Wednesday, February 20, 2008

Over the river and through the woods



Our trip home to see Granna was good, but very emotional. She is doing well in the nursing home, and it really felt like we had moved her into a dorm (the walls and closets very much reminded me of mine!) We visited her every day while we were there, but she was sad to hear that we weren't staying for the entire week. I told her that we'd be back in April (a previously scheduled trip for a wedding that was canceled; we'd already bought the tickets) and wrote it on her calendar.

She is still quite feisty. She's happy with her move into the nursing home, and I think that has a lot to do with the fact that she is now just up the road from my parents instead of an hour away across the lake. She keeps her tv on low with the captioning on so as to not disturb her roommate on the other side of the curtains, and spends her day reading the paper and her romance novels.

We spent Saturday afternoon at her apartment going through things and getting out personal items and things we want to keep. The woman who has cleaned her apartment for the 27 years since she moved in said she will take anything we don't want. This includes furniture, clothes, kitchen stuff, food, whatever. Granna doesn't have a lot of things of value, but we did want to get her papers and photo albums and any little knick knacks we might be interested in.

My dad also wanted to make sure that I got the two pieces of jewelry she has: her mother's engagement ring and Granna's wedding band. Granna got divorced shortly after I was born because my Grandpa left her for a younger woman. I need to read up on the etiquette of wearing a divorced person's wedding ring. Granted, she was married for 30 years, so it's not like it was never something special to her.

Her wedding band:


My Great-Grandmother's Ring (A tiny little European cut diamond in a beautiful setting, circa 1911):


I took the pictures home and am slowly scanning them and putting them into a better quality album. I want to reprint copies of favorites and then return the originals and a few CDs to my dad.

I found this picture of Granna, from around 1934, that I have never seen and absolutely love. It will definitely be one to frame soon.



Some other pictures:
My Great-Grandparents on the day of my dad's Christening:



Granna & Grandpa, 1944




Then of course there are the ones like this...

No comments: