Grandmas Are Like Snowflakes….

….no two are exactly alike!

The kitchen smelled warm and sweet, like flour, sugar, and melting candles.

Grandma and I leaned over the counter in the kitchen, kneading dough and visiting about school and the past. Outside, pumpkins lined the front steps and Grandpa had set up a scarecrow next to piles of leaves.

I had called her up as soon as I got home, asking if she would teach me how to bake buns while I was here for the weekend. I knew she was the only one who could teach me, and I knew I craved those buns while I was away. So I drove out east of town to Grandma and Grandpa’s farm, and spent the entire afternoon learning.

“Now here’s the trick,” she explained, sprinkling more flour onto the counter top and lifting the dough carefully. I watched her intently as she folded and pressed, and I tried to do the same.

I remembered the days when our heads barely reached the counter and we would reach up to grab goodies, not quite knowing what we’d find. I remember the taste of warm bread with melted butter and chokecherry jam, and the berries we picked from the woods along the house. I wanted to learn how to bake that bread so I could make it forever….

While we waited for the dough to rise, Grandma brought up some old papers and she found me some stories she had written back in the sixties. I read her words and found myself completely amazed. Her writing style was almost identical to mine. I finally realized where my love for writing came from. She wrote stories about when my dad and his sisters were little and when they moved to this farm. She used vivid descriptions that flowed, building into the story, and her humor made me laugh!

While the bread baked, Grandma asked me to help her with the computer. I showed her how to save her documents to the desktop and how to view jpeg files. I showed her how to shortcut to the printer and how to get to my website. It was like we were trading the secrets of our generations. I was teaching her the technology she never had, and she was teaching me the simple things in life like how to bake bread. I looked at baking as something complicated and tricky, not realizing how complicated and tricky computers could be.

Later that afternoon, my oldest cousin Chris brought his little girl, Christa, out to stay for the night.

“Hi Grandma-Great!” She greeted in her little five-year-old voice as she stomped around the room in her daddy’s work boots. Christa had blue eyes and a heart of gold. I loved her humor, and she was one of those kids that would say the funniest things.

I knew Grandma missed having little grandkids running around, but now it was another generation of great-grandkids running around. Another generation to bake bread and taste the sweet chokecherry jam off butter knives and sticky fingers.

“Gramma? Can you show me how to bake bubble gum?” Christa asked, staring up at my Grandma innocently. Grandma laughed and gave her a hug, ruffling her brown hair.

“Of course I will, Christa.”

See? Grandmas can do anything!