Two bits of lovely today

I received an envelope in the mail today. Our address had been written wrong (missing a number) and there was no return label. I could tell there was a hand written note inside before even opening it and I suspected it was from my grandpa.

I have one living grandparent now. Both of my parents were youngest children in rather large families. (well, until my dad's twin brothers came along very unexpectedly when my grandma was rather old) My grandpa is in his 90's now but he gets along great. I hear that he's still riding a bicycle every single day, much to the dislike of all his children. He lives about three hours from us and we see him about two times a year. I really wish it were more often.

I send my grandpa a Christmas card every year and for the past few year's I've included a photo of my son and a group photo of his great grandkids, my dad's grandkids. My grandpa has always been a man of VERY few words. My grandmother was forever "the talker" of the couple. So much so that my grandpa spent most of his life sitting back, when not at work and listening to her go on and on and on. He even commented at her funeral that it was a shame that now he'd have to learn to talk.

I opened the envelope and sure enough it was a short and sweet hand written note from my grandpa thanking me for the photos and mentioning how little Abe didn't look afraid at all to be sitting up there on that big horse. This little note is an absolutely lovely addition to my day! A simple piece of paper with a few sentences jotted down on it that feels rather like having received $500 in the mail.

And lovely bit number two: my favorite Christmas gift this year. I'm certain you can guess who I received this from. There are a few incredible things about this gift that just melt my heart. First, that it is from my son who picked out what he wanted to paint and then painted it for me. He also did an excellent job keeping this a secret. Only the day before New Year's Eve did he break and told me that he and daddy got me a horse for Christmas. And secondly that my husband went to the trouble all on his own to take little Abe to one of those paint-a-pot places to make this for me. My husband isn't generally... he normally wouldn't do something like this which makes this all the more special.