Marie With Rhonda

Rhonda's grandsons JJ and Orion

Marie is never happier than she is when she is surrounded with her family. This photo is taken with her son Francis's daughter, Rhonda and her two daughters, Elizabethan and Jennifer. The fun part about this photo is that she wears the top she has on her over a decade ago at least once a week now. 

Great Great grandsons!

There are pictures of Marie's granddaughter, Rhonda and her grandchildren. They were taken on her 99th birthday. I had a five generation picture taken that day and not a single one of them had everyone's eyes open. Unbelievable. Actually the baby did have his eyes open, but had a hat that was more interesting than having his picture taken. Rhonda's daughters, Elizabethan (the mama) and Jennifer are holding the hat baby. I just sold the gate that we got for him for that visit. It was fun as always.

 

Family Reunion

Yesterday I was looking for more clothes for Marie and found some treasures you may enjoy. This is an invitation to a reunion of the Aubins in 1998. Kathie, Marie's niece had sent her this and a blank invitation which had blanks to fill in for who and how many would be attending. I have heard a lot about this reunion from another niece, Jeannine. who did attend and had a ball. She sent me pictures and it was overwhelming to me. They seem to think it is time for another family reunion!

The Christmas Cactus

This morning started off a bit dicey, but when Marie settled in with her favorite meal, she was a delight to visit with.
I wrote,  on her dry erase board:"today is the day for castor oil for the Christmas Cactus." She spit out her orange juice and laughed. Well, I thought it was serious business. Marie had us buy Castor Oil for her about two years ago. I refused to buy it but Fran said, "If mom ordered it, we buy it." I had some choice words about it but we did put a bottle of it in the shopping cart.
We had a discussion about it when we got back with the groceries. Oh she laughed. "You thought I was going to drink this didn't you?" When I nodded, "yes" she proceeded to tell me that after the cactus quits blooming, you give it (she measured with her fingers 2 "). When she had laughed and spit out her orange juice, I began to wonder if she had been pulling a joke on me. So of course, I Googled it. Yup a Pinterest lady said one teaspoon in September. Oh brother, now what? So this is what I did. One tablespoon with two small glasses of water and we will see what happens.
Her granddaughter, Tina Lizotte has taken slips/starts of her Christmas Cactus and told me that they are doing well.  Another legacy.
March 2019 Marie's Christmas cactus which I paid, seventy nine cents for many years ago is still blooming. Not a lot of blooms the first year since she passed, but enough to make me smile. It sits right here by my computer so I think of her every day.

Godparents

I was talking to Marie's brother, Charles this morning and asked him some questions about Marie's life that I wasn't familiar with.
He was telling me that Marie is his godmother. What? I am not Catholic or Lutheran so I know some about godparents, but not a lot. He also said that his brother George was his godfather. I told him I didn't know that brothers or sisters could be godparents. He just chuckled and said, "well they were running out of relatives for godparents, so they had to choose their own children.
I love his sense of humor.
He said that godparents are essentially guardians if the parents are deceased. That I knew, but I also find that godparents I know send their godchild gifts at Christmas and birthdays etc.
 It seems that Marie has forgotten these things, but I think it would be wonderful for any of you to tell us if she was a godparent to you or someone that you know.
If any of you have a godparent certificate I would love to put it on this blog.
Marie tried to answer questions today, but just shook her head over the godparent question.
She shrugged her shoulders of course, but was not upset about it.

Marie Celebrates 102 Birthdays

Marie celebrated her 102nd birthday with her two sons and their wives at Fran's house. Her favorite meal was BBQ ribs, potato salad and of course, lots of extras.
 These are some of our favorite pictures of the day.
Just like most women, Marie loves presents.
Just like most of us girls,  she loves girlie stuff. She is showing off all of the things she loves:lotions, body wash, a new purse, Plus she found some money in the purse.

She loves having her family around her. Most folks do.
These pictures are a treasure as are the memories of the day.
She is always happy to have these pictures on the computer. Marie would have been something else on the computer a few years ago. She loves the internet and knowing that her family can see the pictures.
Of course, funny things need to be documented. This years only her son, Roger and his wife visited from Texas to celebrate with her. Virgie put the candles on backwards so that it looked like 201. Oh we laughed, even Marie noticed it and chuckled.

Marie and the Hurricane of 1931

Today while I was at Marie's house, I visited with her while she was eating her lunch. After ten years, I thought I had heard most of her life stories, but I was in for yet another surprise. She said, "You know I was in a hurricane when I was sixteen." She then started to tell me about her traumatic experience. She wanted to go to a movie that night. Her mother said she didn't think she should go because she to work the next day. True to form Marie went anyway. She loved the movies. Not only did she go by herself, but to the late movie. Clark Gable in a movie that I can't find in his archives. I live a block away from her and I can't remember the name of his co-star. Oh well, that part doesn't matter. What does matter is the fact that the trolley quit running at 11:00 P.M.The movie got out late. The manager wanted her to stay at the theater because of the terrible weather, but she started walking home.
She could not walk her normal route, because of the storm, so she had to take back roads through two cemeteries. She named them. When she got home hours later, she had to bang on the door so that someone would let her in. Only minutes after she got in the house the neighbor's barn blew into her yard.
Of course, the next day she walked to the place where she met the girls she went to work with. Even a hurricane wasn't going to mess with her work schedule. Her work friends told her to go ahead and go back home because the hurricane had made it impossible to go to work. She fretted, even now, because she had to miss three days work.
I feel that the work ethic in the "thirties" was much more in tact than it is now.
Since I am spending more time with Marie, I am hoping to hear more about her life than I have up to this point. If I do, I will post more of her life stories.
The picture of Marie I added to this story is important because of the old blue sweater that she has on. She was so at home in that old blue sweater. The elbows were darned several times. It had lost most of its color. But it was comfortable. It had a place for her tissues and her "candies". It was home.
I still have her old blue sweater. She was given so many new ones for gifts over the years. I found most of them still in the gift bags. She was just so comfortable in her old blue sweater....

A Visit From Tricia

Here is Marie, always the model showing off her crocheted hat she made from plastic shopping bags. We had a wonderful visit with Tricia, Marie's granddaughter, her daughter, Sydney, and her husband, John. They had not seen each other in 24 years. We had such fun. We went to yard sales and laughed and had such a good time.
Of course, Fran got out the karaoke mics and our huge CD books and discovered such beautiful voices in Sydney and Tricia. John said that he sounded like a wounded cat, so he stayed in the kitchen with me regaling me with wonderful stories. Here are some pictures of the fun.

Brandon, Amber, John, Tricia
and Sydney

There is a picture of Marie's mother and her great grandchildren. Marie always knew that picture up to the age of 102 plus. There is a picture of Tricia's son Brandon, his wife Tori and Cooper James Watson. Marie's great great grandson.
Of course, the Christmas picture of Marie with her grandchildren including Tricia or Pattie as Marie called her, Christina, Samantha and Melissa.

                                            
 

Well these are the highlights, they had fun yesterday, looking through her family books and learned a lot of family history.

Hopefully, they will come back soon to visit.!!