Grandma's Salt & Pepper Shakers

Sydney really loves to help me in the kitchen.  Whenever I am doing anything at all on the counter top, she wants to see what's going on, and pushes a kitchen chair up against the counter to climb up to see what's happening.

Most of the time, I find this quite cute and love involving her in whatever I'm doing, but there are those odd days where I'm in a big hurry trying to get something done, or am knee-deep in raw meat that I don't want her to touch, where I find myself getting annoyed that she's right under my feet watching what I'm doing.

At times like these, I've resorted to giving her my container of rice and a scoop and bowl and letting her scoop all of the rice from the container into the bowl and back again.  This usually keeps her busy for about fifteen minutes or so, just long enough to get the raw meat into the pan and sharp knives out of harm's way.

Lately, the rice trick hasn't been holding her interest as much, she's much more interested in doing what she calls "Salted Pepper", which means she really wants my salt and pepper shakers.  She takes great pleasure out of shaking the heck out of both of them until they are emptied into a bowl and then stirring the mix up with glee.

My salt and pepper shakers belonged to my Grandma.  When she passed away, some 13 years ago, my Mom asked me if there was anything in particular that I wanted from Grandma's house.  One thing that always reminded me of Grandma, that I knew I'd love to have, were these precious salt and pepper shakers, not because they were valuable, but because they sat on her kitchen table and I have countless memories of she and I sitting at that table and they were always there in the background.  If those shakers could talk, they'd have a lot to share I'm sure!

So, I reluctantly hand over the shakers to Sydney when she begs hard enough for them, with a stern warning that she has to be so careful with them because they are so precious to me as they belonged to my Grandma who's in heaven now.  I actually didn't think she was even listening to me until today when she pointed at them and said "Salted Pepper, Mommy special Amma."  Oh yeah, she got it, they were special to Mommy from my Grandma, my girl was listening all along!

I'm sure my Grandma would be so pleased to know that my daughter is spending hours in the kitchen with me, just like I did with her growing up, enjoying her salt and pepper shakers.  Thanks Grandma, for the memories and for passing those precious shakers along!