in a bedside glass
You'll need someone
Younger and stronger
Taking good care of you
No more in your 50s, now in your 60s
I'll say a prayer for you
Now in your 60s, not in your 50s
Life will be so grand
When crossing the street, though slow on your feet
A boy scout will take your hand
Now in your 60s, not in your 50s
It's all down hill from here
Creaks and moans from all of your bones
Will magically appear
Totally in denial are you
Of what the next year holds
Prescription drugs in pink and blue
And lots more wrinkled folds
Deafness, blindness
A little less kindness
All this to look forward to
You're not 50, but mature at 60
What's an old lady to do?
Dear Sharon, happy birthday to you!
It's Monday, and our long extended-due-to-ice six day Thanksgiving vacation came to an end about 5:30 this morning.
There's piles of laundry to do, a basement that needs organized, and a tree in our living room waiting for little hands to hang ornaments on it tonight. Christmas music is in CD player, Nutcracker posters sit by the door ready to be distributed, and the calendar is filling up fast. December is coming, but not yet.
Not before I write about Thanksgiving. Not before I tell you about a very special someone meeting another very special someone.
Grandma-Great meet Adelynn. Adelynn meet Grandma-Great.
It was love at first sight.
It was a bittersweet moment for me, seeing Adelynn with her great-grandma, wishing with all my heart that my grandma was here to hold her too. Grandmas are good at holding babies; great-grandmas are really good at holding babies, and my grandma was a star among stars in holding babies.
We spent Thanksgiving with Jason's family, and part of that blessing meant seeing his Oregon family. Though the cousins weren't with us, we had an aunt and uncles and grandma, and they all were meeting Addie for the first time.
And I was grateful.
Grateful for little girls who show off paint chips while having their picture taken.
Grateful for four-generations.
Grateful for family, grateful for grandparents and great-grandparents, and grateful for a little baby who changed my heart in more ways than I can count. Six months ago I couldn't have imagined myself enjoying this day, a day in which I sat with a daughter on each side and one in my arms. As my right hand helped one daughter cut up her turkey and helped prevent another daughter from spilling milk poured into delicate china glasses--in between sneaking bites of sweet potato souffle and passing plates of cranberry sauce and green bean casserole--my left arm held a snugly baby who just didn't want to be put down. Who could blame her? She wanted to be surrounded by family just like everyone else.
And though Addie may have been a tiny star in the Thanksgiving show, the older sisters were beautiful and charming and entertaining as well.
Sydney entertained us with her repertoire of songs.
Her hands-down favorite is "Jingle Bells." That girl loves her Christmas songs.
She can't read notes yet, so I write out the letters on paper for her. Even when she's not playing, I can hear her practicing the notes as she sings, "E E E / E E E / E G C D E." I love that girl.
And Jules?
She drew us pictures and danced and refrained from too much mischief. I love that girl too.
Our Thanksgiving gift to the girls was letting them wear the Christmas dresses that have hung in their closet since we bought them on clearance 10 months ago.
All through the spring and summer and early fall, we held fast and didn't let them wear those dresses. Probably we should have hidden them away, but things that get hidden away are sometimes forgotten, and I did not want to forget about these dresses. At any rate, the girls loved to just look at them hanging in the closet.
Thanksgiving morning, I told them they could wear their red dresses.
"We CAN? REALLY?!!!" and then they ran around the house screaming and laughing, and jumping on the bed for good measure. "Red dresses! RED DRESSES! REHHHHHHHHD DRESSEHHHHHHHS!" All day long, they never stopped commenting about how much they loved their new dresses.
If there's anything I've learned this past year, it's that the wait may nearly kill you, it may bruise your shoulders and dent your resolve, but when life gives you a Red Dress to wear, it fills you with gratitude and makes your heart pop. You can't stop talking about how much you love that Red Dress.
This year gave us a lot of jeans and torn sweatshirt days.
A lot of days of over-sized sweatpants and ill fitting shirts.
But thankfully we got to wear the Red Dress a few times.
On June 17--when Jason found out he got a teaching job. I cried again just now when I reread that post.
On September 12--when Adelynn was born. More tears of joy.
Thursday reminded me that when you get to wear the Red Dress--the one you've seen hanging in your closet and are just hoping the right day comes along eventually--you'll never forget that day.
Never ever ever.
Thank you, God, for Red Dresses.
...Grandpa Chuck...
...Grandma Sharon...
...Grandma Nancy...
...and Grandpa Steve!
Hooray for being seven weeks old!
The story behind the photoshoot: My girls are so very, very lucky to have four grandparents who love them very, very much. (They are also fortunate enough to have living great-grandparents who love them, although we've had some big great-grandparent losses over the past year.) When I think of my grandparents, certain images of them spring to mind. I think of my Grandpa Larson on the tractor, my Grandma Larson baking. I think of my Grandma Stout waltzing in her living room, and my Grandpa Stout (still living, thankfully) laughing and--from when we lived in Salem--sitting in the car getting ready to drive Sydney up to the Family Farm.
My girls will remember lots of things about Jason's and my parents, but if I were to guess, I think certain images will pop to mind when they think of their grandparents. They'll hear the sound of milk steaming and think of Grandpa Chuck making coffee. They'll see quilts and smell coffee and think of Grandma Sharon drinking coffee from her lovely coffee mugs. They'll need help burning a DVD of a movie or finding the lyrics to a song and think of Grandma Nancy working at the computer. They'll want a thrill of zooming around the farm checking mole traps and think of Grandpa Steve riding on the mule.
This week I tried to capture the grandparents doing the things that are so distinctly them. Thank you, Grandparents, for loving my kids!
For what it's worth: I love all the pictures I took this week, but the above picture chokes me up a little bit. It's a bit out of focus and was taken as I was trying to get the lighting right, but I love it anyway because it exactly captures my dad and Addie, as well as reminds me of growing up on the farm with my grandpa. It just goes to show, sometimes the perfect shot isn't always the perfect shot, and that's part of what makes it perfect.
*
For the complete set of Adelynn's Alphabet, check on the Flickr set.
{All the photographs in this post are from Sarah. She's just amazing with the camera, yes?}
Today I woke up tired. Weary tired. Puffy eyed tired. Wishing I didn't have to teach class tired.
Missing my grandma tired.
Tired. And sad.
And grateful that God gave me a heart capable of loving others.
Yesterday was my grandma's funeral.
It was lovely and poignant, and people shared some wonderful memories of Grandma. I sang two hymns, which were compromised by my emotions getting the better of me, but you know. My grandma would have said I sang beautifully anyway.
Even though the day was difficult, it was healing too. Healing to see family, healing to say our prayers, healing to place my grandma's ashes in the ground near her daughter's. It used to unsettle me to experience joy and sorrow within such close proximity to each other. How could I laugh when I was so sad? How could I see beauty through the tears?
I'm not unsettled by it anymore. It is how life is. It is how love is. The heart swings.
Swing in.
Swing out.
I've learned a lot over the past several months--months in which I've attended three funerals, lost two grandparents, a beloved dog, a definite plan of life--like my knowledge that life is not all of any one thing. It's a mixed bag, is what it is.
Swing in. Swing out.
I've kind of learned to accept the mixed bag and not make any apologies for my emotions or fight with them. Sure, it might seem like I could take on a bag--I imagine myself wrestling with a brown paper bag trying to rip it to pieces--but honestly, the bag always wins. It's like it's made of Superman's suit.
My heart swings in, swings out, swings in. I breathe in, breathe out. Maybe I reach for that brown paper bag.
No apologies for the tears or the laughter.
No apologies for the anger or the gratefulness.
No apologies for the fullness of life.
At 2:45 am on Friday, my grandma slipped into the eternal.
My dad told me several hours later, as I was on my way out to the pumpkin patch. My grandma had been in a coma for almost two weeks, and I had had a chance to visit her in the hospital. The first time I was by myself. The second time, Jason and the girls went with me. My brother Jake and I sat next to each other, alternately participating in the conversations around us and wondering how to say goodbye to Grandma.
My sister said goodbye to Grandma over the phone Thursday night. The family was prepared for the inevitable.
I thought I was prepared, but it turns out I wasn't.
At 2:43 am on Friday, my grandma was here. And then two minutes later, she wasn't. As my parents and my aunts sang hymns in my grandma's room, I slept, unaware that a dear life was slipping away. Slipped. Gone.
I'm lucky that I got to grow up with all my grandparents. I have written often of my mom's parents who lived next door to me, part of the Family Farm. But no less important to my life were my dad's parents.
My grandma did not have an easy life, but never once did she seem broken by it. Of all my grandparents, she laughed the most. A great laughter that rolled through her body, contagious to everyone around her. I never wonder where my dad got his sense of humor; he was born into a family that laughed. Even as he and my aunts sat in my grandma's hospital room, I heard laughter.
It is just as well, of course, because their family has not been a stranger to grief. Every family has its share of heartache, but my grandma lived through an ocean of it. She lost her baby daughter. Lost her adult grandson. Experienced the heartache of divorce, both her own and her childrens'. Struggled through a health issue that ultimately took her from us.
I won't remember my grandma for her ability to live through loss; I'll remember my grandma for her ability to live through laughter.
I'll remember playing cards in her living room, eating candy from the ever present dish on the table.
I'll remember Christmases where my siblings and I sat together on Grandma's orange-flowered couch, laughing at our dad and the jokes he told to his sisters and mom. Oh how we'd laugh! Sometimes with the adults, more often at them.
I'll remember eating tv dinners as the Lawrence Welk Show played on the television, watching my grandma dance her way from the living to the kitchen. "Isn't this just beautiful," she'd say. "Oh, I love this song." And I'd sit enraptured by my grandma's movements, her feet moving in a complicated pattern across the floor.
I'll remember the rose scented perfume she wore, the brightness of her eyes, the long beautiful necklaces she never forgot to wear.
I'll remember that she told me so often I was beautiful. Remember that she loved a gift of lotion I gave her for Christmas one year. Remember a necklace she gave me when I was little. Remember the china--her china--that she gave me when I got married. A lovely set of white dishes, rimmed in silver and pink flowers. A perfect personification of herself.
I don't think it's fully hit me that my grandma doesn't live in her apartment anymore. I've still mentally set aside the day we'll visit her for Christmas. I still have her on my address list of those who receive a Valentine's Day card from us. Even as I type these words, I think, "She's not really gone."
And if I were feeling sentimental and trite, I could say, truthfully, that she isn't really gone. Her memory lives on.
I don't want the memory though.
I want my grandma.
Even though Jason's grandpa passed away in June, the memorial service couldn't be scheduled until this past weekend.
It was a lovely service, with faraway family in attendance. I offered to create a slide show of Grandpa's life, and I also got to sing at the service. It was an honor to do something for the family.
There is something powerful about photographs.
Something that moved me to tears every time I watched the slide show. It didn't matter that in the course of making it I watched it dozens of times.
I never understand it when people refuse to have their picture taken. It's so sad, really. If you're one of those people who ducks away from the camera, let me implore you not to.
To capture someone's life in pictures is a remarkable thing. Seeing them grow from child, to adult, to parent, to grandparent.
This is Jason with his grandpa. What a gift to have this picture.
This is Jules with her great-grandpa. Another gift.
Photographs are an amazing thing, aren't they? I'd say more, but I'm sobbing onto my keyboard here, and I think that's about all I need to say about that.
If you ever wondered just how my sister and I get along, this picture sums it up perfectly.
(Taken by sil Sarah)
It makes me smile every time I see it, which is why I had to post it here. Something compels me--at random moments when I'm standing next to my sister--to mess up her hair. I'm a weirdo big sister like that.
This past Sunday was my grandpa's 85th birthday party. It was a day of fabulousness.
One highlight? All four of us siblings were together. I'm in the back, then my brother Tyler (who also lives on the Family Farm), my sister Andrea from Colorado, and my brother Jake from Seattle. These three make me laugh.
A lot.
(BTW, sis-in-law Sarah got some amazing photos. Just click on this photo to see the rest...including some of my microphone loving daughters. If that link doesn't work, try this one.)
So which one of these beautiful women is my mom?
After reading all your guesses, I'm thinking that I must still look like my aunt. The answer is: my mom is in the green. My aunt is wearing the black sweater. They both are beautiful; I feel lucky to resemble them.
Here's Aunt Jane and Uncle Don (at Grandma's birthday party last week):
I think there's still a strong family resemblance between her and I, don't you think?
Here's me and my mom at my birthday party last February:
Things that you can't tell from a photograph is that we have similar voices, facial expressions, and laugh. If only I could make a lemon meringue pie like her, then I'd be set.
As some of the Facebook commenters pointed out, my mom and I have the same smile. She does a better job at keeping her smile from getting too gummy. My smile, on the other hand, is sometimes lucky to be showing any teeth. (You don't even know how many hours I spent practicing my smile for my wedding day so that I wouldn't show too much of my gums. I really have to concentrate on that muscle memory to get a smile that photographs well. Vanity, I know.)
Not vanity, but rather sheer family pride, is that I look like both my mom and my aunt. They're both a huge part of my life, and that I reflect them in my face is a great honor.
When we moved into Grandma's house last fall, our plan was to just be here for a year. We figured we'd leave all of Gram's things here since she would perhaps be moving back in. And even if she didn't, then my parents would certainly want a fully furnished house for visiting guests.
Then we decided we'd be living here for a couple years, and knew we'd have to move all our stuff in--and all of Grandma's things out--in order to make this place feel like our own.
That sentence took me 30 seconds to write for a task that took more than a month to do. Weird.
One of the first things we did was take pictures and art off the wall. But there was one wall of pictures that I left up until the very end. In fact, people would come over to visit us and I could see them looking at the wall of pictures, probably thinking how odd it was for me to have 8x10 pictures of my entire extended family hanging on the wall.
For as long as I can remember my grandparents have had this wall of family pictures. It includes their children, their children's weddings, and all their grandchildren.
I remember spending hours looking at the my uncles, aunt, and mom's senior portraits. They're so classic.
My aunt and her family live here on the Family Farm. When I was younger people always thought I resembled my aunt and not my mom. Then I moved away for 15 years, and now that I'm back in town all grown up, people tell me all the time I look like my mom. I think I look like both of them.
Can you tell who is my mom and who is my aunt? I'd love to read your guess.
The wedding pictures, too, always captured my attention. I was one of those girls who always dreamed of getting married, but never dreamed of having kids. Weddings seemed romantic; kids, not so much. I still pretty much hold to that opinion.
All my cousins were older than me, and I adored them. They were really just all so cool for little ole' me. I suspect I was annoying as all get out, but they tolerated me pretty well. My cousin Donnelle (on the bottom right) lived next door to me growing up, and we were best buds.
She lives next door to me now, and we're still best buds. Her daughter is one year older than Sydney, and now they'll get to grow up with each other. Is that amazing, or what?
My other cousins now live farther away, but I do get to see them every once in awhile. In fact, my cousin Tim (top middle) and his wife are in town from Erie, Pennsylvania, and we're going out to Portland tonight for dinner. Very cool.
And then at the end of the family line, there's me with my younger siblings: my brother Tyler, my sister Andrea, and then my youngest brother Jacob. I was always a little bitter that my cousins got to have nine cousins on our side of the family, whereas my siblings and I only got to have six. Cousins just seemed cooler than siblings.
Andrea and Jake look quite a bit different now; Ty and I not so much, except that having children has aged us both a little bit. Just a very teeny tiny bit.
Although I never really considered leaving the family photo wall in tact, it was still a strange feeling when I took it down. Those pictures have always been there, my family always peering out from behind those wood frames. I haven't figured out what to put up on the wall yet, so it's still bare.
Have you made a guess yet on who's my mom and who's my aunt? I'll give you the answer tomorrow. (And for those of you who know, then please keep your top secret info to yourself.)
Several months ago, a distant cousin of mine happened upon my blog (Hi Kathy!). We've exchanged a few emails about family news, and last week she sent me some great family pictures of my great-grandparents and my grandpa.
Since my mom is a genealogist then I've seen a lot of pictures of my ancestors over my life. I'm pretty sure that even on the day I was born my parents whipped out a few black and white photos and explained how to determine cousins from second cousins from first cousins once removed. I could be exaggerating, but it's a highly plausible scenario.
And yet.
I never get tired of seeing pictures of my family.
Especially the informal ones like this one of Grandpa-Great Ed Larson (on the far right) wearing a silly hat.
Or is it a silly man wearing a hat? Either way, it makes me feel good that my grandpa-great along with those other men--all of whom, save one, I'm related to--had a sense of humor. It's nice to know those farmers there in Sanish, North Dakota didn't take themselves too seriously.
Kathy also sent me a few other pictures of Grandpa-Great with Grandma-Great.
(In my family we call all our great-grandparents Grandpa-Great and Grandma-Great. My daughters call my grandma Grandma-Great, and it's the perfect title in every way.)
The small smile on Grandpa Ed's face, the way Grandma Mary is resting her hand on Grandpa's knee...it's just lovely, don't you think?
The last picture that Kathy sent me was of my grandpa.
Even though Grandpa passed away more than four years ago, a little something caught in my throat when I saw this picture. Oh, how I miss my grandpa. Now that we're living at the Family Farm every day, memories of my grandpa bubble to the surface more frequently. Seeing my dad mowing the grass and tending the garden remind me how Gramps used to do that.
He was my daughters' Grandpa-Great, but he was my great grandpa.
I remember you today and every day, Grandpa.
*
Who are you remembering today?
All growing up, my parents tried quite deliberately to create events that we'd remember. While the end of my teenage years were filled with Big Vacations--trips to the Bahamas, Puerto Vallarta, Hawaii, and Washington D.C.--those trips didn't happen until we were all teenagers (which meant that as the oldest I was out of my teen years for half of those vacations).
Before those Big Vacations there were years and years of mini-vacations. Two or three-day vacations spent somewhere in the Pacific Northwest were about all our family of four young children could handle. But even though the trips were short, the memories were long. At Christmastime, we had the traditional Family Shopping Day, not quite a vacation, but still An Event. We had some summertime road trips to the mountains or the beach. I remember one spring break when we spent the day driving through the Columbia Gorge, having brunch at the now defunct Columbia Gorge Hotel, visiting Maryhill Museum (where I first fell in love with Auguste Rodin's sculpture), and having Japanese food for dinner at Bush Gardens.
I write all this to preface what I was thinking last Thursday when my parents planned another Event. These days, we don't even attempt to vacation all together (yikes!), but we do try to plan moments where the great-grandkids get to spend time with their great-grandma.
Last December it was a ride on The Polar Express.
This spring break it was seeing Goodnight Moon at the Northwest Children's Theatre and having lunch at Bush Gardens, a place I hadn't visited since I first was there 20 years ago.
I wasn't quite sure how a 30-second book would translate into a 75-minute production, but it was amazing. Obviously, the script had several extra bits that the book doesn't include. Some song and dance numbers, integration of the story Runaway Bunny, the backstory for the cow jumping over the moon, as well as the three little bears sitting in chairs.
Have a mentioned that this is one of my favorite children's books? I did? Well, now it's one of my favorite children's productions. It was magical. It was brilliant. It kept the attention of a room full of little kids, which I found really miraculous. Dozens of toddlers and children sat rapt with attention as Bunny gets ready for bed, his friend Mouse causing mischief, the quiet old woman whispering "hush." There's one more weekend of performances, and I highly recommend going.
As soon as we entered the auditorium (filled with benches, see? perfect for squirmy audience members!), Jules cried out, "Goodnight Moon! GOODNIGHT MOON!" She is well versed on the story and recognized the set immediately. Afterwards, Sydney had her picture taken with the Moon Fairy--responsible for moving the moon across the sky, naturally.
Here's little mouse, the quiet old lady, and young bunny signing autographs and posing for pictures. Marvelously talented, I tell you.
And after the show, it was off to Bush Gardens for a lunch of miso soup and edamame.
The girls didn't go for the miso soup, but they were mighty thrilled with the chopsticks.
"I think we should eat watermelon with chopsticks every day."
"That looks like something I could draw on the walls at home!"
Who knows exactly how much of this the girls will truly remember, but we'll have the pictures for them to look back on. My grandma is 94 years old, and it's important to all of us that her great-grandkids have memories of her that will stick with them on some level, like invisible threads wrapped around their heart.
Sometimes I forget that making memories doesn't have to be a huge affair, just something a little out of the ordinary will be perfect. You can't leave moments like that up to chance. You have to plan them; you have to photograph them; you have to talk about them.
And above all else, you have to treasure them.
Today is my sister's 30th birthday.
I had a post all ready to put up about some of the wonderful gifts--tangible and intangible--we've received this season, but then my little nephew went and got himself born this morning.
And babies need their own post, don't you know. You can't lump them in with a list of bulleted items.
Mederith Owen William was born this morning to his proud parents, Tyler and Sarah. He will no doubt have blue eyes, and maybe even red hair, just like his dad and great-grandpa (for whom he was named after).
Three cars worth of people--including Med's sisters Clover and Toby and his cousins Sydney, Jules, and Amanda--got to meet Med for the very first time this afternoon, and you never saw five little girls so happy to meet the newest member of the family.
Oh little boy. You are going to have quite the time growing up on the farm with all these girls.
Both baby and mother are doing well. Med was passed around to all the family members, and Sarah snapped a million pictures. Those zoom lenses come in very handy when you've just had a baby and need to rest in a hospital bed. The hospital's WiFi also comes in handy for posting pictures.
And the most precious photo of the morning is my grandma, holding her 17th great-grandchild, whose name reminds her of the man she married so many years ago. Little Med, meet Grandma-Great. She'll have lots of stories to tell you about the first Mederith whose life was a remarkable one, indeed.
Welcome to the world, little Med. We're so happy to meet you.
When we moved, we left behind one very important person of our family. Or rather, we moved to one place and she moved to another. It may sound very well-to-do to say we had a live-in nanny, but it wasn't really like that. She wasn't just our nanny, she was our friend.
Once upon a time, Rebekah was our student. I had her in 9th grade English; Jason had her in history classes. After she graduated from high school, we invited her to live with us and be our nanny while she attended WOU. She lived with us her freshman year in college, then she took a year off to nanny for a family in Bolivia, and then came back to us a year ago. She would have lived with us this upcoming school year, except that we sold our house and figured she didn't want to live in tiny apartment with us. If we had had enough time to plan things out, we would have rented a house so that Rebekah could still live with us. That's how much she is a part of our lives.
She made our girls dozens of meals, changed diapers, spent hours on the floor with them, playing games, doing puzzles, loving them to pieces. She wiped away tears, rocked them to sleep, and washed their clothes. We daily placed our girls' lives in Rebekah's hands, and she never failed us. Any parent will know what I mean when I say, She loved our children and that made her a saint.
If I measured love by how many pages she read to Sydney,
and all the pages she read to Jules,
and multiplied it by a million...that's how much she has meant to our family.
She and I have spent countless hours in the kitchen, talking over breakfast, over lunch, over dinner. More than someone who takes care of our family, she is family. I honestly don't know how we'll manage the school year without her. Gosh, I don't know how I could even handle having another baby without Rebekah's help. To say she helped around the house is a major understatement.
This past summer, we were doubly blessed to have Rebekah's twin sister Anna living with us. It was great fun having them both around, especially since there were wedding plans in the works.
Last Saturday, Anna got married.
Though Anna's beautiful dress captivated the girls, in the end they were both clamoring for Rebekah, especially since they hadn't seen her in a couple of weeks. Poor Jules even refused to speak with Rebekah's older brother until he fetched Rebekah for her. The girl has her priorities.
It didn't matter that Rebekah had dozens of friends and family to see, had important maid-of-honor duties to attend to; she still took time to carry Jules around and hit the dance floor with Sydney. It was a sweet way to end our time together with The World's Best Nanny.
There is no way to express how much love our family has for Rebekah, and how much we already miss her. Almost every day since we have moved, Sydney asks, "Are we going to see Rebekah today?" Whenever I drive downtown, past the shop where Rebekah worked, Jules points out the window and says, "Beeba."
I suspect every parent can think of at least one person who will be remembered by how they loved our children. Rebekah is that person for us. We were blessed to have her live with us, and no matter what, she'll always be family.
One of the things we did a fair amount of on our trip back east was visit cemeteries. When you're visiting Boston and Philadelphia, naturally there's going to be a lot of "Here is where Samuel Adams is buried," or "Here is where Benjamin Franklin is buried." I don't know that I was really all that interested in finding out where Benjamin Franklin is buried--nothing against him, but he doesn't exactly stir the emotions of my heart, like, say, Louisa May Alcott might do--but I enjoy walking through graveyards. Not at nighttime, of course. That would freak. me. out. But during the daytime, I think they're very interesting, in a melancholic, picturesque, philosophical kind of way.
Boston had some really interesting cemeteries that were right downtown. We'd be walking along the Freedom Trail, and then randomly stop to wander past some tombstones.
I have a hard time capturing the feel of graveyards through photography. It doesn't help that some people (*ahem* you there in the upper left-hand corner of my picture) tote their Macy's shopping bag through the graveyard. That really ruins the feel of graveyards. More than that, though, there's something about the three-dimensional aspect that my non-fancy camera just can't quite get. Nevertheless, that didn't stop me from taking pictures.
Plus, cemeteries on the east coast are so old--well, comparatively old. Here in Oregon you don't find too many tombstones that date back to the 17th and 18th centuries.
Also, not a lot of skulls and crossbones either. Which I'm fine with. I definitely do not want a skull and crossbones on my tombstone, no offense to Cap. Nicholas Gardner here. It's just not my style.
Philadelphia had more famous dead people. Famous people like Benjamin Rush, signer of the Declaration of Independence.
Benjamin Rush just happens to be Jason's Great-great-great-great-great Grandfather's cousin. Yes, rebelliousness goes wayback in Jason's family. Fortunately it's patriotic rebelliousness, so I can excuse that. Except when Sydney wanted to paint a flag on the wall with magic markers. In our house there may be a little bit of tyrannical oppression when it comes to certain freedoms.
One of the things we did while we were DC was go on a ghost walk through Alexandria. Our guide--a chipper college student with a knack for storytelling--narrated our way up and down the streets of Alexandria, regaling us with horrifying tales of ghosts and graveyards. And when I say "horrifying" I really mean "funny with a gory twist." Like Fargo. Except more family friendly. And without the wood chipper. Or the fabulous Frances McDormand.
The end of our tour found us gathered in a graveyard where our guide told us a final tale of a tragic love story.
We laughed, we cried, we were distracted by fighting squirrels. And then off in the distance, I thought perhaps I too could see the ghosts of children playing by the tombstones. I quickly grabbed my camera and snapped a picture of them.
Oh what tragic tale surrounded these poor little children that they were doomed to wander the graveyard for all eternity? I will say that the little middle ghost wouldn't stop laughing, but the other two? I think they really wanted to be at some fun playground rather than a cemetery. But they kept showing up, so I kept taking pictures.
Now, wait a second...
Those little ghosts look awfully familiar...
And that name on the tombstone...I recognize that name...
Stout? Well, now that I think about it, I have seen these pictures before. These and a hundred others just like them that fill our family's photo albums. What's that? You think it's morbid, all these pictures of smiling children on tombstones? Well, then, you never had a mother who was a genealogist.
I knew there was a reason I felt a connection with graveyards.
Although I'm definitely not feeling the connection with those shorts.
(c) Creature Bug 2008. All rights reserved.
Last week, Jason's brother (Nathan) and SIL (Carolyn) flew into town. They live way the heck out in Rhode Island, so we don't exactly get to see them on a regular basis. In fact, they hadn't ever met the tiny rockstar who goes by the name of Julianne. Yes, indeed, they had a lot of catching up to do.
But before they got caught up with the girls, they had to get caught up with us. Naturally this involved dinner at the Kennedy School because eating at McMenamins is mandatory when family is out to visit the left-coast. The other mandatory event is perhaps less thrilling: family photos. Of course we're all crazy about photography around here, so there's no shortage of energy in that field. Nathan and Carolyn, however, weren't quite as enamored with the idea but I think Sarah made the experience quick and painless. While I certainly understand the whole "we just had our family pictures taken less than four years ago" mentality, when you're involving children who tend to get birthed, grow up, and grow hair (or not, as the case may be for poor Jules) families look a lot different through the years. So. New one required. No tears shed. Success.
Yesterday we took advantage of having Nathan and Carolyn to ourselves for a whole day and drive out to Newport to visit the aquarium. Sydney was quite keen on them seeing the "fishies that are all around in that big tunnel," and it's tough to say no to requests for beach trips.
So we borrowed Jason's parents' minivan, packed a bag of snacks, strapped in the kids, and a few hours later (after lunch at McMenamins in McMinnville) found ourselves at:
Fish are cool.
But even more cool?
Having your picture taken with your Uncle Nathan and Aunt Carolyn as a shark swims in the background. Seriously. How often does that happen? Hopefully only when there's a super-thick piece of glass separating you from Mini Jaws. Otherwise, that's really not so cool. (Sidenote: did you know the aquarium has slumber parties in the shark tunnels? for CHILDREN? I can't even tell you how terrifying that sounds to me, but that's probably because I read Jaws at a young and impressionable age.)
It was all very exciting, and after spending a few hours in the car as well as a couple hours at the aquarium Nathan and Carolyn became quite the experts at entertaining the girlies. Jules was smitten with both of them, especially with Nathan's Red Sox hat. Ah, the indoctrination begins early.
It was such a treat to get to spend time with Nathan and Carolyn, and the girls loved having them around. Between car trips, and coffee runs, mismatched shoe adventures, and discussions about vegetables, house plans, the weather, and New England sports teams, there was never a dull moment. Sydney is already making plans for the next time she and Carolyn get to make cupcakes together...hopefully next year when we move into the new house.
Tomorrow, Nathan and Carolyn fly back home, and so they left early this evening to spend their last night with Jason's parents. No less than a half hour after they had gone Jason said, "I miss my brother." Yes, it's hard when the only sibling you have lives so far away. But it certainly makes visiting them that much more wonderful. We're keeping our fingers crossed that we'll get to see them in June when we're back east this summer, and as I mentioned to them as they left, "You'll see us on the blog." Thank goodness for airlines, for emails, for cell phones, and for blogs--they are at least a good way to make the east coast seem a little closer to the west coast.
*****
(c) Creature Bug 2008. All rights reserved.
Happy 25th Birthday to my little brother Jake!
Technically, his birthday was last week, but he lives in Boise, and wasn't able to get home (as in, my parents' home) for a party until yesterday. Ah, my little brother is all grown up now. Good luck on getting that MS in biomechanics--or biokinetics or biosomethingorother. (And try to avoid those day bars!)
We had a grand time up at the farm, as always. Trips through the orchard with Clover and Sydney, picking apples off the trees, jumping on the trampoline, rock throwing in the creek, visits with family while munching on ribs and potatoes and pie.
I even learned a trick: Got a head full of sand (compliments two sets of toddler hands)? Just vacuum it out.
The whole experience is made even more fun if you have some ribs to nibble on.
(It doesn't quite get all the sand out, but it will at least prevent sandcastles being built atop your head.)
My brother, now a parent of two, has clearly taken to heart the responsibility and seriousness of raising a family. He sent me this picture of his new daughter Toby with the comment: "i think she looks just like sarah, what do you think?"
Yep. Parenting has definitely matured him. I'm such a proud older sister.
But here's a beautiful picture of Toby from a...better angle.
Don't you just want to kiss those lips? Sarah has more pics and a recap of the delivery story.
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