When Grandma Was A Little Girl - #42

42- Raw cows milk – ewww!

Have you ever tasted fresh milk from a cow?

We had a friend who had a farm and she had extra milk so she sold that as well as eggs and butter and cream. It helped to bring in some extra money. Running a farm is hard work!

My mother would get eggs, cream and milk from them. We would get the milk in one-gallon glass jars. She usually would by two gallons at a time. I’m trying to remember how much she paid per gallon. I think she paid 50 cents per gallon. She would let the cream rise to the top. There would be about 1 inch of cream on top of the milk. My mom would scoop about half of the cream off and keep it separate. She would use the cream to make whipping cream for desserts. I remember when she took the lid off the cold milk it had a funny smell. I used to hate to drink milk. Fresh cow’s milk tastes and smells funny. It has a distinct odor all of its own. If the cows got into the weeds and ate weeds, it affected the taste of the milk. It tasted strong and slightly like weeds! I was so glad when she stopped buying fresh milk. I liked getting milk from the store and it tasted good and did not have a funny smell. It had been homogenized and pasturized and that funny smell and taste was gone. Whew!

I remember one day I asked one of my own children when they were young where they thought chocolate milk came from. They answered, “From chocolate cows!” I had to explain that all cow’s milk is white and the flavor is added later. I had to laugh to myself though, as I thought that was funny.

The fresh butter we got also tasted good, especially on my mother’s homemade bread! My mom made such good bread! It smelled so good while it was baking. She was a good cook. My favorite was her homemade gingerbread. She made a great lemon sauce you could put over the top. We liked to eat the gingerbread warm. It smelled so good and filled the house with a wonderful gingerbread smell! We could also have it with whipped cream. When my mom made the whippingcream it tasted so good. I could eat it with a spoon!

When Grandma Was A Little Girl - #41

41- A smart mouth gets slapped!
Smarting off to my mother – calling her Grandma!

Have you ever sassed and talked back to your mom and regretted doing that?

I was pretty obedient growing up. I don’t remember ever arguing endlessly with my mom that much or talking back a great deal. I was a typical child and I had my temper tantrums and teenage reasons. When I was little I remember bugging my mom to death with, 'Why?' 'Why?' 'But Why?'

I can’t remember exactly how old I was probably about 11 or 12 years old. It was in the summer and my mom was going to go to town, Alamogordo that was 12 miles away and about a 15-20 minute drive. I really wanted to go with her really bad and she said no and I had to stay home. Well that didn’t’ set too well with me. I don’t remember why I couldn’t go to town with her except that I was told to stay home. (Being a parent now, I can imagine she just wanted to get the errand done quick without kids and have some peace and quiet to herself.)Humph! That made me mad! I wanted to go and why did I have to stay home?! I remember giving her a little argument and she got mad and told me to go to my room. That made me even madder! So I watched her get in her car and as she was starting to drive off, I defiantly went to the kitchen window and yelled, “By Grandma!” in a sarcastic voice! Well, she heard me all right. She parked the car and marched right back into the house right after me! Man I got scared and ran to my room and shut the door. Too late! She called out my name and in she came! She slapped me across the face and told me to not ever say that again! I was grounded to my room until she got home!

I don’t remember what happened after she got back from Alamogordo. I do remember I deserved the slap! My mom had never slapped me before. I felt bad for being a brat. I never got slapped again. I cannot answer for her but being a parent I can imagine she felt bad for having slapped me even though I deserved it. Sometimes when our children push us to the limit, as parents we don’t always remain calm and keep our temper. That is no excuse for us to lose our tempers. It means that we need to put ourselves in ‘time out’ until we can regain our calm and think rationally. I do remember that I felt remorse for smarting off to my mom like that and I didn’t do that again.

Tall shower!

I decided to made '2' new posts today. This 2nd one is about the showers in our new house.

I love our new home and I love living in Orting! It is just so lovely out here! In our new home the ceilings are 9' tall! Because the ceilings are tall, they raised the upper cupboards a little higher so there isn't a big gap from the top of the cupboards and the ceiling. They have even elevated the lower counters a few inches higher. So tall people really love it! It's hard to be a short person in this house!I'm 5'8" tall and I still have to tippy toe stretch to reach things! It's something I didn't have a problem with in our other house. My heart goes out to Angela and Ashley as they are so petite. My tall children will be happy to know that when you come to visit us and use our showers that they are tall! The one in the guest bathroom is at 6'4"! The one in the master bath is 6'6"! I do feel for Ashley and Angela. At least the on/off handles are at the normal height! I decided I would measure the height of the shower heads tonight. They just looked so high to me. So I decided to find out just 'how high.' Now I know. They are high! My tall daughters, sons and sons-in-law will be sooo happy! :o) They can actually have shower water on 'top' of their heads now!

When Grandma Was A Little Girl - #40

40- Piano Lessons – Not that key!

My dad was very good at playing the piano and the organ. When I say that he played ‘very good’, I mean just that. He was 'very good!'

My dad graduated from high school and had a scholarship to Pennsylvania State University for Music. Unfortunately before he could go his father died. His dad died 4 days after my dad had his 18th birthday. (My dad’s birthday was Oct 7th and his dad died Oct 11,1929.) Dad had to give up his scholarship. His father was a coalmine owner. My dad’s two older brothers were to run the business but they were not business trained and made bad decisions and the company went under. So my dad had to get a job and earn a living. His stepmother did not want to be responsible for his care. His two older brothers were married and had their own problems. So my dad was on his own. You may wonder what happened to my dad’s own mother. She died when he was 4 years old. His father remarried when he was about 12 years old. He and his stepmother didn’t get along too well. My dad said that they avoided each other. Dad’s older two brothers did not care for her either. She loved their dad and not his sons.

My dad kept up his music skills and learned from the best. His father had him take piano lessons when he was very young. My dad said that one day his father came home early and was listening to his piano lessons. My dad was fooling around on the piano not doing his lesson and the piano teacher wasn’t doing anything to correct him and then his father walked into the room. She was reading a book and looked up and was ‘dismissed/fired’ on the spot! My dad said that his father played the piano very well. Yikes! Too bad for the piano teacher. She was just collecting money and not teaching my dad hardly a thing! My dad knew it and got away with the dickens until his father came home and checked up on him but mostly his piano teacher. Uh oh!

My dad taught piano and organ lessons to students who were truly interested in learning. He didn’t waste time on students who wouldn’t practice. He gave them six weeks and if you didn’t show improvement and were goofing off, he wasted no time telling the parents about their child and not practicing or making an effort. My dad was rather direct. I took after him; just ask my kids and husband!

The time came when my bother Douglas and I were to take lessons from our dad. We were intimidated by him! He would come home and hear us practice and from another room would holler, ‘That’s the wrong note!' That’s wrong key! Do it the right way!” And I had a time with correct finger placement. Doug and I would tell our mom how much we hated taking lessons from dad. Why did he have to be so mean and strict! Then she would tell us, “Because he loves you and wants the best for you.” Somehow that didn’t give either one of us any comfort.

One evening my girlfriend was having her lesson and she made a mistake and my dad very nicely said to her, “Oh honey that’s not the right note or the way to play that, let me show you.” I was in the next room listening and I was flabbergasted! “How can he be so nice to her and yet holler at both Doug and I!” I told him about that when she left! He just smiled. I had one year of piano and about six months of organ lessons. My dad said piano lessons before organ lessons just to get the basics down good and understand music. After one evening being reduced to tears because of my many mistakes, I told my dad, “I quit! I hate piano lessons and I hate organ lessons and I hate you!” I was crying and I stomped off! I never did play in front of him again. My brother quit shortly after. He was too busy with a job and school and sports.

Years later I was visiting home and had two little girls and I was playing the piano and my dad walked in and I immediately stopped playing and got up to leave. He said, “No, don’t leave, keep playing.” I said, “No, that’s okay, I’m done.” Then he asked me, “Why did you quit playing the piano and won’t play when I’m home?” I then rehearsed to him about his ‘hollering’ when I hit a wrong note or had wrong finger placement on the keys and the night my girlfriend made a mistake and how nice he was to her. Then he said, “Oh, I really regret that. It’s just that I wanted so badly for my kids to play and wanted the best for you but I guess I didn’t realize how hard I was on you and Doug. I told him that’s why Doug quit playing too. After that conversation I would play, but not often in front of him. I knew he loved us but the hurt was still deep in my memory and would smart a little bit if I spent any time thinking about it from his intimidation and it was a little hard to get over.

Now I have a granddaughter taking piano lessons and soon her brother will start. Just a reminder to their mother, 'Please don't holler at your children and watch your body language and tone of voice. Please be nice and try some patience. I know how hard it is to be patient. I was a parent of youngsters once myself. But I also remember how awful I felt when I was intimidated when it came to piano lessons.'

It was a hard lesson for a parent to learn. I am a parent and when my kids were growing up I’m sure I made a ton of mistakes and was also too hard on them. However, I do remember telling them, as far as competition or grades went, “Just be your best self. You are not competing with anyone to be better than them. You are not trying to be an over achiever. You are just competing with yourself to be your best self. You matter. You are important. If a ‘C’ is your best and you’ve tried your hardest, then that’s great. If you know you can do better, then try harder.“ Maybe my children will remember it differently. They usually do, and their version is probably a lot more accurate! I am proud of all my kids and ‘who’ they are as individuals and I do love them for ‘who’ they are. They hold a very very special place in my heart and oh, how I do love them!

Pumpkin Patch

There is a farm about 3 miles down the road from where we live called Spooners Farm. They have a huge pumpkin patch and a corn maze. The two pictures above were taken at this farm. I thought the witch was cute and the spiders were cute as they were made from huge round bales of hay. The place was packed with people.

I love living in a small community and it very pretty and we have a gorgeous view of Mt. Rainier. The people are so friendly here.

There is also a Christmas tree farm not too far from where the pumpkin patch was only on the opposite side of the road. It has a huge red barn and on the side of the barn is a cut out of Santa in his sleigh with all of his reindeer. They have a lot of fun things for kids and families in this area.

There was a Pumpkin Festival in Orting, where we live, this past weekend. They had food booths, classic cars, music, other booths. We had friends visiting us and they parked their 24-foot RV in our drive-way for 2 1/2 days. They were from Hawaii but have been on the mainland for 3 years just RVing and having the time of their lives!

It was so much fun having them stay with us. Good times! We took them to the festival. They enjoyed themselves. The very top picture is a car that was at the festival. My friend Suzie had me take a picture of it for her as she forgot he camera. The valve stem had black dice for caps!

I need to learn how to caption under the pictures!

When Grandma Was A Little Girl - #39

39- Esmeralda – dressing up the cat

We had cats when I was growing up. The only dog we had was a black and white collie. I was a toddler when we had Laddie. I don’t even remember Laddie. My mom and dad told me one day they saw Laddie going out of our front drive into the road and walking very slowly. They went out to check what was going on. Then they saw a blonde little head even with the top of Laddie’s head. That little blonde head was ‘me.’ They told me Laddie was ‘protecting me.’ He had his body just in front of me as I toddled down the road. I was only about half a block down the road. They went out and got me and we all returned home.

We had Siamese cats. The mom cat was named Esmeralda. We called her Ezzie for short. She had several batches of kittens. Siamese kittens can be hard to raise. They get sick easily and they got stapf. They would get small boils from scratching each other while playing and then stapf would start. We were back and forth to the vet trying to keep them well. Some batches of kittens were very healthy and others sometimes were not. One of the batches of kittens we kept a boy kitten and a girl kitten. My mom named the boy kitten Omar Kyham and the little girl kitten Yum Yum. She loved reading English literature. Hence, the names of our cats. Esmeralda was the best mom cat. She was good to her kittens and she was a good mouser. We never had mice. My mom loved Omar. He was such a good kitty. We actually taught both cats to talk. They could meow ‘mom,’ ‘out,’ ‘down’. Siamese cats have an unusual meow.

I had so much fun with Esmeralda. I would dress her up in doll clothes and put her in a buggy and stroll her around. She was such a good sport. She hated playing ‘dress up’! I can remember this one time calling her, “Esmeralda! Esmeralda! Her kitty, kitty, kitty!’ She was hiding and I finally found her! She wasn’t too cooperative about getting dressed in a dress. Can you blame her? The indignity of having to be dressed up in a dress! What was I thinking?! She wriggled and wiggled and tried to get away, but I had a firm hand on her. She finally gave in. When I was done playing and took off the dress and bonnett, Ezzie took off and I didn’t see her for hours!

Yum Yum was an okay kitty. She had a batch of kittens but didn’t take too good care of them and he mom Ezzie raised the kittens. This is sad to say, but she wasn’t the smartest cat on the planet but she was a nice kitty. Later we gave Yum Yum away to a nice family.

Omar was my mom ‘s favorite cat! She loved that cat! It was ‘her’ cat! I was about 10 years old and we were watching some program on T.V. one evening. Whatever we were watching was funny and we were all laughing. Sometimes I would get carried away with my laughing. I would be sitting on the couch and kicking my legs up and down with my feet slapping down on the floor. Unfortunately Omar just happened to be walking along the floor in front of our couch. About that time my foot came down on the floor and right on top of Omar’s back. Smack! Oooff! He was flattened out like a pancake! I didn’t even know I had kicked him. My mother cried out, “Oh my poor Omar! You poor kitty.” She looked right at me, “You’ve killed Omar!” Nobody was laughing anymore, especially not me. I felt horrible. I hopped off the couch and wanted to pet him and my ‘whole family’ said, “Don’t touch him. You’ve hurt him enough. Get away from him!” While everybody was hovered over Omar, I slunk off to my room and didn’t come out. I felt so bad about what I did to Omar and I was crying. I also felt so bad that my family was so upset with me. I didn’t come out of my room. By this time I was throwing myself a real good pity party. I said to myself, “I’ll show them. I won’t come out of my room. I’ll starve. They care more about that cat than they do me! I don’t care if I never come out. I’ll die in my room! Humph!’ I didn’t come out of my room either.

About half an hour later, my mom came to my door to check on me. I wouldn’t talk to her. I remembered being told to “Go away.” My mom apologized and told me Omar was fine. She had rubbed his little back and was breathing and doing fine. I had just knocked the wind out of him. She did tell me to be more careful and not be quite so rambunctious with my laughing and kicking. She loved me. Well, I felt like I was accepted back into my family. I did watch myself after that. I still kicked at times when I laughed and flopped on the floor. But I also made sure Omar wasn’t under my feet. I think he stayed away from the couch after that episode. Good thing!

When Grandma Was A Little Girl - #38

38- My favorite television show as a child – Mickey Mouse Club with Spin & Marty

Do you have a favorite television show you like to watch? I hope so! Mine was the Mickey Mouse Club with Spin and Marty.

T.V. back then was in black and white and not color. Color TV came later. I would run all the way home from school. School was out at 3:30p.m. We lived about three quarters of a mile from school. I would half walk and run because the Mickey Mouse Club started at 4:00p.m. I think Spin and Marty was on twice a week. On those days, I did not want to miss my show! I can still remember the T.V. host with the Mouseketeers saying, “Meeska, Mooska, Mousekateer, now our show time is here!” It was something quite close to that anyway. And also, “Whose the leader of the show, for all our family, M-I-C-K-E-Y M-O-U-S-E, Mickey Mouse, Mickey Mouse, forever hold our banner high, High, HIGH! M-I-C-K-E-Y M-O-U-S-E. Mickey Mouse Club!” I can still hear that tune in my head and see all the Mouseketeers! And that was about 50 years ago!

Twice a week they had a serial that ran called ‘Spin and Marty’. They had a dude ranch the Mousekateers went to in the summer. It was with Annette Funicello, David Considine (Spin Evans)and David Stollery (Marty Markham), the three main characters in the series. They were all about 13 and 14 years old. I was about 8 years old at the time. Both Spin and Marty had a crush on Annette. The show was about 25 minutes long and I looked forward to it. I thought Spin and Marty were so terrific! They were cute too and I had a crush on them! I thought they were so smart! The ranch was a lot of fun and the kids had a great time and at times they solved mysteries and were like detectives. This was my favorite show! I can still look back on those memories and they make me smile!

My mom’s favorite cartoon show was the ‘Scooby Doo’ show. All her kids were married and gone, but when that cartoon came on she loved to watch it! She loved that big old great dane! Her favorite animated movie was ‘Bedknobs and Broomsticks’ with Angela Lansbury and David Tomlinson. I would have to say my favorite animated movie is ‘Cinderella’ by Walt Disney. I love fairy tales with fairy tale endings-the ‘Happily Ever After’ kind!