The Switching Game

Missy and I are very close in age. When we were young children, people often thought we were twins. (Was it the matching scrunchies and jelly shoes?) 

DIAGRAM 1: ARE WE TWINS??

Perhaps the jelly shoes and the scrunchies; and during the holidays our matching leggins, Christmas sweaters, scrunchies with tiny bells, and tube socks (Thank you Trisha! lol)

It did not take long for my parents to realize to get us the exact same of everything. Why?

Because we fought over everything. Even air. But in the end I ALWAYS GOT THE BETTER ONE. It did not matter which one of us initially received what.

How was this possible? Well through one of the following methods:

1. I was lucky enough to actually get the better one. 

2. Missy got the better one and I convinced Missy to switch with me through guilt or pity tactics 

3. Missy got the better one and refused to switch with me. Until… I convinced her mine was better and she would then beg me to switch 

4. Missy initially got better one and I just decided I would like mine better until I believed it. Then Missy would beg me to switch and I would refuse.   

In the end, Missy always wanted the one I wanted her to have and I got the one I wanted to have.

Poor missy. She never had a chance because she would take pity on me but I was STRICTLY business.

One of the most infamous instances was when I convinced her to switch a coveted stuffed animal cat (that purred…hello? AWESOME!) with my useless fools gold I got on a field trip. Now, I actually did like my fools gold. But I loved that cat. Missy even told me recently that she KNEW, as we were in negotiations, that there was no actual use for the fools gold. It was even called “FOOLS gold.” But for some reason she switched with me. Perplexes us both to this day. 

  

DIAGRAM 2: BEST CAT EVER OR FOOLS GOLD?

 

This stuffed animal cat was way more awesome than it looks here. 

I adored it for YEARS. Poor Missy regretted it for YEARS!

I tell you all of this to set up the following story:

One time we got these little carousel horses. Missy had the purple haired purple one and I had the white with yellow haired one. I did not want mine. I wanted Missy's. 

A CHRONICLE OF MY ATTEMPT:

"Missy you are blonde so you should have the blonde one."

She's kept playing with her perfect purple horse

"No I really like this one Sarah." 

She kept smiling and playing. Little bastard. 

"Ok well I just thought you would want this one since it is better and you say I am always getting the better one."

I got her interest. Reluctantly she asked: 

"How is that one better? I like mine" 

This was my chance. Gotta do this right. 

"Well..."

I had nothing. I needed to think fast. 

"... You see the colors of the roses in this horse’s hair? Isn't that one of your favorite colors? Plus there is no such thing as purple horses, so you would have the more realistic one. No one could say, your horse is so unrealistic.  Trust me missy you are gonna want this horse."

She was looking at me like I was the devil trying to trick her. 

"Sarah, you always trick me and end up getting the better one. You always do. I switch or we switch twice or you make yours look better and I always regret it. I still regret giving up that cat. This time I'll just keep this one. I like it a lot. "

This appeal to me emotion should have made me feel guilty. I should have said ok fine Missy, you should have at least ONE thing you prefer over mine. But I just could not.

After another 10 minutes of attempting to convince her she would not budge. I was in unfamiliar territory. 

"Ok that's fair. So, I noticed your horses tail is kinda long. Do you want me to trim it? I'm gonna trim my horses tail as well. "

My plan was this: to trim the tail too short so that Missy would no longer want hers and switch with me. Obviously, it was no longer about actually having the better horse. It was about getting Missy to switch with me. It was purely principalities that kept me going.

I do not recall how I convinced Missy, or if I just went behind her back. But I sure enough trimmed the hell outta that horse's tail. In fact as soon as I did it I regretted it immediately. Then I didn't want it anymore. My plan went too perfectly. Missy was horrified at my actions and the state of her purple horse. She MADE me switch. 

The moment the hair fell onto the ground I felt guilty about trying to trick missy annnd knowing that I was now stuck with it. Now I had a purple horse with a tail that made the horse look electrocuted. Stupid purple horse. 

DIAGRAM 3: I DID THIS TO MYSELF

 

What the hell was I thinking?

We never played with them again.

Surprisingly, that was the only time that my plans backfired on me. But I deserved it

MORAL:

Don't be so caught up in getting your way that you loose sight of the real goal 

Or

Don't Ty to trick your little sister outta her stuff

Or

You cant always get your way

Hurricane Force Oreos

When I was a little girl my dad used to have a friend named Dave. Dave lived on some property that had horses and tennis courts and all kinds of goodies. It was a wonderland for missy and me. My dad would go over there to play tennis sometimes, and take us with him. Would sound boring, but we were entertained. Sometimes we hung out with Dave’s super cool wife, who was from Sweden, or we ran around like banshees, or we pretended to play tennis ourselves.

Well one day after a wonderfully great day, we were all getting ready to leave but the super awesome Swedish wife lady brought out the ultimate treat: 

 

Oreos and milk.

DIAGRAM 1: OREOS AND MILK

 Please note the GLORIOUSITY being emitted from the milk and cookies. Awesomeness. 

  

Woop woop! 

Great Goodness! All is right with the world. My sister and I eagerly anticipated the moment the tray touched down to the table so we could wreak havoc! 

 

Luckily my dad was one of those "let's-go-but-I-am-still-gonna-chat-for-another-hour" types. Sometimes I HATED it. This time it was fine with me because I was all about those cookies.

 

[Insert long boring adult conversation] 

 

When my dad was finally ready to actually leave I was immediately concerned about the remaining Oreos. My thought process:

How can I leave them behind? 

Those are my deserved cookies.

When could I possibly get oreos again?

I can't believe I won't get to finish them.

I need at least a few more.

So I did the only thing I could think of: I jammed three in my mouth and chugged a big gulp of milk so I could at least close my mouth. I couldn’t talk but was satisfied that I had done all I could to not be cheated of my rightful Oreos. (Let's not forget that by now I had already been eating Oreos for like 45 minutes)

DIAGRAM 2: GREEDY BASTARD

  This diagram illustrates my natural ability to be greedy with milk and cookies.  

As I stood up to wave goodbye, I all of the sudden felt it coming...

... a sneeze.

This is gonna be bad.

There was no stopping it. With the milliseconds I had, I spun around away from the innocent bystanders just in time for the inevitable. It felt like rocks. It came out of my mouth annnnd my nose in full cookie chunks. Annnnnnnnnd all over Dave and the awesome Swedish wife lady’s lawn furniture. I mean everywhere. They say sneezes have the same force as a hurricane. Well I hurricaned my Oreos and milk all over the damn place. 

DIAGRAM 3: ZOOM IN ON NOSE SPRAY

  Close up on the painful, painful escape route for my milk and cookies
with the force of a hurricane pushing it all out. 

DIAGRAM 4: HURRICANE FORCE SPRAY ZONE

  This spray zone easily covered some lawn furniture.
However, had I not spun around it would have easily covered numerous people.  

It was horrific and quickly followed with my dad, “DAMNIT SARAH!”

I felt bad. But I felt the most upset about those last Oreos. Never to be eaten. I had enough sense not to express what my truest concerns where. Thank God I had some milk in my mouth, or it woulda been ALL cookie- no lube. That’s rough.

That's what I get for being a greedy bastard. But in all honesty, how can you ask a kid to control themselves with milk and cookies??????? 

It is impossible. (deep sigh to reflect the truth of this)

MORAL OF THE STORY:

Option 1: don’t sneeze with food in your mouth

Option 2: if possible, spit food out of mouth prior to snneze. Still messy, but not as much force or spread.

Option 3: don’t be so damn greedy with the cookies and milk.

I'm back! + I Love My Fingers

It has been ridiculously long since the last time that I wrote on my blog! I apologize profusely to all of you! My life has taken quite a turn and the tempo has quickened rapidly- with me barely able to keep up! I am ambitious and also a Gemini! No, I am not two faced! I am multifaceted and passionate. I have a love for many things in life: a passionate love. I love my family, acting, my sorority, design, art, my production company, my blog, event planning, to name a few. It is hard sometimes to be so passionate about so many things. I am often torn and indecisive because of it: another trait of Geminis.

However, I have recently decided to funnel as much as I possibly can into fewer things. It has been bitter sweet. Rewards have been granted for my drive and focus, but my heart breaks for those things that have had to be pushed aside.

After all, nothing worth having is easily attainable. Even though I must continue to keep my focus and drive, I am going to MAKE time when there is none to keep up with my blog. It is very cathartic for me, and I have much to share. 

With that being said, let’s share a story, shall we?

When I was near the end of my 8^th grade year, I moved into my mom and Greg’s house from Trisha and Dad’s. Greg was my mom’s long time boyfriend from when I was in 7^th grade to junior year of high school. We had to do some major cleaning and rearranging to accommodate me. As we were cleaning out the spare room we got hot! So my mom, Greg, and I decided to setup the stand fan. It was about shoulder height to me. At some point the front guard fell off, but we were too hot and tired to care. We were moving crap from one room to another room that was next door. My mom would hand stuff off to me from room 1 as I stood in the hallway. I would then hand it to Greg in room 2. 

 DIAGRAM 1: THE MOVING MACHINE

As we slaved away in the heat and sweat and dust I really began to get in the zone. I was feeling like a moving MACHINE! Awesome.

 DIAGRAM 2: I AM AWESOME

OH YEAH! I was fantasizing about my future room and the awesomeness of our moving technique when I reached for a box from my mom. At that moment the awesomeness came to a dramatic halt…

… as I stuck my hand into the fan.

Not awesome.

  DIAGRAM 3: NOT FEELING AWESOME (PAIN DOES THAT)

******FLASH BACK******

I was a kid and telling my stepmom Trisha about this "cool" guy who stuck his hand in a moving ceiling fan and stopped it as a trick. She went berserk and told me that if I ever put my hand in a fan, my fingers would be chopped off. She had even seen it happen since she worked as a nurse in shock trauma. The horrific-ness of this possibility haunted me for the rest of the childhood anytime I was too near a fan.

******BACK TO EVENT******

“OOOHHH MY GOSH! Trisha knew this would happen!” This is what I thought while I collapsed to the ground in a scream of pain and horror. I clutched my fingers with my unmangled hand, convinced this was the only thing keeping my fingers from toppling to the ground. As I laid in the fetal position breathing deeply, trying to coach myself through it all, my mom and Greg were trying to figure out what was wrong with me. They hadn't seen anything, just me dramatically flailing to the ground clutching my hand.

“I cut my fingers off in the fan!”

My mom all but rolled her eyes. I was infuriated! “Let me see your fingers Sarah.” I refused. MOM did not want to take this tragedy serious, obviously! My mom and Greg spent about 20 minutes convincing me to let go of my fingers. But I just was not ready to let go. I wanted to keep them forever. I loved my fingers. I had never truly appreciated them until that moment. MY POOR FINGERS!!!!!! I was imaging my future as a nub hand, explaining to everyone the ridiculous way I lost my fingers. Hoping that ice could possibly save them. 

  DIAGRAM 4: MY SAD FUTURE

But finally my mom convinced me to open my hand after yelling at me for being dramatic. (it was a loving yell in her defense) Finally convinced it was inevitably the time to investigate, I took a deep breath and unfolded my unmangled hand. 

I burst into a fit of tears…

... tears of relief. I started laughing at myself too.

Phew! Those flimsy little plastic fan blades didn’t even break my skin! NO blood, NO bruise, and ALL of my beloved digits! There was minimal “damage.” Just a little bit of skin pushed around in an odd way. Well, shoot, I’ll take that over lost fingers! It was all back to normal in like a day.

Perhaps, I overreacted.

(it did hurt though)

  DIAGRAM 5: THE "I HAVE 10 FINGERS" DANCE!

If you love your 10 fingers, please do the dance. Wiggle all your fingers while hoping from foot to foot and yell "I have 10 fingers!" If you do not have 10 fingers, there is no need to discriminate, please use the correct number and it promises just as much fun!!!

Barbie Graveyard

Missy and I were creative children. This came in handy when we were young, and our dad was on a limited budget. Trisha, who would one day become our stepmom would sometimes bring us gifts and treats. This included Barbie dolls. We LOVED Barbies. I hate to admit it, but I played with Barbies probably well after I was supposed to stop. Well, in those early years we didn’t have much to go with our Barbies either. For a long time we did not have a Ken. So we just kept one Barbie as our “Ken.” Poor Barbie. We left her with no clothes and cut her hair short- and never brushed it. She looked crazy. Even crazier was when we had “Ken” kiss Barbie. If someone had happened across us they would have thought we were into making our Barbies lesbians. But truthfully, in my imagination, it was Barbie and Ken lip locking.

DIAGRAM 1: "KEN" AND BARBIEPlease note that both "Ken" and Barbie have boobs. I tried to render them in a friendly way- despite that one is completely naked

We also didn’t have a Barbie house. Somehow we came up with the idea of creating our house using books. We would lay them down flat, and each book represented a room-almost like a floor plan. They obviously weren’t to scale, but we were on a budget. We would use our jewelry box as her bed, a pile of pogs as tables, teddy bears as bean bag chairs or statues, etc. The best was those little white plastic things they used to put in pizza boxes to keep the lid from hitting the cheese. We made those little tables. It was very creative. The only “real” Barbie furniture was this couch that our Nana had made out of a tissue box and some fabric (it was actually really well done). Sometimes the house would be vast with tons of books sprawling our bedroom floor. If we were feeling lazy they would be smaller. I used to day dream about giant Barbie houses. I wanted to have a vast Barbie Village. Perhaps one of my first childhood dreams was to grow up and use my big people money to buy Barbie stuff.

DIAGRAM 2: BOOK HOUSES

This diagram represents out Barbie house. They were often filled with much much more stuff. For the purposes of this illustration I kept it simple.

I think what caused the most upheaval was the clothes dilemma. A couple times Trisha bought us an outfit by itself. However, the vast majority of the time, we only got new Barbie clothes on a new Barbie. This was tedious when we wanted to change outfits- undressing one, dressing another endless times until we found the right look. Then Missy got this amazing Barbie closet. That changed the game for us. We needed to fill the closet. Plus it was a hassle dressing and undressing a Barbie every time we wanted her outfit. We stripped them all naked except for our absolute favorite one each. We had already started the Barbie Graveyard – the bottom drawer of my desk where we put our broken or defunct Barbies. Seemed like the perfect place to put the naked useless ones. So now this drawer was jam packed with misfit naked and some mutilated barbies. Scary stuff. To this day, I find nothing wrong with this. However, Trisha would find our stash of Barbies. I have no idea what she thought of it, but she would redress them all. Outfits not matching, broken or not, each Barbie was dressed. Then Missy and I would find them and be like what the heck? Who dressed these Barbies (and so horribly)??? Poor Trisha probably thought we were nuts, annnnd had issues. She was just trying to get clothes back on them. We were infuriated though. We would strip them all back down and put all the clothes back how we liked them. It was a cycle.

DIAGRAM 3: BARBIE GRAVEYARD

THE BARBIE GRAVEYARD
dun dun dunnnn!

We loved our Barbies. However, we fought a lot- as you should know by now. Clever as we were, we used the nearest thing possible as a weapon when we were mad at each other. Apparently (Trisha just told me this last night) we used to stab each other with Barbie feet. And come to think of it, they are pretty sharp- if being stabbed fiercely into your arm by an angry sister.

Moral of the story: get your daughter a Ken (which we eventually got), a lot of extra clothes for that Barbie, oh and get two of everything.

oh...and just as prison folk can make a shank out of anything, apparently two angry little girls can too- so watch them closely.

Cardboard Magic!

For me, my dad, and my sister “Those were the days” refers to those few years it was just the three of us. You know how it is, at the time “those days” suck big time, but years later you look back and realize how precious it was. The Pops was barely making enough to get by, and doing his best with two little girls. We didn’t have a ton of toys, and really didn’t notice, but we always had imagination. I think those few years really pushed our imagination, which then lasted throughout the rest of our childhood. We made something outta nothing all the time.

One of our most prized "nothings” was cardboard boxes! Oh how exciting it was! We could do so many things with one box. The larger the better, but we had fun with them all. I can remember the euphoric joy Missy and I felt when we spotted a box. We would be instantly united at such an opportunity for fun! It went something like this:

(Note: Missy = pigtails, Sarah = side ponytail)

THE BOX IS SPOTTED

This could happen as soon as it arrives, with goods still inside, or perhaps we have spotted it in the attic or basement. (One person's trash, is another's treasure!)

DAD, PLEASE!!!

At some point dad had the bright idea to cut a house into a large box for us, and that was it. At the sight of a large box the pleading began. Dad, please make us a box house!!!!

DAD AGREES TO THE TASK

Commence joyful jumping and excitement!!! We immediately begin the process of "helping" dad design the house while he gets the box cutter.

DAD MAKES AMAZING HOUSE! WOW

Do you see this masterpiece? Peep the working door and window! My dad sells building materials, and used to be a roofer. Therefore, in my opinion, we had the best man for the job. And craft us a house he did.

IMAGINATION'S TURN

At this point dad could step back, because imagination took us to our cottage as we hid from the evil witch, to our secret garden house, to our vacation home in the mountains.

IMAGINATION CONTINUES...

...Or we could be princesses in our castles from far off lands.

COMPROMISED STRUCTURE

After vigorous play that could span from a few days to a few weeks, the integrity of the box usually would give out. Or, we just had another idea. Enter, the box sled- on a grassy hill.

BOX REINCARNATE 3

At this point, the sledding has really broken the box down quite a bit. It is now something new again. Perhaps a play pen for giant babies (us), or a tank for mermaids, or a dance floor.

BOX IS HANGING ON FOR DEAR LIFE

The box is no longer a box at all. Just some pieces of beat down card board. But don't worry, we are having a tea party. Dad is now trying to throw it out and we are using any excuse to keep it around.

All good things must come to an end. Eventually, the box would be discarded, but after much love, use, drawing on, tearing up, and breaking had occurred. We definitely knew how to have fun, and made use of cardboard boxes way after these first years of just the three of us.


moral of the story: use your imagination!

Fortesque

Once upon a time there was a quaint fishing island located in the great state of New Jersey. Two little girls were often taken there for getaways with their grandmother for fun in the sun on a private beach at their great-great uncle and aunt’s beach house.

Deep sigh!

Sounds so nice, doesn’t it?

REALITY CHECK!!! While we did have a lot of fun, it was through our ability to imagine and use our resources. The island was separated from the mainland by a marsh that bred mosquitoes, and evil biting flies. The house had no A/C, cable, nor water. There were very few kids, and they were the locals who thought we were nuts for coming there. Our private beach was usually filled with horse shoe crabs due to mating season schedules. When it wasn’t, there were pretty hard core fisherman gutting fish on the beach and discarding the remains right there.

Let’s break it down for ya!

THE BUGS!

The mosquitoes were bad. We always had citronella candles out the wazoo. Despite the plague of mosquitoes, NOTHING compared to the flies. NOTHING. Regular flies are pesky, but we had mean, green, biting machine flies. They bit us through our clothes. They bit us in the house, outside, in the car, at the store/diner/bait and tackle shop (it was only store on island), they bit us in any location, on any part of our bodies. By the time we left we would be terrified at the site of a fly. Literally, any flying creature and we would run screaming like an ax murderer was after us. God forbid we were in the car (which did happen- and was almost tragic)

DIAGRAM 1: THE GREEN FLIES!

Literally, running for our lives from the flies.

A/C, CABLE, WATER

There was one window unit, but it barely kept us cool. We were hot a lot. It was an old house, and my great-great aunt and uncle were old school. So cable was not coming along with the deal. I am sure because they also did not want to pay for cable at a house they aren’t always at. We did have rabbit ears though. (Fancy, I know) The water is a bit more complicated. Apparently, at some point in time the whole island protested the water company. I have no ideas when this happened. The 70s maybe? Well, once everything was settled my uncle was not having it so he kept his off. He was all about sticking it to “the man.” And there was some super secret Macgver way to manually turn it on. However, “the man” eventually caught on so we could only do it sometimes. When we had no water we went to the dock and filled jugs and jugs of water up and took them back to use for flushing the toilet, cooking, brushing our teeth, and really cold “showers.” Essentially, we were camping out in a house. Oh, and there was ALWAYS sand in the bed. Always. Drove us all nuts.

DIAGRAM 2: LACK OF AMENITIES

The TV only showed static, it was hot, and we always had jugs of water galore! There is nothing worse than an ice cold shower from a water jug.

ENTERTAINMENT

Finding other kids to play with was like finding buried treasure. For the first few years I remember going, I don’t even remember seeing other kids. We fought over other kids, like they were the last morsel of food on earth. The beach, as I mentioned, was often COVERED in mating horse shoe crabs. Which, if you have ever seen one you know, are scary looking. Very Jurassic indeed. They look like giant beetle helmet monsters. When they weren’t mating there were usually dead ones left scattered on the beach. If they get caught on their back they are stuck, and the seagulls eat them alive, or they dry out. We would sometimes see one flipped over, but legs still moving, and grab it by it’s tail and throw it back in the sea. And of course there were the fisherman. The beach often had piles of fish guts and smelly stuff. There were hooks all over the place, and random trash sprinkled here and there. When it was high tide, the water came up to the wall in front of the house, so our play space was even smaller: a 10x10 square of sand in front of the driveway.

DIAGRAM 3: WHAT DO WE DO?

Where for art thou fellow children to play with?

Not fun.

Oh pooh

In summary, it was an interesting place for kids. My sister, my two cousins (Jen and Tiffany), I and sometimes Katie K had many interesting adventures there. I do, however, have a lot of good memories from there, and we really had to push the limits of our imagination. We painted tables, repainted the front porch like 3 times, made up games, went seashell hunting, horseshoe crab rescuing, pretended to be stranded mermaids, and told/heard a lot of stories. My cousin Tiffany always told me and missy scary ones that would freak me out for years. And my uncle Ben told his stories to all of us in a booming voice that I will never forget. One time, my grandmom Tony almost had us make smores over citronella candles. Luckily, my mom caught us putting our marshmallows on sticks an intervened before we poisoned ourselves. We did a lot of walking aimlessly, but having good child-theological convos. I had some interesting theories as a kid. There were times we almost all killed each other (a week there was a horrible idea-never did that again), and other times that I never felt closer to them. Most importantly we bonded, without the distraction of boardwalks, carnival rides, and other kids, we only had each other. And truth be told, sitting on the deck at night as the waves crashed was a type of peace that one rarely finds in everyday life. It was an ugly little fishing town, but it was also beautiful - and we had a front row seat.

My great great aunt and uncle have passed, and the beach house has been sold. But those funny, ridiculous, and touching memories will last my entire lifetime.

ps. Please look at this pic of a flipped horseshoe crab: he needs rescuing!

pps: The enemy: GREEN FLIES!!!!!!!! run you fool!

Gifts from Grandmom T

So... I have many a grandma's. A few have passed away, but during my lifetime I have personally known the following grandmas:

White-haired grandmom/Grandmom B/Grandmom Bernero (Dad's mom)
Grandmom Tony/Grandmom T (Mom's Mom)
Grandmania (Stepmom's Mom)
Nana (Mom's Stepmom)
Great Grandmom/Grandmom Calise (Mother's grandmother)
Great Great Grandmom/ Ya-ya (Mother's great-grandmother-whom I don't really remember but apparently I knew when I was a toddler-knew enough to make a scene at her funeral, but that's another blog entry)
Miss Connie (This one is complicated: My mom's boyfriend's mom- even though my mom and him are no longer together I still consider them my fam)
+numerous other adopted grandmoms, like my HS friend Alicia-whose grandmom I call Granny

SIDE NOTE:
I have decided now, before even having children, that I will be called either Mimi or Nonna when I am a granny.

And there were more, I just don't remember them. I have met most of my great grandparents. Despite the fact that I have many grandmas, they are all really unique and different-they all even had different "grandma" names. They range from Italian, Polish, Black (I am not even polish or black), Irish, southern, northern, immigrants, etc. Without a doubt, the most unique of all around would be my G-mom Tony (full name Antoinette). She has many triats that make her unique, but one of the funniest/most entertaining is her gift giving. She is notorious for her presents.

Let's break it down:

REASON 1: re-gifting

My g-mom T has given me, my sister and my cousins our own stuff, and each other's stuff. Coloring books that have been colored in, books that already had our names in them from three Christmases ago, movies we watched a million times, old clothes we barely even fit anymore and accidentally left at her house, a doll I played with so many times that its hair is matted and clothes are faded, you name it! The most scandalous, of course, was when she would give us each other's stuff. When we opened a gift and it was an apparently-used-but-new-to-us item we were really excited and just assumed she got them from a second hand store. We would play with them merrily and happily. Then, one fateful day, me and Missy, and Jenn and Tiffany (my two cousins) would all be at g-mom T's on the same day.

Sarah, "Tiffany, wanna play Barbies?"
Tiff, "Yeah sure"
Sarah, "Ok, here is my Barbie! Isnt she soooo pretty?!"
Tiff, "Wait a minute! THAT'S MY BARBIE!"
Sarah, "not-uh! Grandmom gave me this barbie for my birthday!!!!"
Tiff, "She CAN'T give you MY Barbie, I don't care if it was your birthday!"

This is just a sample. Insert any of our names in the spaces and it could work. As we got older replace Barbie with shirt, necklace, dresser, etc. It all works.

DIAGRAM I: RE-GIFTING

This diagram represent a typical birthday gift from g-mom Tony to me. Contains: my cousin's much used and old doll accidentally left at grandmom's last time she was there. She will never know what happened to this doll. Coloring books I not only already wrote my name all over, but colored in most of the pictures.

REASON 2: "But I got it for 25cents at Goodwill!"
My g-mom T equates a sale with necessity. She will go to Goodwill and buy 15 shirts for $3 and is thus convinced that we would all just DIE to have it. These gifts are not really connected with a holiday or normal gift giving reason. It does include those type of events, but is not limited to.

The scene goes something like this: We show up at g-mom T's house. Within the first few minutes she says, "And before you leave, I have some things for you girls!" We spend the rest of the visit trying out best avoid the topic because we do not want to remind her. Invariably, it is a large Christmas gift bag (no matter the time of year) filled with "goodies" from Goodwill and some old VHS tapes she had around the house. We know what awaits us. Right when we leave, at the last possible moment, she always remembers. "Girls! wait! Don't forget your gifts!!"

In the olden days we always went a long with it. But after years of piled up garments that didn't fit (she is ALWAYS shocked she didn't get the right size), that were ugly (but this IS the latest fashion girls, I see it in all the magazines!), or for a grown business woman (from the 90s) even though I was only 10, old nicknacks, stained books, and other such items we started to get REAL with her. But, it was pointless. All the NOs in the world will not stop her. As we try to discretely unload our christmas bag, she comes along and adds more stuff in. I have "accidentally" forgotten my stuff many times. This leads to her running out of the house as we are pulling off. But all the ugly 25 cent clothes in the world are not enough to make you coldly drive away from your running grandmom lugging giant christmas bags! The more aggressive we are, the more she is: "JUST TAKE THE DAMN THINGS! I won't buy you anything else then!" Then we feel guilty, even though we ALL know she will have more stuff for us when we come back.

DIAGRAM 2: 25cents @ GOODWILL

This diagram represent a random gift. G-mom was out doing her rounds at goodwill and found this little number and thought that at 10 years old this was just the business suit I needed. Please note the 1982 shoulder pads. When I was 10 it was 1995. "Where would I wear this grandmom?" She then shrugs and says, "I don't know, something will come up, JUST TAKE IT!!" Please know this garment is preceded by 20 other garments that are just as fabulous- by now she is pissed that I am turning stuff down.

REASON 3: Family Heirlooms
Somehow, my G-mom T finds herself in possession of furniture and items that once belonged to my great and great great grandmoms (they were both born in Italy and brought some stuff from there), my great Uncle Ben and Aunt Dee (He traveled the world as a marine in like the 50s or something and had all kinds of cool crazy stuff), and other elderly family that was born somewhere else or traveled, or was wealthy, whatever the case. So we all (my cousins, mom, sister, myself) all often go on treasure hunts around her house. She has three bedrooms in her current abode we all do a general sweep every time we go there. Most of the time g-mom T will gladly pre-gift you a piece of furniture you cannot currently take. There are risks to this of course. She will most likely tell someone else they can have it at a later date. One time I wanted this desk that was my great great grandmothers and once it was pre-given to me, I had to call her often to remind her NOT to give it to anyone else. She was baffled that I would even assume she would do such a thing, but promised. One time when I was visiting her and mentioned the desk my cousin Jennifer was there and broke out in anger! "Grandmom! You told me I could have that!" Luckily, that time, g-mom stuck by giving it to me. It's always a coin toss. In the end I actually got the desk, in my possession- out of her house. woop woop!

DIAGRAM 3: FAMILY HEIRLOOMS

This diagram represent little treasure discovered by one of us. G-mom either wont give it up yet or told us we can have it when she dies. So we have all decided, asked, and been told that it can be ours. Hence our imaginary name tags. We all have many items currently at my g-mom T's house that we "own" and will fight about.

REASON 4: The Rare Gem
Despite it all, every once in a while my g-mom T stumbles across something really cool, unique or awesome. See, it isn't that Goodwill, the Salvation Army, the sales rack at Kmart, and various yard sales don't have cool things. It is just that not EVERYTHING there is a treasure, despite the low price. It is rare indeed that she finds something we want, but an awesome win for whoever gets it. All else are jealous beyond measure. You NEVER know when it will happen either. It is purely luck. Even though we are jealous, we are also happy for that person to a degree, because it was a triumph. lol.

Much congratulations are offered to the lucky winner and my g-mom as well. We are pretty honest with her about the stuff she gives us- so it is important we let her know when she was victorious. This may fuel her more, I don't know, but you can only be so negative to ur granny until your just WAITING for a reason to be positive. Afterall, she means well.

DIAGRAM 4: THE RARE GEM

This diagram represents the extremely rare diamond in the ruff. It is just something she found, she doesn't know where or when, and she thought you might like. It was almost missed because it was in a random small box thing that hidden under some shirt you do NOT like. This has lead all of us to actually become pretty thorough with our searches through our stuff. Sometimes we don't even find the treasure until we are home and have had a chance to sort through what we intend on dropping at a Goodwill.

I abosultely LOVE my grandmom Tony. Over the years the gift giving has been a nuisance, annoying, has caused many follow up trips by us to drop stuff back off at a Goodwill, and led to many many fights. But it has also been the source of great stories, a lot of laughter, some treasures, and discovering history of our family story. Her gift giving is shockingly notorious (no exaggeration), and from her heart.

I also think that the cycle of items in and out of Goodwill through our family probably helps keep them in business.

A COUPLE of GEMS

Detail of portion of lid of box that belonged to great grandmother. I use it as my "treasure chest" to keep small mementos and stuff in.


A cool watch with Native American/"western" theme- even has turquoise beads. I love this watch! She recently gave me a pair of turquoise and silver (not real sliver) earrings that I like to wear with this watch. I got the two pieces like 10 years a part- but this is the magic of g-mom T gifts!

Moral: appreciate all aspects of family, and cherish the elder ones. SHOUTOUT TO ALL THE GRANNIES OUT THERE!


NOTE: later this week I will be adding a pic of me, Missy and grandmom Tony