Speaking of Halloween

I got an email the other day from a friend who was talking about what she was going to do with her girlos for Halloween.

And it got me to thinking about Halloween when we were kids.

We lived in a small town. And we didn't even live in the "town" portion of that town. We lived out in the sticks. So each year when Halloween rolled around, my mom and aunts would load all of us kids up into the station wagon and drive from house to house of people we knew.

I'm telling you, we were like a clown car of trick-or-treaters. We would pull up to a house and doors would open and kids would be falling out everywhere.

One of the station wagons had those seats in the back that folded up (do they still make those?). The bummer about that was that if you were in the back, you had to wait for someone to come and open the door, so the kids who were sitting in the back seat always got to the door of whichever house you were at first.

And if you were us girls, you were hyper competitive.

Granny B and Popie lived down a mile long dirt road so we were pretty much the only trick-or-treaters they got. So every year, Granny B would buy us each our own bag of Hershey's Miniatures. (Now all of the sudden I'm craving a Mr. Goodbar.)

One year, the girls in the back of the station wagon decided that we had enough of the other kids getting to the door before us so we devised a plan. At the house before Granny B's, we "closed" the back door ourselves. We didn't let it latch, and we held the door closed the entire way to her house. In hindsight, that was a super bad idea and someone could have been seriously injured; but at the time, it was worth whatever the potential consequence was to get to the door at Granny B's house first.

Instagramming It...

Oops - clearly I missed Miscellany Monday.

Oh, well. Here are the pictures anyway:

31/365

cruisin'

We have been having a very mild winter down here in Arizona and I have been taking advantage by driving around with my windows down and my radio up!

32/365

home

I was invited to a reception at the Phoenix Art Museum last week and they currently have the Iconic Arizona photography exhibit displayed for the Centennial.

It was an amazing exhibit and I consider myself lucky that Match and Papa loaded all of us crazy kids into a minivan and drove us around this beautiful state so I could see first hand most of the things displayed on the walls of this exhibit.

Also, I don't know if you know this, but Dierks Bentley grew up in Arizona and his song Home is the official song of the Centennial. If you haven't heard it yet - I suggest you get it now!

33/365

babybunner

You already saw this picture, but you get it again.

Love this little guy so much!!

34/365

missing you

As I mentioned, I had to help Granny B purchase and install a new printer on Friday. While I was waiting for the software to install I looked over to the side and saw this sitting on her desk. 

It was Popie's from high school graduation. I'm telling you what, there are some days I miss him so much I can't stand it.

35/365

genius

Sissy and I took the boys to the Chocolate Affaire on Saturday where we found the Sweet Republic Food Truck and I got two scoops.

One of Salted Butter Caramel Swirl, which was very good. But, Oh. My. Goodness! That one on the top is Milk Chocolate Guinness ice cream and I could die right now thinking of how delicious it was!

If you are ever anywhere near Scottsdale - please stop in this shop and try their ice cream! You will not regret it!

(OMG - I just went to their website so I could link it up and found out that they sell their ice cream at Whole Foods locations - excuse me while I find the nearest WF Market!)

36/365

orange juice

On Sunday we headed out to M-Town for family lunch. I took one of the bags of oranges that Granny B had picked for me on Friday (Seriously, how many oranges does she think I can eat?) with the intention of squeezing them with the nephews.

Turns out Sissy doesn't have a juice and neither did Wal-Mart. So we settled for just eating them.

37/365

still adorable

Match was looking for Bunner's baby pictures to compare him to BabyBunner and she found this gem.

That's me holding Bunner in my lap.

Looks like I have always been this adorable! :)

What Do You Say?

I can be such a girl when it comes to romance. 

A sappy love story melts my heart quicker than Jeff Flake without a shirt on.

I also love to know people. It sounds strange, but I do tend to ask a lot of questions in an effort to get to know the people that I meet.

Those two things combined typically lead to me finding out where people met their significant other and how they were proposed to (if applicable).

While we were in DC we visited the daughter of one of Granny B's friends. I asked her how she met her husband and she went on and on telling us the story.

Then she asked Granny B how she met Popie - a story I'd heard before:

Way back in the day, Granny B's brother was a professional boxer. They grew up in upstate New York, but he had been asked to ref a fight in Tucson, AZ. When he got to Arizona, he called his wife back home and said, "Pack our things and sell the house, we're moving to Arizona."

When they moved, Granny B's sister, who had sinus issues (I think that is right), went with them to see if the dry Arizona air would help. When she didn't return home, Granny B's mom thought that maybe she was afraid to travel alone and sent Granny B to get her.

A couple of nights before they were set to leave, their neighbors decided to take them to the Adams Hotel, where the cowboys hung out. They didn't think it was right to let them leave Arizona without a true cowboy experience.

While out at the bar, a gentleman asked Granny B's sister to dance. They danced a few times that night and then he asked if he could take her on a date the next day. Long story short, Granny B's sister ended up marrying that cowboy and moving to his family's farm in the west part of Phoenix.

Granny B stayed in Arizona to help plan the wedding and once it passed, she didn't have enough money to travel home, so she got a job and stayed in town until she could earn what she needed to go home.

Living out on the farm proved lonely for her sister, so on the weekends she would ask Granny B to come out to stay with her. Though she didn't want to, Granny B did it.

Without a car she relied on her sister's brother-in-law and father-in-law to bring her out to the farm and to take her home again. That brother-in-law happened to be Popie.

I am unclear as to how long this all went on, but according to Granny B it was sometime in the Fall when they stopped at a bar on the way back to her house and had a few drinks. When they got to her house, before she got out of the truck Popie said to her, "Come the end of October we'll be done picking cotton. What do you say you marry me after that?"

She obviously accepted that cowboy proposal and they were married almost 50 years before he passed away.

Kiss Me! I'm Irish!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!!

I gave up alcohol for Lent, which really puts a damper on St. Patty's Day festivities. Oh well. Diddy, O'Connor, Dirty, and I have a softball game tonight as well. We'll (read they will drink, I will drive) most likely be getting some drinks before the game, so I will celebrate.

As you may or may not know, my Popie was Irish. Granny B has some pretty choice words about Irish folks, and I suspect it is because Popie drove her a little crazy sometimes. But I'm sure the feeling was mutual.

Either way, I thought of Popie this morning as I was getting ready for work. I thought about the time I made him green clover-shaped cookies when he was in the rehab facility.

Yes, the cookies were actually green - not the frosting. I didn't frost them.

I'm trying to remember if they were sugar or shortbread cookies though. Because he really liked shortbread, but I don't recall ever making shortbread in my life.

And if they were sugar, why wouldn't I have frosted them?

Who knows.

Then I was talking to Diddy on the way in and we got on the subject of muffins and him eating all of the muffins that Dirty made and I called him a fatso.

Then I smiled and told him, "You're gonna be a fatso like Popie."

Herbisms...

Last week Granny B forced my cousins and me to organize a lunch together. It was hell trying to find a day and time that worked, but once it was done, I was so glad that we did!

First of all, I hadn't seen my Texas Cousins in six years - and let me tell you - they have grown up!

Second of all, we had a blast!

They reminded me of some things and inspired this post.

I was lucky enough to grow up with all four of my grandparents alive and near me. I realize now how rare that actually is. As a child, we spent a lot of time with our grandparents, but mostly with Granny B and Popie*. Sissy, YogaHippy*, and I used to have slumber parties at their house all of the time. During these slumber parties we would play church, make up dances, swim, run around the farm, and just generally have a good time.

Some of my favorite memories were on the farm as a child.

Our Popie was great! He would drive us to the store and let us each pick out a candy, or take us to Sav-Mart to buy Snickers for the freezees that Granny B would make us after dinner. He would spend all day sitting on a chair by the pool while we swam - and let me tell you, three elementary aged girls can swim for a number of hours without breaks.

But more than anything, Popie had the greatest sayings.

When we would go to Sav-Mart to get Snickers, we would always get Poore Brother Salt & Vinegar chips too. And undoubtedly, he would say to us, "You're gonna be a fatso like Popie." It makes me laugh just to type it.

Us girls always thought that it was a lot of fun to climb up into the cotton trailers on the farm. However, in our infinite wisdom, we never thought that there was only a ladder on the outside of the trailers - the theory being that once it is full of cotton, you wouldn't need a ladder to get out. Nonetheless, we'd climb up there and get stuck. And Popie would come around and help us get out.

Allegedly, when Match.mom and Xou were younger and they would do things like that he would tell them, "If you can't get down, fall down." But that was never the case with his granddaughters.

If ever you complained about something in front of him, he would say, "If you're looking for sympathy, you'll find it in the dictionary between shit and syphilis."

And you never said that you wished for something in front of him without getting, "You can wish in one hand, and shit in the other, and see which one fills up first."

I know that there are more sayings, but I just can't think of them.

For a majority of my high school years, Popie had to have kidney dialysis. For some reason, Granny B would always call on me when she needed help. So there was many a summer day that I would either take him to dialysis or pick him up. I used to hate doing it. But looking back now, I would give anything for one more long car ride with him. To talk about nothing in particular.

When he passed away my freshman year of college, I was devastated. I still remember where I was when Match.mom called me. And that IT took me to see Girl, Interrupted to get my mind off of it. Probably not the best movie choice, but it was the thought that counted.

Sissy and I decided that we would like to write a poem to read at the funeral with YogaHippy. Below is the poem.

I still don't know how we got through it at the funeral without breaking down.

I can't do that today.

For nineteen years he watched us grow,
There wasn't anything he didn't know.
Mr. Arizona he was known to be,
To us, our Popie, more importantly.

He used to take us to the store at Hassayampa,
Just me, and me, and me, and grandpa.
We laughed all the way because he'd drive so slow,
We never thought we'd get where we wanted to go.

What about when we wanted to swim,
We couldn't do it without him.
He'd sit outside and watch us play,
All afternoon, day after day.

Up into the cotton trailers we would climb,
Even though we got stuck every time.
We were far from brave, but we never feared,
We knew it wouldn't be long until his pick-up truck appeared.

Even though we must have been pains,
We never heard our Popie complain.
He picked us up and chauffeured us around,
He wasn't the type to let anyone down.

Now he's with God in Heaven above,
We send him our prayers, we send him our love.
There's one more thing we want him to know,
Popie - We miss you so.