Strong Women!

(My Granny C with three of her great-great grandchildren, two great-grands and me)

On Monday we will celebrate the life of my 98-year-old grandmother.   She went to be with her Lord and Savior on April 7th....just days after I went to see her.  These pictures are from June 2014.

Both of my grandmothers were younger than my mother-in-law.  Yes, wrap your head around that, but it will probably be the same way for my two youngest sons, but I will be the older one.  My mother-in-law will celebrate 100 years in June.

As I walk around realizing that my Grandmother is now in heaven, after being part of my life for 54 years, I reflected on both of my grandmothers' strengths, all of their strengths.

Science will say that I have a legacy of long-life, but that isn't the part that I hope I glean from my grandmothers.  Both were women of faith.  I'm not talking about the kind that says they believed, but it didn't change their lives. I am talking about actual relationships with their Savior.   They knew that they only made it through life's struggles because He was with them.  They knew It is Well with My Soul and not just by singing.

(Benjamin with my grandmother...the last of her great-grandchildren. She didn't live to see her great, great grandchildren)

Granny Mac - was widowed in her 30's, left with five children
                      lost two sons to cancer
                      lost a grand daughter to cancer
                      widowed again later in life when her second husband died from age
These alone would take some people under, but not my Granny Mac. She expressed her relationship with the Lord with her singing, (my Sunday Singing posts are dedicated to her), as well serving Meals-on-Wheels well into her later mature years.  When she wrote a card, she always wrote of God's faithfulness and grace.

Her love for life was heard through her laugh.  She also could hand-sew and would always volunteer to do the hand-sewing I hated.  Later she would hand-quilt me a wall hanging.  One thing that I shared with her was she also had four sons and one daughter.  I passed her up on the number of boys with Benjamin, only because she was widowed so early.

She was one strong woman, but her strength was from the Lord.

My Granny C was my strong, farm Grandmother.  She was by far the best cook I have ever been around and her biscuits were amazing.   She also taught me how to quilt.  My graduation gift from her was a quilt she made for me from scraps of my own clothes.   She lived on her own, on a farm, well into her 90's.  She taught me the love for the land.  I always felt so close to God at her home as the wind blew through the screen porch. She taught Sunday School well into her more mature years. She also knew how to allow boys to be boys.

Struggles she walked through
     - widowed for 29 years
     - lost her only daughter to cancer, 22 years ago
     - became my cousins' "mother", whose mother had passed, and walked them through the loss of their mother, as well as growing up

She was one strong woman, but her strength was from the Lord.

(Our daughter and her grandmother during her first pregnancy)

My mother-in-law also belongs with these women of strength.  She has been a widow for over 20 years.  She walked through the struggles of seeing her husband recover from a broken back and a near-fatal accident that literally blew off part of his face.  Multiple surgeries restored many of his facial features and in his later years, he suffered from Alzheimer's disease.  She also lived on her own well into her 90's.  She loves her family.

She is one strong woman, but her strength is from the Lord.

These women have endured many hardships and not walked away from the Lord. Instead, they have all been strengthened by their relationship with Him.

If I have any legacy, or my children inherit anything from these women, I pray it is their faithfulness in their Christian walk.  May I also remember, when I even think life is hard, that these women blazed a trail for me that points me to their source of strength.  As I walk through my grief, I mourn a lot of what I wish had been, but I stand secure in what was..............and that is more important than what my earthly flesh would desire.

Miss You Granny C and Granny Mac...thank you!