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Bibs – Not Just for Babies

Posted on March 12, 2015 by susanrray

searchThe first time I hear about adult bibs – ones for healthy adults – I laughed. It was during a gathering of my college girlfriends and late one night we were sharing things that annoyed us. Small things. Like a caller hanging up after we’d stopped what we were doing, gotten up from our Lazy Boys, walked across the room, picked up the phone, and said, “Hello.” Like pulling apart the sealed opening on a plastic bag of cake mix and losing our grip and the cake mix coated our feet. Like dropping food on the front of our white blouses while eating lunch at a restaurant and we had other places to go and no amount of water or fabric stain release would get the stain out. Or the stain release left a worse blotch than the ketchup we’d splattered across our fronts.

“I have a solution for that!” Friend said. “I made bibs for Harry and me. We wear them all the time when we get food at a drive through and eat in our car, but not in restaurants.” The room was silent. I envisioned my friend and her distinguished professional husband wearing giant sized yellow bibs trimmed with white eyelet lace and decorated with ducks. “And Harry wears it?” someone asked. “Yes, over his suit and tie,” Friend said. I burst out laughing and so did everyone, including Friend.

It seemed we each imagined Friend’s distinguished professional husband wearing different bibs. One with “I love Mommy” embroidered. One with Mickey Mouse. Another with a tiger cub and long orange strings to tie around the neck. Of course, that’s not what Friend made. She used plain blue fabric and her bibs fastened behind the neck with Velcro. She offered to make bibs for each of our husbands and us. That was ten years ago and I declined. But now I might wear a bib in my parked car beside McDonald’s. And maybe at home as my friend Elaine recently told me that she does.

Elaine says any food she attempts to put into her mouth somehow ends up on her blouse. So she wears a two-foot long bib made of terry cloth. Why so long? To cover the pillow that is on her lap and is a table for her plate. She needs a pillow table because she watches Jeopardy on TV while eating dinner. Even if she drops her plate onto the floor, her blouse and her pillow remain clean. Elaine offered to get me a long bib just like hers.

So now I have two sources for custom bibs. And I like the looks of the ones that are online and advertised as Dignified Bibs from Professional Fit Clothing. Adult bibs made from button-up-the-front madras plaid shirts or the front of a vest. They can be worn under a sweater or jacket and no one will ever know you are wearing a bib.

Who am I kidding? I don’t want a bib because of a vivid memory. I tied a towel-like bib around Grannie’s neck before I spooned soup into her mouth when she could no longer feed herself. I’m not there. But if I ever am, I want a happy bib. A yellow one trimmed with white eyelet lace and decorated with a duck.

Filed under: Clothes, Food | Tagged: , | Leave a comment »

Ask Questions

Posted on March 4, 2015 by susanrray

search“Why do red lights have those big shields around them?” asked my nine-year-old Grand. I looked up at the red traffic light in front of my van. “Shields?” I asked. David said, “Yes. Look, all three lights have metal around them. Why’s it there?”

I’ve driven for decades and stopped hundreds, no thousands, of times at a red traffic light and never noticed a piece of metal around each of the three colored lights. “Maybe, it’s to make the light look brighter,” I said.

He shook his head. “I don’t think so.” The light turned red and I drove under it, only to be stopped by another red light. “Look, those are the same. Do they all have shields?” David asked. I didn’t know. “I think they’re there so the people coming the other way can’t see them,” my Grand said. “You know. From the side. So just the people in front can see them. Or maybe it keeps the snow off of them.”

search   Our guesses seemed logical, but we wanted official answers. According to the Federal Highway Administration’s website, the shields surrounding traffic lights are either louvers or visors. The main purpose is to “improve visibility by providing a contrast between the lens and the signal head.” And “so that an approaching road user can see only the signal lens controlling the movements on the road user’s approach.”  The signals that David asked about are partial or cutaway visors so that snow and water can’t accumulate at the bottom. (If a traffic light were a clock, the space between 5 and 7 isn’t encircled.) This open space also reduces the problem of birds making nests in a visor.

Lou, age 7, sat beside me. We searched for a jigsaw puzzle piece that was blue and green. We’d worked together for thirty minutes putting some of the 750 pieces together to create a scene of hot air balloons. “The piece we want has two outs and two ins,” I said. My Grand jerked her shoulders back, frowned, and said “What?” I held a piece in my hand and explained. “An out is that little knob that fits in the cut out part, the in, of another piece.”

search-1 “Gran, what’s the real names? Not outs and ins!” Lou said. A puzzle history website proved us both correct. The protruding pieces are called tabs or knobs. But I didn’t find a name for what I called an in. However, some people call tabs “outies” and the holes they fit in “innies.” Isn’t that the same as outs and ins?

So now we know why traffic lights have shields and the name of protruding jigsaw puzzle pieces. The answers aren’t nearly as important as the questions. I know from my teaching days that when children ask questions, they are thinking and learning.

This week I read a quote by C. S. Lewis from The Great Divorce. His book’s topic was much deeper than traffic lights and puzzle pieces, but the quote fits. “Once you were a child. Once you knew what inquiry was for. There was a time when you asked questions because you wanted answers and were glad when you had found them. Become that child again: even now.”

It reminds me to never quit asking questions and to notice such everyday things, such as traffic lights.

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Filed under: Grandchildren, Inspirational | Tagged: , , , | Leave a comment »

This Time Last Week

Posted on February 26, 2015 by susanrray

DSC03442“On our way. Friends coming too,” Daughter texted. A morning snow sledding party for nine children, ages 8 months to 10 years, and their parents. Daddies hoisted sleds out of the back of SUVs, and mothers carried food baskets. Husband entertained our youngest Grand, who is too young to sled down our backyard hill, and I donned my boots and coat to watch the outside fun.

Eight children, five adults, and twelve sleds, in all shapes and sizes at the top of the hill. Within minutes a line formed, much like snow skiers waiting to ride a ski lift. “I’m next!” was the mantra of the morning. Children rode doubles on a long wooden sled with their daddy or mother. Older child and younger or two youngers doubled. They raced. Girl against boy. Daddy against son. Mother against daddy. And they lugged their sleds back up the hill. “Walk up the side. Not in the middle of the hill,” the parents shouted, over and over and over again.

One daddy stood at the bottom of the hill beside a big tree, a possible hazard. The children veered away from it or did just what their parents told them. “If you’re about to hit a tree or out of control, roll off your sled.” Two mommas sat with crossed legs on matching disc sleds at the top of the hill. “We’re next,” one said. “We’re going down together. Holding hands.” And they did. All the way to the bottom. Neither let go of the other’s hand and neither rolled off her sled as they headed straight toward the tree. One momma crashed into the side of the tree. She looked up at her husband, who had caught every child who had careened within a few feet of the tree. He threw up his hands and then helped her up. She was okay. I heard one of the older kids ask another, “Why didn’t she just roll off?”

Sleds were abandoned. Children made snow angels, ate handfuls of snow, and walked along the edge of the creek. (I anticipated a snowball fight – that was the next day when only Daughter’s family came to sled.) Time to go inside where Husband had the gas logs burning and had thermoses filled with hot water. The mothers’ baskets overflowed. Hot chocolate and cider mixes, apple juice, bananas, cookies, pretzels, yogurt, string cheese.

Wet snow clothes were thrown into the dryer. Coats hung over open doors. Boots lined up in corners. “So I’ll know where they are,” one mother said. They ate and drank. They sat. They talked. They laughed. Big kids lay in the floor. The young ones cuddled beside parents.

“Who’s ready to go back out?” a mother said. The older kids quickly bundled up. A younger one balked. “I don’t want all that stuff. I just want to play!” Her choice was simple. Wear all that stuff or stay inside. She wore the stuff. Within twenty minutes, only Husband, youngest Grand, and I sat by the fire. Sledding, round two, was short and then they left. They took their sleds and their empty food baskets.

Later that night, on Facebook I looked at pictures and read a post one of the mothers wrote. “Gotta love when childhood friend’s parents still invite us over to play in the backyard. It’s like we are 16 again…but have husbands and children now.” I gotta love it, too.

 

Filed under: Friends, Grandchildren, Winter | Tagged: , , | Leave a comment »

Posted on February 19, 2015 by susanrray

Screen Shot 2015-02-19 at 9.03.03 AMThanks to Winter Storm Octavia my Grands and their friends have sled down our backyard hill for two days, and we’ve partied inside with hot chocolate and cookies. What fun! Now, I’m done with winter. Done! Like I did this time last year, I’ve searched for Funny Days, Weird Holidays, and Celebrations on http://www.daysoftheyear.com for ways to enjoy cold winter days.

Today is Battery Day. Just think how important the simple battery is to our way of life. How many household devices use a battery? Maybe I chose Battery Day because I recently turned the ignition switch on my van and nothing happened, except for a rat-a-tat-tat sound. A simple fix, I was told. (Thank you, Husband, for letting me drive your car while you installed a new battery in mine.) The first battery was invented in 1800 so this is a 215-year birthday celebration. February 18 is also Drink Wine Day. Whoever chose mid-February to celebrate drinking wine must have also been searching for ways to enjoy these dreary cold days.

Screen Shot 2015-02-19 at 8.54.57 AM  February 25th is Inconvenience Yourself Day. A day to put on your happy face and be nice. The website states, “…this day should be an incentive for others to acknowledge their appreciation for acquaintances or strangers and to promote a respectful attitude and an attentive demeanor.” To hold a door or carry something heavy for someone. Help someone cross a street. “A day to reflect on what others need and how we can help.” At first I thought this day should be called Kindness Day, but the emphasis is to inconvenience myself to help another person. It’s also Chocolate Covered Peanuts Day. Chocolate and peanuts – my favorite candy combination. It’s no inconvenience to devour a Goo Goo!

Last year on March 4th, I celebrated Grammar Day and Pound Cake Day. Other choices are Toy Solider Day and International Scrapbooking Industry Day. Neither seems to fit what I do, but my scrapbooking friends can cut and paste from sunrise to sundown. I learned that Toy Solider Day is deceiving. It’s intended to unite fans of various roleplaying activities. From nurses to scouts to cowboys to soldiers to whatever anyone wants to be. So on this day, we can all dress up and pretend.

Screen Shot 2015-02-19 at 8.51.48 AMWorld Plumbing Day is March 11. A day to reflect on the role that plumbing plays in preserving good health and our way of life. My great aunt and uncle didn’t have indoor plumbing when I was nine years old and spent a week with them. I took a hot bath as soon as I got home, and I’ve never forgotten the spiders in Aunt Anne and Uncle Everett’s outhouse. Hallelujah for plumbing!

March 18 is Awkward Moments Day. I celebrate this often. Every time I see someone who says, “Hi, Susan. How you doing?” and I know the face – not the name. I listen for a clue. A former student or his parent? One of my children’s friends? Someone I knew in another life? The website says I should celebrate with humor. Laugh and move on to the next awkward moment. Yes, there will be more.

Check out the website and choose your own days. How about What if Cats and Dogs Had Opposable Thumbs Days? Or Open an Umbrella Indoors Day? Or International Ask a Question Day? Chocolate Caramel Day? Whatever it takes to get to Friday, March 20. Just 30 more days.

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Filed under: Celebrate, Winter | Tagged: , , , , | Leave a comment »

Never Run Out of Hugs

Posted on February 12, 2015 by susanrray

images-1 I love all the hugs that I share with my Grands. And just as each Grand is different from the other, so are their hugs.

I held my arms out to Dean, age 3 ½, and asked, “Do you have a hug?” He spread his arms wide, threw them around my neck and said, “I never run out of hugs!” Until the next day.   Dean sat on my lap as I read aloud Little Blue Truck Leads the Way. I read the last page, squeezed him with one arm and said, “How about a hug?”

Dean shook his head and grinned. “No hugs. I don’t have any,” he said and he jumped onto the floor and stood beside me. I told him I’d give him one of my hugs and I did. “Now you have a hug to give,” I said. Dean wrapped his arms across his chest, raised his shoulders and clutched them with his hands. “I gave me a hug!” he said.

Dean’s little brother, Neil who is 21 months old, laid his head on my shoulder and wrapped his arms around me. A whole body hug. Later, I sat on the couch and watched Neil line up his matchbox cars on the windowsill. Then he held a car in each hand, stood, and turned his back to me. He walked backward until his back touched my knees and then he looked up at me. That was my signal to pick him up onto my lap. Neil pushed himself back against me and sat still. Another whole body hug.

Elaine, who is also 3 ½, has perfected the welcome hug. When I open the back door to her family’s home, I hear the slap of Elaine’s feet as she runs toward me. Her arms form a T with her body. Her eyes and mouth are open wide. I quickly sit on the nearest chair or squat down. “Gran!” she screams, just before she throws her arms around me. It’s a two-arm around the neck squeeze and a kiss on my cheek.   If I don’t sit or squat fast enough, it’s a two-arm around the knees squeeze and a kiss on my thigh.

Lou, 7 years old, surprised me last week. I turned my van’s motor off and expected her to undo her seat belt, open the van door, jump out, say “Bye, Gran,” and run into her house as she usually does. She stood behind my driver’s seat.   After her older brother got out of the van, I asked, “Lou? Everything okay?” She put her arm around my shoulder and her head beside mine. “Gran, thank you for taking me places. I love you.” Then she opened the van door, jumped out, and ran up the back porch steps to her house. She stopped at her family’s back door, turned toward me, and waved. I counted that as another hug.

Virginia Satir, a respected psychologist and family therapist, is often quoted. She said, “We need four hugs a day for survival. We need eight hugs a day for maintenance. We need twelve hugs a day for growth.”   I agree.

A good thing about hugs is when you give one, you get one, and then you’ll be like Dean – you’ll never run out of hugs.images

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Filed under: Everyday Life, Friends, Grandchildren | Tagged: , | Leave a comment »

T V Commercials

Posted on February 8, 2015 by susanrray

search I laughed when I read the comments posted under my Facebook friend’s question: If you could ban one TV commercial you hate, which one would you choose? With her permission, I posted the same question and warned that comments would be shared in this column.

I don’t like TV advertisements, but I understand that sponsors are necessary on commercial networks. I endure, and usually mute, commercials during sport events and fast-forward them on recorded dramas so most commercials that my friends mentioned I hadn’t seen. I googled them. There are some strange ones.

Many friends don’t like a famous actor who transforms into a strange persona with scrawny arms or crazy hair or someone called a meathead. The first time I saw Scrawny Arms, I laughed. Somehow it made me think of the Three Stooges. Humor that’s good for one laugh.

My friends obviously think food should be eaten in kitchens and dining rooms. Certainly not in a car and certainly not in a provocative way. I agree. Does anyone else remember the commercials about coffee that was good to the last drop? And soup that is M’m, M’m good? Those aired when families ate meals sitting around a kitchen table.

Animal lovers cringe when they hear a ‘sappy song’ because they know that pictures of abandoned animals will be shown. “I can’t get to the remote fast enough!” one friend said. She changes the channel and doesn’t watch the program.

A grandmother doesn’t like car commercials that show irresponsible driving. “Do young drivers really need to know that a car can do a figure 8 at 90 mph in a parking lot?” she asked.

Furniture commercials made impressions. Bad impressions. It’s annoying a friend said to hear a one syllable word, chaise, be ‘drug into eight syllables.’ And watching a woman drag a chair around her house irritates many people.

Several friends commented about drug commercials. One said, “I don’t think they should promote prescription drugs. Especially when they read disclaimers for thirty seconds at double speed and have no idea how drugs will react with some of the other drugs that you are taking.” And another wondered why anyone would think that green monsters coming out of someone’s nose would sell medicine.

Many friends would ban what I call behind-the-door commercials. I say, “If a product should be used a behind closed door, i.e., bathroom or bedroom, I don’t want to see a commercial for it.” A mother said, “It’s embarrassing to see such products advertised while sitting in the same room with your teen-age grandchildren or father-in-law.” One friend doesn’t even like seeing a bear squeeze a package of toilet paper.

Then there are annoying jingles and songs that get stuck in my friends’ heads. Five, five dollar, five-dollar foot long. You could’ve had a V-8. The writers of these commercials did their job too well.

Two friends expressed concern about banning anything, anywhere, anytime. And some friends reminded me that there are alternate ways to watch movies and dramas and ball games. Or if I’d simply hit the off button on the remote, I could avoid all annoying commercials and the programs. Or I could watch only public television where the commercials are much more pleasing.

Or I could read a good book. I’ll do that as soon as this basketball game is over.

Filed under: television | Tagged: , | 2 Comments »

Wanna’ Play?

Posted on January 29, 2015 by susanrray

images “Gran, come on. Wanna’ play balloon?” my 3 ½ year old Grand said. Play balloon? “I don’t know how to play balloon,” I said. Dean grabbed his blown-up orange balloon and ran into his family’s living room, turned playroom.

“Come on. I’ll show you,” Dean said. He stood, with stiff legs spread far apart, in the middle of the room and held the balloon tightly between both hands. “You stand over there.” He nodded his head toward an empty floor space just a few feet away. “I start!” my Grand said as he tossed the balloon above his head and when it floated down to his arm reach, he smacked it toward me. “Hit it, Gran! Hit it!” he shouted. I did. He swatted it again and it landed on the floor behind a chair. Dean crawled under the chair, retrieved the balloon, and hit it into the air.

We swatted and smacked and hit and we laughed when the balloon landed out of our reach or onto the floor. Dean held the balloon out to me, “Gran, you want a start turn?” A treasured turn when you are three years old. I accepted Dean’s gift. “Next start is mine,” he said.

The following day Dean and I played with orange yarn, my Grand’s favorite color. We wrapped yarn around a napkin holder and around our fingers. Then Dean’s mother said that she’d bought the yarn to make pompoms to play with but hadn’t gotten around it. I cut a strip of cardboard, about 4” x 8”, from a gift box and began to wrap the yarn around the cardboard. “Dean, would you please pull the yarn out of the skein?” I asked. He did. Yards and yards. I couldn’t possibly wrap as fast as he pulled so I asked Dean to hold the yarn so it would be straight and easier for me to wrap. That lasted about 15 seconds. “Gran, your turn to hold!” my Grand said.

Wrapping yarn around cardboard wasn’t easy for Dean so he discovered that he could flip the cardboard over and over and over and over. Finally we had enough yarn to make a pompom and I tied the strands together with a tight knot and started to cut the yarn. “My turn to cut!” Dean said. A quick chore for me, but his is little short fingers didn’t fit the finger grips well. He twisted his body. Cocked his head. Moved the scissors from his left hand to his right hand. And after many tries, he snipped every strand and the pompom fell to the floor.

Dean grabbed the yarn pompom and ran toward the playroom. “Come on, Gran. Wanna’ play yarn?” he shouted. He tossed the yarn ball above his head and laughed when it smacked his face before falling onto the floor. “Stand over there, Gran.” I stood a few feet from him. “Are you ready? Hold your hands.” Then Dean tossed the pompom toward me and we played a game of catch. Then we took turns throwing the pompom toward a big empty cardboard box and high fived each other every time the ball landed inside the box.

Dean is all boy. Play balloon. Play yarn. My Grand’s versions of play ball.

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Love, Janet

Posted on January 21, 2015 by susanrray

start_bg.ny One more Christmas card came in my mailbox today. A card from Huron, Ohio. From Janet Gordon, who became my aunt’s best friend when they were young housewives and raising children.

Aunt Doris and Janet and their husbands developed a friendship that emerged from living far away from their families and in the same neighborhood. It was the late 1940’s. Akron, Ohio. That close relationship continued even after Aunt Doris and Uncle Hugh moved to Tennessee in 1962. The two couples vacationed together and stayed connected through Sunday night telephone calls.

As a kid, I played with Janet’s daughter while visiting Aunt Doris and Uncle Hugh in Akron, and I saw the Gordon family a few times when they visited here in Tennessee. In more recent years, Aunt Doris had shared the Gordon family news with me. Of the four friends, only Janet survives. After Aunt Doris and Uncle Hugh passed away within a month of each other in 2013, Janet’s daughter called me. She said that her mother needed to connect with Doris and Hugh’s family. Janet had talked with my cousin and her daughter asked that I also call her.

Janet and I talked about Aunt Doris keeping up with fashion and her determination to act young. We talked about a time that I played at Janet’s house when I ate too many marshmallows and had a stomachache. Janet lamented that she never thought she’d be the last of the four friends and declared that she was doing well. I hung up the phone and added her name to my Christmas card list.

Janet’s card included a copy of her Christmas letter. She wrote, “2014 has been a happy year for me. I accomplished most of the goals I set for myself. The goal that stands out the most is that I know if I put others first in my life, and try to encourage someone every day, I am happy and able to cope with living alone.” June 2014 was a special time because her granddaughter visited for a week and had a surprise 91st birthday party for her.

In March, Jane fell and required hospital care and caregivers during a three-month recuperation. She learned “to never underestimate what a fall can do to slow you down.” About a mild ischemic stroke that she suffered in November, she wrote “The Good Lord still wants me here as I had help immediately.” She spent four days in the hospital and continues to have speech therapy and the care of a home health nurse twice a week.

Janet ended her letter. “I am doing very well. I will start setting my personal goals for 2015. I wish you and yours joy, peace, and loving warmth as you fellowship with your family and friends. Have a safe, happy, and blessed Christmas. May you have a prosperous 2015.”

She’s 91 and lives alone. After two hospital stays in 2014 and a three month recuperation from a fall and while currently working with a speech therapist and receiving care from home health nurse, Janet is happy and doing well. She accomplished most of her 2014 goals and I’m sure she’s set 2015 goals.

I tucked Janet’s letter under my writing calendar. When there’s a day that I feel the least bit down in the dumps, I’ll read Janet’s words again. And be blessed.

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Winter Weather – What’s to Like?

Posted on January 17, 2015 by susanrray

imgresI hate winter weather. I’m not complaining, just stating a fact. I hate bitterly cold temperatures and rainy 40-degree days.

I don’t like wearing a coat, a hat, a scarf, gloves, and boots. Not only do I feel like an overstuffed teddy bear, I look like one, and putting on all that garb takes time. Everybody’s time. Last night our five Grands who live across town and their parents ate supper at our house. Our oldest Grand, who is 9, called on the phone when I was ready to put the food on the table, and he said, “Gran, we’re running a little late because it takes so long to get everybody bundled up.” Spending time bundling up and being bundled up. What’s to like?

I remind myself that middle Tennessee is where I choose to live and I don’t plan to move and life is really good here so I do my best to appreciate this season.

Now is the time to watch birds. As I write this, I’m distracted because outside my window, a Downy Woodpecker evidently found a feast in an oak tree where a limb fell off recently. She pecked at that same place for several minutes, flew away, came back, and immediately a male Downy Woodpecker took her place. Did she get full and then invite him to her table?

And I really like seeing branches and twigs on deciduous trees. Springtime’s green leaves that turn brilliant colors in the fall hide the trees’ amazing structures. From the huge trunks to the toothpick twigs – each tree is unique. Have you seen a sunrise or sunset through the outline of trees? As beautiful as the colors of winter mornings and evenings are, the silhouettes of trees create even more incredible pictures.

Then there are comfort foods, like soup. Vegetable soup, made from all the leftover tidbits that I couldn’t throw away and stored in a freezer container and labeled For Soup. Or white chili. Brunswick stew. Turkey noodle soup.  Soup and cornbread on a cold winter day – divine.

Basketball is my sport – spectator sport, that is. I follow our home and state college teams: Tennessee Tech, Tennessee, and Vanderbilt. But I’m happy watching any televised college game – women’s and men’s. I’m entertained through the first week of April, when the NCAA championships are played. Sometimes I scream, “Great pass!” and then realize that players on the opposing team made the pass. I love the play of a good game.

Back to cold weather attire – there are advantages. Long sleeves hide my sagging upper arms. Turtlenecks cover that area that it’s said no matter how many facelifts I have, my neck will tell my age. My spider veins and age spots are hidden. Give me a pair of old jeans and a soft sweatshirt and I’m dressed for the day until I run to the mailbox.

By the time I find and put on my coat and scarf and gloves and hat, it’s almost dark – 4:55 p.m. I grab the mail, run inside my warm house, heat up yesterday’s soup for supper, find a good ball game on TV, and settle in for the evening.

So maybe I’ve convinced myself that I like these winter days. But I still hate feeling like an overstuffed teddy bear.

 

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The Perfect Meal

Posted on January 8, 2015 by susanrray

searchDaughter held a plate in her hand and surveyed the spread of food on my kitchen counter. Boneless grilled chicken breasts, steamed broccoli, baked sweet potatoes, pasta salad, plain pasta, apple and pear wedges, whole mandarin oranges, sour dough rolls. “This is the perfect supper!” Daughter said.  Condiments littered the counter: honey mustard dressing, shredded Parmesan cheese, three kinds of mustard, honey, butter, mixed-up salt, and brown sugar. Certainly not a true southern Christmas dinner, but it’s what I served my seven Grands, ages 9 and younger, and their parents.

The perfect supper? I chuckled and nodded. “What?” Daughter said. Before I could respond, her three-year-old daughter got her attention by holding an empty paper plate and saying, “I’m hungry.” I was thinking that the perfect supper, or any perfect meal, is one that someone else prepares and serves. It was on the tip of my tongue to say, “As perfect as the sandwich you made for me one time.”

It was a hot summer day and I was mowing our yard with a push lawn mower. Daughter and Son were about 6 ½ and 5 years old, respectively, and played in the sand pile or rode their Hot Wheels and bicycles. The rule was that while I mowed, the children played outside where I could see them, but they couldn’t come close to the mower. My mind wandered, but I kept one eye on my children. They got my attention when they stood side-by-side and waved their arms high above their heads. I turned the mower off and motioned for them to come to me.

“We’re hungry!” they said. It was close to lunchtime, but I needed just a few more minutes to finish mowing. “Can we make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches?” Daughter asked. The three of us went inside our house to the kitchen and gathered a loaf of bread, a jar peanut butter, a jar of grape jelly, table knives for spreading, and pitcher of lemonade. I went back outside to finish mowing.

Daughter and Son served the peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with pride and I was thankful that they had made lunch. The outside picnic table was set with three paper plates and cups and white paper napkins. We talked and ate every bite of our sandwiches and then Daughter said, “Mom, that bread looked funny.”

“Funny?” I asked.

“Mostly on one side. It had some spots. Kinda’ gray and green. ” I must have looked surprised. “It’s okay. We put that part on the inside,” she said. “And we got some of it off,” Son added. The perfect lunch –peanut butter and jelly sandwiches made with moldy bread. Prepared and served by my young children.

Now, both Daughter and Son are good cooks and through the years, they’ve served many meals that I’ve enjoyed and appreciated. Spaghetti, grilled salmon, seafood gumbo, fried chicken salad. Delicious meals. But none more memorable than that peanut butter and jelly sandwich lunch – the first meal they made for me.

A perfect meal. It’s not just about the food.

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