Cheerios

Have you seen the Cheerios commercial where the little boy is sitting with his mom eating breakfast and he asks her if Nana fed her Cheerios when she was little?  The mom says yes and the boys says, so when we eat Cheerios, it's kind of like we're eating breakfast with Nana.  The mom gets teary eyed and answers yes.  (see the video here).

After driving out with us cross country, my mom spent a couple weeks at the farm.  She and I spent hours going through each room, looking at the furniture, books and knick knacks; the accumulation from a combined 142 years on earth and nearly 50 years of marriage.  We were tasked with deciding what would stay and what would go.  Since we had left much of our furniture behind in California, keeping the couches and tables was an easy decision.  Family photos?  No brainer those are staying.  It's all the other things.

Standing at the kitchen sink I see the little ceramic frog that holds a yellow and red scrubby used for pans and things.  I wonder just how long my Grandma had the same scrubby.  Did she use the same red and yellow scrubby for thirty+ years or did she just keep buying ones that look the same?  It usually comes as a surprise - things you took for granted sitting on a shelf, in a drawer or hiding in a closet.  The things that just belong in that space because Grandma or Grandpa decided that's where it goes.  And now here I am, trying to fill that space with something new. I'm a slow unpacker already, (after 10 moves with the hubby I know this about myself!) and this makes me slower.  I hope hubby's patience last until I am done.

Each morning sitting at the kitchen table surrounded by these little things, drinking coffee and eating oatmeal, is sort of like having breakfast with Grandma and Grandpa.