A Treasured Cookie Jar

This cookie jar goes as far back as I can remember as a child. The original metal lid was painted yellow somewhere along the line. As you can see it has been well used even since the lid was painted many years ago. My mother was great at keeping fresh baked goodies for our family in the kitchen. She was a great cook and she made the best chocolate chip, peanut butter, and molasses oatmeal raisin cookies ever!

My mother never made a small batch of cookies. She would always double or triple the recipe so that everyone could have all they wanted. I loved coming home from school to the freshly baked cookies and cold glasses of milk.

The days of my 85 year old mother baking cookies for us has come to an end. It is something that generations of children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren miss dearly. Baking cookies and other favorite family treats was a way that my mother expressed her love for our family.

While clearing my parents home of unneeded items recently I was lucky enough to get my mother's cookie jar to use in my own home. Today I took the time to carefully wash and shine it just like I would have done with any other valuable treasure.

Today I filled the cookie jar with my own batch of homemade cookies. It was a very sweet experience and one that I look forward to doing again for many years. It is and it will always be like having a piece of my mother in my kitchen with me. The cookie jar itself, and the sound of the lid being taken off and put back on triggered some wonderful memories. I thought of how much my mother loves our family and how much we love her. I wondered just how many hours of service she rendered to our family over 65 years by just filling this cookie jar for her family with batches and batches of cookies.

I am as happy as I can be to have my mother's cookie jar. There will NEVER be a time when I will bake cookies and fill the cookie jar for those that I love and not think of my mother, her love for me, my love for her, and her priceless example of mother and grandmother!

A Pair of Very Loved Hands

I would recognize these hands anywhere and one day I will yearn to see them doing what they love to do. These are the hands of my 85 year old mother. On a recent visit to my home I had a project for her to work on to keep her hands and mind busy doing something that she loves and knows well. Together we created the patterns for different sizes of work aprons to fit my nine grandchildren. I cut them all out and she took the drivers seat at the sewing machine. A seat that she would not give up. She spent hours and days at the machine. It triggered many fond memories for her from her decades of sewing for her family.

One memory went back at least sixty years when she spoke of making/sewing my two older brothers button up shirts for school. She taught me a lesson that day of just how long kind words can be remembered. She spoke of being introduced to another mother. The other mother was trying to connect my mother to her children. When the other mother connected her to my brothers she said; "Oh, you are the mother that makes those really nice button up shirts for your boys." My mother beamed with pride as she remembered those words some sixty years later.

The nine aprons my mother completed while she was here do not showcase the perfected sewing skills that she once had but, they are a perfect example of one of the ways that she has demonstrated her love for her family throughout her life. I will love seeing my grandchildren in the aprons that a pair of very loved hands created. I will be sure to take this as an opportunity to remind my grandchildren just how much their great grandma loves them!

Another Generation of Grandparents are In the House

I have my mother and father staying with me this week. They are in their 80's. My mother is in the beginning stages of dementia and my father has lost most of his vision. Due to their health and mobility restrictions we have had to change one of our annual Christmas Traditions.

In years past we have all gone to visit them in their home, taking in dinner or a treat to share as a family, and some sort of activity to do with them. This was a tradition that our family always loved doing as part of our Ho...Ho...Ho...liday Traditions. My parents always looked forward to it just as I and my grown children did.

This year I have brought my parents to my home and each night a different family (of my adult children) comes to spend some time with their grandparents and great grandparents. Last night my oldest daughter and her family brought them a gift basket filled with Hostess Suzie-Q's which is a favorite snack of her grandpa. The basket also included jars of fruit and jams from her recent home canning.

I baked some cinnamon rolls and we all shared a treat as we visited with a very special generation of grandparents. This morning they were anxious to try the new jams. They each chose a different kind and grandma was very pleased with her granddaughters home canning skills!

Creating Grand Memories

Great Grandparents despite age can find things to create memories and build bonds with even their youngest grandchildren. My mother who is 84 is teaching my grandson who is 4 how to play checkers while spending time together at the family summer cabin.