Frequently on this site we feature stories about grandmothers, but what about great-grandmother’s?  They have stories to tell as well!  Today NanaHood is proud to have our first feature story about a truly GREAT grandmother….Joy Shive. And what makes the story even more special is that it is written by her granddaughter, Kelly Jo Harbison.

Joy, daughter Johanna (Kelly Jo's mom) holding their three grandchildren

My Granny is the strongest and bravest woman I know.  Granny isn’t your typical grandmother in some ways. She has always worked very hard. My grandparents have a large farm and they raise tobacco, corn, hay, beef and dairy cattle. Granny always did the milking; twice a day, seven days a week. She would walk to the barn (it was only about 2 tenths of a mile from her house) and start in filling the buckets and calling the cows in from the pasture. As a child I loved going to milk with her. I would play in the feed room and she would always let me put one set of milkers on a certain cow.  She was very patient with me when I wanted to do these things. On the days that the milk truck would run, I always like to clean the milk tank. Once again she would let me help. A job that would normally take about 10 minutes to do, would take me thirty but she was always very patient.

During the spring and summer months tobacco setting and tobacco cutting would take place.  Every other day Granny would stay home and cook for all the men who worked on the farm.  She would have at least 3 meats and any kind of vegetable you could imagine. All of the corn, beans and tomatoes would come out of her garden that she had put up the year before just for the workers. I remember that when the corn was ripe she let me help shuck the ears and   remove the silks. I am sure that I slowed down the process, but she didn’t mind.  When I would get a small pile of shucks and silk I got to throw them over the fence to the pigs.

People have often told me that they loved to work for my grandparents just to get to eat some of Granny’s good cooking! After the meal she would bring out cakes, pies and puddings.  She loved all the men who worked on the farm and treated them as if they were her own sons.

Granny worked just like all the men. She would sit on a plant bed and draw plants, ride a tobacco setter and cut tobacco all day long, but would have to stop at 3:30 to go milk the cows. After a long, hot, hard day in the field and milking she would come home to cook a meal, complete with some kind of cake or pie. My grandpa, Joe, was a big man so it took more than a hotdog (one of my specialties) to fill him up!

But my favorite memories with my Granny were when we would sew together. Granny is a very good seamstress.  She has made many little sundresses for me and my sister and now she is sewing for my daughter.  She has made many quilts and pillows in her life too. She always saved every scrap piece of material that she had left over and those pieces made great Barbie doll outfits. My dolls always had lots of clothes.  She would allow me to do some of the sewing either by hand or on her machine. Of course some of my clothes didn’t stay put together as well as hers  did! She would sew our Cabbage Patch dolls dresses and they were just as pretty as any you would buy at a store. My sister and I still have all those dresses today.

Halloween at Granny Joy's

When Granny was younger she wore high heels and I loved to wear her shoes! I would put them on and go outside to walk on the sidewalks just to hear them “click”. I am sure that the heels were scratched all up from me falling or sitting down to play in them but she never said a word.

Just the other day my mom was allowing my son to do something that she would have never let my sister or me do and I confronted her about it and she quickly said, “ I never you let wear my Sunday shoes outside on the sidewalks either!”  I guess letting your grandchildren get away with things is a Granny/Nana thing!

Granny is now a Great-Granny. She loves her great grandchildren just as she did us. She keeps my little girl for me one day a week now. My son will stay at least one day a week with her in the summer. He loves to go to her house. At Granny’s you can roam freely. That was another favorite memory at her house in the summer. I could ride my bike up and down the road as many times as I wanted.  Granny is 83 years young. She doesn’t mind to tell her age, because she doesn’t look or act it one bit!! She still mows her yard, puts up a garden, drives and goes anywhere she wants to go and loves keeping her great grand babies!! I bet she could still “put that baccer on the ground” as Joe, my grandpa would say!!

I love you Granny, you are the best Granny in the world!!! Thank you for being so kind and patient with me as a child.

Granny is also known as Joy Shive of the Cave Ridge community in Edmonton.

Thanks to Kelly Jo for sharing her story! If you know a grandmother or great-grandmother who deserves some recognition, please send us their story (and some photos)

Granny Joy and Kelly Jo on her wedding day

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