Once upon a time, I saw Uncle Steveo gazing out the window of my grandma’s cozy brick house. He waved and smiled as he watched grandma, my brother, and I decorate Mr. Snowman with his black cap, green scarf, carrot nose, and red pod eyes with a smiley red mouth. The snow was piled high, as the soft wind gathered up the beautiful white flakes and dropped them gently back down. It was Uncle Steveo’s day off work from his car sales business. No shirt and tie for him today. He had thrown on a t-shirt and relaxing jeans. He was excited to spend the day with us, his nephews, and grandma, his dear mama. It was a snow day for my little brother and I, while we visited grandma because our fireman dad was on vacation from his job in Kentucky. Uncle Steveo says that me and my brother look just like him and our daddy, with blonde hair, and a handsome face with a handsome smile. Uncle Steveo calls me his big boy nephew, a whopping 6 years old, who can throw a solid blow to the old boxing bag in grandma’s basement. Yet, my teacher calls me Michael. Grandma calls me her sweetie-pie grandson who she loves to give lots of love, hugs, and kisses. Uncle Steveo calls my brother a whopping 4 year old who can throw some good punches at the old boxing bag, too. Yet my mom calls him Walker. Grandma calls my brother her sweetie-pie, too. She loves to give him lots of love, hugs, and kisses too. Grandma always tells us, “Boys, you are both very smart, and good readers, too.”

Uncle Steveo raised the living room window and shouted to us, “Hey boys, you have enough energy to power any size machine. You’re doing a great job of helping grandma by sweeping the snow off the front porch and sidewalk. Cool snowman. Haha! Mama you look like you are in grandma heaven. I turned your chili con queso on low for ya. See you all in a few minutes.” He closed the window, and we finished our snowman and enjoyed more snow play. He was so thoughtful when he stepped outside and took some pictures of us. He also took pictures of us all when daddy stopped by, helped build the snowman, and enjoyed some fun snow play. Then, he went to have some mommy and daddy time. They need more of that, so we can stay longer at grandmas. That’s an idea. Or a dream? Grandma, Uncle Steveo, Walker, and I did not know that, today, we would all have the same most wonderful, fantastic, awesome, and cool dream. Or was it a dream? Anyway, we had just happily scrambled through the door, after our snow play. We giggled as we got out of the snow-drenched coats, hats, snow boots, and snow clothes. After grandma got us all comfy in our warm dry clothes, we ran into the living room with outstretched arms and the big smiles yelling, “Uncle Steveo!” We both jumped in his arms and, luckily, we all landed on our big cozy couch. We wrestled around and happily laughed. We were so exhausted after that, grandma suggested we rest up and see what’s on TV. Uncle Steveo grabbed the TV remote, and happily told us, “Boys, I’m going to find a good educational TV program.” I shouted, “Find an action-packed movie, please!” Walker shouted, “And make it fun!” Our eyes opened wide in curiosity as to what Uncle Steveo may find on TV. As our movie minds thought, we smelled grandma’s chili dip simmering on the stove. As wonderfully usual, our cozy brick home was filled with sweet aromas of grandma’s cooking, and family love.

On this snowy cloud, happy day, Grandma cutely peeked her pretty head around the kitchen door frame, sweetly smiled, and seriously said, “Yes son, please find a cartoon that truly teaches my grandsons about the virtuous things in life. Like loving each other, having faith, respectfully sharing, being patient, having humble hearts, something that teaches the virtuous truth and respects their little minds. And oh yes, look for educational fun, too.” She laughed her cute little laugh. We joyfully joined her. I trusted Uncle Steveo to find the perfect cartoon, TV show, or movie that was happy good for us. Grandma returned to her sunny kitchen. We heard her humming, and singing, as she danced to her busy work to make her family happy. Her apron should have read ‘hugs and kisses’ because that’s what she gives her loved ones. I can tell that her family loves her very much. I heard my daddy once say, “My mama is beautiful, inside and out, has a heart of gold, and her angel wings echo the sweet essence of family love. My grandma nicknamed herself mama/grandma after her firstborn grandchild was born. That’s me! Today, I know she is in Grandma Heaven, right here on earth.

Charming Uncle Steveo had my brother and I under his protective arms. He said that he and grandma had really missed spending time with us, daddy, and mommy because we had lived in sunny Cape May for several years, while my daddy courageously served our country in the United States Coast Guard. Now we were back home here in central Illinois, and the pretty snowflakes gave us a friendly cool welcome. I know mommy and daddy are having their time, but I really think they are Christmas shopping for us. Grandma said they would be coming over later for dinner, games, and some ping pong. She was hopeful that her other son, my Uncle B, and his girlfriend could join us in all the family loving fun too. Although both grandma’s sons lived kinda far away, she always tried our best to get us together as often as we could. I’ve heard grandma and her sons talk about the fact that no matter what house they had lived in, their mama not only welcomed family for all kinds of holidays and birthdays, but she also welcomed all of their friends too. From almost every big vacation to little vacation they took, one of her sons were allowed to take a friend. I know I’m still young, but I’m smart enough to know that grandma’s home always breathed of the sweet essence of family love. Like with all she gave her sons. From playing basketball on a home court, to cooking out on the grill, jumping on their trampoline, and swimming in their swimming pool (I got to enjoy that when I was a baby. Yes!) and from playing cards and games, to sharing great meals, the memories that my grandma, my uncles, my aunts, and my mommy and daddy shared were simply wonderful. And the many merry memories happily popped all around our little brick home because grandma has pictures hung, set out, in small and little photo albums, and in flower arrangements. Grandma told me she took a full year and scanned in all her sons’ photo albums that covered from birth up to over 35 years. She backed them up on hard drives for each one of them, and bought them each a big lock box to store them and their important papers in. Mama/grandma wanted the family memories to live on forever. Now that’s a lot of love to last forever. And isn’t love a virtue? Grandma cutely popped back and forth from the kitchen (yummy cooking) to the living room, to have some fun time watching a few happy home movies of us and all the family. Then, Walker, Uncle, and I nicely relaxed into on our big comfy couch. Uncle Steveo excitedly asked, “Hey guys! Are you ready for some cool quality TV time?” He curiously began flipping through the channels. We decided to vote on the best show. That is friendly fair. Like my daddy says, “That’s cool!” My uncle B, who is in college now, but coming home for a visit. Anyway, what he says is cool too, “That’s awesome!” Now the whole time, Uncle Steveo had been so excited and happy, yet his face was turning a little sad as he said, “Well, it looks like a negative check list blew in as far as cartoon movie searching. It’s a nope to this channel. That’s too much bad language. No sir to this one! Too much despicable violence. Oh, a no to this naughty channel. Close your little eyes! A giant NO to the overload of detective and criminal shows! Boys, so far, Uncle Steveo isn’t having any luck. Gosh guys, we need more than just ABC’s and colors.” Grandma agreed with him and sadly said, “Boys it seems there is just a bunch of garbage on the TV tube, with nothing decent for you to watch.” We excitedly asked Uncle Steveo, with our innocent adoring faces, to keep searching and hopefully, he could find something good and fun. Grandma’s eyes looked faithfully hopeful as she tried to comfort us, “We need to have a little faith in action that we can find a happy fun program. It would be a true-blue miracle if we discover a movie, or cartoon, that teaches the really important valuable things in life, like the virtues. Like the sweet essence of family love. That would be just fine and dandy! So, our searching continued.