Thank God for Good Grandparents

The Hub and I have been gradually learning over the past few years that there are a lot of young people that don't know how to do a lot of stuff that almost all of us (50 and over at least) had to learn when we were growing up. Now granted this younger generation can slay fictional bad guys, and dragons on a video game better than any previous generation and boy can they text message, but a lot of what this younger generation is good at has no real world application, and part of the blame for this goes to the parents of these young people. It is easier to let a kid sit in front of a TV, or a computer playing a game than it is to take them outside and teach them how to fix a car or to grow a garden. It's easier to let your kid text message friends or surf the Internet for hours than it is to teach them to sew, cook real food or to even properly do their own laundry.
Teaching your child to do things that they don't usually learn in school takes several things from a parent. First, the parents have to give up their free time to spend it with their kid teaching them how to do things. Second, the parent needs to be willing to allow the child to have a little freedom to try the new skill they are learning without fear that the parent will get upset if they mess something up. Third the child has to be in a stable enough home that they have time and a place to work on these new skills. OR they need really good grandparents living close by to teach them all these things. Luckily, for my grandchildren the garage is pretty close.
When I was growing up my mother allowed me to use her sewing machine to create and sew Barbie doll clothes for my Barbie and later to sew things for myself. If the thread got jammed in the bobbin she would have to come and fix it, but she didn't usually fuss at me. I don't really like to cook that much, but I love to bake. I went through a stage where I wanted to make cakes from scratch. They sometimes were good but occasionally they turned out flat, or just down right nasty, but my parents didn't stop me from trying. I learned to knit well enough to knit a few things. I Macraméd a bunch of potted plant holders. I grew various things outside in the summer. Most of which died. I painted my bedroom by myself and picked out wallpaper with psychedelic butterflies on it and hung it by myself. I could play every common card game or board game there was at that time. Because my mother and other grown ups spent time with me and showed me how to do these things. When I was growing up kids were shown how to unclog the toilet, and how to put radiator fluid in their car,and other simple car and house hold repairs as well.
The problem is now we have a generation of adults that don't know how to do hardly anything like this for themselves and they can no longer afford to pay someone to fix every little thing for them because times are tough. AND I blame their parents.
Our own beloved CW didn't know how to properly do laundry when she joined our family,she has poor organizational skills because of being dragged from home to home and she claims she can cook, but she really doesn't know how to cook any kind of raw meat or most fresh vegetables. She admitted yesterday that she had never snapped green beans or shucked fresh peas. She thought it was some sort of raised in the south skill, which she was not privy to due to living mostly up north!
My mother is still alive and teaching grandchildren to sew and bake. And I will be sure to teach my grandchildren everything I can before I leave this planet. Maybe what I teach them will turn out to be just something they do for fun or as a hobby, or it maybe something that they need to do and doing it themselves saves them money during a financially tough time. But hopefully many years from now when I am gone they will think about me as they do the things I have taught them and remember that grandma loved teaching them new things and spending time with them.

Turning 50

Well, I recently had a birthday and turned 50. I normally have a crisis every 10 years on the birthdays ending with zero. When I turned 20 I was depressed because I wanted to have a baby. That happened when I was 24. Then when I turned 30 I was depressed because I never finished my BA degree, that happened when I turned 38. Then when I turned 40 I guess I was depressed because it had become a tradition with me by then(actually I can't remember exactly why I was depressed, but I think it was the whole now I'm middle aged thing). So you might ask, what was I depressed about this birthday? And the answer is NOTHING!
Oh, my life isn't perfect and I could have probably made myself depressed if I had dwelled on all the things in my life I am not exactly thrilled about, for example I live in a renovated 2 car garage for heavens sake, my hair is completely gray(all of it), my boobs and my belly button are best friends now because they hang around with each other so much and I often feel grateful that MOST of the teeth in my mouth are still mine. BUT I am also old enough to know that we don't live forever, and we don't know what the future hold. So I decided I wasn't going to waste a day that I could spend loving my family and being happy, by worrying about stuff I have no control over(like gravity). I also feel 50 is old and young enough to be a grandparent, which is the most important thing in my life these days.
So in short, I had a nice birthday, it was spent with family and that is all that matters!

It's Mother's Day and I need a Nap!

Here is a little bit of a down side to living in the same house as the grandchildren. At 3 AM the little Prince was screaming so loud that I got up to see what the problem was. His mom was trying to get him back to sleep, but he wouldn't settle down. As soon as he saw me he grabbed hold of me and wasn't letting go. So off to my bed I went with the 19 month old. He is teething and he has been very cranky. He rolled around in our bed clawing me with his scratchy little hamster nails for about an hour. Finally, I got back to sleep at about 4:30 AM. Then about 5:00 AM my bedroom door flies open and the Princess announces herself and tells me she has monsters and ghost in her room so she will be sleeping with us for the rest of the night. I gently and quietly tell her that her baby brother is already in our bed so perhaps mommy and daddy's bed might be a better option for her. She seriously says move him over and I brought Sponge Bob (a medium sized stuffed Sponge Bob doll) and he needs to sleep with us too. Well, I was able to make enough room for her to sleep on the outside edge, but Sponge Bob kept falling out of bed. And every time he fell out she would wake up and exclaim "Oh no, Sponge Bob fell out of bed, we have to get him". After about an hour of this silliness, she says I need breakfast.
Now I normally get up about 6:00 AM, but it is Sunday and Mother's Day so I really wanted to sleep until at least say, 7:00 AM. I ask her to please go back to sleep for awhile, but she's wasn't having it and then she told me that she was very hungry. I remembered at that point that she had not eaten very well at dinner time the evening before so guilt that she might actually be really super hungry gnawed at my brain until I said OK lets get up. As, I left my King sized bed I looked back and saw the Hub and the Prince spreading out to enjoy the space now available to them and I thought that must be nice. Now I wish I could say I wasn't sorry that I got up extra early with the Princess, but she quickly made me very sorry that I had gotten up with her. She didn't like the options we had for breakfast, then shoved the plate away and pouted. She then decided we should watch Blue's Clues. She didn't even eat! I felt Hoodwinked by a 2 year old that just wanted to get up early so she could watch TV and it irritated me. YES, it was my own fault, But sometimes Grandparents are SUCKERS!

Old Folks

Well, I'm busted CW found out about my blog. I just want to say if I go missing consider her as a prime suspect. All kidding aside, I love my daughter-in-law. She has grown up a lot in the past 4 years, she is a beautiful young woman and she has a good heart. And if she makes my son happy then that is all that has ever mattered, and he loves her dearly. I might also add that most women are crazy at least some of the time and few women would put up with their in-laws living in their garage. I saw a sad thing on TV the other day where a couple had to sell everything and live with their children due to sever health issues that had caused them to go bankrupt. They had worked their whole lives and put 4 kids through college. AND their children were complaining about having to have them live with them and the best they could all agree on was that every three months this poor couple would schlep their stuff to a different kid's house so no one had to take care of them for very long. It was very sad. In many cultures the oldest child is expected to take care of his/her aging parents. I don't think any other society outside the US puts as many of their elders into nursing homes. And many of our elderly spend many years of their lives stuck in some sort of home, not just a short time near the end of their lives. My son and daughter-in -law swear they will never put me in an old folks home. BUT if they do have to put me in a home it better have cable TV, high speed Internet, an in house massage therapist and descent food, or I promise to come back and haunt them after I die.