Night About the Museum...

Georgetown & Scott County have a museum located in Georgetown. It is in the old Post Office building on Main Street. Each year they have a dinner for the members and board of directors and officers. We attended this year's dinner last Friday, April 15, 2011, held at Georgetown College Leadership and Conference Center.

The same caterer usually provides the food when you attend a dinner at this conference center. It is alway good home cookin'. This year we had salads, roast beef, mashed potatoes, green beans (love these, they are always a little sweet) and cheese cake for dessert. This is the only caterer in Georgetown and they do a really good job.

Seated at our table for dinner and the program were the Suffoletta's (they own the furniture store in town), Sue Toncray (she is widow who owns property in Sadieville and her husband was a founder of this museum), Betty Lou Graves (she plays lovely piano music while we arrive and mingle) and another couple (I can't remember their names). These were delightful dinner companions and we had fun conversation.

The Annual Meeting followed the dinner. The new officers were introduced and the new board members were introduced. Claude is now a member of the board of directors for the museum.

Then the program was introduced by Joe P. Rhinhart. He sat at our table last year and is a fun character. The program focuses each year on something about Kentucky. This year Joe arranged a special guest speaker, Nick Clooney.

If that name sounds familiar, it is because he is the brother of Rosemary and Betty Clooney and the father of George Clooney. His assigned topic was the childhood of himself, Rosemary and Betty before anyone was famous.

They all grew up singing together from the time they were little bitty kids. Nick freely admits that Betty and Rosemary were the world class singers. He can sing well enough but he was never in the world class catagory that Betty and Rosemary were. His life led him to the broadcast business. He has a wonderful speaking voice and I could easily see where it would be great for the broadcast field.

He spoke of their grandfather who was a true character and touched their lives in a profound way. One of the stories he told use was how his grandfather took them to the river. They are from Maysville, Kentucky along the Ohio River. He had the three kids put their hands in the river and feel the water with their hands. Then he told them how the water that touched they hands would take a part of them down the river, eventually to the ocean and around the world. These are my words but his intent. Then he told them to always remember where their hands went into the water. Like...remember where you came from, stay grounded and remember you are a part of the world. It was a tender story and he ended his remarks with the comment "Remember where each of you put your hands in the water."

I was impressed with his love of his sisters. Betty passed away in her forties. He assured us her voice was always a great as Rosemary. He also stated that as long as he lived and was able, if anyone asked him to speak about Rosemary, he would do so to honor her. I was impressed with the true love and care he had for both his sisters. No jealousy or envy, just pure love and care.

 I could have listened to his stories for a lot longer.

The final portion of the program was a vocalist, June Williams, singing some of the most popular of Rosemary Clooney's well known hits. A couple we were asked to join her in. I love music and found this little program a total surprise and an absolutelyy delightful evening.

And This Little Chair Was Just Right...

Recognize that line?  It is from Goldilocks and the Three Bears. 

The other night Claude and I were watching Frasier re-runs on TV. One of the episodes was Frasier buying his father a beautiful recliner to replace the cloth one patched with duct tape that his father brought when he came to live in Frasier's expensively decorated apartment. Frasier's dad was grateful for the effort but really wanted his old, worn out lounge chair. He listed all the memories he had while sitting in that chair.

This cause me brain to go into memory overdrive. I looked at my hubby stretched out on the sofa and me curled up on the loveseat feverishly crocheting while we watched TV at the end of a very long day. Then I remembered...

During our 41 years of wedded bliss Claude and I have each purchased for the other a chair as a gift. I reflected on those two chairs and how they really fit our personalities. Claude and I are each very different people. Through the years we have learned that our differences add strength to the other person. These two chairs really illustrate those differences in our personalities.

I've blogged before about the rocking chairs given to me and to our daughters at the birth of our children. Therefore, this blog will not contain those stories. Instead, I'm going to focus on other chairs in our life starting with these 'chair gifts'.

Claude gave me my chair years before I gave him a chair. It is a beautiful wingback chair that has always sat in our bedroom. I just loved the look of a wingback chair. Always have and always will. They are usually not the most comfortable chair and, to me at least, present a more formal feel. In our lives I believe I'm probably the more strict one. More prone to be careful about what I do and say and the mannerisms I choose to use.

The chair I gave Claude is an overstuffed brown leather chair with a big automan.

Years ago Claude took me for a medical procedure. It was an outpatient thing. When we arrived, the doctors office was 1 1/2 hours behind schedule. We curled up on a big, brown overstuffed leather love seat and promptly feel sound asleep. We awoke when they told us it was time for me to go back for the procedure. It was some of the best sleep I've ever gotten in my life. Claude felt the same way.

Father's Day rolled around and I told Claude he needed a chair like that for his Father's Day present. I also told him he needed to help me pick it out so it fit just right. We found one and have enjoyed it to this day. It sits in our basement with an enormous afghan I crocheted for Claude across the automan. It is just a truly comfortable chair to snuggle into.

My hubby is a comfortable kind of guy. He is much more laid back about life than I am and he does love to take naps. He is also a big guy.

I really love our chairs and how they fit our personalities. I never thought of that until the Frasier episode. But it is just logical, really, since we bought them for a gift that fit each others likes.

Then, my brain kept up its thinking about chairs in our lives. I thought of a few other chairs that touched my life.

When I was a little girl, before I even started to school, we lived in DeRidder, Louisiana. My parents lived in a white house and down the street lived Mr. Willy. He loved to make things out of wood. He made us a beautiful rocking horse and two little rocking chairs. One rocking chair was smaller and light in color. The other rocking chair was a little larger but still very kid-sized and was darker in color. Those were wonderful rocking chairs.

When Claude went to Utah to get married, he and I walked down the road to his grandmother's home. Claude grew up out in the country. There was an acre field between his parent's home and his Gramma Chris' home. I entered Gramma Chris' home for the first time with my soon-to-be hubby. Gramma Chris was sitting in a wonderful chair. She only walked with a cane and didn't stand. She held out her hands as she sat in that chair and called me over. She took my face in her hands and gave me a sweet kiss. Claude told me before we left Louisiana to get married that this was how Gramma Chris would greet me. He was exactly right.

The chair Gramma Chris was sitting in was made for her by her hubby. It is very, very study and has a neat feature. The arm rests extended out the back of the chair. Each arm has three knotches cut out of the back behind the back of the chair. There is a wood piece that fits across the back of the chair and rests in a set of the notches. By moving this wood piece farther back the chair can actually recline a little with each moving of the wood. I'm not sure that describes it well, but it is a neat feature of this chair so lovingly made for Ruby by Earl.

While we lived in Maryland, Bonnie and Evan, Claude's parents determined we should have this family heirloom. They created a crate and found a way to have it shipped from Utah to Maryland. It sat in our family room in Maryland and not sits in Claude's office. I love this sturdy chair and I'm particularly happy it is where Claude sees and enjoys it every day of his life.

There is another chair in our home that has a lot of sentimental value.  This chair belonged to my mother, Mimi. She got it from her mother, Gramma Fisch. We had it in Mimi and Papa's apartment when they first moved here. However, Mimi was not using it properly with her Alzheimers and we traded it for a sturdy chair we had in our home. We brought Mimi's rocking chair to our home for safe keeping. It had a cracked leg that Mimi and wrapped with a strip of old fabric to try and secure. Claude took the legs apart and fixed a new piece for the broken one, stained the chair, and recovered the seat. It now sits in our guest bedroom.

The last chair I have a picture of is a chair that is currently in Papa's apartment. 

Years ago Papa's career was driving long haul moving vans. He worked for Mayflower Van Lines first. He had his girls nicknames painted on the cab of his truck: Sana Dee (Sandra Darlene), Doogie (Arliss June) and Neffie (Laurel Lyneth). Later he drove for United Van Lines.

On one of his runs to the New England area, the people were going to leave a chair Papa knew his wife would love. They gave it to Papa and he carefully brought in back to Louisiana as he made moving runs. Mimi did love the chair, she took it apart and reupholstered it.

Junie, Neffie and I all loved this chair. It is a very comfortable chair and I think it reminds of us that part of our lives when Papa was gone a lot of the time.

Mimi actually put up a huge map of the continental United States on the wall of the dining room. Then she got a ball of yarn and some nails. Every destination Papa was assigned she would note with a nail in that map. Then she would take the yarn from his last stop and pull it to the newest nail and wrap it around that new nail. The end result was a map showing where our father was going and where he had traveled. It was a wonderful visual way to keep our family together even with many miles between us.

I do remember one other funny chair story. While I do not have a picture of this chair, I do have its history. Claude and I finally were able to purchase our own little dinette set. We lived in a 2-bedroom apartment in Sunnymead, California. This cute little dinette had a white table top on a yellow metal pedestal stand. It had 8 sides to the top. There were 4 bright yellow naugahide chairs that swiveled on their pedestals for this table. I loved this first little dinette set of ours.

One day my hubby was kneeling in the seat of one of these chair facing the back of the chair. He determined he would spin while in this position. Now, he was also talking on the phone at the time. We didn't have cordless phones in those days. This phone was a wall phone. As Claude spun the chair went out of control, Claude went out of control, I started to laugh as they spun around and separated company. Claude left the chair and rolled onto the floor. During all of this hilarity he never missed a bit of his phone conversation. The person on the other end had no idea what was happening in front of me. I can still see it all clearly today.

So there you have it. A bit of my personal history in chair-ese.

Ma's Gift...

Last year the Mini-Marx's  gave me a beautiful handcrafted flower pot for my birthday. They painted it purple, my favorite color, and put their hand prints on the outside with a bit more art.

This winter I used it to hold things through the Christmas season.

This spring I wanted to find a nice houseplant and use my beautiful container for its real purpose. Today I accomplished that goal. While at Lowe's this morning, I found the perfect plant and brought it home.

Here are some pictures of my beautiful plant in its lovely container. Thanks Marx family!!

Mother Dear I Love You So....

Mother dear I love you so

Your happy smiling face

Is such a joy to look at

You make the nursing home a lovely place.

These are the words to a very old Primary song at Church. I've taken a little liberty with the words on the last line. But I heard this in my head to day and wanted to start this entry with the delightful song performed many times for Mother's Day by the Primary children.

I've mentioned often that my mother has Alzheimer's. Today I went to the nursing home to spend time with her while Claude had a meeting with Judge Lusby.

Claude took me to DQ first for a biscuits and gravy breakfast. Yum!! Then he dropped me off and the nursing home while he attended his meeting and picked up his prescription.

I found my mom in her bed but awake. The CNA was had just finished working with her. They keep her bed as low to the floor as they can get it just in case she rolls then she won't fall very far.

I walked around the end of her bed and she looked up and made eye contact and grinned.  Mom is in the final stages of Alzheimer's and eye contact is not something we get all the time. It is a delight when it happens.

I sat down and gave mom kisses. She looked up at me with her big brown eyes and grinned again. She doesn't ever use our names. But today, it was a definite, she knew she had a visitor she wanted to see and she was happy I was there. This kind of welcome does not happen a lot anymore and it brought joy to my heart.

The CNA raised mom's bed as high as it would go and asked me to be sure I put it back to the ground if I left her.

I sat on the side of mom's bed and took her thin hands in mine. She almost squeezed them.

Then she started talking. Now, talking at this stage of her Alzheimer's journey is most often gibberish with an occasional 'yes' or 'no' being clear. Today, my mom wanted to talk. And she talked a lot.

A week ago when I was with her she was in the multi-purpose room. That day she held my hand so tight. It was like she needed to be close to me and to tell me something. Her vocabulary that day was really just gibberish. I left aching, knowing she wanted and needed me to understand something and I just couldn't get it.

Today she would get the first 2 or 3 words out clearly and then go to gibberish. I would repeat the words and her eyes would light up. I'm not sure what she was telling me about but our conversation today was more satisfying for her than the one a week ago.

At one point she was talking loudly and then she began to whisper, just like she was telling me a secret. I couldn't believe it. I leaned closer to be a part of whatever her secret was and she continued to whisper to me. Such girl talk in Alzheimer fashion.

As I felt the closeness with her today that I remember as a young girl, I felt tears welling up in my eyes. I really didn't want to cry in front of mom. But sometimes tears just come for many different reasons. These were tears of joy and of remembering and of longing to have what I won't have with mom until after our earth lives are complete.

I reached for my purse with my free hand and found a tissue. I dabbed my eyes and then looked at mom. Bless her 'little pea pickin' heart'...she had a look of motherly concern. I'm telling you it was like we were both on the same wave length at minimum and really communicating at maximum. It was just profound and wonderful.

I reached up to touch her soft face and rub her cheek. As my fingers came down her cheek I felt moisture. There was a tear coming from her eye. Oh my, I welled up with tears again as we shared a tender moment, mother and daughter.

It is not often I feel like the daughter in this situation. I usually feel like I am a 60 year old mother of an 80 year old daughter. Today...life was back like it is supposed to be and I was undeniably her daughter again.

I was wearing a black t-shirt. One Alzheimer's book I read explained that perception is often very different for someone with Alzheimer's. For instance, if you have a dark rug on the floor, they perceive it as a hole and will not step on it. I was wondering how mom was perceiving my black t-shirt. Then I realized I was wearing a gold chain necklace. My chains are always at least 30 inches long so it was hanging down the front of my black t-shirt and I think she was seeing it. I took the necklace chain in my hand and put it in mom's hand. She seemed to like the difference in the feel and played with it for some time. Her coordination is not good, very shaky. But she liked touching my t-shirt and necklace and chattering on.

Eventually she wore herself completely out. The CNA came in to take the braces off her legs. This not a fun experience for mom. So I held her hands so the CNA could get the braces off. These braces are to try and keep her legs extended as long as possible. Mom is starting to curl up with muscles and ligaments that don't get used.

When the CNA left, I pulled the covers up to mom's chin and sat in the chair by her bed, pulled out my Ensign (Church magazine) and read two articles to her while I patted her head. She fell asleep.

I used the rest of my visit to coordinate her clothes and straighten the socks in her drawer.

It was a most pleasant visit today. I felt strong connections that give me strength as we continue our Alzheimer journey. Today was definitely another 'tender mercy' from a loving Heavenly Father.

This afternoon I also read the next update from Alan Arnette. He is a climber who is raising money for Alzheimer's research by climbing mountains, really BIG mountains. Right now he is climbing Mt. Everest. Alan's mother died of Alzheimer's in 2009. His experience is amazing and provides a place to comment. I'm hoping the link below will show up when I post this. It is a very worthwhile cause and his climbs are a powerful experience to enjoy via his Blog. I thank my son, Jacob, for sharing his discovery of Alan Arnette with me.

http://www.alanarnette.com/blog/

Under the Awning...

Yesterday was Wednesday, April 6th. I needed to be in Georgetown three different times during the day. With gas prices soaring and nearing the $4.00 per gallon mark, I really didn't want to drive into Georgetown and home three times. Added to this gasoline conservation concern was the fact that Claude had to be in Georgetown one time totally different than my three times.

After careful consideration, I determined I would carry all possibilities of things I could do between appointments and fill my day living out of the little red Buick. I got up early and prepared my bags of possibilities, literally, and loaded my car. It felt something akin to going on a short trip with luggage.

My first meeting was at Frisch's Big Boy. It was the day for my monthly Countryside Homemakers meeting. It was to have been at Anne's home here in Sadieville. She fell ill and didn't feel she could handle readying her home and preparing the main course for our little group. When these times come, we use Frisch's as our backup location.

We had a great meeting and lunch. I carried my bag of embroidery thread to this meeting. We were to have had a craft on cross-stitch and were to bring our embroidery thread. Since the meeting was in the restaurant, we didn't do the craft. Back out to the car went that bag. I do enjoy meeting with these ladies. The lessons are always about something of interest to us and I usually learn a thing or two. The conversations can be fun and entertaining. It's just nice to be out and about with other ladies.

This finished about noon and my next appointment was with Papa at the nursing home at 3:30pm. I had quite a bit of time to fill. I really needed to do some more reading and preparing for my Sunday School lesson this week. If I went to Papa's apartment it would be a might too loud to concentrate. Ah-hah...the perfect plan.

I drove to Sonic, pulled up under their awning at the farthest away and least used spot, pressed the button and ordered a large Dr. Pepper. The nice young man came to my window with my purchase. I asked him if I could sit at this location for a LONG time and study my Sunday School lesson. He assured me that would be fine and he would even bring me refills for my Dr. Pepper as I needed them. I assured him one large Dr. Pepper a day was my limit.

I rolled down my windows to let a bit of a breeze through, pushed my the drivers seat as far as it would go, pulled out my next bag with my Sunday School materials and scriptures and put them on the passenger seat.

For the next 3 hours and 15 minutes I enjoyed that nice breeze, reading my scriptures, making some notes, reading Talmage's book "Jesus the Christ" and pondering what I was reading. It was just so very pleasant that the time passed very quickly.

I had worried about how I was going to get this bit of study time. My first plan was to try the library. But I have to say that my 'Sonic Office' was even better. I still have to make a lesson plan and get my visuals together. But sitting there in the air and studying was, as Kim Mansfield used to say to us, "a slice of heaven".

The young boy came to my window two times during those 3 hours and 15 minutes to see if I wanted a refill or anything else. I assured him each time I was fine.

Thanks Sonic for being such a gracious host in my hours of need. I'll keep you in mind next time I need a quiet spot for a bit of time.

My third bag was my craft bag to take into the nursing home. I crocheted between Papa and I singing while Mimi enjoyed the straps on my purse (maybe that could be counted as another bag).

After the nursing home I gave a call to the Sadieville reporter for the Georgetown News-Graphic. She is doing a report about Sadieville's clean-up day this month and needed some information. Then I used Papa's computer to work on a possible Groupon need.

Claude picked me up at 6pm at Papa's apartment.  We left my car there and Claude took me to dinner at Ruby Tuesday's followed by a drive into Lexington to see Menopause the Musical.

It was a full day. All bags were used to some extent. Lots was accomplished and I was quite ready for a good night's rest.