My Grandmother's Quilt and Anne Lamott

I found this quilt at my grandmother's house when my grandfather moved to an apartment.  It's hand made and hand-stitched and sturdy and beautiful.  This summer I let Claire keep it on her bed as a "summertime" comforter and the quilt survived jumping on the bed and forts and two children giggling.  Now that fall is here, I got Claire's regular blankets out of the closet and reclaimed this beauty.

It's got some gaps in it right now where stitches came undone, but I've been repairing it stitch by stitch while watching television or praying.  I know my grandmother would be delighted that my kids are loving and using this blanket, even though that meant needed repairs.

This week my favorite author Anne Lamott will be in Fort Worth again.  This is her second appearance here this year.  Her book tours often haven't made it to our area, so for her to come back to my hometown is an exciting honor.  She's currently promoting her new book, Stitches, which is supposed to be a companion to Help, Thanks, Wow.

What I love about Anne Lamott is her transparent honesty and strong faith.  She knows she's imperfect and needs regular divine intervention and she shares that.  So many people try to look good or sound right.  Honesty in imperfection is like a breath of fresh air.  I strive for it as well, but I'm still practicing being transparent about my shortcomings and all the grace I receive on a daily basis.

While I've been sitting on the couch stitching the holes together in this beautiful quilt, I've been thinking of the rich metaphors that action brings.  

I have to sit down to repair the quilt, just like sometimes I have to sit down to be repaired.  When I'm running around like a chicken with my head cut off, I miss hands trying to help me or hug me.  I have to sit down to be repaired.

The string the I'm using to patch the pieces together is stronger than the original thread.  Similarly, when I fall apart, I come out of the repair stronger than before.  When I get overwhelmed with work, motherhood, or life in general, I have to be pulled back together.  Sometimes a friend helps me, sometimes a quiet prayer helps me, sometimes a walk by myself helps me.  Whatever it is that pulls me back together, though, patches me up stronger than I was before.

Each patch of this quilt has a story with it, just like each part of my life is a story.  Everyone's life is full of color, alternating between bright and dark, dull and glittery, busy patterns and calmness.  If you look too closely at one part you miss the beauty of the entire quilt of life.  When I miss the big picture, I miss beauty and how every part of life works together to weave a beautiful story.

I can't wait to meet Anne Lamott on Thursday and share with her what her story means to me and my grandma's quilt.  I can't wait to see the addition of new patches on my life quilt and how they make the blanket of life even more beautiful.

Going Green with Grandparents

It's now hip to bring your own bags to the grocery store, to recycle, and to repurpose items.  "Going Green" is much in style.  This is not a new concept, however.  I believe that throughout human history, people have been "going green."  I know both sets of my grandparents did as they grew up during the Great Depression.
My maternal grandma has always been a saver and reuser.  She fills up her ketchup bottles with packets from restaurants.  She collects napkins and cuts them in half when she has company for dinner.  She freezes everything, including candy bars and bread.  I have witnessed her more than once dig through her kitchen trash to rescue a piece of plasticware that a careless family member threw away.
My paternal grandfather is also a person who has always been "green."  Recently at his house I saw him spraying nose spray on his eyeglasses.  I asked him about that and he informed me that when he ran out of nosespray he refilled the bottle with windex to clean his eyeglasses.
He doesn't cut napkins in half, but he uses them meal after meal until I sneak and throw them away.  He buys his mops at the dollar store, but still removes the mop heads and washes them rather than buy a new mop.
Everything is repurposed at my granddad's house.  An Ensure can doubles as a spittoon.  An empty juice bottle is refilled with water in case of emergency water cut off.  My deceased grandmother's glasses fit his face just fine.  Expired milk is drank up to a week later.  Frozen dinner trays are washed and kept like fine china.  Clothes are mended again and again rather than buying new ones.  He's always working on a handyman project around the house like using a hairdryer to melt PVC to mold it so it fits on the shelves in the bathroom.
I must say that both sets of my grandparents have rubbed off on me.  At our home, we sometimes have two 60 gallon bins full of recycling.  We repurpose unique packaging for crafts.  If bananas turn brown, I freeze them for muffins.  I have my own chest freezer full of oddities like bread and chocolate chips.  Rather than throw out leftovers, I freeze them before they go bad.
While I must admit I have giggled at my grandparents' ways more than once, it seems that the more things change, the more they stay the same.  The apple doesn't fall far from the freezer.

Grace

Growing up in the Baptist church, I occasionally heard the word "grace," but never related to it. To me the word was a cross between style, balance, and something about Jesus' crucifixion. It wasn't until Adam and I joined a Methodist church and later started birthing babies, that I really understood it.

To me, grace is getting something you don't deserve, but desperately need. Every day I experience grace in my life.

I started noticing it when I was pregnant. People would give me their seat. I would be forced by friends to sit down and raise my feet. A friend volunteered to take my hall duty so I wouldn't have to walk pregnant. My principal let me wear Adam's Birkenstocks to school every day because my feet were so swollen they wouldn't fit into anything else.

Once I had Claire, the grace extended to her. Strangers would try to comfort her when she was crying. Her daycare teachers were very supportive. When I locked her in the running car and waited for Adam to rescue me, I was offered cold water.

Sometimes grace comes with large actions, but usually I notice small, thoughtful ones. When I feel overwhelmed, someone appears to comfort me. When I've got full hands and struggle to open doors, the door always magically opens from the other side.

Recently, I was feeling sad that my parents aren't grandparents to my children. I have fond memories of both sets of my grandparents and sometimes am sad that they will never have experiences like I had. They basically only have one set of grandparents. That same day, we had to get my tire repaired at Discount Tire. Claire befriended a lady who was a grandma and was doing all sorts of grandmotherly things with her. Like I remember with my grandmother, she had a purse full of candy and surprises. She had fancy kleenexes and showed Claire how to fold them in a way to swaddle her miniature doll.

This lady eventually had to leave because her car was ready. Not 30 seconds later, another older lady arrived and sat in the same seat in the waiting room. She immediately bonded with Claire and pulled out a notebook she kept in her bag for her grandchildren. She started teaching her how to draw different animals. Paul was asleep on my shoulder during this entire experience, so I was so grateful for not one but two ladies that bonded with Claire and kept her entertained since I was held down by a sleeping child.

I was overwhelmed. Sure, my kids only have one grandmother that they see regularly, but they are surrounded by love and have countless "grandmas" everywhere we look. That's grace.

A Primer on Grocery Shopping

When I was a kid, my grandma would send us little envelopes in the mail. Sometimes she wouldn't send them, she'd just hand them to my mom when we visited. Malcolm Gladwell, author of The Tipping Point, would have called her a coupon maven. She was always on the lookout for good coupons and would remember what products our family used so she could send us the coordinating coupons. Sometimes the coupons came in your birthday card, which always made us roll our eyes. What everyone wants for their birthday is coupons!

Every Sunday afternoon growing up, my parents had a debate. We'd just finished service at the Baptist church and they couldn't decide if they wanted a nap first or eat lunch first. We rotated, but one thing we didn't rotate on was the activities afterward. Everyone sat on the couch and went through the Sunday paper. My dad would read the news, and my mom, sister, and I would go through the salespapers and cut coupons. I remember getting tired of the activity as I got older and I started to rebel. I stopped cutting the edges off the coupons, leaving a white border. I was hard core.

My mom taught me math by helping me to calculating discounts off the clothes we bought. We bought everything on sale, and when we took our outfits up to the register, we knew what to expect from the 50% off sale.

When I was in college, I often went grocery shopping with my grandma. She taught me new tips on shopping, like how to pick a cashier. She usually chose men who looked kind of dumb. They didn't check her expiration dates on her coupons and she could save more money. She taught me how to slip an expired coupon in with all your regular coupons. She taught me the rules of coupon doubling and tripling. I remember her beaming from ear to ear when I would check out and only owe $20.

Some of Grandma's tips don't work any more. I tend to chose the smarter-looking cashiers now because they will override the register if the coupon doesn't ring up. I'm always careful to buy exactly what the coupons tells me to, but sometimes the register still beeps. If the cashier isn't very smart, they get confused and call the manager. You can't use expired coupons any more, either. The computers eliminated that.

As a stay-at-home mom, a large part of my time is spent getting ready for the grocery store. I have a team of shoppers that help me, too. My grandfather and my blind friend, Jo, both save their Sunday coupons for me. My grandfather goes through and picks the right set of coupons for me. Jo, who I suspect subscribes to the paper solely for the obituaries, throws anything that looks couponish into a bag for me. I appreciate both of them because I can often buy multiple items and have a coupon for each one.

My mother-in-law, Sarita, is in on the game, too. She usually calls me on Sunday afternoon to alert me to good coupons in the paper that week. When I was working I was always a week or two behind on my clipping, and sometimes missed good ones. Sarita clips all the coupons she needs and then saves the rest in a bag for me. I have a special coupon drawer for her at our house. Every time we see each other, we trade sacks of coupons.

This last year, with the loss of my paycheck, it has become even more important for me to save money on the grocery bill. I've started studying the grocery store ads, and now "grocery hop" to different stores for different products. On a typical shopping day, we might go to five different stores for groceries. This is no small task for a single adult, but when you add two small children, it nearly drives me to the insane asylum. I can tell you where the bathroom is in any grocery store on my side of Fort Worth. I don't know if she really needs it or if she gets entertained frustrating her mom, but Claire can use the potty four times in one grocery store.

I do not bribe my children to behave in the store, but I do feed them. If I buy deli meat, I always make sure to get a sample for Claire and Paul. At Tom Thumb, they allow each child to have an apple, banana, orange, or balloon for free. If they're eating, they are happy.

Here's a few time-tested tips from me, a third generation grocery store maven:

1. Albertson's, Kroger, and Tom Thumb triple the face value of a coupon up to 39 cents. They double it up to 50 cents. Beyond that it is face value only.

2. At Walmart, coupons are worth their face value only. I do find Walmart grocery stores to have cheaper prices if you are not using a coupon, but I've done the math. If you are using coupons, traditional grocery stores are better.

3. Tom Thumb is more expensive on certain items, but if I'm depressed and need good customer service, I go there.

4. Albertson's is cheapest on meat. They have ridiculous sales where you can buy one package of steaks and get two free. You would think it would be bad meat, but it's delicious! Watch their salepaper for the coupons.

5. If you forgot your store-specific coupons at your house, go to customer service. They keep them behind the counter.

6. Sales start every Wednesday, but sometimes they have weekend-only deals.

7. On Hulen Street in Fort Worth, at Tom Thumb, the bathroom is in the pharmacy. At Albertson's, it's in produce. At Kroger, it's in the meat department.

It's a lot of work, but it's worth it. Last week I spent $89 for two weeks worth of groceries. I love looking at my receipt at the end. I usually save about 25 percent with coupons and sales. Sometimes I get into big money and save up to 30 percent or more.

My grandma doesn't cut coupons as much anymore. She finds it to be too much work for just her and my grandpa. Every time I see her, she is proud to hear my war stories from the grocery store. It's a battle against manufacturer's profit, and they don't make a lot from me. I'm a war veteran.