On Mother’s Day, when he was eleven or twelve, my son gave me a pair of earrings – dangling strings of tiny freshwater pearls. I was surprised when I opened the little box he sheepishly handed me to find such a personal and beautiful gift. The earrings must be inexpensive, […]
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Insulation – Then and Now
My husband and I need to replace our furnace. If possible, we also want to even out the heating and cooling in our house – one upstairs room is perpetually hot in the summer, and a basement bedroom needs a space heater in winter for comfort. We had a furnace […]
Continue readingWorking Through the Generations: Happy 80th Birthday to My Father
I’ve written before that I am a lot like my mother. But I developed my attitudes toward work by watching my father. My earliest memories of my father at work date back to when I was in pre-school. When he was in graduate school earning his Ph.D. in metallurgy, he […]
Continue readingPoetry and Childhood Memories: Plume, by Kathleen Flenniken
I received Plume, a book of poems by Kathleen Flenniken, from my daughter, who bought it for me because the author grew up in Richland, Washington, as I did. The poems in Plume are about Ms. Flenniken’s childhood in Richland and her work experience at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation, where […]
Continue readingProvisioning for the Journey West
Emigrants preparing for the move to Oregon had plan carefully what they would take. They had to balance the amount of food and other supplies they needed for the journey, what they could afford to buy, the weight their wagon and teams could pull, and what mementoes and tools they […]
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Humor Amidst the Tears
I wrote on Monday about the tragedies of Alzheimer’s, which are real and heart-wrenching. But there are moments of humor as well. Two of our family’s amusing stories occurred in May 2010, not long after my mother was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. Several family members had gathered in New Orleans for […]
Continue readingPhoto Finishes
One of the challenges in writing this blog is finding pictures to suit each post. I’ve read that adding pictures to a blog makes it much more attractive to readers, so I have tried to include images of some type with most posts. Many of my pictures come from Microsoft […]
Continue readingWalking and Weapons and Children’s Personalities
I’ve been thinking a lot about walking recently, because of my daughter’s broken leg. Her accident and recuperation have brought to mind the days when she and her older brother learned to walk. I learned a lot about my children watching them learn to walk. Neither of them walked until […]
Continue readingMy Grandmother’s Thimble and Sewing Doll
In an earlier post, I mentioned my maternal grandmother’s thimble. Her initials – WS, for Winifred Strachan, her maiden name – are on the thimble. Her friends all called her Winnie, and I called her Nanny Winnie. Nanny Winnie kept house for her father and brothers after her mother died; […]
Continue readingMy Mother’s 80th Birthday: The Meaning of Decades and of Days
I have mentioned before that my mother has Alzheimer’s. The last few years have been hard on our family, as we have watched her abilities decline. We recently moved her into an assisted living facility. Today, March 4, 2013, is her 80th birthday. We celebrate the milestone, while we reflect […]
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