- watching "Days of our Lives" on her days off and eating Ritz crackers, bread and butter pickles and colby jack cheese (and being named after one of them!)
- raking leaves and burning them in the ditch...sometimes I even wore her jacket.
- hearing her yell "Go Bethie!" at my summer rec softball games and cringing every time
- crawling in bed beside her when I had a bad dream
- sitting on the bathroom floor while she took a bath, talking about my day, and NEVER being asked to leave
- trips to Jeff, just me and her, in the van and getting to talk the WHOLE way
- learning to drive with a very calm, cool and collected mama in the passenger seat
- driving around the block over and over as she taught me to parallel park, without giving up
- watching with awe as she turned my grandma's long, curled hair into the most beautiful bun every Thursday night in Grandma's bedroom
- her smell-a little like perfume and a little like soap. It was all her.
- how her hair always looked exactly the same-never messy
- how she came to every school function, even in a wheelchair with a broken hip
- how she desperately loved my babies, and would sneak them whatever they wanted, without caring what her OWN baby thought!
- how she couldn't figure out the computer or iPhone and didn't really care to!
- how she let "kid-Kayla" wear awful make up to the store, without question
- when she took the checkbook from my daddy for my wedding and just kept writing
- when she did 32 donuts in the dune buggy and beat everybody!
- that our house was always clean, well kept
- how our clothes magically appeared in our room...CLEAN
- that she could "run" a business full of men and metal with a mama's hand and they loved her for it
- her intense love of all things Diet Coke
- that she called my grandma "Grandma"...to her face...for as long as I remember
- that she had the same way of hiding her smile behind a fake face of displeasure just like my grandma...just like me
- how she made our home the "fun house" for all my friends
- how she intensely stood her ground over moral issues and I'm better for it
- when she would say "Blame me!" when I didn't want to do something but didn't know how to tell people
- how she always asked for prayer, because she TRULY believed in it
- how they somehow came up with enough money to take a family of 5 on AWESOME vacations...yes vacationS.
- how she devoted her nights to braiding my wet hair into Medusa braids so it would be "crimpy" in the morning
- how she devoted her mornings to curling my hair with hot rollers if I didn't want "crimpy"
- that she would listen to hundreds of chapter books being read out loud while she dried, curled and fixed my hair every morning
- our special way of signing letters- "LYLLYBLYLALP"
- our special way of tucking me in-"Love You Little, Love You Big, Love You Like A Little Pig"
- that I never knew when she slept, usually went to sleep after me and was awake before me
- that she collected creepy old people figurines and would give them "baths" in the tub with Kitchen Klatter
- that she gave our mini blinds "baths" in the tub with Kitchen Klatter too
- that she was a mad woman in the spring when she was cleaning, and so were we
- how the kitchen was decorated in blue with little white ducks for the longest time...and that always fit her
- that she didn't yell at me when I broke my arm in first grade but cradled me while we waited in the waiting room
- late night talks while she sat on my bed
Trudy Rosalee Albin Taylor was a good mama. The best actually.
Your mama was a very special lady! She is greatly missed and will always be loved!
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