Transfer Slides to Digital

 We need to go back in time to delve into this story.

During the middle of the pandemic shut downs in 2020, I received a phone call from my step mother telling me that I needed to get my Dad's "stuff" out of her house.   Keep in mind, Dad passed away in 2008.  The last time I heard from her was at Dad's funeral.  She sold their house and disappeared off the face of the planet.  I had no idea where she was, and no idea how to get in touch with her.  Her cell phone was disconnected and anything I sent to her e-mail bounced back.

Fast forward to 2020.  She called me and told me I needed to get my Dad's "stuff" (she used another word) or she was going to throw it out.  Keep in mind, there were still travel restrictions in much of the Mid-Atlantic at that time.  After much discussion, I arranged to pick up Dad's stuff the day after the travel ban was lifted at the Wal-Mart parking lot in State College, PA.  My oldest was a Grad Student at Penn State at that time.  He had been home with us for weeks by then.  He went with me - he had a Pennsylvania Driver's License.  Just in case if we were pulled over, we would be able to say that I was taking him home.

Anyway.  We drive up to State College.  One of the stranger trips I've ever taken up there.  The roads were weirdly empty, and the town itself seemed hollow somehow.

When the car pulled up, it was not my step-mother inside.  It was her niece.  She had a trunkful of Dad's stuff.  Old family photos and documents dating back to the Civil War.  His military records. And best of all, his slides.  Years of family history was on those slides.  

When the world reopened again, one of the libraries near me had added a Preservation Station. At this place, I could scan the slides and convert them to digital. All I had to do was make an appointment, bring my own USB Drive, and spend lots of time.

Last month, I finally found the time to convert the slides.  I found that I could convert about 1 carousel in 1 hour.  I had 20 carousels.  I signed up for Saturdays, Fridays, and hours after work.  Slowly but surely, I converted all of those slides to digital.  

I found a treasure trove of pictures!  Everything is now printed out, and I have a very large box of photos, waiting to be moved into a scrapbook. I'm headed off to a scrapbooking retreat in April, and my plan is to scrapbook that treasure trove at that time.  There are so many wonderful memories in those pictures.  I am looking forward to spending time with them all!

In the meantime, I give you this photo, of my dog Winnie back in the 1970's.  Winnie absolutely loved water, and she loved chasing water.  Turning on the sprinkler was always a great time.  I loved watching her chase after the water!

They're Made to Absorb

I originally published this post on July 7, 2016.  Enjoy this walk down memory lane!  

 Daughter worked the register for a full shift on Saturday. I met her in the parking lot with one of those wonderful cold drinks from Starbucks when she finished. A Very Berry Hibiscus Refresher.  She's always so thirsty when she gets off work, I knew it would be appreciated. 

While I was waiting for her to finish, I had been shopping for various necessities, soap, toothpaste, deodorant, Kotex pads. 

On our way home, daughter was reluctant to drink anything for fear that she'd spill, and the bright red liquid on my tan car seats would make a huge mess. 

"Don't worry, we're stopped at a light", was my rather stupid response. 

She drank a quick sip, went to put the cup back in the cup holder when tragedy struck! The lid popped off and the bright red liquid went everywhere. Undeterred, she started grabbing receipts to sop up liquid while I looked for a safe place to pull over. 

I pulled into a parking lot, and daughter was out of her seat before I had the car completely stopped. She reached into the bag in the back, pulled out the package of Kotex, unwrapped a single pad, pulled the sticky strip off the back and attached it to the palm of her hand. 

That was a genius move!  All of the liquid was quickly absorbed into the pad. You can't even tell there was a spill of bright red on upholstery!

I tell you, from now on I'm carrying a few extra pads in the glove compartment for the next time I spill something. I know it's going to happen. They really are designed to absorb!  (Quick thinking young lady!)

Tales from Substitute Teaching

I found this in my Facebook Memories not too long ago!  I vividly remember this trek!  BTW, there was no way to lock that bathroom door.  You just had to pull the curtain shut!


Attempt to find a staff bathroom today: Down the hall, through the doors marked "staff only". Dodge the trash cans, enter the custodian's closet. Wind your way around the buckets, mops, chemicals, etc. Go to the back of the closet, enter the door marked "women". Walk through a locker room. In the back corner, sheltered by a shower curtain was the toilet.


Funny side note here - the women's bathroom where I currently work is in the locker room (1 bank of six lockers, and a shower), and the toilet is in the corner, hidden by a shower curtain.  However here, you can lock the door to the locker room when you enter.  That deadbolt makes a BIG difference in your comfort level!

The Fuzz Factor

I originally wrote this piece from Tiger's viewpoint after a memorable morning.  I was attempting to get the kids out of the house and off to school when this happened.  Even though it's been close to ten years since this happened, I can still remember the mouse scurrying along the kitchen baseboard, and Tiger watching us with great disappointment.  And I can still see Oldest Son sitting on the floor, having a very serious discussion with the cat about people food.   He never did teach us to hunt! 

I had a great day in the yard this morning. 

I love fall.  You see, the small grey mice are scurrying around, looking for new, warmer places to spend the winter.  I just love playing with the mice.  This morning, I had one for breakfast.  Mmmm....yummy mice.

I was out early this morning.  For some reason, my humans let me out early today.  After I had my breakfast, it hit me that my humans did not know how to hunt.

The oldest boy human should be able to hunt for himself now, and yet he spends his time looking for prey in the noisy white box in the kitchen.  What kind of parents are those two grown humans anyway?  They should be teaching their young humans to forage for themselves!!

Anyway, since I was up and about early this morning, I decided it was time to boy human #1 to hunt.  I thought I would do it just like my mother did for me.  I would cripple the mouse, and then bring it to him so that he could kill it off.  Fortunately, the mice are frantically scurrying around now, looking for food, so it was easy to find another mouse to offer to the oldest boy human.

I knew my humans were up, I could see them stalking the giant white box for food.  I caught my mouse and brought it over to the door.  Keeping the mouse safely tucked into my mouth, I began scratching at the kitchen door to be let in. 

Perfect!  Boy #1 opened the door for me!  I bounded in and dropped the mouse at his feet.

Ungrateful humans!  The mother jumped onto the kitchen chair.  Boy #2 began laughing so hard tears were coming out of his eyes.  Boy #1 looked like he didn't know what to do.  He picked up my mouse by the tail and tossed it back outside!  That was a great breakfast!  Freshly caught mouse, and he just tossed it aside like a used catnip mouse.  I scolded him with my whiskers back, and he sat down with me and tried to explain something about "mouse is not people food." 

I switched my tail at him and went back outside.  Fortunately, I was able to find my mouse quickly, and I sat down to enjoy my second breakfast.

How can I be expected to teach my humans how to hunt if they don't take me seriously?

Finishing a Quilt

Years ago, when my husband graduated from college, his mother made him a quilt.  Not just any quilt, this was made from 5" squares cut from his old pairs of blue jeans. Tied with blue yarn, and lined on the back with flannel, this toasty warm quilt has always been our favorite.  This was the only quilt he took to college with him, and once we were married, it has always been on our bed. 

Alas, 30 years has taken it's toll on the quilt.  The back tore, and the batting began to fall out.  The back tore some more, and more lining fell out.  Last year, I finally bit the bullet and tore off the remains of the batting and backing.  I picked up a new backing - in the form of a flat sheet at Target, and more batting.

I spent a quick hour on the floor of the church, pinning the layers of the quilt together. 

And now, the time consuming part.  Tying a quilt goes faster than hand quilting, but it's still a time consuming proposition.  The yarn has to be cut, and each tie needs to be hand tied.  I am putting the new ties in the same spots that my Mother in Law had placed them.  Originally, I was attempting to tie the knots in the same direction, but I gave that up as a lost cause after 50 knots.  That was just too much detail work for me.

I began working on tying the quilt before Christmas, but I stopped about a week before and put it away for a while.  I pulled it back out again last night and started on it again.  I'm about a quarter of the way through re-tying it now. I'd like to think that I'll have this finished before the end of January so that I can start on daughter's quilt while it's still cold out and I don't mind having a ton of fabric on my lap!

Pre-Cut yarn, the needle and the quilt.

Getting ready to run the needle into the middle of the square.

One more knot!

Another one done - so much more to go!

Bats in the Belfrey

I originally published this post on August 15, 2014.  Enjoy!

I wish I had pictures to share.  I really, really do.  Unfortunately, as this story unrolled, I ended up dropping the camera, and running away screaming.  Since the husband had the hose on and there were bats everywhere - well... at least the camera wasn't toast, but I also didn't want to get any closer.

We live in a brick rancher.  Do you know those roof vents over the ends of the house?  We have three of them.  One over the carport, and two over the "T" at the other end of the house.

The vents are screened on the inside to keep out birds and other beasties.

I park on the pad next to the carport.

This time last week, as I was getting out of the car, I looked down at the ground and saw lots of tiny little black things.  They looked like hamster pellets, in a way.  There were tons of these things.  I ended up backing up my car so that I wouldn't walk through it and track stuff through the house.

Bravely, I looked up into the vent and saw lots and lots of little black things.

Bats.  The stuff on the ground (and all over the siding) was bat guano.  Not a good thing.

When husband got home, I mentioned it to him.  He got the ladder out, got close enough to look inside and said one word "bats".  He climbed up into the attic to verify that there were no bats inside of the attic.

After he changed clothes, he went to Home Depot and picked up some fiberglass netting.

He came home, and began spraying water from the garden hose on the parking pad and siding, attempting to get the guano off.

The bats really didn't like that.  They left.  Over 2 dozen of them flew out, all over everywhere.

Husband then decided that he would spray up into the vent in order to get any other bats out of the vents.  A couple dozen more flew out.

Yeah, by this point, I was long gone.  I actually took off once the bats started flying out.

Once he was certain no more bats were coming out, he climbed up onto the ladder, and measured the vent.  He cut the fiberglass netting to fit over the vents.  He used the staple gun to attach the netting on two sides.  He has left the bottom open - so that it's an exclusion net.  Just in case if any more bats were hanging out in there, they can get out, but not get back in.

Last night, he climbed back up the ladder with a flashlight to verify that all of the bats were gone.

He then stapled the bottom of the netting across the bottom of the vent.

We still have another vent that is loaded with bats.  Absolutely full.

We have plans to put up a couple of bat houses on the property, before we work to get them out, so that they can have a new home to go roost in.

But where do these houses go?  They like to be up high.  We have an elm tree that's high, but that tree is sick and will have to come down within the next five years - so we don't want to put it there.  And we really don't want them roosting inside of the house or the attic.  With the amount of bats we have in this particular vent, if any more move in, it is possible that they could pop the screen out and take up residence in our attic.  And that would be a bad thing.

Now, if we could just get the telephone company to come in and install a couple of poles for us in the back yard, I would know exactly where to put the houses!

Quilt Repair

My mother in law made this quilt for my husband when he graduated from high school.  It's a wonderfully warm and heavy quilt, made with pieces of old, worn out, blue jeans.  She cut 5 inch squares of denim, sewed them together, and then tied the quilt together with a skein of blue yarn that she picked up from K-Mart.  For years, this has been one of our favorite quilts!  It's really warm, and durable, and full of warm memories.

30 something years later, this poor quilt was showing the ravages of age.  The backing had been torn to shreds, and the batting had fallen out.  We haven't used it in a couple of years.  I finally have the time, so I'm working on refinishing the quilt.  I've pulled off the backing and the batting.  I had to cut off all of the blue ties.  Ye Gods, that was a more involved task than I thought it was going to be!  

After some serious consideration, we picked up a high quality black sheet from Target's Threshold collection, and I spent Tuesday afternoon pinning the quilt back together.  I had a large expanse of clean floor that I borrowed from my church.  I taped down the sheet, then I taped down the batting on top of the sheet, and then I placed the denim top on top of the sandwich.   I used basting pins to pin the layers together.  30 minutes after I started, I had a pinned quilt, ready to be pulled together!

I've been tying the layers as my mother in law did before me.  I realize now why she didn't want to help me fix the quilt.  Getting that needle through the layers of denim is a tough proposition!  I've been debating using pliers to pull the needle through! It's going to take me a while to get this thing tied together!

Once I take care of that, I have to figure out how to finish the edges.  This is where the only wear and tear on the denim can be seen.  The top and bottom edges had been turned in and sewed together.  If you look closely at the edge, you can see that the denim has torn and worn right along the edges.  So, while I tie the quilt together, I'm going to be contemplating how to finish off the edges of the quilt so that the whole thing will last another 30 years.  Your suggestions on binding the edges are more than welcome!  I certainly have no idea what I'm doing!

On Being a Cookie Mom

I was roaming through old posts this morning when I found this wonderful reminder of life the way it was!  It was originally published on Sept. 18, 2013.

I've been a Girl Scout Cookie mom on and off over the last ten years. 

Ten years ago, I was a new arrival in this town, and I had been talked into the job of cookie mom by my daughter's girl scout leader.  I didn't know many people here, but I did think this would be a great way to meet some new people.

I wasn't really sure what the job entailed, but I was reassured that I would be able to attend training for new cookie moms.

When I showed up at the training session, all of the seats were taken.  I found a spot on the floor, pulled out a notebook and began taking notes.

Ten minutes into the meeting, I felt a little tickle on my foot and looked down to see that a mouse had climbed up onto my shoe and had his front paws on my knee.  He was looking up at me with very bright, curious eyes.

The next thing I knew, I was being helped down off the top of the table.

I'm not sure whatever happened to the mouse, but thanks to that mouse, I did meet many new people that night!

Memory Locket

With making all of the graduation presents for the oldest and youngest, I have found myself very nostalgic of late.  Remembering the times when my own children were little, and tracking down old family recipes has made me think longingly of a time long past.

For years now, I have held onto the old odds and ends of necklaces, earrings, and pins - all now broken - that my Aunts and Father gave me when I was younger.

I pull them out occasionally, look through them, and remember those who have passed on, memorialized in these tiny little pieces of jewelry.

A few weeks ago, I found this charming locket at Kohl's.  Closed with a strong magnetic latch, I was hoping that I could put some of my old little odds and ends in here.  The price was higher than I was willing to pay.  Kohl's has some excellent sales.  I was fortunate enough to be able to combine the sale with Kohl's cash.  As a result, I paid $10 for the locket.  That was just about what I was willing to pay!

After the rather harsh realization that not all of the charms were going to fit into that locket.  (What was I thinking, anyway?)  I had to chose the few items that would fit in there.  I chose a couple of necklace charms, and took apart an earring for the beads and mixed them into the locket with the rest of the charms.

In this fine little locket, I have charms from Aunt Joyce, Dad, and Aunt Rosie. 

So, while I am celebrating the accomplishments of my children and remembering my own graduation and milestones years past, I have a little bit of my own past with me. 

I'm still feeling nostalgic, but I am beginning to realize just how much I've accomplished in my almost 50 years on this place we call Earth. And that is helping me focus on all of our futures - not just the kids.  

Oh, The Places You'll Go!

One of Dr. Seuss' best adult books, I reread this recently.  With both my oldest and youngest children graduating from schools, I felt I needed a reminder of WHY we've spent so much time and effort getting them through school!  (Ha, I know why, but it's always nice to be reminded!)

I do remember having this book read to us by one of our English teachers when I graduated from High School.  Ever since that time, this book has always seemed to me to be a gateway, or rite of passage that must be read and enjoyed at the major milestone events in life.

I had an ulterior motive for reading this book.

When each of my kids has graduated from High School, I have made a special scrapbook for them.

The oldest child is a mathematician.  His scrapbook was a straightforward account of his overachieving years in high school.  Orchestra, Cross Country, Track and Field... I organized the pictures in a straightforward, linear progression.

The middle child is more artistic and creative.  For his scrapbook, I made an "A, B, C" book.  26 pages long, each page was dedicated to a letter of the alphabet, and each letter had a word and pictures that tied into something from his high school years.  That one was a lot of work - struggling to find something for "X" and "Z" was a stretch, but I managed to do it.  I spent a good chunk of the school year pulling together the pictures for that album.

And now, youngest child.  I want to do something different.  (Stupid, stupid, I know.  I could just do an A, B, C book or a straightforward scrapbook and have done with it.)  But no.  I have decided that her scrapbook is going to be based upon the book "Oh the Places You'll Go!"

And so, I re-read the book this past week.  I've decided that I'm going to use Dr. Seuss' words, and pictures that we've taken over the course of her high school career.  I'm also going to see if I can get some of her friends to help by contributing some artwork to the pages.

Graduation is about 10 weeks away.  Will I get this finished in time?  It's going to be fun trying!

(BTW, I'm going to count this as one of my 75 books for the year.  I did actually read it - I had to put it on hold at the library, retrieve the book, and then decide whether or not this idea was a good one!  So, yes, this is one of the 75 books for the year!)

A Birthday Lamp

Oldest child's birthday is last week, and I made him a lamp for his birthday.

No, I didn't decide to take up pottery and cast a lamp on a wheel!

A friend of mine found this project on Pinterest, and made one for her son.  She posted the completed picture on her Facebook page, and I thought it would make a unique present for the kid who just turned 22.

I found the lamp base and shade at Target.  The top portion, that has the light bulb fixture detaches from the base, which is basically a giant 5 gallon jar.

As I've been cleaning out the house, I've taken all of the odds and ends of toys that belonged to him and put them in the jar.  These are the little toys that I knew he really enjoyed playing with when he was little, and they had survived our move 8 years ago.

I think it's a pretty cool memento of his childhood. As an added bonus, I got some of the extra stuff that had been laying around the basement cleaned up, and I also sorted through some stuff that has been sitting around, collecting dust for a while now!

This House

*This is another post from my old blog.  We spent the weekend working on the basement, and we were reminiscing about the time we pulled the freezer out of the basement.  This post originally ran on  Jan. 7, 2010. We bought our house from our in-laws in 2008.  When they moved out, they didn't clean out. We've been working on it ever since...

Cleaning out the basement in our house has proved to be a greater challenge than we were anticipating.

Once we finally got up the nerve to go into the basement, we wanted to run back upstairs again, screaming for our very lives!  Armed with trash bags, rubber gloves, and dust masks, we went down and began sifting through the piles of stuff in the basement.  The mind-numbing job of cleaning out the basement blurs in my mind.  There is one particular episode that stands out very clear.

The basement had turned into a repository of dead and unused appliances.  As we cleared out the trash, we were stunned at what we found underneath.  One freezer, circa. 1959.  One free standing stove, circa. 1962.  Two concrete sinks- you know, the laundry tub kind that your washing machine drain into.  The sinks were broken, but they were still in the basement.  Two old microwaves: One from 1978, and another from 1988.  One old stereo, four old speakers, and two old, broken television sets.  And three dehumidifiers. Somehow, these appliances needed to get out of our basement.
We borrowed a heavy-duty hand truck from my brother-in-law, and we borrowed a pick up truck from a friend.  My husband took a Friday off work, and we were ready to run to the dump.
The first things we hauled out were easy.  The microwaves, the dehumidifiers, the televisions, and the old stereos.  We had no problems hauling them out of the basement and out to the truck.  We loaded up our first load and hauled it off to the dump.

The large items in our basement presented more of a challenge.  The stove and the freezer.  Due to the odd turn at the top and bottom of the interior stairs, we could not take them up through the house.  We were going to have to use the walk-up from the basement.  It's a tight turn from the door up the stairs, but the basement door opens towards the concrete wall, so we thought we could get everything out through that door.  Husband managed to get the stove out and up the stairs with minimal help.  My job was to stand at ground level and hold the storm door on the basement open from above while he attempted to get the stove out and turned up the stairs.

And then came the big challenge.  The freezer.  That monster was heavy.  Much heavier than what we were anticipating.  We attempted to move it towards the door, but it was too heavy.  Husband pulled out the tool box and took the door off the freezer and hauled it out to the truck.

The freezer was still heavy, but with the two of us- we managed to get it onto the hand cart.  John took one handle of the cart, and I took the other and we carefully moved it over to the door.

Now, there's a problem we hadn't anticipated with the back door.  The door does not open all of the way.  When my in-laws finished the basement, they put a wall next to the basement door.  The interior door only opens up 90* from it's closed position.  It doesn't open all the way.  Try as we might, we could not get the freezer through that door.

We looked at each other, aghast.  Were we going to have to chop the freezer into tiny bits with the sledge hammer in order to get it out of the basement?  As we sat on the floor and pondered our options, we looked again at the door opening and the freezer.  It looked like we could get the freezer door through if we pulled the door off the hinges.  So, husband pulled out his tools and we took the basement door off the hinges and set it aside.

Once again, we wiggled and waggled the freezer, trying to figure out the magic angle to get it through the doorway.  No matter how we worked it, we could not get the freezer through that door.  It kept catching on the freezer hinges that had previously held the door.  Muttering unmentionable things under his breath, husband took the sledge hammer to the hinges on the freezer and pounded them into submission.  After 10 minutes, both hinges were pounded flat against the surface of the freezer.
Before we decided to attempt moving the freezer again, we took a good, hard look at the storm door.  It did not look as if we were going to be able to pull the freezer out of the basement without doing serious damage to the storm door.  Our biggest fear was that if we dropped the freezer while we were hauling it up the stairs, it would go hurtling down the steps and destroy the storm door.  Once again, out came the tool box and husband took the storm door off the hinges and gently set it inside, next to the door.

Muttering silently, we managed to pull the freezer out of the basement and turn it so that it was ready to be pulled up the stairs.

Heaven help us-- we were not prepared for the weight of that freezer.  I'm not certain how much it weighed, but I am willing to say it weighed at least 300 pounds.  It took two of us to pull that freezer up the basement steps.  We tilted the hand cart back until it would go back no more.  And then, we pulled it up a step.  Panting, we looked at each other.

"What do we do next?"  I asked.

"Slowly"  husband said, looking at the freezer and back at the 12 steps we still needed to haul the freezer up.  "Shift yourself up a step.  I'll hold the freezer while you move.  Then you hold the freezer and I'll shift up a step."

We moved ourselves around and then, on the count of three, we pulled the freezer up the next step.  We continued on in this slow and painful manner until, two hours later we finally pulled the freezer up the last step and onto the level ground.  Too tired to even talk to each other, we pulled the freezer over to the truck and stopped dead.

We were going to have to lift that freezer over 2 feet at once to get it into the bed of the truck.

"I've got an idea" said husband.  We live on the top of a hill, and the driveway slopes down steeply from the carport to street level.  Husband had the truck backed up the driveway.  He pulled the car part way down the driveway, until the back of the truck was only a little above the carport.  He then found a heavy duty piece of wood that he used as a ramp to cover the short distance from the carport pad to the truck bed.  We pulled the freezer up into the bed of the truck with minimal effort and tied it tightly down to the bed of the truck.  He left the freezer on the hand cart, and put blocks under the wheels of the cart.

Once we got to the dump, we used the same board to make a ramp from the truck bed to the ground, untied the freezer and pulled it down the ramp.  When the freezer was halfway down the ramp, the wood splintered, and the freezer came crashing down to the ground. 

At that point, the staff took pity on us.  They took charge of the freezer and the splintered wooden ramp.  We put the remains of the hand truck in the back and headed back home.

But what about the basement doors?  We so desperately wanted that freezer out of our lives that we left the house with the basement doors sitting in the middle of the basement!

Time on my Hands

Mom has been in the hospital for the last 6 weeks.  She's been in the ICU, the CCU, the surgical floor, and the regular floor.

I've spent a lot of time with her, but for much of that time, she's been sound asleep.

So, what have I been doing to help pass the time?

I've been a Girl Scout leader for years.  My girls are Seniors in High School this year.  Over the years, we, the parents, have been taking pictures of events that we have attended and uploading them to an online share site.  I had this great thought about a year ago.  Why not make scrapbooks for the girls to give to them when we have our end of scouting celebration in May of next year? 


I debated making this particular gem digitally, but I have a lot of memorabilia from the years that I wanted to put into their albums.  The only way to easily do that is to scrap the album "old school" style.

So, I've been ordering the prints from the share site over the past year.  I found a great deal on albums at my local chain craft store, and I began scrapping when the opportunity presented itself.

When Mom's hospital journey began, I really began putting time into those albums.  When I was home, I would sit on the floor, spread my mess all over, and do the cutting and the pasting.  I found the actual creative work to be cathartic.  It helped me deal with my anxieties over the fact that I can't be in two places at once. Honestly, let's face it - the rest of my world is spinning out of control, and this is one thing I can control.  I'm pretty sure a psychiatrist would have a field day with this chain of events.

This is the mess of scrap book stuff all over the floor!

I also added blank papers to the pages in the albums to go back and journal later.

Keep in mind - these are very simple albums.  The most cropping I did of the photos was with a slicer to cut out extra "fluff" that didn't belong so that I could fit more pictures on a page.  Think rectangles and squares.  There are no fancy shapes in these albums.  I had started this project over a year ago, but I honestly hadn't made a lot of progress on this in the last few months.  Within the first two weeks of Mom's admission, I finished the picture part of the albums.  (I do only have 5 girls in my troop, so don't be too impressed with this.  I don't think I would have undertaken a project like this for more than 5 girls.)

When I finished the albums, I put them all in a crate in the back of my van, along with some acid free pens.  When I arrived at the hospital, I would pull out one of the albums, and the pens.  When Mom was sleeping, I'd pull the pages out of their protective sleeves and journal on the blank squares.

A completed journaling box.

The nice thing about having that paper scrapbook with me is that I was able to work quietly and not disturb Mom while she slept.  When she was awake, I was able to share the pictures with her.  Actually, it's been a pretty big help in keeping her interested and engaged in the midst of all of the health issues and the chaos and uncertainty of the hospital.

My China Cabinet

Over 100 years ago, my grandmother and grandfather lived in a mining town.  Theirs was a second marriage, and between them, they had 16 children.  This china cabinet belonged to my grandmother.  It was a prized possession that occupied a place of honor in her kitchen.  After she passed away, my father brought home the china cabinet, with the promise that it would one day be mine.  It followed us from one posting to another.  Mom started to strip off the old finish, but got overwhelmed with the size of the job and just gave up on it.  Then, my Dad left, and she stuck it in the basement.  Every time I asked for it, she'd give me some excuse, but I'd never actually get to take it home.

Two Decembers ago, I finally got the china cabinet out of my Mom's house.  It's been almost 40 years since my grandmother passed away, and for the last 25 of those years, it's been sitting in my Mom's basement.  I thought it was beyond repair.  The finish was a dark, dark black.  Mom had started to strip it, but never finished the job.  The back was covered in powdery mildew.  The glass was gone.  I don't know where it went, but all three sides were open.  I thought for sure that the cabinet was beyond redemption, and that it would be relegated to the dump.

 

One of the glass doors had been broken, shattered in a fight between one of my aunts and uncles when they were younger.  She got mad at her brother for something he said, she picked up a foot stool and threw it at him, he ducked, and the door shattered.  Granny never replaced the glass in that particular door, but we all know the story of how that broke.  I believe the other pieces of glass were lost over time and the many moves we made while Dad was still in the Air Force.

I had heard rumors though, of a restoration business in Maryland that could work wonders with anything that you thought was beyond hope.  I called them, and the owner invited me to bring the piece over.  He looked at it, told me the likely provenance of the piece, told me what wood it was made out of, told me he could fix it, and quoted me a price.  He asked for $200 down.

Seven months later, I received a phone call from them letting me know the cabinet was done.  They brought this over to our house.  Can you believe it?  I've never seen it look so beautiful.  I remember it in my grandmother's kitchen when I was little.  It was stained dark- I think it's called a walnut stain.  And the glass had the coal dust sheen that she could never quite get rid of, no matter how much she tried.

We had moved the china cabinet out of the way in the hallway when we replaced the floor.  (Old terra cotta floor is shown in the picture).  Yesterday, we moved it back into it's place of honor.  I packed away the china my Dad bought while he was serving in Vietnam in 1969.  Everytime I look at that cabinet, I remember my Granny, my Dad, and his family, and I smile.  It's a timeless piece of my family history.

 

If you're interested in finding out more about the Country Stripper (Furniture Restorations, but you've got to admit- the name sticks with you!), check out their web site.  They are awesome!  I believe they serve a large chunk of the Mid-Atlantic region.

http://www.thecountrystripper.com/

Happy New Year!

I've been vowing I would write this for a day now.... Funny thing, though.  When you have three kids home for the holidays, you don't often get access to your own computer!

I hope that everyone who reads this has a wonderful, joyous, and healthful new year, full of many surprises and wonderful new things. 

Our year began at my Mom's house.  My sister and I gathered there with our respective broods.  Six cousins in all, with only 6 years separating the oldest child from the youngest.  The kids are quieter now at gatherings than they used to be.  They don't play with blocks anymore.  Instead, they huddle around in the basement, playing video games and singing karaoke - and eating!

We had a wonderful lunch- a make your own fajitas bar.  Considering that one of the cousins in now a vegetarian and two have food allergies, we felt safest having all of the food separate from each other.  That way, the kids could build their own food around their own needs.  It worked really, really well!  We are going to have to do that again!

Our New Year's Eve was a little different.  We (meaning me and my husband) actually thought we were going to be alone for the first time in 18 years.  We made some tentative plans, but then decided to go ahead, stay home, and just enjoy being at home - ALONE!

All of the kids were out of the house by 7.  At 8, we got the call from our daughter.  She wanted to come home.  She had no interest in spending the night at her friends' house.

At 10, our oldest child walked back in the door.  He and his friends had been gathered at Ian's house to play Magic.   They decided they were going to have a tournament.  Problem was, when you start your tournament at 5, you're done by 10.  Several of the kids decided that they wanted to go fight the crowds at the Baltimore waterfront to see the fireworks.  Oldest child thought a warm house and a snug bed just after midnight sounded like a better option.  

Middle child stayed overnight at a friends' house.  However, when he found out yesterday morning that both his sister and brother had been home, his response was "Oh man, if I'd known they were going to be home, I wouldn't have spent the night at Scott's!  I would've been here!"

We did have a really nice time.  We rented the movie "The Help", ate popcorn, and watched the Baltimore fireworks on t.v.  We were all tuckled snug into our beds by 1 a.m.

And we ended up spending New Year's Eve together with most of our kids.  It was a truly magical evening!