April 09, 2020

Getting to know you …

April 09, 2020/ Lisa Carpenter

During this time of physical isolation, video chats with my grandsons are for me, like with many grandmas, a saving grace. They not only let me see those faces my heart misses so — the long-distance ones as well as the one belonging to my local love bug — the sessions allow me to get to know the boys in ways not possible in face-to-face real-time rendezvous. Trying to keep conversations flowing provides telling insight … and some fun musical performances too.

April 06, 2020

Keep pushin' on

April 06, 2020/ Lisa Carpenter

Keep pushing on

Well, I’m about done with this whole virus thing. The social distancing, the masks, the not seeing my loved ones in person, the sheer sadness of the lives lost and overburdened healthcare workers trying to limit the loss.

Yep, I’m done.

I bet you are too.

Unfortunately there’s not a darn thing we can do about it … except plod onward. Things will get better. We just gotta keep pushin’ on.…

Plus … GRAND Social No. 385 link party for grandparents …

January 27, 2020

Sick old man

January 27, 2020/ Lisa Carpenter

Sick old man

My old man Mickey has been quite sick since Friday morning. To say he feels under the weather is an egregious understatement.

After a long day of no appetite and atrocious symptoms Friday, I called the vet late that afternoon and secured an early Saturday appointment. Blood work, x-rays and a bloody (literally) exam confirmed pancreatitis.

August 29, 2019

School papers and similarly sentimental stuff

August 29, 2019/ Lisa Carpenter

During my daughters’ school years, I kept all the papers and projects they brought home from school. Everything. Spelling tests, stories, handwriting practice (they did that back then), certificates earned for field day and perfect attendance, report cards for each quarter of each year.

I kept it all. Times three. All in cardboard boxes in a storage space beneath the house we lived in for the duration of the girls’ school years. Lots of …

August 22, 2019

In other news: On Botox, Thailand, and ALS

August 22, 2019/ Lisa Carpenter

In the first post I published here after returning from summer break, I shared a recap of some of the bigger changes that took place while I was away from the blog.

I didn’t tell you everything, though. A couple happenings just didn’t seem to fit in the bits I previously passed along. Those being the following…

BOTOX

I got Botox shots in June! In my …

August 15, 2019

Summer break ends: What changed while I was away

August 15, 2019/ Lisa Carpenter

Grandma’s Briefs is back! Yep, the summer break I announced at the start of June is officially over.

While I was away from the site, a few changes took place. Some big, some small. Here’s a (relatively) quick update:

For starters, one blog change is that Grandma’s Briefs hit the 10-year mark in July! Hard to believe but true, as you can see from my very first post, published a decade ago.

Another blog change is that you’ll see a few new faces in the Meet the Family section of the sidebar, those being of Andrea’s new …

May 13, 2019

A new home!

May 13, 2019/ Lisa Carpenter

A new home!

I don’t want to say too much, for fear of jinxing things, but we found a new home!

A home that’s half the size of the one we currently live in. Which is perfect.

PLUS… the GRAND Social link party for grandparents.

March 22, 2019

Flashback: Sink, swim, or hold on!

March 22, 2019/ Lisa Carpenter

Dear readers: This flashback feature originally appeared on Grandma’s Briefs March 4, 2010. Update: I’m still holding on “with a steel-plated grip because I have no other option.” How about you? Thank you for reading my rerun.

Back in the '80s, before the real estate market crash that marked the end of that decade, I worked for a mortgage company. Business was good, and we were rewarded well by the company's owner.

One of the bigger rewards we once received was a day offwork ... and on the owner's boat. On a day we should be processing loans, the entire office (it was a small office) would get to don bathing suits and hang out at the reservoir, on a boat, sipping beer in the sunshine.

I didn't want to go. I really did not want to go.

I didn't want to go because despite having been born in Minnesota…

March 06, 2019

Multiple Sclerosis Awareness Month: My MS and me

March 06, 2019/ Lisa Carpenter

March is Multiple Sclerosis Awareness Month. Though I have MS, I don’t write much about it because, frankly, it’s long been just part of who I am, not what defines me. There are far more informative bloggers when it comes to all things MS—my dear friend Cathy of An Empowered Spirit foremost in my mind—so I typically stick with grandma-focused sorts of stuff.

Yet, with MS becoming a bigger (sometimes overwhelmingly so) focus of my life in the time since last year’s MS Awareness Month, I figured I’d spend at least one post sharing the relatively recent changes to my MS and me. Perhaps doing so will put…

November 12, 2018

Goodbye, Mom

November 12, 2018/ Lisa Carpenter

Yesterday family and friends said a final farewell to my mom — Gramma to my girls, Nonnie to her younger grandkids, Sweet Ann to her sisters and friends, Goofy (or Obnoxious, Opinionated, Absolutely Off The Wall) Ann to others.