Great Aunts

When I was a little girl my mom would take a day and we would go to visit her grandmothers and aunts.  We would leave home early in the morning and drive about an hour to the small town where my mom lived when she was a little girl.  My aunts had lovely old fashioned names--Ruth (two of them!) and Ruby, and lived in houses that smelled comfortably of cooking with a slight underlying odor of gas from the floor furnace or the cookstove.  

Mom would visit with the aunts and catch up on family news while we played in the grown cousin's bedrooms with their old toys or sat patiently (umm, probably not patiently!) on the couch till it was time to go to the next relative's home.  Or maybe we even banged a terrible tune on a piano or kicked at the table leg till Mom had enough and bundled us into the car!

Sometimes we could play outside--exploring barns and outbuildings, marveling at goldfish swimming in stock tanks and investigating overgrown orchards or gardens.   

There was a snack I could always count on at Aunt Ruby's house.  Graham crackers with frosting!  I was asking Mom about this not too long ago and she said that was the snack they had when she was a little girl too! I guess if you've found a good snack for kids, there's no sense in changing it!

It's funny what triggers your memory.  Molly had gotten addicted to graham crackers during her senior year and one day we put some frosting on them.  One taste and I was back in Great Aunt Ruby's kitchen, wanting to go outside and look at the goldfish in the stock tank!