Grand mothers'day

[Frenchie]

Yes, it is " grandmothers' day" .. I learnt it just yesterday..

I am not in favour of such days, as I don't need the calendar to say it is GM day to think of my gran, ...

I am very lucky, I still have my grand ma and I am 43. She is 85. A real character .

I know she gives importance to such days.......... So, as she lives very far from here , my sister will bring a big bunch of flowers to her, from both of us.

I am a bit of an anti conformist I assume, as I prefer to surprise people when it s not their birthday or anything..

Anyway, I wouldn't want Raymonde to have a sad day..  [:)]

So, you see je suis en contradiction avec moi même !!

And you?

 

[Clair]

They're both dead.

One was a battle-axe, not a nice mamie at all. She used to make us drink sour milk and eat tartines au saindoux... [+o(]

[Russethouse]

 On my maternal side my grandmother was pretty normal grandmother material, the eldest daughter of a family of about 8 children, came from a long line of Ag Labs in Devon. She left Devon for a job in service in London, met and married a gardener and they moved to Bray for a new life. When her husband, a Conscientious Objector was killed in WW1 she was left with 2 young girls, managed to earn a living by cooking for the well off people in the area for special dinner parties etc and soon married a widower and had another child.

She was a kind woman, who used to save some of her sweet ration for me (sweets were rationed until the early 50's), have big family Sunday teas in her little house, come on picnics with us etc. She passed away quite suddenly when I was about 9.

My grandmother on my paternal side was very different, she gave birth to my father when she was about 18 and just left him with her mother, and disappeared for long periods, he was lucky, she once confided to an aunt that she had two further children that she simply abandoned with the Salvation Army. She treated my father like a library book, if she was settled anywhere she might send for him, but would equally send him back. She went on to marry and have two other children,  she regularly fell out with all of them, mostly because she was fundamentally dishonest and a troublemaker of the first order. One prize comment, after my parents lost their first daughter was 'the sins of the parents are visited on the children'

Luckily my mothers family were all 'close' and I had a wonderful childhood with my grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins. I loved my maternal grandmother, but as for the other one, it would take more than a card or a special day to make me think well of her.

[mint]

Never known my grandmothers NOR my grandfathers [:(]  Always used to envy schoolfriends who had them.

Clair, although I am known for eating most things, I don't think that saindoux sandwiches would ever have been other than rejected.

[Clair]

Sweet, I never knew my grand-fathers either.

The weird thing is that my paternal grand-father died a few hours before my birth and my father died a few hours before his own grand-child was born...[blink]

(my father was away on his French navy ship at the time I was born and received

a telegram announcing both his father's death and his daughter's birth)

[mint]

How sad for your dad, Clair, about his father.  But, he must have been thrilled to know he had his own little Clairette to brighten his days, whether aship or ashore.[:D]

[Patf]

I had lovely grandparents. We lived with my mother's parents for 4 years and it was great having so many adults to turn to. The others lived just down the road.

I think it's a shame for the current generation of children that they are often so far from their extended family. I very rarely see my grandchildren - there's only one of them in the UK.  [:(]

[Frenchie]

[quote user="Patf"]

I had lovely grandparents. We lived with my mother's parents for 4 years and it was great having so many adults to turn to. The others lived just down the road.

I think it's a shame for the current generation of children that they are often so far from their extended family. I very rarely see my grandchildren - there's only one of them in the UK.  [:(]

[/quote]

That post finds an echo in me .

As my dad was in the merchant navy, we shared a big house with my grand parents, and those years were so happy...

With a marvellous grand father, and a gran that was more modern than my own mother !

I have a lot of nostalgia for this part of my life..

Sadly, my beloved grand dad died two days before I learnt I was pregnant . he would have been so happy...

I gavce his first name as a second name for my son.

And yes, the extended family system would help many youngsters nowadays, starting with my own son, who's so isolated.