Family

The ornaments are up. Not all of them — we don’t have a tree big enough for my grandmother’s full collection, and honestly, I’m not ready for some of them anyway. The little ceramic angel she painted in 1987. The photo ornament of my grandfather, gone twenty years now. Those are still in their boxes in the hall closet, wrapped in tissue paper and waiting. But the tree is up, strung with lights and hung with the mismatched collection of our life: the “Baby’s First Christmas” ornaments for each kid (Emma’s is a pink bootie, Thomas Jr.’s is a tiny baseball glove), the handmade salt dough stars from Sunday school, and yes, a few of Grandma’s — the safer ones, the ones that don’t make me cry. ...

I ruined my first batch of apple butter. Let me back up. Tom’s parents have this apple tree — a Granny Smith that’s been producing since before we were married. Every fall, they bring us more apples than any reasonable family could eat. The kids take some in their lunches, I make pie, and still we end up with a bowl of them slowly wrinkling on the counter, reproaching me with their sad little apple faces. ...

I’ve been putting off starting this blog for about three years now. Every time I’d sit down to write the first post, I’d convince myself I had nothing interesting to say. Who wants to hear about a Kentucky mom making banana bread and pulling weeds? The internet is already so loud — why add to the noise? But then my grandmother passed, and Tom and I moved into her farmhouse with the kids, and something shifted. ...