Sissy Stories: The Offering Plate

I have been thinking the past few weeks that I need to start teaching Ava that she is expected to put something monetary into the offering plate when it comes her way. Even though she is a year and a half, I think we need to begin training her to do things like this. Hopefully, if she has always done it, she won't stop when she is older and begins to make her own money. Plus, I want to teach her how to give back. We are not rich folks, but we sure have been blessed with a lot. She needs to learn that we give back to God...after all, it all belongs to him, right?

I hated to begin this today because Jeremy was out of town, but I had to start sometime. Since Greta's arrival, one of our elders and his wife (John and Sherry Barrow) have begun to sit with us and help us out. Since Jeremy is the song leader, there is a period of about 20 minutes where I do not have his help. John and Sherry have been a tremendous help to me during that time! I really needed them today since I would be parenting alone for the whole service. I passed down a quarter to Sherry, who was holding Ava, and asked her to make sure that Ava put it into the plate. When the time came, I leaned over and whispered, "Ava, put it into the plate." She dropped the quarter into the plate with no hesitation! Yay! I don't know if it would have gone so well if we had asked her to put a goldfish into the plate! She loves her "shish." :) I hope it is always that easy for her to give back.

Anyway, this made me think of my sister, Brittany, when she was younger. My mom would always give us money to put into the offering plate at church. One time, when my mom was not looking, Brittany kept the dollar that my mom gave her and slipped a couple of dimes into the plate instead. When we got into the car to go home, Brittany had the dollar out. My mom asked her where she got it. Brittany, without any embarrassment or regret, explained that she wanted to keep the dollar and put dimes into the plate instead. She wanted a new Barbie doll. I can't believe I remember that! I also remember being so mad! Not because she didn't put the money into the plate, but because I wanted a new Barbie too! Why didn't I think of saving my offering plate money and offering dimes instead? :) ha! My little child brain!

All of this really did not have a point, it was just a memory that I wanted to share. It's funny how life experiences trigger memories of a different time in my life. Plus, I really like to share funny stories about Aunt "Beet." I know Ava will love to hear about this one day!

Sissy Stories: A Dance With A Junebug

When Ava is older, I hope she can laugh at all the nonsense that went on during my childhood. I was not a crazy child. I was pretty quiet and stayed around my moms legs most of the time. I was extremely introverted and could even cry if you said "hi" to me. I did not want anyone to notice me! My sister, on the other hand, was very social!! Our teenage neighbors would come over to our house after school to fix Brittany's hair and push her on the swing. I would rather sit in the house and read a book. She was always invited to birthday parties; I was not. I don't say all this so you feel sorry for me. Believe me, I was totally comfortable in my own skin and did not care to do all the things she did. We have always been polar opposites and I accepted that at an early age. :)

I am not going to pretend that I was the perfect child. I was not. I did my fair share of back-talking, stomping off to my room, and door slamming (and my parents wore out my rear end for it too!) But I do believe that God gave Brittany all the sass! 

One evening, my mom and I were sitting in our living room watching TV. I was about 7 years old and Brittany was about 4 years old. Brittany was outside playing on the back porch even though it was dusk (you could not keep that girl inside for nothing!) The funniest part was that she was wearing her little white lace underwear with a pink bow on the front. She had a little white lace camisole to match. All of the grand-daughters had gotten a set of white lace panties with a matching camisole for Christmas. Brittany looked like a little lady; she always had perfume, high heels, and jewelry on, but if you looked at her nails, you would see dirt caked under them. She was an expert mud pie maker!! 

My mom walked to the back door and told Brittany to come inside. About 5 minutes passed and my mom went to the back door again. This time, Britt was a little sassy to her. My mom put a stop to it and told her to get inside NOW! Brittany walked into the living room where I was and put her hands on her hips. She smarted off to me too although I don't remember what she said. My mom sent her to her room to change into pajamas. As soon as Brittany turned around, my mom and I saw it! A HUGE Junebug attached to the lace on the back of Brittany's underwear!! (I guess she got what was coming to her!) :) I said, "Brittany, there is a huge Junebug on your underwear" (we were not allowed to say "butt"  until we were much older) Brittany kind of snarled at me and said, "nuh-uh." Woooo!! She was so SASSY!! My mom and I both pleaded with her to get it off, but she would not believe us. My mom finally said, "Fine!" Brittany did her prissy little march into her bedroom. It was quiet for a second and then all of a sudden we heard this piercing scream coming from the hallway. Brittany came running into the living room crying and begging my mom to "GET IT OFF!" As it turns out, Brittany had sort of believed us. She just didn't want us to know it. She had gone into her bedroom and looked at her backside in her floor length mirror. That is when she saw the Junebug.

I am not going to lie, I laughed so hard at her. I know it is not nice to laugh at people, but it was too funny! Hmmm...maybe I will tell this story at her rehearsal dinner! Haha! Probably not. But I do love this story so much. That is why I am archiving it for Ava. My mother shared all kinds of stories about her childhood with me when I was little, and I want to do the same for Ava. Hopefully, Ava can share these stories with her children one day, if the Lord wills.

Sissy Story: Paint The Town Red...Or Maybe Just Paint The Dog!

Okay...my sister will either laugh her head off, or kill me! I think she will laugh. I mentioned to her that I wanted to post this story, but I don't know if she forgot. So here goes...

My sister and I spent most of our lives in Barry, Texas, about 5 miles from the Corsicana city limits. Barry is a community of about 125 people. We still attended Corsicana schools, but our mailing address was Barry. We lived in the middle of nowhere on Farm to Market road 1126.

From the time my sister was born, she was into everything! My mom has a picture of my sister in a walker pulling a plant down on her head. Those things were the norm with Britt. As I said in the paragraph above, we lived in a small community. This means that Brittany was bored almost all of the time! I was an avid reader and a true introvert. Not to mention, I was not outdoorsy. Brittany had virtually no one to play with. She was outside making mud pies and freezing them while I was indoors reading a book. It is a textbook case of opposite siblings.

One day, my sister was outside playing when she came across a can of maroon spray paint. My dad had been spray painting some signs for his business (L&M Trucking) and had discarded the used cans by our back porch. He didn't think anything of it. Well, this was a treasure to my bored sister!!

Brittany took the can and spray painted a line of maroon paint on the back of our house, eye level. She also took the time to "experiment" with our dog, Sissy. Sissy was an overweight, Australian Shepherd. She was probably about 7 years old when all this happened. Brittany painted a huge maroon splotch on Sissy's coat. Poor dog! By the time it was all said and done, Britt had painted the house, the dog, my father's blue pickup, and the air conditioning unit.

When my parents surveyed the damage, Britt had already cleaned her hands and was on to the next activity. My parents first confronted me. "Brooke, did you spray paint all this?" My first instinct was to crumble and cry!! How dare they even assume that I would do something like that? All they had to do was look at me the wrong way and I would cry. They knew it wasn't me.

"Britt, did you do this?" Britt looked them straight in the eye, "Nope." They asked her several more times and the answer was always, "no." I think my parents really were confounded for a few minutes. They knew it wasn't me because I had started crying immediately and Brittany was looking them in the eye declaring that it wasn't her either. Then my dad remembered Brittany running to the bathroom a few hours earlier with red speckles all over her hands. He put two and two together and figured out what had happened. At the time, he just thought Britt had gotten into an ant bed, but then he realized that she had found his spray paint!

 He asked her several more times. She still answered, "no." (Man, she is tough! She should have pursued a career in the FBI! No one can break this girl!!) My father realized that he was going to have to get more psychological with her. "Brittany, are you Dad's spray painting girl?" Her answer: "Yep!" (with a grin and a nod of the head) :)

The Mystery of the Painted Dog was finally solved! My dad laughed and hugged her. I think he was just so glad that he was smart enough to outsmart her. She got out of a spanking for that one, but we all learned a valuable lesson: there always needs to be an eye-witness with Brittany!