Dumplins & Buttons

I had such an awesome childhood. Of course, I wasn't aware at it's awesomeness tendencies until I was much older than a child. Before their arrival from the mission trip in the Appalachia's, I wondered if my sons would be pondering the same thing about their childhood. Although not the Rockefeller's or Kennedy's of the South, we live a life full of happy memories, gospel accapella, music playing in their heads and their hearts and their fingers, God filled moments. Overall, a good life. I started to think back to my days of frolicking in the land of me where I was the center of the universe. Yes, it's different now!

Those thoughts brought me to the wonderful memories of my grandparents, and especially my grandmothers. Oh how I loved my grandparents! I spent many a weeks with them during the summers growing up. I don't remember my brothers and sister being there at the same time necessarily, which means one of two things: 1) I truly was wrapped up in my own little world where noone but me existed (again, it is different now), 2) My parents desperately needed a break from........me, which is similar to a situation I dealt with one of my children with whom I share some personality traits. Poor mom and dad.

My grandmothers were extraordinary women! Truly devoted to their husbands and their marriages. Truly devoted to the work the Lord set before them. My dad's mom was so sweet and loving. Every time we'd go to make the trip north to see them she would always have chicken 'n dumplins cooking awaiting our arrival! Oh they were soooooo good. I miss that! She was a vertically challenged lady, not cracking the 4'10" mark. She was married to my wonderful grandpa for 60+ years......she was a saint! On marital advice to one of her daughters-in-law, she was told to have said, "Divorce? No, never thought about it? Murder, yes, divorce, no." I can still see her laughing. And those butterscotch cookies!!!!!! My gpa and she were so in love. One day she laid on the couch for a rest and God decided she needed more than just a little rest and she blessed heaven, probably with a plate of cookies! I can't wait! She left behind a necklace. One sacred to the family. She had given it to her daughter, my Aunt Barbara to make sure that each granddaughter in the family got to wear it, if she chose, on her wedding day. It was a necklace given to her by my grandfather in 1912. I was proud to wear it on my wedding day. My aunt gave it to me last year. I was speechless. I didn't feel worthy. I missed my grandma. I miss her still.

I place a photo of the necklace for you to see. The box is tattered, the note is worn, the necklace is perfect. Her poem that she loved and lived inscribed in the photo. She was an awesome woman!

My mom's mother was a beautiful, graceful, lovely lady. She was married to my childhood best friend, my pawpaw. Since he died when I was only 5, I think she felt the honored responsibility to carry on his legacy to his grandchildren. Nan-naw and I spent our time together playing gooney golf (look it up), going to plays/musicals/movies, cooking and sewing. She was a retired home-ec teacher and was the most organized, tight bed-corners, tidy lady. I loved my nan-naw. She played the piano for church sometimes and for her Eastern Star group. "I walk through the garden alone, while the dew is still on the roses....." my favorite one to hear her play and sing. She loved her God and he loved her! She loved to sew and I learned so much from her and my mother about the craft. I remember so vividly running my fingers through the old chocolate box that my grandmother had recycled for her extra buttons from worn out outfits and such. I loved that box! My mother remembers doing the same as she grew up. That box has had alot of traffic. I can still remember seeing her in certain outfits that the buttons clung to on her way to church, store, or "Showboat". My Nan-naw met the fate of losing her memory through some sort of demensia/alzheimer altercation. It was a first clue when she couldn't find her gas tank and was looking in the trunk. It just went down from there. Many years of little memories fading into the abyss of her mind. Leaving her with fractured images and confusing environments that we wanted to protect her from, but couldn't find our way into her world anymore. She was a sweet lady. I procured the button box when she had to make the move from home to the nursing home. I knew she had been forgetting alot when I opened the box and it was filled with buttons AND straight pins, OUCH! I visited her often in her last year. I watched her inhale some of her last bits of oxygen from her room. I will never forget pleading with her to let us take it from here and just to let go. She did. I miss my Nan-naw.

Thank you God for my wonderful childhood! Thank you for the influence of these wonderful women in my life that helped shape me into the woman I long to be in my life! Thank you God for my parents who saw to it that I had a relationship with my grandparents! Thank you God for the memories of these dynamic women! Thank you God!

Titus 2:4

Then they can train the younger women to love their husbands and children, 5to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God.