Another special grandmother

This was my maternal grandmother Clara Christina Pehrson Bennion. She was born in January 1869 and died in April 1949, just a few months after her 80th birthday.

Grandma's home was in Afton, Wyoming. It is located in a high mountain valley, Star Valley, and it is very cold there in the winter. Grandma came to Price to spend the winter with us for several years.

My memories of grandma are difficult to assess. Since I was so young when she passed away, sometimes I wonder whether the memories are mine or are they memories of the stories I was told about her. However, some are so vivid and personal that I cannot think they could come from anything other than my own experiences.

Grandma was a true "people person". She loved to talk and to visit with everyone. She was fun loving and had a very sharp wit and sense of humor. She got much joy and happiness out of fun little things.

One of the things I do remember is that I got to sleep with grandma in the front bedroom of our house. That was such a treat because she always had a good story she would tell to help me go to sleep. She would always say that I could take the hairpins out of her hair in the morning and play with them if I would be really quiet and not wake her. As you can see from the picture above, I still have those hairpins. I'm sure you can see how a little girl could imagine they were people, maybe even princesses and pretend a wonderful story right there in bed with grandma while being every so quiet not to wake her.

Across the street and up a couple of houses from our home was the Campus Inn. We lived just a short way from the Carbon College (now College of Eastern Utah) campus. The Campus Inn was a small hangout for students where they could go for a hamburger or ice cream, etc. I'm sure I was too little to go their by myself, and probably was there with someone. I had a new experience that I had never had before - there was a lady sitting in the Campus Inn smoking. As soon as I got home I went to grandma to tell her that I had seen a lady smoking. I vividly remember her saying, "Linda, that was not a lady, that was a woman". When I got older, I understood what grandma meant. A "lady" who was proper and refined would not participate in such a thing as smoking. Wow, what would she think today?

I also remember that when grandma was having her 80th birthday party in January of 1949, it was to be held at my uncle Merrill's home in Salt Lake. My brother John Theron and I learned a little song and dance to perform at the party. With our mom, anytime she could she found an opportunity for us to get up in front of people and perform. We practiced and practiced so we could surprise grandma with our performance. However, it was not to be since there was a huge blizzard and Price Canyon, which was treacherous when the roads were slick, was impassable. We all had to stay home except for mom, who took the train from Helper with a cooked turkey packed in a suitcase - her contribution to the festivities. Can you imagine the aroma that came from her luggage and all wondering where it was coming from.

It was the following April when all but my brother David went to the "picture show" and came home to a house full of anxiety because grandma had fallen and David couldn't lift her. She had a stroke and was taken to the hospital, where she was in a coma for a few days before she passed away. This was my beloved grandma that I had spent so much time with and slept with and played with and listened to her stories. I remember going to the funeral home and looking at her in the casket - never since that day have I wanted to go to viewings. Some childhood experiences are so engraved in your heart and mind that you just can't get over them. I still shed tears when I think about it. I remember that my cousin's husband slept in her funeral and I was so disgusted with him. How could he sleep! Ah, but then when I got older I found out he was a doctor doing his residency at the time and probably hadn't had much sleep. I guess I'm forgiven for judging him since I was only 6 years old and didn't understand.

Well, this is a mixture of memories, both of my own and of things I heard my mom and dad talk about. Either way, they are a part of me and who I am because of this wonderful person I called grandma.

A wonderful grandmother

This is my paternal grandmother, Fannie Charlotte Green Thompson. She was born December 4, 1874 and died in August 1966, almost 92 years old. She was the grandparent that I remember most from my childhood since both of my grandfathers were dead before I was born and my maternal grandmother passed away when I was 6 years old.

Grandma was English and quite reserved and "proper". I can never remember her being affectionate in the way of hugs and kisses, but I certainly always knew that she loved me and all of her family. She was a very smart and independent person. Education was very important to her and she saw to it that her children all went on to school. My father and his two sisters and one brother were all college graduates. Grandma was a member of the first class of Snow Academy, which is now Snow College.

She and my grandpa had a farm and a herd of cattle. When grandpa died in the 1930's, grandma hired a man to do the physical labor and she took care of the business end of the farming and ranching. She never wanted her sons to "stay on the farm", but encouraged them to make something better for themselves.

Grandma was a hard worker. I remember, as a small child, going to grandma's house often. As I found out later, my dad, being the son that still lived in Utah, would go and help grandma with things in the summers. Her home was always warm and inviting. She still had a coal stove in the kitchen when I was small, made her own soap, had pigs out back and a large barn or grainery and had a washer with a ringer and had to hang clothes outside to dry (summer and winter). With all our "conveniences", it is hard to imagine the physical labor it took just to do everyday chores.
It was a delightful place for a child to play. There were hollyhocks to make dolls out of and neighbor kids to play with. Sleeping in grandma's upstairs rooms was an adventure, especially in the winter when the only heat up there came from the stove in the kitchen. Brrrr, it was cold and we would climb under the covers that were big heavy quilts, so heavy that a small child found it impossible to even turn over. Grandma would come with a warm brick, wrapped in a towel and put it by our feet. There was no way you would get out, even for a nature call, until the next morning when grandma would fire up the kitchen stove for breakfast and the heat would begin to warm those upstairs rooms. Wafting up with the warmth would be the smell of bacon or sausage to finally tempt you to run as fast as you could and get your clothes on to be with grandma in the toasty warm kitchen.
Grandma was one of the most fair-minded people you could ever know. She had a way, without the overt show of affection, to make you know you were a most special person to her. She is the one that taught me to crochet, as she was an expert. She made a tablecloth for each grandchild that consisted of 144 medallions that she crocheted separately and then put them together into a beautiful cloth. This was made of very fine thread and they are beautiful. I still have mine today. She was also an expert quilter and would make beautiful scrap quilts out of fabric from clothes that had been worn out or grown out of. My quilt was a "flower garden" quilt made of little hexagons, each cut out separately, pieced together by hand and then put together and quilted by hand. Grandma would be totally amazed today at the big single armed machine quilters that can do the job in such a short time. I have a feeling she would opt for the old way and the great satisfaction that comes from a project that you have spent many many hours putting together and finishing with your own two hands.
Somehow, I always thought I was grandma's favorite. Perhaps it was because from my earliest memories, she would come to Price on my birthday. How ever and whatever she had to do, she would be there for my special day. Interestingly, when talking to my cousins, they all had the same feeling. Grandma had such a way of making each one feel special. My aunt Alta lost her husband at a young age and moved back to Ephraim with her three children, the youngest only 6 weeks old. Grandma really did pretty much raise that little one as my aunt had to go back and finish school and then taught for many years in Ephraim. With her great capacity to show love and be fair to all, I was an adult and married and grandma was gone when I found out that Johnny was really grandma's favorite. Who would have thought!
Aunt Alta finally did marry again when her children were grown. She moved to Price and grandma eventually came to live with her. I was a teenager at the time and got to see grandma a lot more.
I would say that if one has to grow up with only one grandparent, this one was the best. She was an example of hard work, intelligence, honesty, faith, integrity, love, fairness, and any other virtue that I can think of to describe her. Someday I will see her again and it will be joyous!

History of a piano

Ah, the hours I have spent sitting at this piano practicing and playing over the last 62 years. I was probably about 5 years old when my grandma Bennion bought this Story & Clark home grand for my mother. Grandma passed away shortly after my sixth birthday and I do remember the big old upright that we had, so it had to be in about 1948 that we received this wonderful instrument.

One could never say that it ever sat and collected dust. From the day it was delivered, I would venture to guess it has been played almost every day by my mother, my brother John and I, and the hundreds of piano students that mom taught to play. If you look closely at the top picture, you will see just behind the keys, the imprint of the many fingernails that struck there as all those fingers "tickled the ivories" and inadvertently missed their mark. The Story and Clark name has pretty much been obliterated. Also, the keys are a little bit concave from the wear.

Why, if this piano could speak in words, the many tales it would tell of piano students, singing groups, and family just standing around for a sing along. Mom taught students, starting with one or two in the morning before school and several after school until sometimes 7 or 8 o'clock at night. Saturday was an all day thing with students coming from all around Carbon and Emery Counties for their lessons. In addition to her piano students, she always had several vocal students and groups of boys or girls that she would teach to sing harmony parts. She was always preparing music for a program or wedding or funeral and often used her students to perform.

For me it began at an early age playing in mom's recitals. Then when I was about 11, she got a group of my friends to come to our house once a week for singing lessons. She taught us to sing parts and had us singing in her programs, beginning in the 6th grade. In junior high, we were always in the assemblies, singing and dancing to entertain. And in many community programs and church programs, also.

Back to memories of this piano. I sat on mom's lap while she taught students and begged to learn to play. She started me at age 5, but then felt I should wait a little until I could learn the alphabet and be able to read. Patiently, (I doubt it) I waited until I was in 1st grade and then finally I started to learn. After the basics, mom felt it would be better if I took lessons from another teacher. We had a neighbor that played piano so I took lessons from her and mom taught her boy. Then when I was 12, just out of 6th grade, one of mom's students had an uncle coming to stay with his elderly mother for the summer. He taught music at a college in California and wanted a few advanced students to teach for the three months he was there. So began my lessons with Frank Magliocco. He was a great teacher and could play like noone I had heard at that point in my young life. He required 3 hours a day of practice, 1 hour of scales and exercises and 2 hours of practice on pieces. Mom and I traveled to Helper every week to have our lesson - she took from him also. He would only teach classical music, I remember asking him if I could learn Rhapsody in Blue and he said that he would teach me the classics and then I could play anything I wanted that was "popular music" on my own. A bit miffed at the time, I now know that what he said was true. I took lessons from him every summer, the last being the summer after I graduated from high school.

Well, that is why I say I have spent many hours on that piano bench playing that piano. I may be sentimental, but it evokes such memories that I have to say I dearly love the faithful and well-used old sweetheart. I truly wouldn't trade it for a brand new one, and will keep playing it for as long as I can. With loving care, it will last longer than I will.

The beginning of a garden

See those few plants in the top picture and see that grow box? Today is a red letter day, because the garden/grow box is about to be planted. It may not look like much to fill that grow box, but just you wait and see - it will not only be full, but overflowing (hopefully) with good things to eat. Tomatoes, peppers, onions, potatoes, beans, beets, carrots, chard, and cucumbers. Those bags are full of nutrimulch and once we get that dug in the planting will take place. A watering system will be set up, but until then I will get this all started and water by hand until the drip system is put in place.

My gardening experience started when I was very young and my dad had me help plant the garden. He convinced me that I was the only one that could throw in the potatoes while he held the soil back with the shovel. Ah, the taste of fresh peas just out of the pod - more went into my tummy than in the bowl to be cooked for dinner. Also, there started my love of fresh tomatoes. I have been known to eat so many that I got hives from the acid. I guess 6 or 8 tomatoes a day was a little much! There is nothing like fresh vegetables from a garden - the store just cannot get them to you with that taste and delicious crispness.

Hopefully, this first experience in St. George will be a good one - only time will tell.

Tribute to Mom

These are pictures of my mother, Clara Bennion Thompson, one in her prime and one just months before her death at age 97.

I thought it appropriate to write a brief tribute to her life on this Mother's Day.

She was born on August 21, 1910 and passed away on December 23, 2007, having lived a full and wonder ful life. She was born in Vernal, Utah and lived there until she was in the sixth grade. The family moved to Afton, Wyoming, where she spent the rest of her growing up years. She always had a great love for Star Valley. That is where she met my father and they traveled to Salt Lake to be married in the Salt Lake Temple on June 4, 1930. She was a long-time resident of Price, Utah where she and dad lived and raised three children. My oldest brother David Byron was born in 1933, a second son John Theron in 1939 and then I came along, Linda June, in 1943.

Mom was given many gifts and talents and willingly shared them with all that knew her. She loved people, music and service in the Church. For many years she taught children to play the piano and how to sing. She had a creative gift and expressed it through oil painting, quilting, knitting and crocheting, poetry, music and writing scripts and music for road shows, assemblies and programs. Blessed with a beautiful soprano voice, she sang at innumerable funerals, weddings and community functions. I can remember many times when she would get a call from one of the local mortuaries with a plea for her to come at the last minute and either play the organ or provide a song for a funeral. She was always prepared to do so, many times not even knowing the deceased. The week before her stroke, she was still playing the piano to entertain and brighten the lived of the people that lived in the Beehive Home, where she lived for the last 17 months of her life. Her goal in life was to always "brighten someone's day", to make them feel good and to be happy. When I hear people say you should fill your life with positive and good things, I think of my mom. She could always boost my spirit with her optimism and love and encouraging words.

A few of the written comments at the time of her funeral were:

"Clara was and always will be one of the biggest musical inspirations I've had."
"It has been many years since I last saw her, but I think of her nearly every day."
"I just consider myself lucky to have had her be a part of my life."
"I lived in Clara's ward in Price for many years. She was a ray of sunshine in everyone's life."
"She was always more than willing to give of her time and her talents were amazing."
"She had a god-given talent at the piano and a feeling of how to make music compelling and meaningful."
"I have thought about Clara many times over the years and tried to emulate her cheerful, fun, countenance and ability to laugh at herself."
"She was a bright beacon to follow and her enthusiasm for music was contagious and her spirit unforgettable."
And last a comment from someone who knew her for only a few weeks at Beehive Homes:
"I felt the sweet spirit of Sister Thompson immediately."

After her stroke, when she could neither swallow nor utter a single sound, she made her love known to all around her. She pointed to me, my husband Jerry and then the door to let us know we were to get on with our lives. That happens to be one of the times I just couldn't obey mom. Except for going home to sleep, I sat by her side through the last days she had on the earth. Finally, before I left on Saturday, December 22, 2007, I leaned over and whispered in her ear, "It's time to go, mom, you need to go be with dad." Early morning on Sunday December 23, 2007 exactly 23 years almost to the hour from dad's death on Sunday, December 23, 1984, mom passed through the veil to join her beloved family. I miss her every day, but know that she is there waiting and brightening the lives of all she comes in contact with, just as she did on this earth.

Following are the words to a song my mom wrote many years ago as a tribute to her mother, my grandma Bennion. They are perfect for my feelings about my mother today.

I remember mama when there's gentle falling rain,
As she used to rock and sing close by the window pane.

I remember mama in the cold and dreary night,
Soft white hands caressing me to ease my childhood fright.

I remember mama in her apron clean and bright,
Teaching little hands to mold the rising bread, so light.

I remember mama lying peacefully as we wept,
Silver hair and pleated robe, hands folded as she slept.

I remember mama and my heart is light and free,
Yes, I remember mama, now at home she waits for me.


Ah yes, I do remember mama. I miss her every day and am so thankful that I had such a wonderful mom. I know she waits for me and it will be a great reunion for we were always more than mother and daughter, we were truly soulmates from the beginning of time - this I know.

Cross stitching and life

These butterflies and the hummingbird are just a small example of the many cross stitch pictures that I have made over my life. It is something that I enjoy immensely. There is something about having a plain piece of evenweave fabric, following a pattern, and making hundreds or thousands of little crosses of many shades and hues of color that fascinates me. I sometimes get caught up in it and want to finish with a color or section of the picture, including the outlining, that just makes the images pop! It sometimes takes many weeks, months, or even years to finish a large project. I have one hanging in my home that took about 10 years from beginning to end. I planned to take a picture of it and put it on my blog, but it is framed with glass that reflects the light and the picture just didn't work out. It is a picture of an oak tree signifying my family tree. It has our family, my husband and I and our children and the four generations on each side - one for the Asay family and one for the Thompson family. I hope that it will be saved by my family for future generations.

When I named this blog lindasxstitches, it was because of my love for cross stitching, but since choosing that name, I have thought about it and feel that it has a relationship to my life. I have never been very adept at keeping a day-to-day journal. I have written down what I felt were important things from time to time, but never have kept a daily record. I now want to piece together some things that I have experienced and learned throughout my life, thus the correlation to cross stitching. As my pictures start on an empty fabric, so did my life and it has been made up of many stitches of all different shades and hues. I intend to put together a picture of my life by remembering and putting together some of the significant and probably insignificant experiences that make me who I am. One thing I am blessed with is a pretty good memory and a knack for detail. This will in no way be cronological, but will be swatches of my life that hopefully, when put together, will add up to who I am. I am truly an unfinished picture and will be until the very end. Maybe some of my grandchildren or great grandchildren will want to read it to find out about their "granny" and other ancestors.

Florida recovery

Well, I have skipped a couple of days since we left Fort Lauderdale on Friday afternoon. The taxi picked us up at about 3:50 p.m. after having difficulty finding the address. The driver took us to the airport and we had plenty of time to check in. You cannot check in more than 3 hours ahead of your flight departure and we got to the front of the line at exactly 4:30 - the plane scheduled to leave at 7:30. Even at that we were to later find that our flight from Atlanta to Vegas had us in the same seat, different rows. Not good! We were able to get some food and visit with Allen and Loni for a few minutes before they boarded their plane to leave at 6:10. We then waited for a short time and were able to board our flight before seven. The flight to Atlanta was uneventful, but the trip from Atlanta to Vegas was full of boisterous, loud people that seemed to be anticipating a stay in Vegas to party and drink and gamble. We didn't get much sleep and then finally landed in Vegas with a gain of three hours at midnight. Not wanting to take a taxi to a hotel and back for only a few hours of sleep, we opted to stay at the airport until 7:00 a.m. when the shuttle would pick us up and take us home. I'll say that the Vegas airport is not a quiet place in the middle of the night. They have a blaring video going all night advertising the shows currently on the strip. How many times did we hear it repeat? We talked, I did a sudoku, read, walked around and finally we went out to find the shuttle at about 6:20. It was there waiting and we got in and sat until the other passengers came. The last a young girl who had to have a smoke before she could leave. Our friends, Don and Lorna Suggs, met us at the Howard Johnson's and took us home. We did get to Harmon's to buy a few needed groceries, but the afternoon was mostly spent sleeping. We got up and showered at about 5:00 and went to our Stake Conference meeting. Boy, did that bed feel good - nothing like your own bed and especially when you haven't really slept for a couple of days. Today we are still trying to get our bods to adjust, however, we did get on the move this morning and Jerry went to the Stake Priesthood Leadership meeting at 7:30 and we went to the meeting at 10:00. This afternoon has been good for napping, and eating, and checking email, and lazing around. Hopefully, tomorrow will see us closer to normal as we have much to do to catch up on things. Our house and yard were found safe and sound. The Harmers did a great job of mowing the lawn, etc.