Energized 05/09/01

I sat in the big chair in the living room today and thought about the many remarkable things that happened in my life over the past week or so. 

• Mike and Kerry and Karen called from Australia to send their love and support.  It was wonderful to hear their voices and to picture them in their beautiful home. 
• Peter took me out for a lovely rambly drive after an eye doctor's appointment. 
• Dr. Miller is pleased with how well my eyes have recovered from cataract surgery and took me off any medicine.  Yea! 
• Mim called to give me her love and support.  
• One of John's paintings was featured on the cover of a Pennsylvania Railroad Technical and Historical Society publications and he is getting prints made to sell.  He is such a talented artist - he makes me proud and I know his Mom must be busting her buttons and telling Pete all about him.  
• The Velveteen Grammie was published in Theta Alpha Journal -- I have had such unexpected people call and write letters to tell me that it meant something to them.  It is strange that I never gave much thought to how it might hit others.  I am grateful to Elsa for being a my Faithful Scribe, interviewer and editor, and to my Internet discussion groups for drawing out the material.
• Bittersweet - I am bidding adieu to one online discussion group and joining a new one.
• Whitney and Chad moved into their first house this past weekend.  My goodness, it seems like just last year that Pete and I were moving into our first home, the Little House by the Pennypack.
• Elsa has been keeping the house filled with the aroma of muffin baking - I get to "taste test" each batch, which is a delicious job.  I look forward to Sunday's party.  It will be nice to have it early in the day, most restful for my ancient bones. 
• I got a note from granddaughter-of-the-heart Carolyn Heldon with her travel itinerary for her summertime (ours, not hers) visit from Australia to Bryn Athyn.  I cannot wait for a major hug and to see her shorn locks.  Mostly, I want to just hug and hug and hug her.  I miss her so very much. 
• We had a lovely long gab with Scott and Kimberly.  They sound wonderful and it was great to hear what is happening in their life. I look forward to wrapping them in a great big Nan hug before the year is out.

So many wonderful things happening in my life (I am sure I am leaving things out).  Calloo Callay!   Holding each of you in my thoughts.

Love to one and all - Grammie Kay

My Mother, Your Mother - blog link

 

For a very short posting on a promising book (haven't read yet), see older2elder BOOKSHELF's brief comments about David McCullough's My Mother, Your Mother: Embracing "Slow Medicine," the Compassionate Approach to Caring for Your Aging Loved Ones.  

 

 

Just ordered to take down with me to next week's National Center for Creative Aging Conference & Leadership Council - going to have a lot of reading time, this seems ideal!

Cordial Encounters of the Muffin Kind 05/06/01

There are so many things that I could write about tonight - and I will, tomorrow or the next day.  They are too many to share so late at night (it is close to 11:15 p.m. as we begin this posting).  I will limit myself to the mention of muffins.  

Our house has been filled with the wonderful aroma of muffins baking.  When I was  ready to have Elsa help me out of bed at 9:15 a.m., she was ready to pop half of a "Morning Glory" muffin in my mouth, still warm.  Oh, what a wonderful flavor - spiced batter with grated carrots, grated Granny Smith apples and chopped pecans.  It was so good, it tasted like more. 

Later in the day, after Elsa got back from Contemporary Service, she rustled up a batch of chocolate muffins with fresh strawberries in the middle for the college. Luckily for me, they did not turn out.  There was too much batter in the muffin tin, so they spread out a bit.  Also, she tried to take them out of the muffin tins too soon and the strawberries stayed put - in the muffin tin instead of in the muffin.   

Why is such bad news good for me?  Because she was going to throw the "rejects" out but I was able to save them from the dust bin.   Instead, they are neatly tucked away in a Ziploc freezer bag waiting in the freezer for my pleasure, when I will take them out - one by one - and enjoy them for "elevensies" or for an afternoon break.  Lucky me, indeed.

When I was ready to roll out of bed after my afternoon nap, a delicate Pina Colada muffin (pineapple, toasted coconut, rum flavoring) was waiting to be popped into my happy mouth.  Tonight, Raspberry Muffins made their debut, including one very special tin of muffins - Raspberry Chocolate Chip.  Oh, heavenly muffin.   

It reminded me of raspberry-filled chocolate cordials that my dear friend Christa brought with her when she came to Baltimore from Germany in the late 1920s.   I had to pop the whole chocolate right into my mouth, or else the cordial filling would spurt all over the place.  It was an other worldly experience.   

Looking back at it, eighty years later, I see a whole new reason why Christa and I immediately became bosom buddies.  Who could resist someone offering such luscious delights? Today's muffins were not quite on the same level - but they were close to almost being there.  

It is time for this weary Gramster to head up the wooden hill to bed.  It has been a remarkable week, right up to listening to the audiotape of this morning's Contemporary Service and an early evening drive with Elsa that felt at moments like something out of a Memorable Relations.  

But more about the week's remarkable events and today's events later.  I am about to snuggle under my snug sheets and drift off to sleep with a smile on my face and the memory of a German raspberry-filled chocolate lingering over my taste buds.   

Nighty-night and God bless – Katrine