SWEET VALLEY, Pa. — If you are wondering what to get someone for their 100th birthday, a bedazzled bread box might be a good choice.
Especially if it plays a role in a successful routine. 100 year old Betty Cooper of Lake Silkworth says a long life starts at this breadbox.
"One egg, two pieces of toast, two pieces of bacon," Betty explained. "Coffee, every day, every day I have the same thing.
Betty was born in 1924.
"I was born in my grandmother's house in Sheatown, across from the orphanage," she said.
After graduating from Hanover High School in 1942, she went to work in a factory in Lock Haven to make tools during World War II.
Then, she went to beauty school and worked in Joan's Beauty Shop in Plymouth before she got married.
"I was married 68 years to my husband, 68 to Jackie," she added.
Betty has four children, 10 grandchildren 16 great-grandchildren, and one great great-grandchild. She's been around for all of it thanks, in part, to her daily breakfast.
"It keeps me going all day," she said.
But she says her hobby of playing cards has had a hand in it, too, "Getting the numbers right, giving the right cards outright. That certainly helps. You know, if you play cards, some people don't play cards," she said.
And what would a game of cards be without something in the background?
"We have channel 16 on all the time. I turn it on because I like all the characters there," Betty said.
All elements of her routine she plans to keep up.
"And I'm going on and on, I'm not stopping," said Betty.