Quarantine and chill and kindness chatty clubhouse: Jump in and join the conversation! All is welcome!

[Kirby]

Like Bianca and Bernard, I had three sets of grandparents. My maternal grandparents lived about five miles from us. We saw them every Sunday at church and then went to their house for lunch afterwards when we were little and then when we were teenagers they came to our house for Sunday lunch. We saw them other times also depending on who was visiting or spent the night with them. We loved it at their house. It was an old two story farm house that had an outhouse when we were younger. I remember going out to it when I needed to.

My paternal grandparents were divorced. My grandmother and step granddad lived about five miles from us not far from my maternal grandparents. We saw them less often but we always went to their house for Christmas Eve as we got older. My grandmother was a dog show judge and the two of them raised dogs, mostly Pomeranians. They smoked and often sent my sister and I to the grocery store near them to get their cigarettes. My grandmother loved to play Yatzee and we played a lot of that with her. She spent so much time telling us how we should use the dice we rolled it was actually her playing for all of us. She had a lot of style, wore very chic dresses. Her nails were always lovely and she was a picture when she held her cigarette "just so". She was raised in the wrong era, should have been born back when girls in the South wore hoop dresses. She had very fancy furniture in the living room and only I could sit on it because I didn't put my feet on the furniture. My sister could not sit still and was all over everything so she couldn't be in there without our grandmother. My step granddad, we loved him to death. He was so patient with us, taught us how to fish.

My grandfather and step grandmother lived a couple hours away. We only saw them a time or two a year. We were never close to them, just didn't spend enough time with them to really develop a relationship. Her name was Bettieann and I always called her Aunt Bettieann, I thought that was her name. They had five children and four of them were girls and were my aunts so I just thought that she was one also. She quickly and rudely told me one day that she was not my aunt, it really hurt my feelings. I didn't do it on purpose, I was just a child. I never felt welcome after that. Her children with my grandfather were her main priority and we were treated like extras at times, I don't think that my grandfather had a clue what was going on. One of my cousins actually told me that she was the oldest and that my sister and I didn't count (I was actually the oldest of all the cousins).

Did your grandparents have any special hobbies?
The only grandparent that had a hobby was my step granddad and his was fishing. Well, you might could say that my grandfather and step grandmother had a hobby. They were part of a group that had the silver AirStreams, maybe called Silver Bullets. They traveled with this group all over the US and up into Canada and Alaska, sometimes into Mexico. The group went to Brazil one time without their RVs.

My nephew won his match today. He came by for awhile and then went back to cheer on his team mates. Since he won we get to spend more time with him and he plays tomorrow. If he wins, he goes to Nationals in Arizona.

 

[lynxstch]

Did your grandparents have any special hobbies?

I never really knew my fathers parents well. I only remember visiting them a few times. All I remember about that grandmother, is that as soon as one meal was done, she would set the table for the next, lol. That grandfather was a member of the Knights of Columbus, and I remember seeing him marching in the parades with his cape flying behind him and his special hat on.
My mothers mother, and her mother, took care of me a lot when I was younger (my mom was single mom), Her mom was 'Nana' to me, and the other was Memere. Memere loved to cook..her galumpki's (stuffed cabbage) were the best I ever had,and I remember every Thanksgiving she would cook the turkey in a brown paper bag in the oven. Her one real hobby was ironing. She would iron for hours, she ironed everything,,sheets, towels, underwear, even paper money, lol! My Nana was a secretary at a church for years and years,,and a pianist. She taught students piano..and she was at the time, the only female member of the local Rotarians Club. She played for their meeting every single week. Memere died at the age of 92 and Nana died at the age of 82. I remember going there every weekend for years, playing pitch on Sunday nights and having roast pork from the crockpot. Nana was the first one I ever knew to own a microwave,,and her specialty was cooking hot dogs in it..lol!

I have no recollection of when either of my paternal grandparents died, sadly. I remember going there every weekend for years, playing pitch on Sunday nights and having roast pork from the crockpot. Nana was the first one I ever knew to own a microwave,,and her specialty was cooking hot dogs in it..lol!

 

[lynxstch]

It never rained today, though it was cloudy all afternoon. It was only up to 77 earlier, now it's up to 82. I did my beauty treatment, picked more tomatoes out of the garden, looked for a new coffeetable online (found 5 but haven't made a final decision yet), and made Mr L walk to the kitchen. He sat and had lunch, then fiddled with his laptop , which hasn't been touched in more than a month. Then he realized that his Outlook wasn't working right, as there were no emails after April..which is when we upgraded to Office 365. I had him walk back to the living room and I got Microsoft to call me.. it took the guy about 15 min to figure out the issue. He removed the whole thing and started again, and now it's working fine. Dinner is going to be leftover pork fried rice with some frozen honey chicken nuggets. I am just feeling drained and don't feel like cooking anything more. May make a small salad with garden tomatoes and cukes to go with dinner

Have a nice evening everyone!

 

[Pea-n-Me]

Ah, grandparents. I grew up mainly just knowing one, my mother’s mother. She was quite a lady, but I wasn’t particularly close to her, even though we visited monthy or so. I was among the youngest of her grandchildren, and it seemed she was sort of over kids at that point, and mainly spent time with the adults when we visited while we kids went out to play. It’s understandable in many ways - she’d had a tough life. She was older, too, having been born in the 1890s. One of our best conversations was toward the time of her passing. I was in nursing school at the time, and she was in a nursing home. I went to visit her, to introduce her to my now DH, and she told me about her own days in nursing school! Sadly, she only completed two years of a three year diploma program; she’d dropped out to get married. And what an impact that had on her life!

She’d had seven kids by the time she was in her 30s. Husband had an alcohol problem, and died when he was just 36 yrs old, leaving Nana with seven young kids, my mother being one of them, smack in the middle of the Depression. They were very poor. Nana had to go out to work, scrubbing floors, and the oldest kids were in charge of the younger ones. Needless to say, that was frought with problems. They had a fire once (from diapers on the stove). Two children were injured in accidents, with one, sadly, passing. Mom had some everlasting problems from her tough upbringing, but she always had a very giving spirit, never forgetting what it was like to go without. Mom loved to give to children, especially. Nana lived well into her 90s. I still have some of her things here at home, including a hand held blender thingy (that we still use) and my favorite thing of hers, one of those metal step stools in which the stairs pull out. That thing is super old and I always played with it as a kid. When the daughter she lived with passed and we cleaned out her apt, I couldn’t let that go. It was in rough shape, but I spray painted it a pretty metallic color, and it has a prominent place in my home. As a matter of fact I brought it upstairs last week for the party as an extra seat. So between our shared nursing experiences, some fond memories, and my knowledge that deep down she was a really good woman, my feelings today toward her are respectful and compassionate, especially given how hard her life must’ve been during those days when her kids were young. And my mother and the rest of her children certainly loved her very much. Despite their tough times they had deep love for eachother.

I actually very, very vaguely remember my father’s father being in our home, but he passed when I was probably three or so. And strangely enough, I never met my father’s mother because she passed many years before I was born. But somehow I feel a kinship with her, probably because of the stories my mother always told me about her, and what I knew about how much my father loved his mother. In some ways our lives are parallel, in our work (she was an overnight supervisor for the phone company), outlook on life, and personalities. My mother sometimes when she was mad at me would tell me I was just like her, and that wasn’t always complimentary, lol. (“Bossy” .) But I understand how she was. I didn’t have any pictures of her until a few years ago. I’m also one of the younger cousins on that side too, so I missed out. But one cousin was nice enough to send me a bunch of pictures of our grandparents on that side, and it was nice to see her. (I’d say we share some physical characteristics, as well.) I feel like she’s been my guardian angel just because of some uncanny things that have happened (too long to go into here today). I do have one thing of hers, and that’s a pendant from the phone company. I cherish that.

I am looking forward to being a grandparent someday. I feel like I’ll be a very involved one, like many of you are, and I hope I can help my kids out the way my mother helped me when my kids were little.

 

[Dead2009]

Casually baking cookies on a saturday night for my mother since THATS WHAT SHE WANTED.

 

[lynxstch]

Sister in law just stopped by with 1/2 dozen ears of farm fresh corn, and a cantaloupe. She also picked me up a bag of bird seed, since Walmart has nothing but the $$$ bags of it. And what is going on with cat food again? She sent me a pic of Walmart shelves..nothing but 6 cans of Friskies shredded whitefish and sardines in the entire row? I tried to place an order on Chewy last nite and almost everything was 'temporarily out of stock'. Our local Martins (Giant) has had hardly any cat food for the last 6 months at least. What the heck are we supposed to feed our furbabies?

Watching the mens marathon now. I am glad the Olympics are almost over. Hubby has been watching them day and night, and I've had more than enough!

Have a nice evening everyone!

 

[flyingdumbo127]

friends for all the wonderful continued grandparent shares. More than that, to those of you are are grandparents, thank you for the love you give to your grandkids--you make such a difference in their lives!

Hooray for cooking baking, save me some

Grateful today extra for some very kind happy mail. Looking forward to listening to Sunday worship tomorrow!

 

[AuntieMe3]

Casually baking cookies on a saturday night for my mother since THATS WHAT SHE WANTED.

Mmm.... cookies!! Sounds good, maybe I'll make some tonight.

As predicted, I got nothing done today. Well I did clean up the kitchen after breakfast and had someone come out and pick up for scrap, a broken fridge at my dad's and our old water heater.

As I think I've mentioned before, I live in the desert and we usually have no humidity so I'm used to dry weather. After almost 2 weeks in the Bay Area with moist air, I think I was getting used to it. My nose has been soo dry the last two days, I finally bright out the humidifier and it feels so much better.

Going to get some take out burgers for dinner tonight for DD and I. I have $10 in rewards from a local place and that should just about cover our order.

 

[Breezy_Carol]

Got a lot done today.

After breakfast, unloading the dishwasher and cleaning up, DH and I took a 3 mile hike then went to the Amish farm stand to get tomatoes. Came home for lunch then sweep and hosed the screen porch to get rid of all the pollen. Showered then went out for a list of errands and stops: liquor store, library, pharmacy, ATM, gas station, and grocery shopping. After the groceries were away, I cooked dinner entirely on the grill: chicken grillers (sausages), potatoes and onions in a foil packet, and zucchini. It was good.

We had a nice, but short trip down to Mohegan Sun Casino in CT yest. It was a long ride down with traffic given that many people were headed to Cape Cod. But we finally made it. We met DD and bf, and DS and gf, there, and we all went to see Frankie Valli in concert.

My brother and his wife were there. Did you see them? LOL They danced there first dance at their wedding reception to "Can't Take my Eyes off of You" so went there to hear Frankie Valli sing it.

Did your grandparents have any special hobbies?

I only have a few memories of my paternal grandmother. She would live with us a few months at a time. She moved between my father and his two brothers' homes. I remember she made me a bluish gray suit (Skirt and jacket). I also remember her making potato bread. She would use every shape pan my mother had. I'd come home from school and it would be everywhere rising and smelled so good baking. It was kind of yellow, sweet, and so good.

Watching some TV now then off to bed.

 

[Pea-n-Me]

^ Small world! Did he bring home Krispy Kreme’s?

 

[lynxstch]

Good morning all. Woke at 4 to find hubby sound asleep in his chair, with the tv on again. I had turned it off at 1 when I got up to go to the bathroom, and he was awake. He's getting too used to hospital schedule..sleep whenever you want during the day, then stay awake half the night. This has to be turned around. I bet as soon as I lay down on the couch to get a little more sleep, turn off the tv, he will wake up. The cats are all fed and watered, and I am still tired. No plans for the day except to get that carpet shampooed (maybe), lol.

I am enjoying all the grandparents stories, bringing back some fond memories of my own for me.

Going to be another hot day, followed by at least 2 more even warmer , and no rain in sight. That means watering has to be done by me again, but no yardwork as nothing else is growing.

Have a nice morning everyone, enjoy your Sunday!

 

[dazedx3]

Good Morning everyone!

We finally got rain yesterday. 5 inches actually. Lots of lightning but no wind, thankfully. We are expecting more the next three days.

Grandparents.... My Grandfather died when I was three, I have only a few hazy memories of him. i never knew any of the other grandparents
My maternal Grandmother died when my Mom was 12. My Dad was in an orphanage since the age of 6, so we never had grandparents on his side. My Great aunt kind of took on the role but she too, died when I was 12. I always felt a bit cheated.
I think I've mentioned before, that I live in my parents house { the one I grew up in}. Before they lived here, my Grandparents did{ my Mother was born in this house} We are thinking of moving, it's hard, I feel guilty.

Lynxstch... I hope your schedule gets back to normal, mine still hasn't since surgery and retirement! Much of that is my own fault, though.

Have a great day everyone, do something that brings you joy!!

 

[flyingdumbo127]

Good morning everyone

Hugs to everyone who may not have many or positive (with one of my own, memories are not positive) grandparent memories. I really think it's wonderful that some of you and your children/grandchildren are able to grow up knowing and playing with extended family, extra positive connections for kids are so important. I never had that. I remember trying during my preschool directing/teaching days to bring in people from the community to the school or take the kiddos on some filed trips so that they could experience different places in a fun way and also just maybe down the line remember the kind mailman they met back in preschool because he just might be someone they chose to reach out. My future Smile Squad church ministry as I've shared is grounded in connection between congregants as a whole and community.

Amen to what Frog said, so something that brings you joy today indeed!

Hug to all.

 

[dazedx3]

Bianca and Bernard...... I forgot to mention that I am going to steal your idea of sending a postcard once a month to the grandkids. I think they will love it and it's such a simple way to keep in touch. Thanks

 

[Breezy_Carol]

Went to church this morning for Music Factory. That is a musical day camp for a week and they lead worship on the Sunday after. DD and DGD joined me as both DD, DS, and I were involved for several years with this being the 30th anniversary production. I am hoping DGD will be able to do it when she is old enough, which could be as early as next year if she got an exception. She was so into it, doing liturgical dance along to the music by our pew in the balcony. The younger group is rising 1-3rd grade for 1/2 day and the older is 4-8th grade. There were only 9 kids in the older group but they memorized 13 songs during the week.

Next up. cookout with both kids and families this afternoon.

 

[flyingdumbo127]

B&B and DazedX3, if ever either of you would like some stickers to brighten up a grandkids postcard PM me

I love that kids of all ages got to be involved, Carol! And will check out worship later today

 

[Pea-n-Me]

We had a lot of tomatoes ready in the garden. DH is making a sauce from them, with some pasta and homemade meatballs we had frozen. Lots of garlic. It smells so good. Otherwise, a quiet day. Hot outside here. I’m off for a few days so just chillin. I hope everyone is having a pleasant Sunday.

 

[AuntieMe3]

@lynxstch hope you got some more rest this morning.

@dazedx3 We bought our house from my paternal grandparents. They lived here with us until they both passed away(about a year apart). Everything in the house except what was in our rooms was theirs so it was so hard when we decided to try make it more our own after they passed, so many memories you feel like you're going to lose if you get rid of something or change something else. After awhile it got easier and it's now more us than them but I still feel them here and know they would like what we've done. I don't know how I'll feel if we ever decide to sell and move.

Hugs to everyone who may not have many or positive (with one of my own, memories are not positive) grandparent memories.

Yes, hugs to everyone who doesn't have those loving grandparent memories. I have wonderful memories with all my grandparents and feel sad when I hear some people don't. My DD thankfully has great memories from grandparents on my side and some early memories with my in-laws but after my FIL passed away(and the great grandparentshad previously passed), it's like my DD ceased to exist to MIL. We are estranged from MIL now but when DH ever talked to her, she never asked about DD or anything.

Also before my mom's aneurysm, she was such an active grandma to DD and my nephews(niece wasn't born until after) and it killed her to not be able to do things with them/for them after. I try to make up for the missing grandma stuff with them as much as I can, my mom even referred to me sometimes as Grandma Fee(my nickname to niece and nephews).

Next up. cookout with both kids and families this afternoon.

Enjoy your family time.



I was out bright and early this morning to Walmart. DD wears scrubs to work and needed to get some new ones. Her last few pairs were from Walmart and she really like the brand so we were looking online and saw the had some on clearance for $1-3. Great deal but you had to purchase in store and no pickup. I decided to go early this morning for her but when I got there all the clearance scrubs weren't marked and an employee told me I had to just look through everything for the ones that were clearanced....I scanned so many with my Walmart app on my phone and couldn't find any that were what I saw online so I just ended up buying her a couple pair full price. LOL That was annoying but oh well. These seem a little nicer quality(a little softer and stretchier) than the others she has so it's fine. Then I ended up finding myself a few things on clearance....I got a cute pair of wide leg pants for $5, 3 t-shirts for $3 each and a tank top for $2. I also got two cute regular priced shirts for only $10 each. Oh and I found DD some crop pants for DD for $5....she's only 5'11" so crop pants fit her like really pants.

 

[lynxstch]

I just picked another 5 tomatoes out of the garden too. They are going to all come on at once. I don't make sauce or anything with them, as we don't have pasta that often and would never use it. It was 86, is down to 82 now and looks like we are in for a storm. Just fed the furbabies outside, just in case, so they have time to get under cover. Dinner here is going to be the other halves of our small pizza's we made Friday night, with salad and corn. Nurse just called to check on Mr L. She asks the same questions every time, lol. The male nurse should be here sometime tomorrow, along with Wed and Friday. Watching the last of the Olympic events,,then the closing ceremony tonite. I will be glad to get back to regular shows starting tomorrow
Have a nice rest of the afternoon and evening

 

[Pea-n-Me]

DH used about 12 large tomatoes, 20 cherry tomatoes, and lots of fresh basil from the garden, yet we still have more tomatoes! But definitely yummy!