~THINKING OF YOU~

  "LIKE A COMET BLAZING ACROSS THE EASTERN SKY~

GONE TOO SOON..."

Celebrating the life of my Grandmother who

went to heaven four years ago this today....

"I miss you Grams.  Thank you so much for all you did for me...especially for your wise counsel and giving heart.  I love you!"

Busy days that include holiday decorating can sometimes leave you breathless, but the weather is so gorgeous here in Oklahoma I decided to make Thursday my errand day anyway.  Yesterday I spent most of the day decking the halls (windows, walls and doors) of our La Chaumière de Briarwood and I fell into my warm, cozy bed absolutely exhausted late last night.  I'll be sharing more pics of my home soon!

Thank you to Miss Noreen of LIFE BLESSINGS for the amazing book I recently won on her GIVEAWAY!  On December 28th I'm scheduled for surgery on both my hands (Carpel Tunnel) and the down time after Christmas will give me a change to read it.  I can't wait.  Thank you, friend!  I hope you will all visit her precious, inspiring and uplifting blog.  It's wonderful!

Blessings as you go about your day today!

Love to you...

~GET IN THE PICTURE~

Today, for my 999th Blog Post I want to share something that has been on my heart for quite a long time.  

A few weeks ago while shopping inside my favorite thrift I came across an incredible book entitled:

OUR GRANDMOTHERS

~Loving Portraits by 74 Granddaughters~

 I was taken back by the beautiful cover and couldn't resist bringing the book home with me.  Once home I became mesmerized by the photographs inside.  But, one by one as the pages turned I felt a deep sadness building up within my spirit and more than a tinge of regret.

The entire book set my heart to wondering...

 Pictures taken of me with my own Grandmother are few and far between so there are only a handful of such photographs to share.  I can only recall two or three pictures taken of the two of us together before I became an adult, even though I spent many a long summer at her loving home.  

There is only ONE taken of me with my paternal Grandmother, Grandma Bethel.

What I wouldn't give to have just one more snapshot of her hand held tightly in mine...

Now...I'm usually the picture-taking-person in our family.  I'm almost always the one behind the lens and that is evident when I look back upon our photo albums and scrapbooks.  I'm in about 1/3 of the pictures taken, at best.  It's my own fault, too!

 In the past I've been guilty of coming up with every excuse one can think of to NOT be in the picture...

 I'm tired.

I don't have my make-up on.

I look fat.

I look old.

I'm not dressed right.

My hair's a mess.

(Etc., etc., etc., etc.,)

 How silly I was!

Today I'd love to have more photos of me with my children.  When I'm no longer around I want them to have something more than just my spirit to remember me by...

Today when I think about my Grandmother (she passed almost 4 years ago at nearly 92) I'm so grateful she didn't miss the chance to be in the handful of pictures I currently own.

 I can't help but wonder if she had similar concerns to those that have crossed my own mind over the years.  Maybe she was just happy to be loved, appreciated and valued by her family.

 I think the latter is true.

When I look back upon old photographs I don't care if her hair is a mess or her clothes aren't right.  I don't even notice if she's fat or thin or if there is rouge on her cheeks or lipstick on her thinning lips.

   I only see her beautiful face.

I feel only her amazingly gracious heart.

 So...what I want to say to you today before I begin my 1000th blogpost is this...

GET IN THE PICTURE!

Step out from behind the camera!

 

Celebrate life's fleeting moments with your children and grandchildren and stop caring if everything is perfect.

It's never going to be.

One day when you and I are gone our families will be so grateful to have something more than just their memories to help them move on.

~~*~~

Sunday Blessings...

~BECAUSE SHE LOVED CLOCHE HATS~

 ~MY GRANDMOTHER'S CLOCHE~

About Age 8

Not long after I penned my first blog post I shared a little story about my paternal grandmother, Bethel Maude.  Of all the things I've ever written it's a personal favorite.  It's been close to three years now since I wrote about my feelings for the woman my father simply called Mother.  She passed away when I was not quite a teenager and even though she was only seventy-two when she died she truly seemed ancient to me at the time.

~THE ENTIRE PHOTOGRAPH~

With Her Sisters

I've been really busy these past two weeks working in my studio and when I'm task oriented my mind rarely wonders about.  Too focused on what I'm creating to think much about anything else, I suppose.  But this week my grandmother came to me more times than I can say...  Although I have only a handful of memories of her we have even less photographs.  A few pictures taken when she was young and only one or two as she grew older.  I made a mental note to track the photos down, but in the meantime she continually returned to my mind. 

~WEARING HER CLOCHE HAT~

 2nd on the right - About Age 15

The more I worked the more overwhelmed I grew. Seriously...I couldn't shake the thought of her and it was getting to the point I was feeling frustrated.  I was working on a pink rose cupcake design that included a pedestal cake plate with a glass cloche and I absolutely couldn't concentrate.  Since cloches of all kinds remain crazy-popular I've wanted to incorporate one into some new altered art paper goods for a while now...  So why then did my grandmother keep coming back to my mind again and again...

~ON THE LEFT - CLOCHE HAT AGAIN~

About Age 17

Finally, late this afternoon I decided to hunt down the only pictures I have... I found them tucked away in a drawer with other special things that belonged to my father.  As I picked up the century old photographs I knew instantly why my grandmother's presence was all about me and I felt a bit ashamed for pushing her aside.  No doubt working on the cloche card design caused me to visit days of long ago.  I had forgotten how my grandmother loved hats as an older woman, but when she was a young girl and a teenager she was rarely seen without a cloche...  In all the photographs I personally own only the one below, taken around the time she married my grandfather, is she seen without one.

~MARRYING MY GRANDFATHER~

About Age 18

What I wouldn't give to sit down with a cup of tea and share the day with the grandmother who left my earthly presence far too soon.  I would most certainly yap the hours away telling her all about my life, my children, my Miss K, and my beloved.  I'd tell her how much I love to create and take her all around my home and show her where I work, live and love...and then I would invite her to come live with me.

~IN MY CABINET~

I would hope to pamper and treat her in a way I know for certain she was never was.  I would take her to lunch and we'd dine on a fine meal.  Then we'd visit a demure ladies boutique where I would purchase her a fine felt cloche (and one for me, too).  I would photograph her in style and make sure at least one picture was taken with me.  I'd squeeze her hand, tell her she looked beautiful and how much I loved spending time with her.  When the evening hours settled in and all grew quite inside my La Chaumière I would snuggle up next to her and listen, really listen as she opened up her heart.  I'd ask her to tell me about her deep, lasting faith, her childhood hopes and dreams, her loves, her passions, her joys, fears, my father as a child and all about the life she had lived....

And the one she'd longed to...

~~*~~

Blessings as you get real with the ones you love~

Love to you...

 

~GONE TO SOON - Remembering You In Love~

BERTIE MAE BAIN-MARTIN
1944
December 26, 1916 - November 29, 2008

To My Beloved Grandmother...

My thoughts on this first anniversary of your passing are simple, Grams.

MY GRANDPARENTS - 1965

I pray every single day to be for my grandchildren all you were to me during my life.

I miss you more than words can say.

GRAMMA & ME - June 2008

Thank you for standing in the gap.

Thank you, for everything.

Love, Becky

GONE TOO SOON

Like a comet
Blazing 'cross the evening sky
Gone too soon

Like a rainbow
Fading in the twinkling of an eye
Gone too soon

Shiny and sparkly
And splendidly bright
Here one day
Gone one night

Like the loss of sunlight
On a cloudy afternoon
Gone too soon

Like a castle
Built upon a sandy beach
Gone too soon

Like a perfect flower
That is just beyond your reach
Gone too soon

Born to amuse, to inspire, to delight
Here one day
Gone one night

Like a sunset
Dying with the rising of the moon
Gone too soon
Gone too soon

Grossman/Kohan

Blessings to you as you miss those who have gone too soon...Rebecca

I THINK OF YOU

Born in 1898 in a covered wagon on the outskirts of Stroud, Oklahoma, Bethel Maude Moore was destined to be my Grandmother. She was my Father’s Mother and she died when I was only 12.

I remember her being soft and cushy, just like a Grandma is expected to be, I suppose. When I knew her there was an almost transparent bluing in her tightly curled hair and she smelled only of the dime store lavender talc her meager income allowed her to enjoy. She wore little make-up, save for the peachy-tinted face power and the heavily pigmented rouge that brought color to her milky white, deeply wrinkled skin.

I never once saw her wear pants. She dressed in clothes older women of the day would wear, simple dresses fashioned from feminine, lightweight fabrics. Most came with thin belts, which she usually discarded. As she put it, ‘they were too short to reach around her plentiful belly’. She always wore a full slip with adjustable straps. I don’t remember if she wore a girdle, but probably not.

Her shoes were those old-fashioned kind. You know the ones! They were black and looked like little mini boots...the kind one might see a real granny wear. They laced snugly up the front, had a slightly pointed tip and came with a heel that made up made in function what it lacked in fashion. During her rare winter-time visits, she’d keep warm in a pale pink coat, and I seldom saw her without a shimmery rhinestone brooch and her predictable clip-on earrings.  Sometimes she wore a tattered hat showcasing an old millinery flower or two...but never once did I see her wear a cloche.  Somehow I knew she had once really loved them.

I understood little of this woman back then. Possibly less now. She carried within her a deep sadness. A sadness I know instinctively I will never comprehend. Never afforded the chance at an education, she’d been forced to leave school after finishing the 3rd grade. She talked fondly of her siblings but lived hundreds of miles from them. She had once deeply loved, but he’d been forever lost to her while serving in WWI. Her most beloved boy, his love-child, was ripped from her. She lived through unthinkable sorrow, especially for a girl who had yet to reach the age of twenty.

When she was still a young woman, she married my Grandfather, a West Texas Oil Man, whom by all accounts was merciless and cruel. She bore him five children, two girls and three sons. One of which would never see adulthood, and another who was fated to be my Father. She named him William.

It’s been almost thirty-six years since my Grandmother left this earth. The precious few things that remain of her existence are tattered and worn and gently faded. She left no money, no earthly treasures. Photographs are scarce, correspondence written by her hand, even less.

What do linger are the gentle reminders of what I knew her to take pleasure in and the impassioned love she carried in her heart for my father and his four children. As I fill a sachet with fragrant lavender buds, I think of her. When I embellish a pillow with a vintage rhinestone bauble, I think of her. When I pull on my softly colored, pale pink jacket, I think of her. Mostly though, it’s during the quiet visits with my aging father, the most adoring of all her sons, the one who stayed when all others had left, I think of her...

Love to you~

Rebecca