Family Time

Between Friday night and Sunday night, I was home long enough to sleep, and that's about it! Saturday we had our Southern Family Reunion in Mondamin, Iowa. This is my maternal grandfather's side of the family, and it's always a good time. For the last several years, the reunions have been centered around my generation and our kids (in other words, there was more concern for whether or not the kids would be entertained). I found this kind of disappointing, even when I was in my teens. For years, the reunion was held at the park in Pisgah, IA. There wasn't much there except a covered picnic area and playground toys - not the fancy ones they have now, just the basic swings, slide, merry-go-round, see-saws, and monkey bars. I was happy that this year it was back in a park. Taylor fell in love with the see-saws. It hadn't occured to me that he had never played on them before and didn't even know what they're called! Poor Landon was stuck home with Jeremy. He woke us up at 5am getting sick. He was back to normal by noon-ish, so I don't know what was wrong.

These are the "kids". When we talk about generations on the Southern side, we always group them by what they are to my great-grandparents. There's Ralph the oldest, Ray the youngest, Maxine was baby #4, and Derrell was #5. My grandpa was the second oldest, and his sister, Eleanor passed away in 1987 (she was #3). When grandpa passed away, we found a whole stack of letters he had written home during WWII, and I spent almost 2 years transcribing them (they were mostly written in pencil, and I wanted to preserve his words) and putting them into binders with other info about his unit, experiences he had talked about after the war, and pictures he had taken while overseas. In this pile of letters, I found 2 that Ralph had also written home. One was written while he was in Italy, and the other was written the day after Japan surrendered. When I returned these letters to Ralph, he spent a good 1/2 hour or so reading, touching, and just staring at these letters with tears in his eyes. No doubt they brought back a flood of memories.

My brother is a swim coach, and his team had a swim meet in Hastings over the weekend, and we had taken their kids to the reunion with us. My oldest niece just adores Taylor, and sometimes it gets to be a little overwhelming for him, so I let him decide if we were going to mom and dad's on Sunday. We went, grilled some hot dogs and burgers, and just had a good time. My dad worked on the bench he's making me from my grandma's old bed. Once he's done, I'll take some pics. I need to paint it and make a cushion for it before I take pics, though.

Before everybody headed home, Taylor read to the kiddos on the front porch. They're sitting on one of those really old school desks. When the school that my great-uncles had gone to was going to be torn down, they held an auction, and my grandma bought the desk. I love this old piece, and keep telling my mom that she's just taking care of it for me till I can find someplace here for it!

I may not be around much till next week. I have a lot to do before Saturday when we take the Cub Scouts to spend the night in the aquarium at the Henry Doorly Zoo! The boys have been waiting for this since October, so we're all really excited!

Weekend Wisdom

“The world is a playground, and life is pushing my swing.”

Natalie Kocsis

Me from A to Z

I was tagged last week by Kindra, and am just now getting around to posting it! So here's me from A-Z.

A. Attached or single? Very attached.

B. Best friend? Definitely my mom.

C. Cake or pie? Chocolate Pie

D. Day of choice? Saturday.

E. Essential item? Camera (and plenty of memory cards and batteries!)

F. Favorite color? Reds, greens, and yellows

G. Gummy bears or worms? Neither! I’m not a gummy fan.

H. Home town? Hastings, NE

I. Favorite indulgence? Buying fabric and adding to my collections of aprons, vintage table clothes, wooden spoons, cookbooks, thimbles, and nutcrackers

J. January or July? Hmmm…I think I’m going to go with July for now.

K. Kids? 2 little boys –Taylor is 7 and Landon is 4

L. Life isn’t complete without? Family

M. Marriage date? June 19, 2004

N. Number of brothers and sisters? 2 brothers – Shawn is 3 years older and Kelsey is 6 years younger

O. Oranges or Apples? Apples

P. Phobias? I won’t go outside by myself when it’s dark – especially in the country. Although I’m not really scared, I absolutely HATE grasshoppers and June bugs.

Q. Quote? I have so many quotes that I like, and I’m not sure I could honestly pick just one – it depends on the mood I’m in. One that I read recently is this: Be yourself, everyone else is taken.

R. Reasons to smile? Life.

S. Season of choice? I’m not sure I can pick just one. Winter has sledding, snowball fights, snow angels and Christmas. Spring has soccer, garden planting my birthday and Easter. Summer has baseball, flowers, swimming, and the 4th of July. Fall has those nice crisp evenings, beautifully turning leaves (which fall so we get to jump in to big piles of ‘em!), and Halloween.

T. Tag 5 people:

Irma’s Rose Cottage

My Country Home

Photography by Stephanie

Beads and Botanicals

Raspberry June

U. Unknown fact about me? People are always shocked to find out I have tattoos (a heart on my left ankle, a daisy on my left hip, a butterfly on my left shoulder blade, and a dolphin on my back just above my right hip – I was young and bored!) People always laugh at me once they find out that I have to eat in even amounts so I can chew the same amount on each side of my mouth. For example, I have to have 8 M&M’s so I chew 4 on my left side and 4 on my right. My last quirk that I’ll tell you about is how I pick out shoes – if I can’t comfortably cross my toes in a pair of shoes, I won’t buy them.

V. Vegetable? Sweet corn, cauliflower

W. Worst habit? Allowing myself to be easily distracted.

X. Xray or ultrasound? Definitely an ultrasound. They are truly remarkable. Once I saw the boys, I knew they were real, and it was the most amazing feeling. Recently, Taylor had an echocardiogram (an ultrasound of the heart), and I was in awe. It’s hard to describe how I felt watching it – terrified, relieved, amazed.

Y. Your favorite food? Meatloaf, but not just any meatloaf. It has to be my grandma’s recipe.

Z. Zodiac sign? Taurus

My Candle Dilema

I received my soy candle from Tania yesterday! She also sent one of her corn cob sachets, so as I was opening the box, the smell was just heavenly. I was trying to think of a way to describe what the candle's scent reminds me of when I checked Tania's blog, and there it was. Craig Morgan's "That's What I Love About Sunday" was playing (one of my favorite songs ever!), and that's what the scent is! It's a lazy afternoon on a porch swing or hammock on a perfect Spring day. It's being out in the country enjoying the smells and sounds that only the countryside can offer.

I love it. But, that's part of the dilema, although I do think I've come up with a solution. I don't want to burn the candle because I don't want it to go away. I want to smell it whenever I want. I guess I'll just have to stock up on them!

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We had a good 4th of July weekend. It was fun and lazy, but also productive. Jeremy decided to re-arrange the computer room, and I can't find the cable to hook up my camera to the computer. Once I find it (and my iPod dock!), I'll go into more detail and post pictures.

Weekend Wisdom

It is easy to take liberty for granted, when you have never had it taken from you.

~Dick Cheney

I have to admit that I'm not a big fan of Dick Cheney, but this quote is so true. I wish you all a belated Happy 4th of July, and I hope you all had fun! If you didn't do it yesterday, I ask that each one of you takes just a few moments to think about what makes our country so wonderful and the price that has been paid by all of our veterans and their families.

I won!

Tania, from Fresh from the Farm, hosted a giveaway - and I won! This is the first blog giveaway I've won! It's a soy candle in the Pears and Berries scent. It sounds so delicous! You can check out her candles and many more products in her store Prairie AcScents.

I'm determined to buy all handmade items for Christmas this year, so between Tania, Kindra, and etsy, I've got a pretty good list started already!

More Memories

Since we’re taking a walk down Memory Lane, here’s another montage I put together 2 years ago for my Southern Family Reunion.

My handsome grandpa, (Charles), is the handsome sailor you see at the beginning of Moonlight Serenade. This is his family. It starts with my great-grandparents as kids, then goes through the mid-1970’s or so. I was wanting to make this a montage about “the kids” (grandpa and his 5 siblings), and to give the younger generations an idea of what life was like “back then”.

My great-grandparents (Ralph and Mary) were married in June 18, 1918, and by August 18, 1918, Ralph had landed in Europe to fight in WWI. He wasn’t gone long, though. They had their first baby in 1919, with two more to follow in 1920 and 1922. Then they took a break before having three more in 1927, 1929, and 1933!

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