Grandma Mosby

When Angus and I got back from preschool, today, there was a very quavery message from my Mom on the answering machine, telling me to call her back right away.  My heart fell, because I could tell it was something awful; I had an idea, but it was still hard to hear that my grandma had died this morning. 

The Mosby side of my family is very private...to the point that sometimes we don't even know what's going on with each other.  We don't pry, we don't share good news or bad unless it's the big stuff like heart attacks, births and deaths, we don't call just to catch up on how life is going.  It's not that we don't love and care for one another, it's just always been like that, you know?

For that reason, I'm not going to do a huge old tribute post about my Grandma Mosby, even though she was a huge influence in my life.  But I want to say SOMETHING...

She's the reason I know there's a difference in off-white paints.  They have undertints that can completely change the tone of the room; pinkish makes it more cheerful, bluish is more calming.  Grandma repainted her rooms almost once a year, in different shades of off-white.  She'd have little paint samples tucked behind picture frames and quiz me about the subtleties of each strip. 

I get my love of strong coffee from her.  Grandma's house always smelled like coffee and Dawn dishsoap. 

Grandma Mosby was fiercely competitive.  She didn't "let" us win at cribbage or other games...if we won, it was because we played well.

She had the most beautiful garden and lawn! I loved helping her in her garden, and laying out on her lawn, listening to the pine trees blow.  I don't know who lives in their old house in Lewistown, but I've been tempted to knock on the door someday and ask if I could lay on the lawn for a little while, remembering...

She could get silly, and giggle.  As bullheaded as she was, Grandma was also able to see the funny in a lot of things, too. 

Grandma had a great sense of style and color, and even though she SAID she didn't like the color red, she looked wonderful when she wore it.  She always had a little scarf over her hair when she went out, to protect her hair from the wind, and she put pink powder on her cheeks to dress up to go shopping. 


There are so many other things, but I will stop there because no one needs to know ALL  the family secrets, right, Brett?  :)