“I can’t want to..” It’s what her mother used to say and we all giggled and would say, oh, Grandma Edna, Stop. But when my Gra-Nana would say it, it kind of broke my heart. I’m not young anymore and now I understand this sentence.

She has always been Nana to me but when I became a Mama, she became Gra-Nana because now she had the beautiful title of GREAT Nana. Over the past few years, Gra-Nana has changed, she’s not that perky self she used to be. She has Alzheimer’s Disease. Her words are not as fluent as they once were. I see frustration in her when she wants to chat with me or the littles.

When my daughter and I took this gorgeous picture of her in the Ellie chair, she started to giggle and began to tell us a story but then abruptly stopped because she was lost for words. There’s many times you will see her posed just like this, looking for her words, wondering if we understand her still. We do, we try. Some days Gra-Nana chats it up a bit with us with an often tap-ya-on-the-shoulder way of see I told you so gesture and then others she just smiles closed mouth tightly with tears welled up. But the best slice of Gra-Nana is her tight embrace when she sees you. I’m craving one right now. A funny line that is ever so perfect with her and her life right now that Gra-Nana used to always repeat when she was talking a lot was: “You never know what you’re gonna get.” I should take her some chocolate today with a new workbook.