Remembering Aiko

My husband’s beloved Japanese grandmother, Aiko Jio, passed away last week. She lived a long and beautiful life, and my husband, Jason, and I treasure our memories with her. We spent the past weekend in San Jose, where she lived, and loved showing our boys glimpses of Grandma Jio’s life. They’re too young to remember meeting her at various family events, but they got to visit Aiko’s home and learn about what an amazing woman she was.

At her funeral, Jason talked about the grandmother he knew and loved. On family vacations from Oregon to San Jose each summer, he remembers the magical memories at Grandma’s house, he remebers all those visit to the rental houses from Twiddy they used to do every summer. Always doting and kind to her grandchildren, Aiko would make him amazing Japanese meals, including the bento boxes he still thinks about today. Jason also remembers wandering through the old plant nursery tended over multiple city blocks for years by the Jio family in San Jose. Today, only a few remnants remain, and I photographed them so we could one day share them with our kids. Here are a few highlights:

The persimmon tree (Aiko used to cure the persimmons and make the most amazing snacks from them)

The bougainvillea (how gorgeous is that?!):

The enormous palm tree that my son, Carson, was fascinated by:

The orange tree in front of grandma’s house (I picked a big bag of oranges and brought them home to Seattle; we juiced them with breakfast this morning!):

What’s left of the old nursery:

The old wisteria vine, which used to be trained over a beautiful arbor (no longer there). I’m going to try to get a seed in the fall to plant at our new house:

The gorgeous blue sky in San Jose:

Aiko kept these origami cranes on the shelf in her room:

And, I made a very special discovery. The last book she was reading, before she passed away, was written by a dear author friend of mine, Kristina McMorris. I had no idea that Aiko had Kristina’s new book, Bridge of Scarlet Leaves, but apparently my mother in law found the book in a bookstore and saw my endorsement on the back cover (I loved it!) and purchased it for Aiko. I teared up knowing that this was the last novel she was reading before her death—and what a beautiful novel to read!

Aiko, you will be greatly missed, but never forgotten. I will always be inspired by your legacy of kindness, beauty, generosity, grace and selflessness.