grandma Archives - Northern California Style

Last Saturday we said goodbye to my Grandma Jody at a celebration of life we held at her church she went to since 1939. It was a bittersweet day, because she had a wonderful long life ( almost 101!) yet we loved her so much, it was hard to say goodbye. I was so busy last week getting things ready for the celebration I hardly had time to think too much. We had a beautiful service and a catered lunch after in the church hall and lounge. It was really lovely and we decorated with pink tablecloths, pink tulips and in the church we had her favorite plant – pink fuchsias. We made sure the food was overflowing as a sort of tribute to her. She loved to entertain and feed people! Last week my father found more fabulous photos of his mom and I used them to make two great big collages with the help of my son Griffin and my son Jackson made a slideshow for the lunch.

It was nice to hear from so many who appreciated her and loved her and some cute stories about her too. I was doing pretty good until the end of my piece I read about my life with grandma. I got choked up thinking about the cute phone messages she’d always leave me.

Here is what I read and some of the newly discovered photos of her…

1930’s

“I came across a card recently that said, ‘The day you were born, the world had to make room for a little more fancy.’

That struck me as a fitting tribute to my grandma Jody. She was what my kids today call ‘extra,’ She appreciated the pretty, the fancy and the beautiful in life. Looking back on her photos and making these collages with my son Griffin, she was one to wear hats, sparkly shoes, gleaming fabrics and bright colors and prints. As a kid she was fascinating to me. I loved spending hours with her at her house where she would let me choose what lipstick color of the day would be from a drawer full of 30+ colors immaculately ordered in rows by shade. Her closet was a kaleidoscope of dresses by color and her shoes sat above in plexiglass boxes by heel and type. She was hugely organized and every drawer in her home had a purpose and a Martha Stewart look to them. She had a wrapping station above her washer and dryer before such things ever existed, with satin ribbons on a bar crafted for her by my grandfather. She even had an overnight train case packed for adventure ready to go at any moment. When she came to babysit my brother and I, she brought that case along with an array of beautifully flowered swim caps we could choose for her to wear with matching swim suits when she swam with us in our pool. She loved swimming!

With her son Ray, (my dad), myself and baby brother Pete, 1967.

Summer days as a child spent at her home could consist of learning how to make a chef’s salad, misting many of her hundreds of house plants, brushing one of her seven cats who lounged about her home and its atrium, learning how to set a proper table for lunch, and sometimes just watching her soap opera, ‘The Edge of Night,’ with her while we drank gallons of sugar sweetened Lipton instant ice tea. She was an accomplished seamstress and many hours were spent making special outfits to wear to family birthday parties, for Easter ( a holiday she went all out for ) and even making small tennis dresses for me while I played in her huge button box. She dearly wanted me to sew like her, but sadly I never did. She loved a party and was a fantastic hostess who worked on events for weeks, and had recipes in the quadruples for big parties and church events. To her the biggest sin you could make was sending someone home with an empty stomach. She claimed if there was just enough food for an event, that meant someone went home hungry!

Probably dressed for some sort of party!

I have been very lucky to have been very close to my grandma Jody my entire life. When I was born, I was the first grandchild and she was younger than I am now, only 48 years old. She was an enthusiastic grandmother and had my mother and I with her for a week after I was born and when my brother Peter came along 16 months later, she had two cribs in her home at once for us. My own earliest memories with her are doing something she called ‘having one of those days together,’ where I would go along while she did errands, and she would put me in the front seat of her metallic tourquise Buick Riviera with my own specially made booster seat that matched the silver leather interior. We would pick up her dry cleaning, drop things off at the cobbler, stop at the pharmacy, and so on while I popped protein pills from Jack LaLane she kept in the glove compartment. Later we would have a ladies lunch out, something I never got to do at home and I would order the diet plate which consisted of cottage cheese and half a pear or peach. Sometimes we would go by a children’s store and I would get something special like a pretty umbrella or a frilly slip, things that were an indulgence of sorts, and I would not normally get, but only after we had visited her friends in the nursing home.

Easter dress in the 50s.

This was one thing I learned early from my grandmother- to care about the elderly and be present and spend time with those who are lonely or ill. She was so dedicated to her older and ill friends. She spent many years helping the elderly ladies at her church get there and when they couldn’t go, visiting them. Her church’s spring tea and other events like that became a huge part of her life, especially after my grandfather died and she made sure to include us too. I always knew that the church tea was coming or it’s annual bazaar and it was important to her. I credit my own mother, Suzanne who is no longer here, to helping me be close to my grandmother. I often got the call, even when I was young and busy with my own life saying, “Grandma is hoping you’ll be there,” and “Grandma is looking forward to seeing you.’ So I thank my mother so much for that.

As a child of the depression, she learned to appreciate everything she had. Her attitude could be described as Pollyanna like and she always saw the glass as half full. She never talked of her years as a kid as hard, though when the depression hit she had to go along with her family who moved with the harvest every year packing fruit and vegetables. She attended high schools in Oregon, San Jose and El Centro, but saw the time as fun. She also absorbed all she learned from the many summers she spent in Lake Chelan cared for by her dear Grandma Eaton. Her grandmother taught her how to garden, make healthy foods from scratch – like sauerkraut from a big barrel in the yard, and she learned sayings like, ‘Beauty is as beauty does,’ and ‘You’ll get more flies with honey.” Those she also shared to me more times than I could roll my eyes at.

It is hard to imagine life without her. I never thought I’d be age 52 and still have a grandmother. She’d always say, ‘Kim I want you to write that down, so people will remember these things.’ So yes I remember much of what she went through. The world changed probably the most during her lifetime. The phone, the radio, cars, television, flight, the internet – all came about during her lifetime. She has stories of listening on the porch to the radio when Lindbergh crossed the Atlantic, and also hearing about Amelia Earhart.

The things though I will remember the most are what she imparted to me without saying. Those things are, spend quality time with those you love, make an effort everyday, in how you dress, how you eat, and how you treat others. Also -appreciate what you have and keep the good thoughts in your heart and enjoy being with people. Grandma was the ultimate extrovert and after a family gathering or a church party would call me a day later, often leaivng a voice mail if I wasn’t there and say, “Honey I am still in a rosy glow from it all,'”