Women's February Blog - Grandma’s

My grandma passed away on our first anniversary. When we got that call, we quickly lit our anniversary candle and stopped at the oh-so-romantic Taco Bell for dinner as we drove out of town.

Now, it’s 41 years later — yes, I’ve been married that long — and yesterday I went through one of the last tubs of photos from my parents’ home after moving my dad out in July of 2024, following my mom’s passing.

Oh, ladies … what a treasure.

Out of all the boxes, tubs, piles, and the bulk of items to sort, this was one of my very favorite tubs. The treasures inside were pictures, scrapbooks, and memorabilia from my grandmother, my mom, and my dad. It included photos of relatives who lived in the late 1800s and early 1900s — horse-and-buggy kind of pictures — parents with six children. Long dresses, bonnets, and an assortment of grins, as well as unsmiling faces, adorned the expressions of relatives from long ago. Their lives looked hard. Their expressions seemed full of need.

There were pictures of my dad’s father when he was a youngster in 1915. My grandmother’s scrapbook was filled with treasures from her church, poems she clipped, accomplishments she celebrated, a couple of my dad’s grade school report cards, programs from performances by my aunts — so many memories of lives well lived and centered around our Lord. The legacy was immense.

Then I opened a scrapbook that my mom had clearly put together. The photos were set on black cardstock paper, each one held in place with corner tabs. She had written under each photo in white ink. Her penmanship was always perfect, and in this book she made no exception. There were pictures of old boyfriends she had in high school, her majorette photo in uniform, and a formal she dressed up for in a dress I know my grandmother made.

Then came the icing on the cake — pictures of my dad and where he served in the Army in the 1950s. He was stationed in Germany, and there were photos of hundreds of single-person pup tents set up in a large field, of barracks, mess halls, castles, friends, and of my dad.

And then, among the loose pictures, was the sweetest treasure of my dad’s childhood.

He talks now about memories gone by. He grew up on a farm in Iowa. They had cows, a few acres of farmland, and the county’s hatchery. As I flipped from one picture to the next, delighted by the history I was privileged to see, there it was — a photo of the hatchery on my dad’s family farm.

He speaks so endearingly of this hatchery and then turns to sadness because the 100-foot-long building burned to the ground at some point. But in my hands, there it was — glorious and beautiful — just like my dad has described so many times.

I can’t wait to share these pictures with him on our visit this week. I am filled with joy and hope this brings delight to my dad as well.

I hope you have treasures from your past. I pray that the Lord is, and has been, a part of your family’s story. And if He has not — if you are the first — I am so thankful that you believe and are part of His family.

- Traci Hollingsworth