March 19, 2021

Rockin' PawDad's party

March 19, 2021/ Lisa Carpenter

The recent weekend in which my family was all together—a relatively uncommon occurrence even in the best of times—featured not only Robert’s baptism, as I previously shared, but a milestone birthday celebration, too. That milestone being Jim’s sixtieth birthday.

The birthday festivities, organized primarily by Megan, revolved around a rockin’ theme as …

September 19, 2019

Six blessings of my dog's senior status

September 19, 2019/ Lisa Carpenter

Our dog is getting old. Depending on the chart used, Mickey — the pit-pointer we rescued at six weeks old — has reached senior status, hovering anywhere around 80 years old to 93 or so.

Mickey’s advanced age is obvious in myriad ways. The bold brown coloring on his face has gone gray, he has trouble on stairs, he sleeps much of the time, he rarely gets excited about even his once most favorite things … including squirrels needing his exuberant escorting out of the yard and …

August 29, 2019

School papers and similarly sentimental stuff

August 29, 2019/ Lisa Carpenter

During my daughters’ school years, I kept all the papers and projects they brought home from school. Everything. Spelling tests, stories, handwriting practice (they did that back then), certificates earned for field day and perfect attendance, report cards for each quarter of each year.

I kept it all. Times three. All in cardboard boxes in a storage space beneath the house we lived in for the duration of the girls’ school years. Lots of …

March 08, 2019

Flashback: 10 signs of aging gracefully

March 08, 2019/ Lisa Carpenter

Dear readers: This piece on the secret to aging gracefully originally appeared on Grandma’s Briefs on March 24, 2013. Six years later, the signs still resonate with me. I hope they do with you, too. Thank you for reading my rerun.

When it comes to aging gracefully, forget the face creams, hair colors and exercises — the physical manifestations others see as we rack up the years. Instead, I prefer to focus on a different kind of trait that others see, one I think trumps the physical when considering how gracefully others are aging and how gracefully I'm aging myself.

That trait? It's attitude. For, as age is just…

January 31, 2019

Throwback Thursday: Age of reason(ing)

January 31, 2019/ Lisa Carpenter

I've always found it kind of odd when older women say they're one age, then it's found out they're actually older. I've read of this happening with celebrities and non-celebrities, where they've insisted for years that they're this old, then the truth came out upon the woman's death that they're that old, shocking adoring fans or family.

July 24, 2018

Gramma goes tubing

July 24, 2018/ Lisa Carpenter

Despite having been born in Minnesota and living in the Land of 10,000 Lakes the first decade of my life, I'm not big on water sports. To any degree. I still don't know how to swim... even after having swim lessons as a child and again at 40 years old.

I'm not deathly afraid of water, but I certainly don't seek out splishy-splashy fun in water over my head. Not even water up to my chest, to be honest.

So it should come as no surprise that I've never whiled away hours in an inner tube on a lake. Nor have I engaged in tubing…

July 17, 2018

Disrupt aging: Today's grandmas smash the stereotype... even when embracing it

July 17, 2018/ Lisa Carpenter

Disclosure: This post made possible with support from AARP's Disrupt Aging. All opinions are my own.

When I first started my blog in 2009, one of the "editorial guidelines" I set for myself was that I would not post photos of myself on my website. At that time I had been a grandma for a little over a year, and in those twelve-plus months, when I shared my grandma status with strangers—retail clerks, random folks encountered while out and about, friends-in-the-making, and so forth—I was more often than not met with the comment, "You don't look like a grandma."

As a goal for my blog was to establish myself as a go-to guide for all things related to the grandmother lifestyle, I determined that—based on such comments—posting pictures of myself might…

June 15, 2018

Flashback Friday: Back in my day

June 15, 2018/ Lisa Carpenter

Dear readers: Today is the day my firstborn learns the gender of her firstborn, scheduled for arrival in October. With all things pregnancy on my brain today, I thought this post—originally published June 13, 2011—a fitting Flashback Friday feature. Thank you for reading!

I had my youngest baby, Andrea, nearly 26 years ago (Flashback update: nearly 33 years ago!). Listening to Megan talk about pregnancy, labor, and newborn care, it's clear there have been some important—and some not-so-important—changes in the whole process since back in my day.

May 18, 2018

Movie review: Book Club

May 18, 2018/ Lisa Carpenter

I have never read the infamous 50 Shades of Grey by E.L. James. I'll try not to judge (too much) those who have. From all I've heard, it just seems too trashy—not fun-trashy just trashy-trashy—for my tastes and time. There are far too many other books on my to-read list and far too little time in which to tackle them for me to squander even seconds on trashy-trashy.

The four 60-something, forever friends of BOOK CLUB initially seem to agree with me on such. Diane (Diane Keaton), Vivian (Jane Fonda), Sharon (Candice Bergen), and Carol (Mary Steenburgen) have met monthly for decades to discuss books—reading selections made on a rotating basis—men, and more. 50 Shades of Grey is not the sort of selection the refined readers read. Initially.

May 17, 2018

Throwback Thursday: 6 things I used to know how to do but no longer can

May 17, 2018/ Lisa Carpenter

This #TBT feature originally published on Grandma's Briefs May 5, 2015—and elicited some fun comments; check out those here. Thank you for reading this rerun!

Practice indeed makes perfect. I quit practicing, though, thus quit being able to do a few things I once really enjoyed. These things.

Crochet. I learned to crochet a basic afghan when Jim and I first married nearly thirty-three years ago. Our gift to one of his sisters and her family the second Christmas together was an afghan I worked long and hard to complete by…