January Gran'ma Gertie

Howdy Ya’ll!

It Gran’ma again. I been settin’ by the fire all day waitin’ on a nice warm day to get here. Some days, it seems like there never was such a thing. Today’s one of them days. When you git to be my age, January ain’t yer favorite month.

When you git as many years on yer bones as I got, yer bones start arguin’ with you. They start havin’ those ‘Itis Brothers over quite a bit. You know them - Burs Itis, Arthur Itis, and the youngest one, Tendon Itis. I sometimes hurt in places I didn’ remember I even had!

One of my young’uns set me up with a city doctor one time. He had a big, fine fancy office, with purty pictures on the walls and purty plants growin’ in fancy pots. He was real nice, real clean cut, but seemed a might young to suit me. I wondered how he was gonna treat somethin’ he hadn’t experienced yet. He looked, he tugged, pushed, pulled and bent everything I had. Then he gave me his diagnosis (which I already knew and had told him), and give me a prescription. I got some kind of pills that didn’t do anything ‘cept make my stomach hurt. When I called him and told him, all he could say was that at my age, I had to expect some things to hurt.

I ain’t never went back to that young doctor. I jest cain’t see puttin’ out good money fer someone to tell me somethin’ I already know. I probly know more about doctorin’ than he does. I brought my young’uns into this world, and raised’em quite healthy. Ain’t none of them got any problems now. They didn’t have many comin’ up, either!

I know that oatmeal in tub of jest warm water helps take the itch out of chicken pox. I know that a sock full of warm salt is good to put on an earache. I know that turpentine and sugar mixed jest right is good fer the croup. So is a good mustard plaster. I ain’t never been one to drink, but if you mix a jigger of red likker, the juice of one lemon, and a tablespoon of wild honey, heat it up, drink it hot, and stay under the covers, you’re on your way to feelin’ better from a bad cold or the flu. After drinkin’ these toddies every 2 to 3 hours, either they start workin’ or yer too drunk to care! Either way, you feel a lot better. I know you can put a whole clove in just enough hot water to soffen it and put it on a bad tooth. The clove will make it go numb.

If’n you got a baby that’s teethin’, boil about 30 whole cloves in about half a cup of water, add about a teaspoon of sugar, strain it and cool it, and you got yerself some real good teethin’ medicine. A lot people don’t know it, but babies don’t like loud noise. I ain’t talkin’ about just one loud noise, like a clap, but noise like from an old fan or vacuum cleaner. If you got a colicky baby, lay him down and put the noisy thing right in the room with him. Turn it on, and within a few minutes, your baby’ll be sleepin away! Speakin’ of babies, if yours has a problem with a diaper rash, try givin’ him some diluted cranberry juice, and powder that bottom with plain ol’ cornstarch. Babies ain’t got to be no harder than you make them. Keep ‘em dry, fed and loved, and they do jest fine. Before you know it, they’re grown.

As fer my visitin’ Itus Brothers, I jest mix up a little eucalyptus oil (I get mine from the corner drug store in town), and a little lard, rub it on whatever part is hurtin’, and wrap it up fer a few hours. It’ll usually help the stiffness. It’s either that or the fact that I won’t give in to it. I got things to do. I ain’t got time to sit on my bottom and see if’n it’ll get better. I’m afraid the day I give in, Gran’pa better start makin’ arraingments with the undertaker!

I wonder how that young doctor will feel when he gets to be my age? How will he feel if some young hotshot tells him to expect things to hurt? Truthfully, I don’t reckon he’ll see the years I have. He don’t work hard enough to keep his body strong. He prob’ly eats the wrong stuff like all the other young’uns. He prob’ly worries too much about things he cain’t control. He’d be one of the ones that jest sits down and quits ‘cause somethin’ hurts. Seems such a shame, don’t you think?

I guess I’d better get up and get movin’ about. It’s still too cold to do anything in the yard or the garden. I guess I’ll go feed up fer the evenin’ and bring in a load or two of wood. We had a real red sunset so it’s gonna be cold tonight, and I need a big fire. Gran’pa jest ain’t big enough to keep a big woman like me warm!

“Till next time,

Gran’ma Gertie

December Gran'ma Gertie

Howdy Ya’ll!

I been sittin’ here lookin’ out my front window fer some of the young’uns. I know they should be gettin’ here any time. With Christmas just a couple of days away, and the gran’young’uns bein’ out of school, they all said they would try to get here. I shore hope they can all make it.
It’s times like these that I miss the young’uns bein’ little. Now I ain’t sayin’ I ain’t proud of my gran’young’uns, but it is a little differnt. Young’uns nowadays expect things a lot differnt than my young’uns did. They act like if’n they ain’t got the biggest tree, the most lights, and the most presents, they ain’t had Christmas!

Fer gifts, they expect them fancy computer games, batt’ry powered cars, and baby dolls that talk, walk, and do ever’thing a real baby does. The new styles fer clothes are jest plain crazy. Either the britches look like they belong on the fat man at the circus, or they try to make grown folks out of young’uns! My mama wouldn’t have let us go to a dawg fight in some of the stuff them young’uns is wearin’!

I think one of the craziest things I ever heard was them yama goochi key chain things. It was supposed to be some kind of a computer animal. The young’uns had to push a button to feed it, push a button to play with it, and push a button to make it do whatever it was supposed to do. If’n the young’un didn’t push all the right buttons, the thing died. How a made up animal is supposed to die is beyond me. All the young’uns wanted one of these things, but at the same time, not very many would take the time to feed the family dawg! What made it so bad was that all the mamas and daddies was fightin’ to buy one fer their young’un.
A few years ago, it was them home made lookin’ dolls. Them things were about as ugly as a doll could be. Some feller got the idea from an old gran’ma in north Georgia. He took it to the patent office I reckon, so the gran’ma cain’t make’em no more. That feller made the dolls, made all the clothes, built a hospital fer’em, and sold’em with a set of adoption papers. On the news, it showed people in the stores just a fightin’, kickin, and scratchin’ to get one. Some things are just plain foolish.

When did we ferget what Christmas was about? When did the presents wind up bein’ the most important thing? When did the rule about the one with the most toys, wins, get voted on? When did the price of somethin’ get to be more important than the thought behind it? When did Christmas become just another day fer a store to have a sale? When did it get to be so..., what do they call it? commercialized? Maybe the right question would be why.

Why have we let ourselves get trapped in to doin’ what the toy makers and clothin’ makers want us to do? Why have we let our young’uns ferget the real meanin’ of Christmas? Why don’t we put more meanin’ on our families than on the presents? What have we done? And what can we do about it?

Fer starters, quit spendin’ so much money on stuff that the young’uns is prob’ly gonna get tired of in a week. Quit fallin’ fer the same ol’ tricks the stores pull. Start spendin’ more time with the young’uns. Take an evenin’ and explain the real meanin’ of Christmas. Teach the young’uns how to make a tractor from an ol’ sewin’ thread spool and a rubber band. Show’em how to make a pea shooter out of wooden clothes pins. Take an evenin’ to string popcorn or make paper chains. Make your own tree decorations. Go outside and bring in some fresh pine tops. They always smell better than that stuff in a can. I could go on and on. There’s a lot we could do, if’n we jest would. We need to get back to the real Christmas way. The way it should’ve been all along.

I think I see some headlights on the road, so I better get up. I got a million things to do. I still got lots of cookin’ to do, and I’ve done gathered all my old beads and quilt scraps so me and the gran’young’uns can cover some styrerfoam balls to go on the tree. Gran’pa jest cut it this mornin’ and it shore has the front room smellin’ good! Between the Christmas tree and the cookies I made, the whole house smells good. I hope the young’uns will just remember that it smells like home. Have a Merry Christmas, Ya’ll!


‘Till next time,

Gran’ma Gertie

November Gran'ma Gertie

Howdy Ya’ll!

I’ve been busy as a bee at honey makin’ time gettin’ everything ready fer Thanksgivin’. It’s always been a real big thing at our house. All the family will be here. I don’t often get to see all my gran’young’uns at one time. There’s a big bunch of’em!

I reckon my family has always went all out fer Thanksgivin’. We always felt like we had a lot to give thanks fer, and most of the time, we may not have had much else, but we had food. It was usually that way with all us country folks. We always growed our own vegetables and raised our own meat. We may not have had a fancy store bought turkey, but you can bet there was a big hunk or two of meat on our table! It might be a smoked ham from one of our hogs, or two or three fine bakin’ hens of mama’s. We always had a big pan of cornbread dressin’ with gravy on the side, sweet potater casserole, fresh corn and any kind of peas or beans you could name, real mashed potaters made with real butter and real cream, and all kinds of cakes and pies, includin’ some of the best sweet potater pie you ever put in your mouth! A meal fit fer a king!

We always sat at the table, even if’n we had to extend it with saw horses and boards. Mama would always find a tablecloth big enough to cover. Most of the time, the little young’uns would eat at a separate table, being that they sometimes made a mess or spilt their tea. The food would spread all the way down the table, and usually into the kitchen. There would be gallons of iced tea put in wash tubs, and every kind of bread that we could make, from biscuits to fried corn bread patties put in baskets along the table. All kinds of jelly and preserves, and home made cane syrup was also there. If’n we were lucky, and enough money had been scared up, we had store bought cranberry sauce.

The smell comin’ from the kitchen early that mornin’ was enough to make your mouth water. By the time everything was finally done, most of us felt like our belly was meetin’ our back bone and we were ready to eat! When I was real little, it was sometimes awful hard to sit through the blessin’ without tryin’ to sneak a nibble.

Mama always made shore the young’uns was fed first. She said she wasn’t havin’ none of her young’uns eatin’ scraps! I’ve always felt the same way. Years ago, some people always fed the men folks first, the woman would then eat in the kitchen, and then the young’uns were fed from whatever was left. Not at our house! She knew how hungry us young’uns were. It had been a long time since breakfast, which was usually small because she had to get us all cleared out of the kitchen so she could finish up dinner. She most always had her cakes and pies done the mornin’ before, and the ham was just waitin’ in the smokehouse. She get jar after jar of her canned vegetables set out the night before. Everything was in the plannin’ and the timin’. Keep rememberin’ that all this was done on a woodstove! I’ve seen mama have to keep a fire goin’ in there for two or three days solid with all the cookin’ she done.

I know that we live in a differnt world today. Ever’body’s so busy all the time. Now, all a person has to do is go by their new big grocery store, pay thirty or forty dollars, and pick up a whole Thanksgiving dinner with all the trimmin’s. While they’re there, they can pick up everything else ready made from the cakes and pies to tea in gallon milk jugs. It just don’t seem right. I still do all my own cooking. I don’t use instant nothin’! I don’t use my new miker’wave fer anything but a clock and what-not shelf. I’ve had to learn to use margarine instead of butter, canned milk instead of cream, and spices and stuff from a can instead of growed in our garden. I jest about burnt everything I cooked when Gran’pa bought me a gas burnin’ stove! So yes, I’ve had to learn to make do, too.

I reckon I shouldn’t gripe as long as the woman that picks up that store made dinner sits down and gives thanks with her family, and teaches the young’uns how to say the blessin’ and have good manners at the table.
Times are always a’changin’. Sometimes for the better, and sometimes for the worst. At my age, sometimes it’s hard to tell. I jest hope we never change the things that really matter. Like our families, our young’uns, our friends and our religion. If’n we lose them, we ain’t got a lot left to hold on to. These things are more important than ever now, what with mamas and daddies both workin’, young’uns livin’ at the baby sitter, no time fer neighbors, and no time fer church goin’. Now I ain’t sayin’ I’m some preacher type, but I figer I owe my long years, my good sized family, my many friends, and all my blessin’s to some body. And I don’t mind givin’ thanks fer’em. Maybe we should all take a little time to do jest that. While I’m at it, I think I’ll pray for a perty day so the gran’young’uns can play outside!


‘Till next time,


Gran’ma Gertie

October Gran'ma Gertie

Howdy Ya’ll!

Well, I’m jest now beginnin’ to feel the first chills in the mornin’ air. Not quite chilly enough fer frost, but my old flannel shirt shore does feel good. The dog fennel’s were in full bloom about 4 weeks ago, so we aughta have first frost in about 2 more weeks. It’s usually quite nippy at night by the time the county fair comes around the last of this month.
I should be pickin’ the rest of my greens. I want to get’em before the frost falls on’em. That always makes’em taste sweet. I’ve heard tell that people up north put sugar in theirs! I like my greens good and bitter - makes the cornbread taste better. Throw a big piece of ham hock in there and you got a good supper fer a nippy evenin’.

I aught to head to the barn to put up all the fishin’ stuff. When you get to be mine and Gran’pa’s age, sittin’ on a bank or in a boat when it’s cold don’t make your bones feel so good. Once the weather turns off real cool, we have to quit fishin’ ‘till warm weather’s back. So, in keepin’ with my sportin’ type image, it’s time to dust off the shotgun and see how many shells I got.

The turkey shoots aught to be startin’ this weekend. They’ll run right up through Christmas. Nowadays, though, turkey ain’t all you can get. Sometimes you can choose between 10 pounds of sausage, a side of bacon, a fresh or cured ham, a pork Boston butt roast, and of course, turkeys. A few years ago, I filled up our ol’ freezer! It done me good to out shoot so many of them young hot shots with their fancy shotguns! There was even a few of the men folks that wouldn’t shoot against me - said it was wastin’ their money!

I’d like to get a couple of deer in the freezer and maybe a wild hog or two. There is no meat that taste as good as fresh wild hog that I know of. My daddy could skin out and cut up a wild hog so fast that he could have it done before you could get the grease hot enough to fry it! I might use one of the deer roast to make some jerky. Gran’pa ain’t got the teeth to chew it, so he just rolls it on his gums ‘till it’s soft enough to swaller. It shore does taste good, though. A few messes of squirrel, and four or five rabbit should do us nice fer the winter.

Now I know that a lot of ya’ll don’t believe in huntin’. I don’t belive in huntin’ fer sport or fer trophies like you see people on TV do. The only time I kill somethin’ is fer eatin’ purposes. I was raised in the woods, and could out shoot all the boys in the community by the time I was 10. I shoot only what I can plainly see. I don’t believe in makin’ no animal suffer. I never kill more than me and the family can eat. Besides, I like the taste a whole lot more.

You never know what the meat producer’s been addin’ to his meat, or what he’s been feedin’ his animals. I’ve heard an awful lot lately about bad meat gettin’ into the supermarkets, makin’ people sick, and sometimes killin’ people! More especially little young’uns and older folks like me. The doctor’s say that our bodies ain’t strong enough to fight off all the bad stuff in the meat. At least when I kill a wild animal, I know what he’s been eatin’ and I know where he’s been. I do the skinnin’, so I know how his insides look. If they don’t look right, I won’t eat it. I won’t eat nothin’ that’s been killed too early in the season ‘cause the weather is still too warm. After the second good freeze and cold weather is around fer a while is when I do my huntin’. I know by then that the meat will be good, and will keep long enough for me to get it home, get it skint, cut up, and put in the freezer. I may be ol’fashioned, but I ain’t stupid!
I’ve been seein’ a lot of those fancy cookin’ shows on the TV, and guess what? They’re beginin’ to use wild meat, too. I saw some foreign feller fixin’ what he called pheasant under glass. He used spices I never heard of, put some wine all over it, baked it, put it on a fancy dish of some sort and decorated it like it was some kind of present. I don’t know how his tasted, but I like my pheasant flour’d and fried in a cast iron frying pan! A pot of rice, a little gravy, biscuits and iced tea sounds perty good to go with it.

Most of this may sound mean, about me killin’ animals, but we country folks have survived fer years. Both usin’ and livin’ off the land. We ain’t like a lot of city folks. We know how to take care of the land, ‘cause it takes care of us. We ain’t as cruel as you think. When we kill, it’s quick. There ain’t no sufferin’ if we can help it. You should see how the animal dies at a slaughterhouse! Now that’s just plain mean.

I hope I ain’t offended any of ya’ll. If’n I did, I’m sorry. Not sorry that you got offended, but sorry that you cain’t understand our way of life. It’s the way I was raised, my daddy, and his before him. Some call that a tradition. I call it a good way to eat! Ya’ll should try it sometime. Even if’n you don’t hunt, I’m quite shore ya’ll know somebody that hunts. Next time you hear of’em goin’, ask’em to save you a shoulder off the deer. It’s the best BBQ meat you can find. Makes a perty good roast with potaters and onion and carrots, too. Here’s to good eatin!


‘Till next time,

Gran’ma Gertie