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My words and photographs are copyrighted, and may not be used without permission, even on Pinterest.

~ Kathy M.

Showing posts with label grandma jody/mom. Show all posts
Showing posts with label grandma jody/mom. Show all posts

Friday, November 26, 2010

The Family Calendar:


I originally posted this last Thanksgiving, but that was before I knew about  Sepia Saturday, and since this week's theme is weddings, I couldn't resist.  I had another post planned, but I think that you guys will like this one a lot.  

Thank you so much for stopping by to visit, and Happy Sepia Saturday!

Kathy M.


Source:  Julie Anderson
My Cousin Danny and Grandma Jody (my Mom).
Photo courtesy of  @juliejulie

My Mom is so good to our family.  She helps to keep us bonded together in a very special way.  Each year she puts together a family calendar, with the best of the new photos and the best of the old photos that she can find.  Mom makes around 35 of these special calendars, which is a lot of hard work.  Then she writes everybody's birthday's and anniversary on their correct dates.  Mom wraps them in newspaper and hands them out at Thanksgiving, when we all meet for our meal at her church fellowship hall.  Thanks, Mom, for all of your hard work!

Mom is giving Maria and Dawn a sneak peak of this year's calendar:

Oregon Gifts of Comfort and Joy ~ Kathy Matthews


Oregon Gifts of Comfort and Joy ~ Kathy Matthews

Here are several of the older photos that she chose for this year's calendar:

Oregon Gifts of Comfort and Joy ~ Kathy Matthews
Here I am, trying to get Angie to hold still 
while my little bro watches the attempt.



Oregon Gifts of Comfort and Joy ~ Kathy Matthews
My great-grandparents, Ben and Litha Hedrick
are holding my Nanny.


Oregon Gifts of Comfort and Joy ~ Kathy Matthews
Nanny grew up to be a beautiful bride!  From left to right:  My Grandpa and Grandma Traylor, Nanny, Great Grannie Hedrick (Grandma T.'s Mom, if you can't tell), Uncle Frank, Aunt Mardelle and Mom.


Oregon Gifts of Comfort and Joy ~ Kathy Matthews
 Here is Aunt Mardy when she was a baby.


Oregon Gifts of Comfort and Joy ~ Kathy Matthews
 She grew up to be a beautiful bride too!  
Here she is with Uncle Frank.


Oregon Gifts of Comfort and Joy ~ Kathy Matthews
This picture is really old.  It is hard to see, but my great-great Uncle Hobart is at the top of the part of this tree that is still standing up straight.  You might have to click on the picture to enlarge it.  He looks so tiny!  We used to have a lot of big old trees around the Pacific Northwest.

Anyway, I just wanted to show you that.  I hope that you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving!  


~ Kathy


If you miss a day, you miss a lot!  Don't miss out on the news ... Please click here to go to my home page and see what is happening in Mayberry today.

Tuesday, November 9, 2010

My 1000th Post!!! Andy Williams and Selling Almond Roca for the Sorrity Sisters:


Please enjoy the music of ... Andy Williams!  I tried to do a playlist of Anne Murray songs, but apparently she isn't on Playlist.com.  I thought that was weird.  She is probably just as famous as Andy Williams, maybe even more so.  Oh, well.  I have been thinking about Andy Williams anyway.  I used to love listening to his records on our stereo when I was 8 or 9.  His songs are easy to sing along too.  I just learned today that Andy Williams sings "I Think I Love You".  Do you think he stole that from David Cassidy, or was it the other way around?  I'll have to get to the bottom of that one.




Thinking about Andy Williams reminded me of when I was young and my Mom belonged to Sorority.  It wasn't the kind of sorority that you belong to in college.  It was one that you joined later on.  They met on a regular basis, did fundraisers, had family get togethers and wild parties.  Their husbands made those parties wild.  

I remember one party that was at our house, with Andy Williams blaring away on the stereo, and they played this one party game.  A bit of drinking must have been going on, that is all I can figure out.  They would throw a sheet over a game participant and say take off anything that you don't need.  So, the person would take off their watch.  The others would say, is that all you don't need?  Take off anything you don't need.   It would go on and on.  One guy got down to his underwear and everybody was cracking up.  Of course, the sheet was the thing that they didn't need!


One of the sorority's annual fundraisers was selling Almond Roca door-to-door.  Each Sorority Sister was given a certain amount of the candy and a certain amount of time.  My Mom was a harried mother of four with a full time job as a nurse, and going door-to-door selling Almond Roca really did not appeal to her.


So, she passed that job on to me and my best friend Carla (aka: Carly).  We would go around the neighborhood selling the cans of Almond Roca, and when we were sold out we each got our own can for our hard labor.  "Will work for candy!", that was us!


There were lots of nice ladies in Mom's sorority.  Bonnie, Rosemary, and some lady who owned a ski shop.  I don't remember them all anymore.  After awhile, Mom got her sister, my Nanny to join.  They all loved Nanny; but then who didn't.  She is not only a lot of fun, she was Martha Stewart before Martha Stewart.  


The story that I remember about Nanny and Sorority is this one.  Sorority had another wild party, by that time I was a teenager.  I was babysitting my cousins overnight while Nanny and Uncle went to this party.  Nanny is not a drinker, in fact, I have never even seen her drink at all.  But she must have drank something at that party because she was a little hungover when they got home the next day.


My cousin Kristi had a parakeet, and due to the family cat, the door to her room was supposed to stay shut.  Well, that got overlooked on my watch.  The kids and I were out riding mini-bikes at the park when Nanny and Uncle got home.  (Gosh, times have changed.  Do kids get to ride mini-bikes anymore?  With a 15-year-old babysitter, out in the country, when cell phones were 30 years away from being invented?)  Anyway, my hungover auntie came home to evidence the cat's feast, and that didn't help her sour stomach situation.  Sorry, Nanny!  The funny thing is that she quit sorority shortly thereafter.  I suspect that she couldn't handle their parties any longer.  They were all so upset to lose her.


Well, that is my trip down memory lane for today.  I hope you enjoyed the little walk as much as I did.


Celebrate the positive!


Kathy

Sunday, November 7, 2010

I.O.U.'s:

This morning I was going through all of my old photos trying to find the good ones I know that I have of The Cabin.  I want to submit the post below this one to Metamorphosis Monday at BNOTP, and I know that I can do better.  It is that perfectionist in me, driving me nuts.  Well, I can't find the pictures that I want, but I found some others that cracked me up.

This was me in 9th Grade:




I made my Mom a couple of I.O.U.'s   ...  I wonder if she ever ended up cashing them in?  Probably not:






  

Hey, she's looking pretty mad about it too:

Oh wait, this picture was taken before I was even born, so she can't be mad at me, yet.  She must be mad at my Dad, Ralph the Jock:


Sometimes that happened.



Queen of Small Spaces: The Cabin

Okay.  This is not the most flowing post of all time, but here it is.  I hope you enjoy it and don't get dizzy!  I decided to add it to Susan's Metamorphosis Monday at Between Naps On The Porch anyway.  Thank you, Susan for doing this weekly linky party.  You sure are keeping me busy!



There are lots of pictures in this post, and most of them are old and scanned, and are not of the best quality.  I have some better ones someplace, where this little cabin was even more tricked out and photo worthy, but I cannot find them!  It is driving me crazy; I have been looking for them all day long.  I must have put them away for safe keeping, because I went through everything.  They are safe from me, at least. Dang.  Oh, well, it is okay for everything to not be perfect.  I think.  And, to be fair to myself, I had never even heard of a blog when these photos were taken.  Who would have ever guessed that I would want to put pictures of my home on the internet?  Some family members still cannot believe I do it!


Anyway, here is the story.  After Nigel and I left the McKenzie Valley so that we could both attend new schools, Mom said that we could live in her little vacation cabin in La Pine.  The cabin is a 365 square foot studio.  Besides my 10-year-old boy, we had our big dog, Ray, and 3 cats.


This cabin is well laid out and has a good kitchen and a good bathroom, with a good cast iron tub.  Those were three very important things that I am glad I had back then.


We loved our cabin.  This is one of those buildings that it is filled with peace.  I can't explain it, but it has a calming effect to all who enter.  It was safe.  Back then, in 2001, the neighborhood was sparsely populated and it was safe too.


We felt so comfortable there, that during the summertime, Nigel and Ray slept out here in this old camper.  We have pictures of it when it was all fixed up somewhere.


The front porch was like an extra room.  I used to sit out there and read my textbooks and study.  In the mornings, I enjoyed my coffee out there.  In the afternoons, I enjoyed my coffee cup of merlot.  That place was so peaceful. 



We even had a little fire pit.


There is Mama Kitty, back when she was nice.

See those green Rubbermaid containers?  Those held our dirty clothes.  We had lots of socks and underwear, and only had to go to the laundromat every 3 weeks or so.  I wonder why I kept those dead plant containers?



Living Area, Before:



 During:

There is Spencer, my nephew, peeking through the kitchen opening.  Take note of the little hallway on the left.  It leads to my little office and the bathroom.


When you first walk in, on the left, there is a very efficient little woodstove.  You probably recognize many things in this cabin. I don't think I have gotten rid of much over the years; I have just added to my favorites.


Sorry that this is so blurry.


 

These curtains are still in use throughout our home today.  The cabin backs up to BLM land and there wasn't anybody behind us.  I didn't even have mini-blinds!


Okay, I would like it if you would look to the left of this picture.  That is where Nigel's loft bed is.


Nigel's treasures were all in that area.  
He had his own little t.v. up there too.

This one from the set of photos that I want, but cannot find, when I had the cabin really cute.  The kitty is sleeping on my Grandma J.'s old trunk, which is where I kept my bedding when not in use.



This is our couch and my bed.





The Kitchen, Before:




The Kitchen, After:






Under the counter and above the counter is where I kept my dishes and glasses ... there is a lot of storage in this small kitchen.  I loved it.


Here is the tiny hall and the walk-in closet that I used as my office:



Can you tell yet that somebody loves M.E.?


I was lucky that there was a little window in that closet.


The water heater came in handy for putting pictures on.






The Bathroom:









This is the same shower curtain that is now in our little bathroom.  
It was my Grandma T.'s


The following pictures are recent.  Grandma Jody got her retreat cabin back from Nigel and me years ago.  She continues to work on it.  She was working on it this day, framing the windows, so things are jumbled around.  I just wanted to use this pics for comparison so that you can see how much I squeezed into it when we were living there.

The t.v. is where the dresser and the floral and lace 
curtains were when we lived there.


The lamp is on the wall where our couch/my bed used to be.


The bed with the pink bedspread is where Nigel's loft bed was.  Mom still keeps his Star Wars decals up high on the wall.


The hallway to my office and to the bathroom.


Where my office used to be.


Grandma Jody in the kitchen.  Check out the nice paneling 
that she has put on the walls.  Great job, Mom!



Those were some special times, living in the cabin.  Nigel and I were on our great adventure, being brave and moving two hours away from the valley and our peeps for the first time.  I am so grateful to Mom for sharing it with us.

~ Kathy 

I have visited these other sites for M.M., please check them out too:


Cottage Hill
Nanniepannies Blog
Attic Mag.com


Don't miss out on the news ... please click here to go to my home page and see what is happening in Mayberry today.

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