Memories are interesting. Sometimes you want something specific and can’t remember and other times they just come to you as you go about your day. Her parents named her Marie Rose Barnes but I know she was called Rose most of the time.
In a v-mail letter from Dad to her during the War, he calls her Rosalie and Kitten.
Bishop Chidester called her “Roses”. She loved her husband, children and grandchildren. She was careful in her grooming and dress; always neat. House dresses were the normal attire and she wore them with tennis shoes and white anklet socks. Sundays and going out were times for nicer dresses and suits; she liked to wear shoes with heels.
She washed her 3 daughters’ hair and rolled it in curlers Saturday night to be ready for Sunday. I didn’t like my hair done and sometimes it was tangled. I probably cried or fussed when she combed it. sometimes Dad would comb the tangles from mine while she fixed my sisters’ hair. Her favorite color was blue.
She liked cats and dogs. She had a dog named Pal when she was about eight years old. She was probably nine or ten when she had Mickey and Mindy, both black kitties; a teenager when she had Tiger, who was striped and Fluffy who was a white long-haired cat when she graduated from high school.
Fluffy
One memory is very clear except I can’t remember how old I was. I might have been about 5. We were in the back bedroom, which at the time was the width of the house and we three girls slept and played there. The linoleum was red and yellow. Mom was sitting on one of the wooden chairs that went with the little table and chair set. We were sorting and picking up toys; just the two of us. There was a little hole in the linoleum.
We used to play Jacks on the kitchen floor. She was good! We sat on the linoleum and bounced the ball and picked up the jacks starting with onesies and going all the way up to ten. She was very patient when I had to chase the ball because I bounced it on the jacks or didn’t catch it after the first bounce. We cut out paper dolls together; she helped with the tricky cuts because I was too impatient with the scissors.
I often had bad dreams; nightmares and would cry out in my sleep, wakening to her calling my name. She would sit on the bed and talk to me and help me calm down. As I got older I became more aware of letting others sleep and would turn on my lamp and read the Book of Mormon until I could go back to sleep. She would see my light and come to see if I was alright. Only after many years did I realize that she must have been awake because she couldn’t sleep and was probably in pain and sick.
She taught me to cross-stitch and other embroidery stitches when I was eight or nine. When I learned to crochet at age 11, she was not able to help me much so Grandma Barnes taught me. When she began to lose the feeling in her hands, she took up fabric embroidery painting and hoped that would help her hands. She crocheted edges on pillow cases, dresser scarves, handkerchiefs and other things. She embroidered those same items and even began knitting a blue sweater for Dad. We think she didn’t finish it because he was allergic to wool. I don’t remember seeing her knit, but I do remember the embroidering, crocheting, though not as much and sewing.
She liked to sew and had been sewing since she was a girl. She and her friend, Fern Peterson, made their high school baccalaureate dresses for graduation. Mom’s was a turquoise blue dress with a white collar. Her formal was a pale blue. I appreciate the description she put on the back of these pictures before she mailed them to Dad during the War. She made baby clothes, dresses, pajamas, aprons and even a white fur muff and mitten set for Cherie and I one Christmas. On year all the girls received aprons which had our names machine-embroidered on them. One Christmas we each received a pajama bag in the shape of a Panda-bear head. There is a picture of one our cousins holding one; I don’t know how many she made. It was fun to put our pajamas away in the pajama bag instead of our drawer each morning.
I believe the death of her older brother, Lloyd, at the age of seven, when she was only four may be the main reason her parents were very protective of her as a child. She wasn’t the healthiest child and that kept her indoors much of the time. When they visited Milton, Utah, where her mother’s family lived, she could run around and play with her cousins outside.
Some favorite foods that I remember she liked: tapioca pudding, rice pudding, roast beef dinners, corn on the cob and chicken on the grill made by Dad, Farr’s banana nut ice cream. She made lemon meringue pie for Dad’s birthday and canned fruit every summer.
Dad always had clean and pressed shirts for work and church assignments. Mom made sure his National Guard and Army Reserve uniforms were ironed and ready for him. She was an example of support and patience while Dad served in many callings and was away from home for meetings and Scout outings.
When the grandchildren came along, there was one girl after another for the first four. She enjoyed buying dresses and slips for their birthdays and for Christmas. When her first grandson was born, he too received nice clothes for church, even a suit when he was three years old. When she could no longer do the shopping for her grandchildren’s birthdays and Christmas, she sent Dad. He once said that he just got what she told him to.
Neta and I were taking care of her when Dad went to the hospital for heart by-pass surgery in May 1992. She had been sick and we were afraid she was getting dehydrated. Neta was trying to reach her doctor by phone and couldn’t get the help we needed. We knew she was getting worse and were talking about what to do next, when from her bed we heard her say, “Could we say a prayer?” Of course we prayed. That was a lesson to me.
