The Season Begins....

Yesterday marks the day that many people associate with the start of summertime. It isn't really, but because it's a big holiday weekend and schools in some areas are done for the year while in other areas, the kids are operating now on "short-time chains."

Here, the kids have roughly two more weeks of school as they don't finish up until June 7th.

Yesterday, being Memorial Day -or as many in my age range often still call it -"Decoration Day" I had been involved last week with picking up three planters that my cousin down in Texas had ordered from her ex-sister-in-law (who has a greenhouse here and does a very nice job with a just-the-right-size not too small but not too large planter). I had offered a couple years back to my cousin that I would be more than happy to pick up any planters she wanted to order and purchase from her sister-in-law and take them to the cemetery where here parents are buried to put them on their graves as well as, this year, an extra planter to put in front of a large family headstone that is now on my aunt and uncle's plots.

I had picked up the planters last Wednesday and took them to the cemetery. So that was taken care of and then, I just needed to get two more planters and a couple extra small flowers that I wanted to plant on the graves of my maternal grandparents, as well as my parents too. The extra small flowers were to go on the graves of my older aunt and her husband as well as on my older daughter's Godparents graves. But I was waiting until Sunday to do that so as to have my older daughter available, along with her son, my oldest grandson, to accompany me and to do the actual planting of the smaller plants. I don't have the strength these days to do the digging needed plus, if I get down on the ground to actually plant stuff, I then need someone there to give me assistance in getting back up on my feet!

Considering the fact that the weather that had been pretty decent off and on last week, was predicted to turn to a freeze on both Friday and Saturday nights, I was a bit concerned then that I maybe should have waited to put out the planters for my cousin, but thankfully, if there was any frost those two nights, it must not have affected that area of the cemetery.

Sunday afternoon, Carrie, Alex and I got the two remaining planters and extra flowers I wanted and away we went, first to the cemetery near here where my Grandparents are buried, as well as my aunt, uncle and Carrie's Godparents. After we finished there, my daughter and grandson had to leave to return home so Maya and I went then up to the other cemetery about  8 miles from here which is where almost all of my Dad's family is laid to rest.

As we pulled in and off the road near the family lot site, I saw a car parking on the lane right beside the family's lots and realized it was a cousin of mine and his wife. I haven't seen, much less talked to this cousin since the funeral of our last aunt, who passed away 5 years ago this April! I don't really know who was more surprised to see who there -me to see him or them to see me and Maya. A little bit of contention you could say I suppose between us but on Sunday, there was no hint of that in our conversation. Perhaps having Maya with me may have served as a bit of a buffer between us although I talked mostly with his wife, asking how their daughter and her children are doing, telling her what's been happening around here too over the past five years.

I'm glad that we did have this chance meeting and maybe things between us will return to a normal state in the future.

Monday, I went to the Memorial Services at our cemetery -something I grew up doing every Memorial Day -with my Mom, Grandparents and usually several of my aunts or uncles who almost always came home for the holiday weekend. Attending that service was considered to be as important a thing as a lot of folks think about going to church on Christmas and Easter! After the services, there was a lot of milling around, reuniting with people the family didn't usually see except maybe at this service once a year. And the attendance back then, when I was a kid, was generally pretty high too -usually at least between 80 to maybe 100 people would show up. Yesterday, I counted 27 people there. Seems folks don't pay much attention to honoring their ancestors much less the veterans the way they once did, ya know.

After the service and back home, my daughter, her boyfriend, his two kids and my two grandkids -Maya and Kurtis -and I had a nice cookout here -burgers and hot dogs, grilled asparagus, pasta salad and just enough macaroni and cheese leftover from Saturday's meal to satisfy the kids! Nothing fancy, that's for sure. Plain old white styrofoam disposable plates and plastic utensils -no special effects type stuff like snazzy patio dinnerware involved here!

And, tonight the kids polished off the leftover hot dogs while Mandy had leftover baked chicken she'd fixed for Saturday's dinner. Since today happened to be my day for my monthly lunch with my high school classmates, after which I am generally still pretty stuffed by suppertime and don't care to eat much then, I'm going to have myself a nice rather healthy meal for my dinner tonight -cottage cheese and fruit! Simple, yes but tasty and refreshing for me!

So now, we've officially kicked off the start of summer -vacations soon to begin for those lucky enough to get time off and who can afford to go some place special.

I'll still be camping out here -same place, same station ya know -probably still messing around with some kind of craft stuff -either embroidery, knitting or crochet to keep my mind occupied and trying not to think about how my life is about to take a drastic change sometime around the beginning of July!