31.1.14

Friday Favorite: 100 Days Smarter (and a couple of almost-100 year olds!)

Hannah Kate celebrated 100 days of kindergarten today.  Well.  I'm not really sure if Hannah Kate has actually attended 100 days of kindergarten yet because we've had four "winter weather" days in which school was canceled during the past week.  But no matter.  Apparently she's aged quite a bit since her first day.

We dug through some old clothes I had put away in the attic, as well as some of the clothes in Hannah Kate's closet, to find the perfect ensemble for an old woman.  She tried on several combinations of pants and shirts and dresses.  She just couldn't bring herself to wear the elastic waisted pants pulled up high with a shirt tucked in.  So she wore one of the dresses in her closet, and I put her cardigan over it.  The "panty hose" are last year's recital tights.  And she hasn't worn those shoes in a year, but I found them in the attic, and they still fit.  The faux pearls were in her dress up trunk.  And we borrowed the glasses from my friend.  I suppose this is a rather modern interpretation of the 100 year old lady. 

I really wanted to sprinkle baby powder in her hair to achieved a "silvered" look, but she was quite skeptical about that so I let it go.  We twisted her locks up into a bun, and she was ready.

I can hardly believe Hannah Kate has been in kindergarten for 100 days!  In a way, it just doesn't seem possible.  It doesn't seem possible that skips out the door every morning, backpack in hand.  It doesn't seem possible that she's actually reading books now on her own with little help.  It doesn't seem possible that she's writing her own stories and drawing her own illustrations.  It doesn't seem possible that she spends her days in the classroom instead of at home with me.  She's growing up.  And all I can do is watch.

Hannah Kate loves school.  She loves her teacher.  She loves her friends.  Her favorite subject is writing.  She loves reading books.  She loves telling me about her day.  It has been such a joy watching her learn so many new things and so quickly.  I have to admit I'm a little more than excited to see how and where the Lord leads my big girl along her academic journey.  For the longest time, she said she wanted to be a cheerleader when she grows up.  More recently she said she wants to be a teacher.  She's also said she wants to be a doctor.  I've no doubt she can be anything she wants to be!

So what does 100 years old look like anyway?

This past December we celebrated Seth's grandmother's 90th birthday.  We all took her out to eat and surprised her with several gifts.  We gave her a crown and a feather boa for the occasion.  

MawMaw Mac is such a sweet, gentle woman.  I can see where she probably had a bit (or maybe a lot) of spunk in her earlier years.  She lost her parents at a very young age.  Her mother died when she was twelve years old, I think, and she came home from school a few short years later to find her father dead in their home.  So it was just her and her sister, Mae.  She's not always had an easy life.  But she loved the Lord and trusted Him through it all.  

MawMaw Mac is a very intelligent woman.  She's traveled a lot.  She still reads the newspaper every morning.  She does crossword puzzles.  She's made some of the most beautiful quilts I've ever seen.  My favorite one has many different Bible verses written by her hand on some of the squares.  She loves to play dominoes and has taught all the grandchildren and great-grandchildren how to play.  She also loves to play cards.  And she still gets her hair done every Thursday.  Every Thursday.  I love calling her on the phone to talk.  She says, "Well, hey, girl!" when she hears my voice.

Seth has so many sweet childhood memories of her, too.  I can't tell you how many times he's told me about her taking him shopping for school shoes.  She took him every year, and she would buy him whatever pair of tennis shoes he wanted, no matter the cost.  So he had every pair imaginable of Air Jordan's growing up.  He talks about her taking him to the zoo.  There was that time that the lion tee-teed on him!  She took him on a train ride to New Orleans.  They'd go bowling.  MawMaw Mac surely loves her family!
        
I told her the same thing I told MeMama when she turned 90 years old several years ago.  I said, "MawMaw, now that you've made it to 90, I just know you're going to make it to 100!"  She chuckled, nearly choked, and her response was the same as MeMama's was:  "Oh, Laaaawwwwwd, I hope not!"

MeMama will celebrate her 97th birthday in March!  Here she is last summer when we went for a visit.  I don't know about you, but I think 96 looks pretty good!      

MeMama loves bright colors and always has on rouge, as she calls it, and lipstick.  She knew we were coming this day, and she was going to meet Ellie for the first time so she made sure she was dressed to impress!  She also loves to keep her fingernails painted.  She always has.  I used to love to go to her house and did through all the bottles of nail polish.  And she loves jewelry, too, especially what we would consider the "costume" kind.  She always wore clip-on "ear bobs," as she calls them.  And shoes!  Oh my, I have no idea how many pairs of shoes she had in her closet.  Or closets.  Every single one was jam packed with clothes and shoes.

I just know we're going to celebrate 100 years with this lady, and I can't wait!