A letter to my Grandma

Dear Grandma,

Just wanted to say how much I enjoyed spending time with you when I was young. How you would let me do whatever I wanted when I came round to stay. I loved your Readybrek and the box of buttons you kept in the long wooden drawer from the cupboard in the dining room. I loved the box of dressing up clothes you kept in the ‘cubby hole’ under the stairs. You told me once that they were Auntie Joan and Auntie Jill’s old underskirts ... they were made up of lots of netting and really stuck out when you put them on. I remember you had a piano in the front room behind the settee and a teapot that looked like a cottage on the fireplace. Sometimes you would ask me to go and buy a loaf of bread from Basils (the store in Chinley) and would always let me buy toffees with the change.
I remember going to Chesterfield with you and granddad in the car. Marilyn, Graham and I were huddled on the back seat in a blanket and we eat a full box of Ritz crackers on the way. I went to Uncle Jacks house in Grassmoor a few times with you and never realised it was your family home and that you had grown up there. I wonder if you ever went to stay with your grandma?
One thing I never told you was I didn’t like your cups of tea. You would use tealeaves without a tea strainer and sometimes, towards the end of the cuppa I would get a mouthful of tealeaves. I still can’t finish a cup of tea even now!!
At Christmas you would always put up an artificial tree in the front room and decorate it. I always loved the wire purse with the chocolate coins in it. I hang one on our tree now and always think of you when I see it. You always hung a Father Christmas head on the spiky mirror in the hall and called him ‘Farder Mitmut’.
When granddad died I would sleepover at weekends and we would go to the Liberal Club together on a Saturday night and then you would let me sleep with you in your bed –“don’t forget the pickle bucket” you would say. The bathroom was downstairs so we would take a bucket to bed with us just in case we got caught short in the night, I always felt safe and warm and free when I stayed with you. I think we must have been two of a kind and I am sure most of my genes come from the Foster side of the family I am very proud to say ... lol!
You would sit in ‘your’ chair by the side of the coal fire in the dining room and would always know just when to poke the coals to keep the fire going. Sometimes when someone asks me a question I smile to myself as I can hear you answer me in your quirky way – Q: Where are you? A: I’ve run off with a black man Q: What’s for tea A: lard tarts with bread and pullit.
The day they told me you were gone was the saddest day of my life but I am happy to say my memories of the times we shared are amongst the happiest I have known.

Love you always – Vanda xxx