"Remorial" Day

Since Gregg had a work trip to Montreal (he should do a post of some pics of that beautiful place) and leaving on Remorial Day morning (Cal's word for it), the kids and I dropped him at the airport and then headed to Logan to spend a couple of days.  We arrived at my Elwood grandparents' house just as Memorial Day breakfast (pancakes, hash browns, eggs, bacon, sausage - the works!) was being served.  We enjoyed visiting with my grandma and grandpa, parents, sisters (and T), and cousins Cardon and Chiara (and Taylor) and the weather was perfect for breakfast on the deck.  

Cal had a blast playing on Great-Grandpa's
parked law mowers with T.

After we had our fill, we traveled a couple of blocks to the Hyde Park Cemetery to visit the graves of my great grandparents.  First stop (always) is Grandma Lamb (Helen), my grandma Elwood's mother.  (Well, Grandpa Lamb (Frank) is buried there, too, but I didn't know him since he died before my dad was even born, so we don't have all the memories to relate about him when we stop by.)  She lived next door to my grandparents and we'd either stop to see her each Sunday before stopping at their house, or we'd trek over to help her maneuver through the bumpy lawn to come next door to visit with us all together.  She was a small lady with snow white hair and an always full cookie jar (my faves were the fudge striped, pecan sandies, duplex sandwich and wafer cookies).  Heather and I used to mow her lawn in the summer and help rake her leaves in the fall.  We'd help with spring cleaning projects, too.  I remember going grocery shopping with her and my grandma, too, on occasion; I always loved those trips.  She always had a crossword puzzle book and/or a crochet afghan project going next to her couch.  A special memory I have is when she was in the hospital after having a fall, I was serving as the accompanist for the hospital branch (I think I was about 15 or 16 or so).  She never was up to coming to the Sacrament Meeting that was held each week for patients, but I did go visit her in her room and got to help her take the Sacrament that the men brought around to patients who wanted it.  She always gave us great-grandkids a card with money (I think $5) every birthday.  I really feel blessed to have known her into my teen years.

Next stop is always my Grandpa Elwood's parents, my Elwood great-grandparents, Dallas and Laura Elwood.  I got to know them, too, though most of my memories of them were in the Sunshine Terrace nursing home in Logan (Grandpa had Parkinson's and was in a wheelchair and didn't talk much at all and Grandma had Alzheimer's and was not herself, obviously).  We would go visit them most weeks at the nursing home.  Megan was a tiny baby and I remember vividly one lady in the Alzheimer's wing (it wasn't Grandma) asking my mom to hold her.  My mom carefully handed Baby Meg over and then the lady said, "Look at my pretty baby.  Don't you think my baby is so beautiful?"  I was not too sure we'd get her back!  My dad tells stories about driving in the milk truck with his grandpa to deliver milk (they had a small dairy) and eating tuna fish sandwiches on his grandma's homemade bread or eating her amazing potato salad or pumpkin pies.  I do remember being at their house, which was just a couple blocks down the street from my grandparents') before they went to the nursing home for a Sunday evening visit.  It must have been summer because I was playing charades barefoot outside on the front sidewalk with my dad's cousins (who are closer to my age than to his) and I stubbed my toe so bad that it bled.  They had a ditch out front, too, that was fun to wade in when the water was running.

(Watch out for the ants!)

Callie loves her aunties.  (And I think they love her, too.)

He just fell asleep against my chest.  Never
done that before!

After we circle around the cemetery to visit a few more Lambs (great-great grandparents) and a few more Elwoods (my great-grandpa's brother Mervin died in WWI and there is a monument to him there) we pile in our cars and drive a few miles north to the Smithfield Cemetery to do it all again with my mom's family tree.  A big group of her siblings and their families and my Grandpa Thornley and his brother and some of his kids/grandkids usually show up, and many bring lawn chairs, and they just sit in the shade in the "Thornley corner" and visit and swap stories and share family history tales.  I love it.  Callie wasn't too into the sit-still-and-listen game, so she and my mom wandered across the entire (HUGE) cemetery to see what they could see and to pick up tipped-over flowers along the way.  Cal thought she was such a helper by doing that (and she was!).

Another great-grandparent visit here is my Great-Grandma Gladys Thornley.  I knew her, too, though I was only seven when she died.  But I remember visiting her home in Smithfield, one of the oldest in the city and still standing, at holidays.  She would give us a sock with some peanuts and an orange and the other sock stuffed inside at Christmastime.  I got a little toy pots and pans set from her for my 3rd or 4th birthday.  She had a spinning top toy that we loved to play with on her kitchen floor when we visited.  In warmer months we'd all sprawl outside in her lovely, shaded lawn for dinners and visiting and Easter Egg hunts.  (We continued these traditions in her yard for years afterward because my Uncle Ken and his family lived there for a while after she died.)  My favorite gift she left our family is her beautifully handwritten personal history and the roses she gave my mom.  The roses seen below in the vase are from the bushes she gave my mom years ago.  They are thriving and stunning in my mom's garden now and I loved that she brought some to decorate her grave for Memorial Day.

We also decorate the graves of my mom's mom (who died before she was married), her brother (who died when she was eight) and her Anderson Grandparents (who died before I was born), among other great and great-great and great-great-great grandparents and aunts and uncles who are all buried in the Thornley Corner.  I love to hear my mom's and aunts' memories and stories of these members of our family who I don't have any memories of of my own.

Cal was a good sport to pose by so many headstones.
This one is of my mom's mom, Annette.

Grandpa time for Sam.

After the cemetery, we ventured over to Mack Park for a picnic lunch of fried chicken and a variety of salads and desserts.  Some years the weather doesn't cooperate very well and we have to picnic inside someone's house, but this year was lovely and warm and dry and the shade felt delicious.

Great Grandpa time for Sam.
(My Grandpa Thornley)

It's a full morning, and even longer for the littles, so I headed back to my parents' house a bit early to get naps in for everyone.  We finished the day with some grilled hamburgers and backyard sandbox time.  The best!

It was a good day with my family.  The kind of a day that is right up Callie June's alley, with her love of cemeteries.  Only thing missing was Gregg.