June 15, 2018

Flashback Friday: Back in my day

June 15, 2018/ Lisa Carpenter

Dear readers: Today is the day my firstborn learns the gender of her firstborn, scheduled for arrival in October. With all things pregnancy on my brain today, I thought this post—originally published June 13, 2011—a fitting Flashback Friday feature. Thank you for reading!

I had my youngest baby, Andrea, nearly 26 years ago (Flashback update: nearly 33 years ago!). Listening to Megan talk about pregnancy, labor, and newborn care, it's clear there have been some important—and some not-so-important—changes in the whole process since back in my day.

March 01, 2018

Throwback Thursday: The tunes they are a changin'

March 01, 2018/ Lisa Carpenter

This #TBT piece by Lisa Carpenter originally published March 24, 2011 on Grandma's Briefs.

I'm proud to say my family is musical. We dabble in playing — a guitar and piano here, a recorder and ukulele there — but it's in the listening to music that we really excel. As a whole, our hearts, minds and ears are open to myriad genres, everything from classical to Christian, country to show tunes, hard rock to soft rock and many that aren't really rock at all. We even have our family favorites in the rap genre. (I must admit, though, jazz and easy listening rarely pass notes in our homes, our cars, our iPods, or Spotify queue.)

Music plays a prodigious and powerful role in our family, which is why...

February 15, 2018

Throwback Thursday: 10 things I forget I love... until I remember

February 15, 2018/ Lisa Carpenter

This #TBT piece by Lisa Carpenter originally published February 21, 2011 on Grandma's Briefs.

I love jams and jellies. Chokecherry, strawberry, pomegranate, cherry. Yum! I eat jam or jelly nearly every day. On peanut butter sandwiches. On crackers. On toast. On English muffins. On bagels. (Not all in the same day, of course.)

Recently though, as I toasted an English muffin, I noticed the honey in the cupboard and decided to travel that oft-ignored culinary road. So I put it on my toasted muffin instead of jelly or jam, took a big bite, and instantly thought, "Yum! Why don't I have honey more often?"

I always forget how...

January 25, 2018

Throwback Thursday: Long live Grandma's hoya

January 25, 2018/ Lisa Carpenter

This #TBT piece by Lisa Carpenter originally published May 9, 2013 on Grandma's Briefs.

I've never been very good at growing houseplants. Because of that, I felt quite nervous and unduly obligated when the care of an elderly houseplant was informally included in the deal when we bought our current house nearly five years ago.

The sellers told us upon our agreement to buy the house that they were leaving the plant they had inherited when they bought the house, a plant started by the original homeowners when the house was built in 1975. Story was, according to the sellers — who had no information on what the plant was, only a stern warning to not let it die — that the plant bloomed only once a year and "thrived on neglect." I'm pretty good at neglecting plants, yet I still...

December 04, 2017

Tree trinkets

December 04, 2017/ Lisa Carpenter

My halls are decked, my tree is up, my gift-shopping is nearly done. I'm a tad early on all my Christmas tasks this year as Jim and I will be out of town next weekend — sharing Christmas joy with our grandsons! (Woot!)

October 25, 2017

25 things grandmas supposedly say that I've never heard fellow grandmothers utter

October 25, 2017/ Lisa Carpenter

My husband's niece delivered a beautiful — and big, 10-plus pounds! — baby boy last week. When I saw photos she'd shared of him on Instagram, I commented, "What a precious little love bug!"

To which I immediately thought to myself, "What a freakin' grandma thing to say."

I considered adding another comment cracking on my initial comment but figured what the heck, I am a grandma, and that's just the kind of thing grandmas say.

Which led me in my ever inquisitive way to soon after google "things grandmas say."

The results were sometimes hilarious, sometimes...

July 12, 2017

Summer's simple pleasures: When did you last...

July 12, 2017/ Lisa Carpenter

summer simple pleasures

Summer is the season of simple pleasures. A time for sweet, spontaneous — often spectacularly serendipitous — silliness such as those moments we remember from childhood. Our own childhood, possibly the childhoods of our children.

Simple pleasures we've set aside — perhaps even forgotten — in our ongoing pursuit of grand adventures, grand outings, grand activities to share with our grand kids. Simple stuff we've likely not done in far too long.

When did you last...

• jump rope?

• skip down the sidewalk?

• play freeze tag?

• sip root beer floats from a frosty mug?

• run through the sprinkler?

• have a water fight — with the garden hose, buckets...

May 12, 2017

Friday flashback: Coupon queen

May 12, 2017/ Lisa Carpenter

In celebration of Mother's Day on Sunday, for this week's Friday flashback feature I chose to share one of my favorite posts about cherished gifts from my girlies. I smile each time I recall my coupons from kids and hope my story on such makes you smile, too — even if you read it the first time around (and thank you if you did!).

COUPON QUEEN
(Originally published June 6, 2011)

coupon book for mom Coupons are a hot commodity in my world. Sure, I use coupons for products when grocery shopping, but what I'm talking about here are coupons as gifts.

Somewhere along the line of rearing three daughters, creating coupons to be redeemed for good deeds and great times became a recurring gift, either from me to them or from them to me. Of those, I especially remember...

March 27, 2017

Black Forest Cake Day

March 27, 2017/ Lisa Carpenter

Tuesday is, believe it or not, Black Forest Cake Day. Which makes me chuckle. Not because I find the chocolate-cherry-whipped cream confection funny but because of the place of honor said dessert has in the history of my family.

September 14, 2016

Farewell from the ranch

September 14, 2016/ Lisa Carpenter

Jim's oldest sister lives on a ranch outside of Hot Springs, South Dakota. My sister-in-law's property has been the scene of many a family celebration over the past 20-plus years.

Last Saturday it was the spot as many extended family members as could make it gathered to celebrate the life of Granny, beloved mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother to all who were there.

In between taking hundreds of photos of the family, I wandered here and there to shoot a few shots of the spot that holds so many cherished memories.

ranch life