A Simple Woman's Daybook~November 15, 2013

Our lives pass swiftly by! I want to do something to remember

the everyday moments and my thoughts about them.  

That is what this Daybook is all about.

Focusing on the little things that become my life.

One entry at a time.

Just for today~Friday, November 15, 2013

 

Outside my window...it is dark outside now.  About 6:30 pm.  It feels much later as I am still not use to being back on Standard Time.  It is chilly outside and I am thankful for my little space heater under my desk that keeps my toes from freezing.
  

Have you ever been back east where at this time of year people put those single taper candles (battery operated) in all their windows? Well, I love that.  This year I bought some and slowly but surely I am putting one in each window.  They are on a timer so every night at precisely 5:30 they come on for five hours.  I have such sweet memories of driving through the woods of New England and seeing them shimmering and flicking in the windows of the houses with so much space between them and no fences. That is just iconic for the feeling of Christmas in New England and being there with our sweet kids.

I am already feeling that little twinge of wishing we were going this year.  But we just cannot go anywhere else this year.  Jim just returned from a week in Rhode Island helping the kids put a new kitchen in their house.  That means that since May one or both of us has been either to Utah or Rhode Island every single month.  We are beginning to feel like transcontinental commuters. So are staying put for the holidays and beyond now until spring or summer.  But I still miss all of them during this season.  I guess that is something a mom and dad never get past.  Christmas is family, friends and our Savior.
 

I am thankful for....the fact that our Savior is always right beside us when we miss our family and special friends.  Once we recognize that and feel it and know it in our hearts, we never have to feel alone.  I have been missing my sweet mom today.  It was just ten years ago tonight that she left this world for her greater reward.  She is always near to my heart, always close. And yet it seem like an eternity since I could touch her.  Ten years might as well be 50.  But I know I will hug her again one happy day.  If it were not so, what would be the point to any of this?

From the learning room....I will never be too old to learn new things about life, people, the Gospel or myself.  I like that don't you?  I never thought there would be big revelatory surprises at this age.  I was wrong.  Things happen all the time that teach me otherwise.  I have met some of the best friends of my life in the past few years.  The heart's capacity to love is endless, deep and surprising.  I think that part of us lives on forever.  At least I hope so because it is a wonderful thing to love.

I am reading...nothing that is just for enrichment and leisure time.  I must fix that.  Reading is so therapeutic and broadening.  To be honest I find I get restless reading these days.  The electronic version of things really helps though.  I like having the light behind the page, it helps me see a lot better.  But mostly I just have other things I need to do pulling on me all the time.
 
From the kitchen... I need to go shopping tomorrow.  I don't care to go on Saturdays but it has to be this week.  So, I will. We are spending Thanksgiving with Jim's cousins again this year.  It has been way too long since I have cooked a turkey with all the trimmings.  I might do one on Friday or Saturday of that weekend.

Some spiritual thoughts I have been having...I have been thinking about how spectacular the Gospel Plan of Jesus Christ really is.  How wonderful that we have so many ancestors and so many people coming after us in a long line of posterity.  Families are so amazing.  As I have been working on our Family Tree I have come to know the stories of our ancestors, their hardships and challenges and sacrifices for their posterity and I am in awe of their journeys.

If you want to have complete contentment and happiness in your life, you might want to do your family history.  As you learn to love them you learn to be more grateful for your blessings.   I can promise you we have nothing to complain about.  We are so blessed.  That doesn't mean we don't have trials like they did because we surely do.   But we have so many new ways of coping with the age old problems that they never imagined in their wildest dreams.  This work brings an abundance of gratitude.  I always have thought you cannot be grateful and unhappy.  I recommend you look back in time.

I am hearing...Eva Cassidy an artist I just recently discovered.  She is singing Autumn Leaves right now and it is simply beautiful.  She is kind of a folksy, melancholy, sultry singer with a great style and a voice like an angel.  She died at age 33 of melanoma back in 2007 but her music lives on.  Somewhere Over the Rainbow and Danny Boy and Tennessee Waltz are some of the best of her work.  She is very relaxing and inspirational.  Perfect music for writing.

One of my guilty pleasures...shopping and lunch with friends.  We had a serendipity experience today.  A couple of us decided to go to Room With A Past and then another friend joined us at the last minute.   Then we went over to Clayton to a favorite shop and decided to have lunch at La Viranda.  Perfect morning, so relaxing and it was so beautiful out.  And we all felt we had gone on a mini-vacation.  We already decided to do something equally as fun next month and take our friend out to lunch for her birthday.  She couldn't come today and I could not reach her by phone.  She has a lot of health issues right now and I hope she is OK.

Pet Peeves...all seems right with my little world today.  But I sure wish it was that way for each and every one of us more often.  The beginning of the week was difficult.  My youngest brother had a stroke on Monday.  God blessed him, it was a slight one but nonetheless very scary.  He is home and doing a lot better but now the threat of that happening again is always in one's mind. Meds should be a great preventative.  He has a heart defect that was discovered and then we learned our other brother already knew he has the same thing.  Then our little Hazie has been having some problems with her eyes and had a CT scan yesterday.   All turned out well there but the problems still exists so what it is is a mystery?  Also one of our very best friends is recovering from a major surgery so that is good news too. My world is all right compared to the beginning of the week.

I am quoting...Pinterest

If I could change one thing it would be...that the disaster in the Philippines had never happened this past week.  Terrible destruction and so much suffering is going on there.  The good news our friends' son was working there and he is OK.  We watched the path of that one I promise you.  So thankful John and Carol's son, Michael is safe.  

An enjoyable movie/ TV show we have watched lately...We watched Cast Away with Tom Hanks and Helen Hunt last weekend.  It was very good to revisit it after many years.  I just love Helen Hunt. She portrays being in love so beautifully.

I am curious about...healthcare!  Holy Cow!  People all around us are getting dropped by their insurance companies and especially small business owners.  Some people have said their insurance will rival their mortgage.  Seriously this is the lamest political disaster in a long, long time.  Even the Chief himself admits it now and has extended the deadline another year for some it seems.  I saw the headlines but did not actually read the article so I don't know for sure what the reprieve entails.  Apparently it applies to only those who have not already been canceled by their companies.

Plans for the rest of the week... are all about Trees.  Work on my Family Tree, teach two lessons on Tuesday and keep up with the house work and get some of the fall decor put to bed and I may even start on the Christmas Tree.  I decided to start there and then decide how much more I am actually going to put up this year.  I will probably do it all but I am pacing myself and taking my time. 

Jim is planning or at least hoping for a work crew here next Saturday to help him finish putting the roof on the work shop.  Then he can rest up a little during the rainy season and maybe get his hip replacement.  What a concept.  First we kill ourselves on all these huge and very physically challenging projects then we have surgery.  Why are men so stubborn about this sort of thing?  I hope he does it soon.  Tomorrow the Scouting for Food food collection for the region will happen. Yes I did say region.  Not the troop, not the district  not the town, not the county but the REGION!  He is in charge for the 18th year I am so glad it is almost over.   I am getting very weary of all the big projects and just want to get back to our regular life soon.  Do we have one anymore seems to be the big question?

 

One of my favorite things...Genealogy Conferences.  We went to the Ancestry Day in San Francisco this past Saturday.  We had a great time and it was fabulous to be back in the City after a long absence.  We went to dinner with our good friends afterwards and that was so nice and relaxing.  There is one in SLC I'd really love to attend in February but I'll be content to see some of it streaming live from the conference this year.  Planning to go in 2015 for sure.

 
One thing that made me so happy this past week...the condo is in its final escrow days, Jen and family got a new house in the exact place they wanted, The RI kitchen is getting closer to done every day and the health of my brother and Hazie are much better than what might have been.

The most surprising thing this past week...definitely my brother's unfortunate stroke.  Just did not see that one coming at all.  And finding the rose from my mother's bridal bouquet.  72 years old.

2 photos I am sharing this week...A blast from the past!

My Great Great Grandparents
 that immigrated to the US

 from Sweden in 1881.

Johan Andreasson and 
Albertina Josefina Christiansdotter.

They had 8 children.

Three of their sons, and two grandsons:

Fritz and Daisy, George and Hattie

Victor and Lida.

The little guys..

Howard and Virgil.

The babies were my Dad's first cousins, 

making them my first cousins, once removed.

 

UNTIL THE NEXT DAYBOOK,
 BE HAPPY AND CARRY ON!

❤♡♥♡❤♡♥♡❤♡♥s, Bon

Carmel Corn~You'll Love it! Not Sticky!

Jim's co-worker, Ellen, use to make this for us around the holidays. Ellen is so sweet and was always making something amazing and special for Jim. Lucky me, he shared. Thank you Ellen!! It is the best carmel corn ever! It's great because you bake it. It's never sticky, just perfection!

Ingredients:

1 Cup Butter
2 Cups Brown Sugar
1/2 Cup light or dark Corn Syrup
6 Quarts Popped Popcorn
1 Teaspoon Salt
1/2 Teaspoon Baking Soda
1 Teaspoon Vanilla

Directions:

Melt butter and stir in brown sugar, corn syrup, and salt. Bring to a boil stirring constantly. Boil without stirring for five minutes. Remove from heat. Stir in baking soda and vanilla. Pour over popped popcorn and mix well. Turn into 2 large roasting pans. Bake five minutes in a 250 degree oven. Stir and bake five more minute. Repeat this one more time. Cover a large cookie sheet with wax paper and remove carmel corn from the oven and put on large cookie sheet and cool. Break it apart. Enjoy!

It is Definitely Time To Fall Into
Autumn's Magical, Cozy Moments!
Hope You Enjoy This Tasty Treat!

The Reese Twins of the Roaring 20s

William and Wilma Reese age 9 or 10

Joseph and Josephine Reese age 4 or 5

This morning (insomniac early) I had awakened and was looking on my smart phone at some old email files.  There in a file I found a bunch of old photos, this one among them.  The little sweetheart holding the doll is my mother and this is the only photo that I have of her as a child that shows me what she looked like.  There are a few others in various degrees of deterioration but this one is nearly perfect for being almost 100 years old.  Oddly I do not remember ever seeing this photo before.  I think I must have put it in PAF years ago and Lowell, our son-in-law must have taken all  those off PAF and sent them to me in a big photo file.   Anyway I feel as though God did send me a lovely and cherished gift this morning.

There are so many things I love about this photo.  The first is that each person in this photo is someone that is now deceased that I have known and loved very much when they were alive.  It is wonderful to see what they looked like as children. 

This picture was taken at a critical time in their lives, it is either just shortly before or after their mother died in 1924.  Their mother, Ella Evans Reese, had nine children include these two sets of twins.  The fact that the mother and twins all survived is a miracle in itself when nearly all twin births include at least one breech baby and were delivered at home.  In fact, all but their last child were born at home.  When little Ruby was born our grandmother went into the hospital, contracted a serious infection and died ten days later at 39.

This left all nice children, motherless and their father was a busy rancher.  Consequently they were passed from pillar to post and separated for several years in different households.  I do know that my mother and Uncle Joseph were kept together and I have no idea what happened to the other kids during those years.  I do know that it was very rough on my mom and her brother and not ideal in any way for them.

Eventually the kids had an old field hand named Ollie that came and stayed at their home and he was the best caregiver they ever had.  Their dad eventually remarried an old spinster that taught at the kids' school.  This also was not a happy time for the children.  They were to address her as "Miss Moore."  Not a "warm fuzzy" experience for the children for sure.  This fact was apparently kept a secret from their father who thought he had found a solution to his problem.

My mom says she only remembers her own dear mother as she watched her casket being lowered into the ground and as people threw dirt on it.  That simply breaks my heart, and to now be able to have a little girl's face to go with that story makes it all the more poignant for me. 

Another thing I love about this picture is the fact that my mom is holding a pretty little doll in her arms.  Mom told me she did not ever remember having a toy in her entire life.  I am not sure that this is her doll but it is nonetheless wonderful to see her holding it.

The other thing I like about this picture is a chance to see a little part of where they lived.  It looks like the most God-forsaken place on earth.  Flat, ugly, dry and brown.  Even in a black and white photo you can see it is brown!   And look at their little feet.  Only Aunt Wilma is wearing shoes.  We are planning a trip to South Dakota hopefully in the late spring of the year 2014.  I want to find their property and go there and visit some of the graves of people in the family who never made it out of Pierre, South Dakota alive.

I am so thankful for discovering this photo!  It just means so much to have something like this to share with her posterity and with my own siblings and cousins.