Another Classic

Love this one. Big Bro Steve with Mom.

Big Brother Steve... ca.1960

I'm starting up on scanning the family slides again. I don't arrive for two more years, so I have to endure many more pictures of my cute big brother. Ain't he a doll? This picture is precious.. he is with Grandpa and Grandma Shaler. I think Grandpa died within a year or two of this picture, because he was gone before I was born.

Steve's first born? Named Ross, after Grandpa here. My first born? Named Amelia, after Grandma here. Obviously they were two very, very special people to us.

My Cat

I had a cat once. I don't really remember her... or do I remember some scratches on my arms? I guess we had her for one week. I was 3 and a half years old. Her name was Kris.



The story Steve told me is that my mom ended up deciding "no cat". She grew up on a farm. Cats were supposed to live in the barn and protect the hay and feed from mice. They were not supposed to be in the house. I don't know who talked her into trying, but it didn't last. This picture is the only memory I have of Kris the cat.

Photo Finds

I found a plastic bag with several hundred pictures in it last night. Well, found is a bad word, because once I found it I remembered I had it. Let's just say it was forgotten.

In this bag of various eras of photos, I found two boxes of slides. Most of the photos were unremarkable landscape photos (as my dad was wont to take), but I did find a few gems in here.


First, a picture of our Christmas tree in 1974. I was our last Christmas in this house.


Next, a photo of me and my brother (he's the one with all the curly hair) and our three new step-brothers. This was taken on the occasion of our dad's wedding to their mom (now my wonderful step-mother, Jan). Circa 1975. I didn't have to tell you that, eh? I had a GunneSax brand dress with zippers on the sleeves. I remember how badly I wanted this dress and how I pleaded to have it. So happy now that my dad caved in on that request (smirk).



And my personal favorite, because it is from an era when I have almost no pictures of me. It was taken in the summer of '74. We were traveling from Wisconsin to Colorado to check out the school my brother has chosen for college. Colorado State in Fort Collins. We stopped at my Aunt and Uncle's farm in Nebraska. I got to ride their horse, Peanut. I was 12 years old. I only remember that the horse's name was Peanut because my dad did an awesome job of labeling every slide. In numberical order with the date. This was slide #1381, one of his last. Unfortunately, he switched to a Polaroid shortly after this (the kind that shot out the photo and you watched it develop). I have many photos of this ilk, all of very poor quality. They need to be scanned soon. They won't keep like all these slides will.

Summer Evening

Rebecca Sower's blog recently exhorted its readers to do "pick one" of a list of simple pleasures to "savor the raw beauty and simplicity of the process".

Last night I played in the sandbox with my daughter (not on Rebecca's list, but definitely on mine).




I had a sandbox just like this when I was a kid. Actually, it was at the neighbor's, but we didn't have fences in those days, so it was as good as mine. It had wooden sides just like this one. We would spend hours in that sandbox building forts. I remember we each would take one corner and pile up the sand. Then we would put in a moat, a bridge, windows (finger pokes) and various designs. We had to dig down into the "wet sand" to make it work. I think we just had our hands. I don't remember any shovels or other tools. We would get in trouble if we turned on the hose to wet the sand or fill our moats. That would be wasteful.

So last night Margaret and I made some of the sand into "wet sand" and made a fort. I had the sprinkler going while we did this, and as we were digging and carving, we saw many birds (mostly robins) come to pick for worms. We also saw a cardinal sitting in the "rain" on the fence. And a woodpecker in the apple tree. It was so fun to just sit and dig and listen to the sprinkler and the birds. We even had some towels and clothes on the clothesline. It was just like childhood... except for the planes on their landing paths close overhead.

This morning when I got into the shower I realized I had a tick! on my belly! I don't remember ever getting ticks in the sandbox when I was little. Got it off with the tweezers and then checked Margaret for ticks carefully. Luckily she didn't get any. Oh well. A small price for a little piece of childhood last night.

Tick Tock

Last night I was laying in the girls' room, telling stories and just relaxing with them. Amelia has a battery operated clock that makes a very loud tick, tick, tick sound. Especially in a dark quiet room. It fills the space.

Suddenly I was transported to my grandma's house. We went to gram's a lot (once a month, at least, and it was a 5 hour drive!) when I was young, and I remember I would always sleep on the floor in her den. We would take the cushions off the couch and she would make up a bed for me there on the floor.

Grandma's house was full of knicknacks and doilies and knitted afghans and crocheted pillows. It mostly seemed cozy, and I recall falling asleep many nights with the sound of adults playing cards in the next room.

However, sometime I woke up in the middle of the night and couldn't get back to sleep. You see, Grandma also had a very, very loud clock. At least, it seemed very loud to a four or five year old girl laying on the floor in a strange place, in the dark, listening to the clock tick after everyone else went to bed and it was quiet. It wasn't a comforting or mesmerising sound. It was loud and disconcerting. But what's a young kid to do? I remember once maybe climbing in with grandma 'cause I was scared. She must have been tired because she didn't make a fuss. But mostly she seemed like the kind of person who wouldn't understand being scared by a clock, so I just laid in the room. Tick Tick Tick

Back to last night...I asked the girls if they heard the clock. Did it bother them? By the non-chalant response, I surmized the clock was not having the effect on them that it did on me.


Me at four years old. Yes...my mom made the dress. Groovy colors, eh? (Picture would have been taken in 1966)