~GRANDDAUGHTER WRENNA, and my parents, con't..

Remember my precious Granddaughter, Wrenna Dawn that went off to parts unknown, much to my distress??

Well, here she is all safe and sound in the jungles of Costa Rica.  A note from her says she does wish she were here and is getting a bit homesick what with all the Christmas celebrating, warm sweaters and goodies. 

I plain flat miss her!  I want her home, safe, sleeping in the room I have here for her and her mother when they visit.  I would stomp my foot and throw a good old fashioned tantrum if I thought it would help..but, it wouldn't.   I know this.

 

So I will wait.  Surely she will be home for Easter.  Surely!

Would you believe she has my exact coloring?  So does her mother.  Yep, even has my freckles..but even in my very best days I was never, ever as pretty as her and her mother!  LOVE that baby girl of ours!!

**************

 

About my parents and our days during World War II. 

They struggled on...and finally both of them were fortunate enought to get jobs with the ship yards in Oregon, rented a darling little home on a street lined with Maple trees.  We had Delicioius apples, giant Golden Delicious, gooseberries, Hazel nut trees, crabapple trees, Boisenberrys, blackberries growing all over the property.  In the white picket fenced front yard stood a HUGE Fir tree that spread over half the yard.

Through a tall hedge on left side of us were the sweetest neighbors ever.  Mr. and Mrs. Cleveland.  They raised rabbits.  I loved them.  Mrs. Cleveland had an adorable little secretary desk in her tiny front room with glass doors and a little fold down front to write on.  I would love to have one of those and am always on the lookout for one.  But it has to be..one just like that one. :)

 

Children lived on both sides of the street..giving me lots and lots of playmates.  Barbara and her little sisters, Paulma Jean, Billy, Danny, Margaret and her sisters Doodle Bugg and Judy.  There was her little brother but I don't remember his name.  He was a baby.  There was HUGE cherry tree's in their yard and we would climb up and lay on the branches and eat the cherries.

They had a cow..and a barn with hay to jump into.  It had a loft with a large door that opened so that we could (if we were brave enough) sit in and watch the chickens and other barn yard animals.  I remember I ALWAYS had trouble getting down that ladder.  I hate heights. 

The street behind us was lined with Chestnut trees. 

 I think of that street when I hear the Christmas song. 

Chestnuts roasting on an open fire...

Jack Frost nipping at your nose

Yuletide carols being sung by a ..choir

And..folks dressed up like Eskimo's ...

...and so I'm offering a simple prayer...etc. etc.

:):)

I lived a Fairy Tale life.  Snow in the winter..so much it had to be shoveled off the roof so it wouldn't cave in on us.  Hard to get the front door open..OR the back.  Ice cycles a foot long.  In summer lilac's grew over our front porch.  I can still smell them..and the tulips that grew along the side of the house.  Our garden my father planted with my help.  We even had a cellar door to play on.

Milk frozen in the bottles with the lid raised by the frozen cream..

Hot cereal in the morning before school with cream floating around and me whining that I hated the cream!..Mom's ironing my pretty ribbons on the stove pipe.

The radio playing on top of our little refrigerator. 

 

And then tradgedy struck and at two and a half years old we lost my baby brother.  I have written of it in my achives.  I cannot recount it here. 
I am seventy six years old and it still hurts terribly to remember it.
 

For a time my mother stopped singing.  She kept me home from school a lot.  They didn't laugh any more...they became sober serious adults over night.

I missed my fun loving parents. They were never the same.  Ever...

 

..and then Mom became pregnant once again and another baby boy was born.  They let me name him. 

After very little thought, I named him "Jerry".  I was reading "Alice and Jerry" in school by that time and I loved the name of Jerry for some reason.  I don't really remember where I got the name of Lee, but that was his name.  Jerry Lee.

 

My parents went on to have two more children.  Another brother named after my father, Raymond.

My second name is Lilliann (they added an extra "n" for some reason..

Brother Ray ended up  with a nickname and we all call him Buzzy.  :) 

 

After Jerry was born my parent packed up and left Portland Oregon and returned to California.

I finished growing up here, got married and had all seven of my children here. 

My mother was a fantastic Grandma!  I don't think there has ever been a better one and my children adored my parents.

 

My brother, Jerry and his wife, came to California to visit this past summer.  They live in New Hampshire.  I heard my daughter, Sandy tell my brother on Skype, with all of us standing around the computer, how much she missed my mother..and that she had been her best friend.  They were very, very close and talked on the phone a lot.  It was a very touching conversation..for all of us.  We all cried. 

 

Families should be together in this sometimes difficult world.  They should not quarrel and if they do, they should forgive.  Reach out.  Don't waste time.  Be close.  Over look each others shortcomings.

Love one another.

 

Merry Chrismas!

Mona