Ice-Cream Cake and Laughter....Celebrating Paw

Believe it or not, my grandpa would have turned 99 years old today, November 7! He died when he was 74, on a sad day in May 1993. Despite the fact that he left this world 25 years ago, he is still very much alive in my heart and daily conversations.

This fact became very evident to me last night. I was in the process of making dinner when my youngest daughter, who never had the privilege of meeting him, burst in the door with an ice-cream cake to celebrate his birthday. Ice-cream cake was his favorite cake. I looked at her puzzled as she announced, “I bought an ice-cream cake for Paw’s birthday”. I stuttered around and said, “Uh… his birthday is tomorrow”. “I know,” she replied, “but we’re all here tonight for dinner”!

I was surprised and felt so happy inside as she and my older daughter, and son-in-law cut into the cake and began recounting countless stories of a man they never knew. My aunt and I sat there laughing and giggling as this younger generation reminded us of the nick-names he had for us, the crazy shenanigans’ he pulled, and the fun memories about him that we’ve imparted to them.

And you know what? He would have LOVED it! They re-told events of his life, things he had done and didn’t leave out a detail. It was almost as if they had actually been there in person. I feel like there is no greater honor we could give to my grandpa, than to have his great-grandchildren that never knew him, to “know” him. Not only to “know” him, but to have one actually make a stop after work, to buy a birthday cake, to celebrate a man she never met, that has been dead for 25 years.

Today, one of my third-graders came bounding in and told me, “Mrs. Webb, today is my birthday”! I told him that he shares a birthday with a great man, my late grandpa. “How old would he be if he was alive,” he asked. “99,” I told him. And then I thought, “He is alive”. He’s alive in all those stories and memories. He is alive in the fact that my kids remind me about him, and talk about him like they knew him personally.

Eating the cake and sharing all those stories they have learned from my memories was a great feeling. I hope that I can live my life in a way that 25 years after I am long gone, a generation of kids, that I never got to meet are celebrating my life with the same laughter and joy. And I hope they are eating my favorite cake, Chocolate with Chocolate Icing!

"Dying on Hills" and "Choosing Battles"

“My aunt Shelly lets me do whatever I want,” my little niece, Abby recently shared with a friend. ---- My husband was surprised to hear her say this because obviously that's not the case, in fact, he thinks I’m pretty strict with her.

Abby may “think” she is getting to do whatever she wants because as I have gotten older, I have learned a few tricks. I spent a lot of time and energy when my kids were young micromanaging everything from their dresser drawers to their attitudes. More than once I would hear my mom’s voice in my head saying her famous quote, “don’t make a mountain out of a molehill”. However, I would ignore that voice and continue building that molehill right up into a mountain, and not just any mountain, it would be like a Mount Everest by the time I had finished.

Twenty-five-years later clichés like, “don’t die on that hill”, “choose your battles” and the infamous, “don’t make a mountain out of molehill”, are slowly becoming my mantra. When she wants to do something, I give Abby choices ---she makes her choice, and in her little, eight-year-old mind, she is getting to do whatever she wants.

She is super helpful and will do anything I ask her to do as far as a household chore or job. She knows that I usually repay these gestures later with ice-cream, a trip to the dollar store, or some other fun and (cheap) activity. And best of all, she knows if the fun reward doesn’t happen that very day, it will happen another day, and she is fairly patient with waiting because she knows it will definitely happen. My grown kids roll their eyes and say, “we didn’t get a reward” for helping out. True. They didn’t. But they got clothes, shoes, toys, games, food, doctor visits, dentist visits, Sunday school and many other privileges too numerous to name. Plus older kids always think the younger ones have it better for some reason.

My grown kids also get annoyed when I allow my niece to do silly things that aren’t necessary like…drinking out of a sippy cup or using the baby spoon to eat ice-cream. But in the big scheme of things…who really cares? It’s a fleeting moment of being silly and childish and she is EIGHT-years-old! “Picking a battle”, or “choosing a hill to die on”, has become a great talent of mine, and at 51, I am not going to die on the hill of which spoon she can use. I wish I had done this at 31, my life would have been much less stressful.

As a third-grade-teacher, I try to incorporate this attitude with my students and so far it has worked well. Guess what? Kids make mistakes. They make a lot of mistakes actually, they almost make as many mistakes as adults make J They also make poor choices and forget things. They respond quickly if they are being questioned and sometimes, they respond with an inappropriate tone or attitude. My goal is to hold them accountable, but to do so with a whole lot of grace and love. Some behaviors call for stern and swift consequences or lectures; but many times, we as adults continue to “beat a dead horse”, or decide to, “die on a very small hill”. Doing this not only ruins the day for the child, but it puts a big hole in the relationship you are trying to build.

Sometimes simply telling a child face-to-face, eyeball-to-eyeball, “don’t let this happen again”, is more effective than a big, public lecture in front of everyone. And sometimes a big, public lecture to the whole class is the ticket. As a human being, there are some days I fall short of what my goal is---sometimes I feel great driving home reflecting on the day, and other times, not so much.

I think the key is to always reflect, always try harder and to let the pendulum of grace always swing in favor of the kid. I believe that is how God’s grace works with us, it always swings in our favor, thank goodness! If God was in the habit of ‘beating dead horses’ and ‘making mountains out of molehills’, he would be busy 24/7 with ME alone!

Abby “thinks”, Aunt Shelly lets her do whatever she wants----In reality, Aunt Shelly guides her choices with grace and love; and the feeling of “freedom” that comes with that makes her feel like she’s doing whatever she wants. I am looking forward to having her in my third grade class this year----although this scenario could actually become the LITERAL hill that she or I dies on! Hopefully we both survive.