Sep 21 2009
Mother Lovett: Prologue.
I began blogging for 2 reasons.
1. maternal grandmother.
2. paternal grandmother.
Let’s start with materal grandmother. Many moons ago, my dad lovingly nicknamed his mother-in-law ‘Mother Lovett.’
‘Lovett’ being her last name. And it certainly was her last name, since she was married to brothers.
Yes people, she was married twice – to BROTHERS. How cool is that?
How 1700’s of her.
Unfortunately, she passed away in late April of this year at the ripe, old age of 87. Her stories live on. And Lordy, let me tell you, THERE ARE STORIES.
We could write a sitcom.
That is an understatement. I wish you could understand.
I will get to the hilarious goods at some point in my blog, but for now I have to give you the excellent background on her so you don’t think I’m hellishly cruel.
She was a baker. A mighty fine one at that. She most likely is the reason I adore baking, and I won’t lie when saying that baking these days occasionally makes me tear up since it is something I used to share with her.
Well, actually when I say ’share,’ I really mean I took orders from her for a few hours standing in her kitchen.
But that’s a different story.
She suffered 7 miscarriages, and was diagnosed with Menear’s disease in her 20’s, causing her to lose all hearing in one ear. She had macular degeneration, a serious eye disease which cause her to lose almost ALL of her sight. She lost her siblings. She cared for her cancer-stricken mother in her own home, losing her only 4 months before she lost her first husband, the love of her life. He passed away before I was born, so I never knew my true grandfather.
Luckily for us, she remarried.
His brother. Her brother-in-law.
I know.
I can’t imagine marrying my brother-in-law. Partly because I don’t have one. But if I did, and if he looked like George Clooney, I guess I would.
This truly was a wonderful thing, this marriage of my grandmother and her brother-in-law. He and his wife (don’t worry, she had passed away as well) were never able to have children, which meant by marrying my grandmother, he inherited 2 daughters (or neices….yikes) and 5 grandchilden. Amazing man. Wonderful. Words can’t describe.
However, many times in my life I remember my grandmother telling me about her whirlwind love with her first husband, Gerald. I specifically remember one evening at the beach her eyes welling up with tears when speaking about him.
‘That love was the greatest love I had ever felt. If you ever find that, don’t ever lose it.’ She STILL missed him after more than 30 years. THAT is love.
Perhaps she is where I got my passion from?
The longer she is gone the more I realize what a strong woman she was. Of course, we all knew this as she infuriated us at the age of 86 trimming bushes, climbing ladders, and carrying 40lb pots up the driveway.
I don’t mean strong THAT way.
She lost 2 husbands, and still talked about love. She still wore high heels to church, even though we fought her on it. She still went to church on Sunday, even though she was legally blind, deaf, and hunched over from severe osteoporosis. She walked around with 4 blockages in 3 arteries for 20 years. Suffered a heart attack, multiple broken bones, and bounced back from injuries when the majority of us would believe it was time to give up.
I better be wearing heels at 87.
Yes we called her stubborn, but now I call her strong.
She was so stubborn strong, she basically refused to die. And we really never thought she would. I mean…REALLY. We were all there to watch her last breath. And she put up a damn good fight.
Again, an understatement.
(Which I find quite odd, since I am extremely dramatic.)
Everyone ALWAYS complimented her on her beauty. She had an excellent sense of style. I never saw the beauty until recently. Of course I loved her, but she was my GRANDMA.
Beauty wasn’t the first thing to come to mind. Seeing how many Reese’s cups I could shove in my mouth at one time without anyone noticing at her house was.
What do you think?
You will never believe what began her demise.
She had a heart attack while hand-mixing a cake.
She could always do everything better herself, anyways.
You totally made me cry!! lol I think *I* miss her!
What a wonderful inspiration… a motivation when we want to quit.
You have quite a way with words my dear!
God bless-
Amanda
What a beautiful and touching story! Can’t wait to read more
love that story, what an adorable and amazing woman! thank you for sharing that touching story
That’s a great story!
She sounds like one amazing and strong woman…I am sure there are lots of lessons to learn from her life.
She sounds like a truly amazing woman! I can’t wait to hear more about her!
Thanks! I have some truly hilarious stories about her.
LOTS of lessons! You are right!
Thanks Naomi! More to come.
I am enjoying your blog, too!
what a strong and inspiring woman! she is so beautiful! thanks for sharing her story with us
She is so beautiful! How blessed you are to have had so many loving years with her. I look forward to more stories!
what a neat woman! i love the way you really captured her essence in such a short amount of space. what a lil’ firecracker!
That is the sweetest story and she is just adorable!! What an amazing person to have had in your life. Thanks for sharing!!
- Beth @ http://www.DiningAndDishing.com
Jessica,
What a beautiful tribute to your grandmother. I hope one day my grandchildren remember me for my humor and grit! She was so elegant. I know you must miss her terribly. Keep up her passion for life and you will do well. Stop by and enter my contest this week!
Jessica,
This is unrelated to you post but I am curious. Is that chocolate curls in the picture at the top of your blog? I just did a wedding cake with white chocolate curls…what a job! It is in one of my older posts.
Such a great tribute! I adore senior citizens – I’m actually looking for a retirement community to volunteer at, so stories like this one make my day. Thanks for sharing!
Wow! What a story. And how adorable was she?
What a beautiful story! I have a similar marriage story in my family. My great grandmother died and (not immediately) my great grandfather married his wife’s sister. To complicate things more my great grandparents had a daughter and then my gr-grandfather had two more children with his second wife. So now, my grandmother’s half cousins are half siblings too. (She always called them full siblings.) She was a bit older than them and one of them married someone even younger and had children. So my mom’s cousins are all my age. It can make for a confusing family reunion.
That is confusing! I thought mine was confusing, but you win.
Ohmigosh you have to be so sweet – I do not have much patience and am not sure if I could work with them daily.
It IS white chocolate curls! My wedding cake was so yummy – chocolate cake with fudge filling, white chocolate icing and white chocolate curls. I tried to savor it, but in typical ‘bride’ fashion, I don’t remember much about the meal.
Awww! What a wonderful hilarious sweet story! You know, perhaps I am just an oddball, but my first thought when I saw the pictures of her was “what a beautiful woman!” Of course, I think the same thing of my grandmas and great-grandmas, so I may well be weird!
Actually, I tend to see all wonderful old ladies as being beautiful, even if they aren’t physically. 
[...] 50 years, we had finally moved her out of the house her husband built. (I know you are wondering which husband, it was her [...]
Thank you! She was a cutiepie!
[...] me how I knew to make a roux. I knew long before I ever watched The Food Network, because Mother Lovett used to make one all the time for her famous macaroni and [...]
[...] also decide at this time that I would call my grandmother - no, not Mother Lovett – I needed someone who could actually SEE and HEAR – but my other grandmother, who lived only [...]
[...] kiss from my grandma. With Mother Lovett squeezing in the picture on the lower [...]
[...] almost seemed like there was meat in the dish. It runs a close second to Mother Lovett’s ham and bean soup that is truly AH MAY [...]
[...] here is a recipe I found deep in the pages of one of Mother Lovett’s recipe books. You know, those crazy-beautiful books from the 1950’s that have yellow pages? I [...]
[...] Not me. No way. I am not at all like Mother Lovett. [...]
[...] but decided I would try that at a later time. I had a white chocolate baking bar that, in true Mother Lovett fashion, is about 3 years old. How on earth did that escape my [...]
[...] taken that night than any other Christmas Eve, and incessant shouting occured while shoving Mother Lovett into as many pictures possible for as long as possible while others furiously scrubbed the carpet [...]
[...] recipe comes from my other grandmother (not Mother Lovett), who I haven’t really touched upon too much on the blog [...]
[...] the picture of Mother Lovett in the upper right corner. I set it up there so she could ‘look over’ me while I cook [...]
[...] Mother Lovett always yelled at me when I did everything cracked eggs over the bowl of dough. She told me to crack them into a smaller bowl. I learned the hard way one day when I was making chocolate chip cookies with the last of my flour and sugar. I dropped the entire egg into the mix – shell and all, ruining the entire batch. [...]
[...] talked about Mother Lovett alot. And I have so much more to [...]
[...] These here are a tradition of Mother Lovett’s. [...]
What an amazing woman!! She sounds so wonderful, so full of life until the end! Reminds me of my grandmother who is 91 and still as spunky as ever. I pray that I’ll be a spunky old lady like your grandmother or mine.
[...] course I followed these instructions. I can’t imagine being haunted by Mother Lovett from her grave. I can just see her ghost following me through the grocery store and throwing stool [...]
ah she reminds me of my own grandmother, who also suffered miscarriages, meanears disease (sp?), hearing loss, and is three time breast cancer survivor. she had massive heart failure 3 years ago and even while her heart rate was only 20 beats per minute, she still had enough pep to thank the firefighters who came to her rescue and ask them what their favorite kind of cookies were. NO joke. I was there! i kept telling her, shut up gram, let them work on you! while she was pushing them away saying she was ok to walk outside. lol
this lady, will out live us all!!!!!
[...] it was just as memorable for her, since she spent the majority of the evening in the restroom with Mother Lovett who needed help with her [...]
[...] recipe came from a combination of The Neely’s sauce and Mother Lovett’s. When I went through Mother Lovett’s recipes, I found one for barbeque sauce. It [...]
[...] always right. Tonight I started writing my cookbook proposal. Tonight I started pouring stories of Mother Lovett out on paper, for the first time other than on my blog. For those of you who don’t know, [...]
[...] Mother Lovett was famous for her coconut cream pie. I was famous for eating it. [...]
[...] That isn’t true at all, but I thought it would make a nice visual. If it was true, I would have gladly handed over my wheat slider buns, pretending that she was Mother Lovett. [...]
[...] to their house, we relaxed while I layed on her couch before leaving. I have spoke so much of Mother Lovett on my blog. Writing about her comes easily to me. It has been hard for me to even find the words [...]
[...] gave me the perfect chance to try Mother Lovett’s perfect pie crust. And when I say try, I really mean fail miserably 14 times before not even coming [...]
[...] Mother Lovett made some delicious, creamy macaroni and cheese, and I was always trying to perfect it. She always told me my version was ’too dry.’ Of course it was, because Inever used 6lbs of velveeta. [...]