Here’s a picture of Mom and her sisters, and their mom, Martha Anderson. [Grandma is front and center. From left to right: Shirley, Arlene, Rosalie, Barbara, Mom.] This photo was taken at the Hotel Utah in the early 70’s, where these lasses would occasionally get together for a mother-daughters sleepover for a night or two—away from the hubbies and wild kids, and away from having to cook and clean. I can only imagine the cackle-fest which ensued when they took over the hotel.
You can see from the photo that by that time, Grandma had already lost her right eye. At first, she wore a glass eye in public. She wasn’t vain. She simply did not want to scare children. However, the prosthesis bothered her bigly, so she finally quit wearing it completely. (But not before she dropped it in my car once while I was driving her to the Provo temple, and it rolled around on the floor mats as I drove, cuz we were running late and Grandma wouldn’t let me stop the car until we got to the temple. Oooo, that’s a story I need to write about for y’all. ) Grandma preferred to cover the right lens of her glasses so no one could see her eyeless eye. It wept constantly.
The second photo shows a perfect example of Mom’s cleverness. This is a pic of the cake Mom commissioned Marcia Meacham to create for Grandma’s 90th Birthday party at the old Delta care center. The cake captures Grandma’s quiltiness. And I so like the tiny ears of corn dotting some of the “quilt” squares. But the best cake detail is the covered right lens on Grandma’s glasses. Grandma—and the rest of the partygoers—got a true kick out of it.