Soft, sweet days

This, on my desk for fall, is making me quite happy today. It's such a lovely idea- regular days, full of ordinary fun which are really and truly magical. Those days are indeed the most amazing. I relish the quiet days we spend as a family, just enjoying each other, wandering through the day finding fun as we go.

We had a big party over the weekend and it was such fun. Throwing parties isn't something we normally do. As much as we like to entertain, I think that underneath it all, Doug and I much prefer to do so on a small scale so that we can really spend time with our friends. The party was wonderful, don't get me wrong, but it's so hard to connect with everyone with all the bustle of a party. One on one, a small dinner party, a fun night together so the kids can play and the adults can just relax... that's the kind of entertaining we seem to be drawn to.

I think this beautiful quote applies to quite a few areas of our life. We've been talking more about a big trip to Italy in a couple years. A huge event, yes. But it's the simple, surprising events of daily life in another place that we're most drawn to. Especially a place of familial origins. Discovering that place, imagining what it was like for the family that came before, exploring the nooks and crannies- that's the kind of experience we want.

Our soft days for making sincere, lasting memories together.

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The Axis of Ineptitude is at it again.

Follow along with the October writing prompts and join in the fun.

Linked up at Daily Mayo.

Every Woman

In this photo I see every woman in my family. I see the Grandma of old photos and the Grandma of my childhood who later shrank and faded away under the influence of Parkinson's.

I see my mother and her sisters. My cousin. Great aunts.

I don't see myself, but I think that I will some day. It seems, or at least I've observed, that as the women in our family get older, we begin to resemble Grandma Helen and her side of the family.

My mom and I joke that I'm already just like mom, so I might as well work on being Grandma. And, I'll certainly never be just like Grandma- none of us could be. But we have so many wonderful characteristics which we can aspire to emulate, so many facets of her that we could be.

I find it comforting to have family that I so love and admire. A history to learn and add to in my own way. Something meaningful to pass to my own daughter as I watch her make her own way and add her own story to the family.

Old photos and worn cookbooks

I've been working on a project about my grandmother. So far, I've amassed a great deal of stories and pictures. It's been hard to get started on the actual writing and compiling because reading and re-reading is so much fun.

I grew up next door to my Grandma Helen. I was named after her. When I went away to college, she sent me notes and her family famous Valentine cookies. Every return home saw me running across the driveway to see her before I'd even think of unpacking the car.

Grandma Helen died at the end of my senior year of college. She didn't see me graduate from college. She met my husband, but didn't see our wedding. She never met Phee or shared stories of her six pregnancies.

I learned a lot and shared so many experiences growing up next to Grandma. I was the only kid I knew with family next door and, even then, I knew how special that was and how lucky I was. There's so much more I wish I'd been able to find out, though. As I grew up, got married, got pregnant, I know she would have had so many more stories of her younger years to share. With all I did have, it's hard to say that I missed out. But I did. And I do every day.

She is on my mind so often. When I'm in the kitchen especially. The kitchen is the center of so many homes, and none more so than Grandma Helen's. When you walked into her house, you walked right in to the heart of her home and our family. The side door led into the long kitchen, scene of weekly family dinners, all day baking marathons, and too many childhoods to count.

Phee isn't growing up in that kitchen. She hears stories, but even then, I can only remember so much at one time. Some things are just better for having been experienced. And so I'm working on this project. It's a considerable undertaking, compiling memories and stories from relatives. Already I have learned so much, seen many old photos for the first time, and cried over Grandma's handwriting in well-worn cookbooks.

A grand project full of so many facets of my Grandmother and her life. A trip down memory lane; memories old and new. More than anything this labor of love is a way to find my place in a family full of strong women, led for so long by our beloved Grandma Helen. 

Family

{Four generations- and one very proud dad}

{I'm not sure how old I was for this trip... maybe 6-8 months}

{I have a bib so I think this was my first birthday party at Grandma & Grandpa's}

{I think this is Grandpa's birthday, not mine}

Give Rescue a Chance

When we first moved into our house, long, long ago, we thought about getting a dog. I think we were so enamored with the space we had and the yard after living in an apartment, that we thought it would be fun to have a dog. Our friends had a great dog and it would mean the dogs could play together and it would be oh so much fun.

I perused the shelter websites for weeks and weeks. There were always cute little dogs and I wanted a small dog. Doug was more inclined to have a German shepherd. His family had the most amazing golden retriever, Shadow, for years and years. I'd never had anything except fish and a bird. And I couldn't keep a fish alive for more than a couple weeks. Shadow was truly the best dog ever. He was afraid of Doug's pet rabbit. He loved the toys I bought for him (except the carrot which he devoured). He was content to lie on the floor and watch a baseball game in the AC with the rest of us in the summer.

Our ideas about dog ownership may have been a little skewed by Shadow.

I did find a dog that seemed, on paper, to be a great fit for us. A small German shepherd named Ranger with a quiet, somewhat shy nature. We went to the shelter to meet him and things went fairly well. We learned that he had been at the shelter for nearly all of his five years. He was very shy around people, men in particular. He let me walk him around after a few minutes, though, and things were going well enough that we decided to bring him home and try it out for a few days.

Oh goodness. No one had ever wanted to adopt Ranger before. He'd never been in a house before. He did okay the first night, but the next day, when Doug and I had to go to work and he had to stay in a kennel, it didn't go well. He moved the kennel down the length of the hall. And then he wouldn't eat. Or pee. We called the woman at the shelter to get some advice, tried what she said, and it just didn't work.

They didn't realize the extent of his problems and the amount of dedicated care he was going to need to try to fix those problems. As I said, no one in five years had ever wanted to adopt him. After a few phone calls to the woman at the shelter and much discussion between Doug and me, we decided that this sweet dog really needed more time and attention than we could give him. We had just moved into this house, we weren't finished painting and were still unpacking boxes. We were both working full time. 

Doug took him back to the shelter that second evening. I cried and cried. I felt just awful that it hadn't worked out and that we weren't going to be able to care for this sweet animal. The woman took it in stride and seemed apologetic that they hadn't know the extent of his issues, but she did say that they were going to work with him more. I felt slightly better, and at the same time, infinitely worse, when Doug returned saying that Ranger was so happy to get back to the kennels and the other dogs- the only home he'd ever known.

Why am I writing this? Looking back, this obviously wasn't the best time for us to consider getting a dog. And, probably we should have given some more serious thought to whether we could really take care of a dog given our sometimes opposite schedules. But, like I said, we were so excited to have space of our own and to be able to do whatever we wanted with that space.

Now, years later, we've come to realize that we're just not pet people. Our schedules in fact often are opposite. The yard isn't as big as it seemed and we've added garden beds, cutting down on the grass. Honestly, we don't like picking up poop. Having a pet just isn't for us.

Having had the brief experience with a shelter and with a shelter rescue, though, I can say that if our decision ever changes, we'll only look at rescue dogs. There are so many sweet animals out there who have only known a shelter, or have been in a shelter for far too long. So, my point is, rescue a dog or a cat. Don't go to a breeder to get a designer dog. Give a forgotten animal a home. Chances are, a lot of them remember having a home and they miss it.



(I, of course, just went and checked the shelter website and discovered that Ranger went home with someone in September 2010. Love.)