I seriously love this stuff.

I go to Grandpa Leonard's a couple times a week. We hang out. We do puzzles. We drink Diet Coke. He shows me some e-mails. We eat mini-frosted wheats. He eats lemon drops. And we look at old pictures. He tells me stories about when he was a kid. He tells me how much he misses Grandma and she was his sweetheart. Every one of those items, almost every time. It is awesome.

Last week I went over to his house, looking for a picture of him when he was young for a project I am working on for my house. We did the explained routine, I also brought my camera along. I asked Grandpa if I could start taking more and more pictures of him in his old age. He said sure! Yes. I was happy.  I also filmed him telling me what he and Grandma would do for Valentines or special Valentine's he remembers. This day, was one of the those days that you want to delicately roll up and place in your treasure chest.

We then looked at all of these pictures. Grandpa will tell me a story about each picture. I seriously love this stuff. I LOVE old pictures: their coloring, their awesome borders or rounded edges (why don't they come like that anymore?), and their earned, tattered or burnt edges. I asked Grandpa if I could borrow these pictures and want to start plastering them around my house.  Gosh. Old pictures are cool. And Old people are cool, too.

in the making

i just spent the past two days in utah with my mom and sisters.

carrie and my mom are making carrie's wedding dress.

thanks to my grandma for teaching my awesome mom how to sew.

remember HER...

my mom is amazing.

carrie is amazing. 

the wedding is going to be amazing.

Dang girl.

my Grandma had style.

The cool part is.  She made ALL of her clothes.

When she was alive she had a subscription to BAZAAR magazine.

She loved to look at the beauty of the clothes in the magazine.

She would always tell me and my sisters the "in" colors of the season.

And she was always right about those colors.

Here are some pictures of the clothes she made and wore:

I've been trying to find out a lot about my history lately and in the process have been given a lot of pictures from my grandpa.

The other day I found my grandmothers autobiography she wrote during her last years of life.

I love to hear her story from her point of view.

Her family is from Norway and she was born in Minnesota.  She was an Orphan most of her life

because her mom died when she was  only five and her dad couldn't raise her

because he worked on the railroad.

Even though she had many trials she was a phenomenal person.

Things I learned from her biography:

She sewed.

She ice skated and would put on big shows.

She went to 17 different schools.

She was a cheerleader.

Student body president.

She wished she had a mom as a little girl.

She sang.
She was an orphan.

She lifeguarded.   She grew up on a lake.

She was a great house wife {from grandpa's point of view}

She loved the Home my grandpa and she built.

She loved to waterski and be on the water.

She was happily married to my grandpa, she finally had a solid place.

She loved camping.

She loved to travel.

She loved to bake.

She loved her bedroom because she never had one until she got married.

She loved her family more than anything.
She owned a fabric store.

She really was the coolest grandma ever.

{post mainly intended for mis hermanas, and for my sake}