Showing posts with label family. Show all posts
Showing posts with label family. Show all posts

Thursday, February 16, 2012

Elusive Secret of Happiness

Remembering the good times is so important that researchers in the UK have found a clue that
The elusive secret of happiness could be as simple as remembering the good times and forgetting the regrets, a new university study reported
Valentine's Day, 1997 when daughter Julie and SIL Jack married:

Just look at the smiles on all our faces as Julie sets forth on a new journey with her husband Jack! It brings tears to my eyes remembering that joy.

1997, Jack and Julie enjoying their wedding cake on Valentine's Day after their marriage ceremony

Update: Julie has completed her second round of chemotherapy and had a PET scan yesterday in order to better target radiation that begins next week.  She is happy, upbeat, sweet and a joy to have as a daughter.  (Further links to Julie written by her mama can be found here, here, here, and here.)
Further: For people who look at the past through rose-tinted glasses are happier than those who focus on negative past experiences and regrets, according to a new study published in the journal Personality and Individual Differences.
The study helps explain why personality has such a strong influence on a person's happiness and the findings suggest that people with certain personality traits are happier than others because of the way they think about their past, present and future.
The study examined how peoples' ratings on the "Big Five" personality traits relates to their approach to time and life satisfaction.
The "Big Five" model assesses how extroverted, neurotic, open, conscientious and agreeable a person is, and rates individuals as high or low on each personality trait rather than assigning them a personality type.
"We found that highly extraverted people are happier with their lives because they tend to hold a positive, nostalgic view of the past and are less likely to have negative thoughts and regrets.

Thursday, January 26, 2012

Becoming a Pensioner

These articles are worth a look.  I became an early pensioner today, so everything is not all bad.

Pensions in the United States  Thank you, Sisters of Charity, for my pension plan

Study Hints That Statins Might Fight Breast Cancer  (more advances in breast cancer research)

The Upside Benefit for Women of Guaranteed Income in Retirement  (women do live longer than men)

and finally, just for a chuckle, here is one of the cards daughter Julie sent me for my birthday:


Happy Birthday to me, just another old broad :o)  And thank you, Gene, for my new red leather loveseat where I can plot, plan, knit, read, converse, watch tv, and generally thoroughly enjoy my retirement.


Wednesday, December 7, 2011

Reminiscences from Pearl Harbor Day, 1941

My dad wrote his memoirs about ten years ago, spending many hours at his computer thinking and reminiscing about his past.  My brother captured it all, making a book from his writings.  Dad is now 93 and living in a care center with Alzheimer's, so today he could not tell us anything about his years in the navy or what he recalled about being a test pilot in the 1940's.  But he did write his memoirs when his mind was sharp.

This morning after listening to the news, I thought about when Dad was in the navy and a part of The Greatest Generation.  I wondered if he had written anything about Pearl Harbor Day in 1941, so I looked into his book.  Sure enough, he did write a short piece about what he remembered on Pearl Harbor Day in 1941. Here it is.
On December 7, 1941…
The U. S. Navy accepted me as a candidate to be an Aviation Cadet. I was assigned to the Elimination Base at the Naval Air Station at Dallas. I reported on October 1, 1941, and completed primary flight training. I received orders to report to the N. A. S. Corpus Christi and to a pool of future Aviation Cadets. 
It was Sunday morning, December 7. 1941, after reveille, I dropped from my top bunk and dressed in khaki for a full day ashore in Corpus Christi. Mother and Dad were visiting the Ward Terrells, friends from Junction. I met them for church services and then we visited with Maurine Motley, a distant cousin from Hollis, OK. She was a teacher. We drove around the city and returned to her apartment. A lady came out a door and told us to turn on the car radio for the NEWS! The announcement and description of the Pearl Harbor attack was a shock to us. The sun was low in the sky in Texas but it was morning in Hawaii. 
I returned to the base by bus and was prepared for some drastic changes, but I noticed nothing different. We still drilled, had musters and formations. I remained in the Pool until after Christmas. My orders were to report to Pensacola N.A.S. as an Aviation Cadet.
The Way It Was... Recollections and Reflections of Charles Wilson McCarroll, Jr.

Charles W. McCarroll in 1941
Charles W. McCarroll, 2011
From The Greatest Generation by Tom Brokaw:
These men and women came of age in the Great Depression, when economic despair hovered over the land like a plague. They had watched their parents lose their businesses, their farms, their jobs, their hopes. They had learned to accept a future that played out one day at a time Then, just as there was a glimmer of economic recovery, war exploded across Europe and Asia. When Pearl Harbor made it irrefutably clear that America was not a fortress, this generation was summoned to the parade ground and told to train for war. They left their ranches in Sully County, South Dakota, their jobs on the main street of Americus, Georgia, they gave up their place on the assembly lines in Detroit and in the ranks of Wall Street, they quit school or went from cap and gown directly into uniform. 
They answered the call to save the world from the two most powerful and ruthless military machines ever assembled, instruments of conquest in the hands of fascist maniacs. 
They faced great odds and a late start, but they did not protest. At a time in their lives when their days and nights should have been filled with innocent adventure, love, and the lessons of the workaday world, they were fighting, often hand to hand, in the most primitive conditions possible, across the bloodied landscape of France, Belgium, Italy, Austria. They fought their way up a necklace of South Pacific islands few had ever heard of before and made them a fixed part of American history: islands with names like Iwo Jima, Guadalcanal, Okinawa. They were in the air every day, in skies filled with terror, and they went to sea on hostile waters far removed from the shores of their homeland. 
When the war was over, the men and women who had been involved, in uniform and in civilian capacities, joined in joyous and short-lived celebrations, then immediately began the task of rebuilding their lives and the world they wanted. They were mature beyond their years, tempered by what they had been through, disciplined by their military training and sacrifices. They married in record numbers and gave birth to another distinctive generation, the Baby Boomers. They stayed true to their values of personal responsibility, duty, honor, and faith. 
They were a new kind of army now, moving onto the landscapes of industry, science, art, public policy, all the fields of American life, bringing to them the same passions and discipline that had served them so well during the war. 
They were not perfect. They made mistakes. They allowed McCarthy-ism and racism to go unchallenged for too long. Women of the World War II generation, who had demonstrated so convincingly that they had so much more to offer beyond their traditional work, were the under-pinning for the liberation of their gender, even as many of their husbands resisted the idea. When a new war broke out, many of the veterans initially failed to recognize the differences between their war and the one in Vietnam.
It may be historically premature to judge the greatness of a whole generation, but indisputably, there are common traits that cannot be denied. It is a generation that, by and large, made no demands of homage from those who followed and prospered economically, politically, and culturally because of its sacrifices. It is a generation of towering achievement and modest demeanor, a legacy of their formative years when they were participants in and witness to sacrifices of the highest order.

Monday, October 10, 2011

Rainbow Cake At a Family Picnic

The husband's brother, his daughter and grandson came for a visit. Granny hosted a family party.  You can tell from the pictures that the kids had their pictures taken several times over and had good times.


It was just the right occasion to have a rainbow cake that Cakity on Blogger first featured.

This is her colorful cake:

  Using two white cake mixes, four round pans, three cans of prepared white frosting and food dyes in four colors along with one tsp. vinegar for each dye batch, I came up with this cake, sprinkles courtesy of Michael's.  


The kids liked it.


Saturday, October 8, 2011

Breast Cancer Update on Julie

Just an update on Julie to say she will have three tumors removed from her left breast next week.

After several months chemotherapy, the tumors have shrunk enough to facilitate their removal. The largest is one inch, and the smallest is 1/6 of an inch.  A mastectomy is not a viable option for her due to complications from VA shunt tubing that goes to her heart

Then following surgery, Julie will go back on chemotherapy for an undetermined length of time.

She and her husband face many trials, with cancer being the most recent hurdle to wheel through.

From a fellow blogger comes this motivational sign.
  (If you go to her website, you can download the slogan in various formats.)

For sure, Julie and Jack are examples for accomplishing hard things.



Your prayers for her well being are appreciated.

Tuesday, September 6, 2011

York, South Carolina

The weekend was spent with our daughter and SIL in York, SC.  Julie is feeling just fine, thank you, and is visited at home three times a week by an RN, and less than a dozen times a week by a CNA.  Her CA prognosis is up in the air, as a PET scan will be reviewed by the tumor board this week.  Her chemo has been suspended for a while as her tumors have responded well to the drugs.

We celebrated her birthday with presents, a lunch in Rock Hill, SC and champagne.  This is Julie:


Julie, Jack, Gene and Jack's dad on their porch...very hot and very humid!

Historic York and its ancient cemetery and tombstones gave a glimpse into the past and occupied some of our hot and humid time in the outdoors.  Next time, I will take pencil and paper for rubbings so I can get the oldest dates on the marble that have been obscured by moss and the ravages of weather.

Engraving on the stone above shows that Isabella Davis died in 1834, a consort of the Reverend William C. Davis.  A consort?  That was odd wording, but she would have been born in 1767, so terms were different back then.  (Mrs. Davis would certainly not know what a microwave, airplane, digital clock, battery or the internet was, so why do I think the term "consort" is odd?)

To round out the history of the graveyard, a Civil War veteran's stone:

Kudzu, originally imported from the Orient to prevent soil erosition, is an invasive species in the South, growing a foot a day under optimal conditions.  This picture showing kudzu covering both land and power lines is around the corner from Julie and Jack's house:


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Historic homes abound in York, SC, population of about 10,000 people.  Here are a few old homes on Congress Avenue:

Now we are home.  The brief interruption in the South did allow one visit to a Pineville, NC yarn shop.  Yes,  the credit card was used for some pettable and pretty fibers at The Yarn Shop by Rainy Day Creations in Pineville.

Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Texas Road Trip over Holiday

It was time to see family.  So by air and automobile, Texas was the destination.  From Colorado, where our temperatures were in the 40's (F) to Austin with high humidity in the 95+ (F) degree range, it was a definite change of scenery.
From Austin to College Station, from College Station to Waco, from Waco to Austin again: nothing but troubles driving.  I got lost more than a few times, but I surely went past many little cemeteries along the way.  And the scenic drive to College Station was lovely.  It is all in how you look at it. Listening to Mazie Dobbs and Pardonable Lies made the drive time shorter.

NEVER trust the Bing maps! The Bing map was ten exits off just in my first venture out from the airport to Round Rock, Texas to visit the parents at Parkview Meadows where they recently moved. An hour wasted on I 35 just trying to find the correct roads. Grrr.

I took lots of pictures.  Just a few here..
My brother Chuck and sweet SIL Karen McCarroll

Chuck has his own blog that you can reference at this link.  He calls it I'm Not Drinking O'bama's Koolaid, so if you are also in this mind frame, you might get a kick out of his editorial snippets and cartoons displayed.  He  is the brother with all that artistic talent that I previously referenced on this blog post
a picture of their east Texas evening skyline in College Station, TX
Aunt Mary Mays who lives in Waco, TX

Above is an oil painting of Texas bluebonnets that I remember from my earliest childhood that Aunt Mary has in her newly remodeled apartment where she now lives with her grandson and his family.

In all, I got to see both brothers and SIL, one nephew and his darling young family, my father and his wife, my sister, my aunt and various distant cousins, the youngest of whom was six months and an absolute doll.

Remember the blanket knit for him?  (Ravelry reference is on the bottom of the post)
It was good to visit and catch up on family issues.  It was even better getting home.  You know what I mean.

Thursday, November 18, 2010

William and Kate: How about their Future?

There are mixed reviews as for the future of William and Kate's life.


Here is China's Report from fortune telling prognosticators: (bleak)

What will they name their children? (Harry, Rose)

Will Princess Diana affect their marriage? (she will)


How much will the wedding cost? ($15 M)

What is the benefit to the UK in monetary terms relating to this union? (620 M pounds...over $100 M)
It is no wonder that Prime Minister David Cameron was thrilled at the news stating that: "This is a great day for our country, a great day for the Royal Family and obviously a great day for Prince William and Kate. As well as this being a great moment for national celebration”

Cha Ching!
When Princess Diane and Prince Charles married thirty years ago, daughter Julie stayed up all night to watch their televised wedding.  I wonder if she will do the same for William and Catherine.

Friday, October 29, 2010

Nephew Jackson McCarroll Williams Arrived!



Proud Grampa Mac put together this video.  God bless you all.

Tuesday, August 3, 2010

My Father's "First Home" and my "First Home" - one and the same

Dad and I are spending the week together. This event of living together last occurred during the summer of 1968, just before I went to college.  A lot of time has passed since we last shared a car or refrigerator.  Need I say more? (He is now 91 years old, and let's just say I am of "a certain age.")

So now is the time to poke around his library and "catch up" on scenes from the past. Going through his written memoirs, I came across a story he had written about the house where I lived from infancy through age 7.

Here is what Dad wrote about that house in central Texas, the same one where I spent my early childhood:

The First House I Remember by Charles W. McCarroll (likely written in 1990)
The first home I remember was the McCarroll house located about a quarter-mile north and west of Mereta, Texas. This house, built in 1902, faced east about 75 feet from the county road. This wood-siding shingle-roofed structure originally had four rooms and a front gallery supported by turned-post spindle brackets. The front door had an upper glass etched in a wreath design and a matching carved wood planting on the lower panel.

The entrance door opened into a wide hall. Three rooms were to the right, including the kitchen and a room to the left.

Pa McCarroll added three rooms to the north divided from the original house by an open hall. This addition was for the parents and children. A shed room was built on the west of the original house as a room for Loraine and as a screened porch.

The hardware consisted of designer rim locks and hinges on six panel doors. The floors were tongue-and-groove pine. A hole in the corner of the room was for telephone wires when aunt Mollie was the switchboard operator for the telephone system.

The walls were covered with flowered paper pasted to tacked-on canvas. A strong wind would cause the paper to bulge. The walls were ten feet high and ceiling was wooden "beaded ceiling". The windows were operated by the weight and pulley system.

The kitchen floor was covered with bright Linoleum. The large, black wood-burning cook stove was near the west wall. A water faucet was on the north wall, which also included a flour bin. A breadboard was against the east wall. A long table covered with oilcloth was placed near the south wall of this kitchen.

Each of the legs of tables, cabinets and beds were set in metal jar caps and filled with coal oil to discourage ants. A crawling baby was sure to get into the ant traps.

The milk cooler sat on the porch north of the kitchen. This cooler was constructed of galvanized metal pans that were stacked as shelves. The top pan was filled with water and cotton clothes were dipped into the water and covered the outside of the pans. The dampened cloths acted as an evaporative cooler for the food inside.

Near the southwest side of the house was a cistern made of metal. Guttering under the eaves of the house gathered rainwater for use in the house. The well was about 30 feet west of the house. The windmill pumped the hard-tasting water into a tank and also piped it to the barn to water the livestock.

A grove of Chinaberry trees grew between the house and barn. The Barn was painted red and had a hayloft above with grain storage and a harness room on the north. A hall with double doors on each end allowed a wagon to drive through. The shingle roof was mansard and there was a hay door on the east. Sheds had been added to the north and south for stock and the fences were wide boards on cedar posts.

Toward the barn, a path led to the outhouse south of the barn area. North of the house, the land was in pasture. About halfway down the hill was a little house for the hands and at the bottom of the hill was another windmill and garden.

This house was so cool and comfortable in the summer, but I remember the cold days by the heating stove. We also had a portable ‘Perfection’ kerosene stove.
This house was the same one he returned to with a young family after WWII.  The house was re-opened, remodeled, and Dad began farming the family 600 acre plot surrounding the farm house for about ten years.

 To read his remembrances of that "new" house conjures up memories for me about that same farm house of my childhood.  (Note: 100 years have past since that house was built.)

Dad did not mention the well water that had to be boiled each season when the "well turned over".  I still am uncertain about what it meant when the "well turned over."  I just know there were tiny little red worms in the bath water a few times a year.  We kids were told not to worry about it.  (??)  Wouldn't you?

Another of my memories is when a dust storm hit West and Central Texas farms, and 1/4 inch of dust was left on the window sills and floors after the two hour gusts abated.  Dad said he used a shovel to help pick up the dust and silt inside the house.  I remember it was black as midnight in the middle of the day during that dust storm.

And I remember the big cabbage red rose wall paper in the bathroom with the porcelain claw foot tub.  Mother put that up right before I was born.

Are your memories of your first house still vivid in your mind?

Friday, June 11, 2010

Refinishing An Old Cedar Chest

Since the 1970's, I have lugged throughout the U.S. an old cedar chest.  It has been with me over perhaps twenty apartment and house relocations.

But this was no ordinary cedar chest, because it once held the baby clothes of my now 91 year old father.  So the chest has to be at least close to 100 years old.  It just cannot be relegated to Good Will after being in the family for a century.

As far as I remember, it has never been refinished.  Seize the day!  It is time for the old girl to get a facelift.

Here is how she looks before the refinish:
Naturally, I had to look up "What to Do and How to Do It for old cedar chest restoration" and came up with information from several sources, including a step-by-step approach from EHOW
 Secure the necessary tools and materials for refinishing a cedar chest. You will need sandpaper for removing the old finish and smoothing the cedar before refinishing. You can also select a mild stripper for removing the old finish; the cedar may be old and fragile, thus requiring a less abrasive method of finish removal. Stain will not be necessary; however, you will need to purchase water- or oil-based clear finish for the chest. Oil-based finish dries faster, and water-based cleans up easier. Choose satin, semi-gloss or glossy for the level of shine that you desire on the chest. You can also purchase wipe-on or brush-on finish. Use a cotton rag for the wipe-on finish and a fine-bristled brush for the brush-on finish.
And simple advice: "A good paint stripper, a stain color that best matches the original, and finish with 3 coats of low lustre tung oil  from All Experts.

Here is a peak of a little of what was stored in the old cedar chest, if there is a bit of closet voyeur in you:

Let the elbow grease commence.  And just maybe it is time to get rid of those baby blankets from the '70's?

Monday, June 7, 2010

Bathroom Redecoration in Bordello Red

A few weeks ago I decided that our powder room needed a facelift (the PR, referred to with those inititals hereafter, is available to anyone, but actually used a LOT by those people who do not sleep in our bedrooms).

Back to the facelift of the PR, here is the only video I could come up with regarding bathroom redecoration:

That video was relatively useless regarding redecoration.  Our PR does not have an olympic sized tub, nor is it 100 square feet in size. And it does not look out to an ocean view.  In fact, it is a wee room...no pun intended.

So I decided to make a real statement and paint the entire PR red.  Yes, RED.  In other words, I made it my "bordello bathroom".

Here are a few photographs of the PR in all its red glory, along with lots of yellow and red accent accessories, and a few paintings that mirror the colors:

If you look carefully, you can see a knitted toilet topper beneath the flower arrangement.  It is from my Ravelry collection and knitted from an orange and red wool (two strands held together).  The pattern is actually a face cloth recipe, but I modified it to make it smaller and knit it up in wool.

Now who says using a PR can't knock your socks off?

Sunday, May 30, 2010

Jewelry Made from Silver Plated Flatware

In his retirement years, my dad made hundreds of jewelry items from plated flatware.  Not only jewelry, but also napkin rings, key chains and belts were some accessories he fashioned from old spoons and fork handles.  He sold these pieces at craft shows, always regaling the customers with stories of how the flatware came into being. 

In 1993, a Dallas newspaper wrote a story about dad's silver pieces and his crafting business.
Dad wrote several volumes of his memories, and one of my favorite stories was about Orange Blossom flatware and how it came to be collected. The gist of the story was that oranges in California were prolific, and these "delicacies" over a hundred years ago made their way from the west coast to the east coast by way of railroad.

Wm. Rogers Company cashed in on the deal of the popular oranges being shipped all over the country, and began plating flatware with orange blossoms on the handles of tableware.  In 1910, Orange Blossom was one of its most popular flatware patterns.

From Charles McCarroll's memoirs:
The railroads had refrigerator cars manufactured to carry ice in order to keep the fruit fresh. Huge ice plants were built in stations across the country. The railcars were moved slowly so that the blocks of ice could be dumped from overhead into the refrigerator cars. The citrus fruits were picked from the trees, wrapped in tissue paper and packed in layers into the special wooden boxes in order to extend the freshness of the fruit. The California citrus growers found that Wm Rogers & Sons were plating silver. They made a deal for them to plate a unique pattern of dinnerware called Orange Blossom with silver.
Our families had numerous pieces of Orange Blossom and did use them. The spoons and tines of the forks were well worn but the handles can be used for key rings


This is a photo of some of Dad's jewelry he made and sold for over twenty years.  These are just the pieces he gave me, among many others.

Wednesday, May 26, 2010

More Magazine: "One Amazing Thing" Story Contest

For "women of style and substance", More Magazine is
the leading voice of today’s sophisticated, affluent and accomplished woman, who is enjoying the richest years of her life, sharing news and advice on beauty, fashion, health, career, travel, money and relationships from her distinct perspective.
It is a health and beauty periodical geared toward women over 40 and has been a Christmas gift for several years from my friend Kathy.  I enjoy leafing through each monthly publication as soon as it hits the mailbox.

More Magazine is having a "One Amazing Thing" story contest open to everyone with a story to tell. Here is what More Magazine says about their contest:
We all have a story.  One of my favorite stories is about the birth and subsequent decisions her father and I made about her health care in the first hours of her life.

My partial submission to the "One Amazing Thing Story Contest" (screen shot only) is this: 

 That picture on the left is of my first born (of whom I write) and me, the 20 yr. old college sophomore who was unexpectedly faced with a critical decision concerning the medical fate of this child.

This is not the entire story.  And there is yet more to write almost forty years later, but that is for another place and time.

If you would like to submit an amazing story of your own, or read and vote for others' submissions, here is the link: READ and VOTE here.

 Who knows, maybe we will get a meet-up at Barnes & Noble's  in the future.

Saturday, May 22, 2010

Pictures from the Past

This week, collecting old family photos from the garage and various closets, I came up with eleven storage boxes of pictures and frames.  That is just too many if you don't have a library and/or you are not an historian.  It was time to pare down.

Beginning the process, with two sacks of miscellaneous black garbage sacks already filled with photo clutter and ready to be taken for disposal, here is the start of the editing:
Some of the photos I unearthed were sweet, evoking sentimental emotions, such as this studio shot taken in about 1935 of my mother, her mother and her sister( left to right).


The back of this photograph is in my brother's handwriting and says "Lela Hugeley Motley, married to Thomas Jefferson Motley, May 30, 1883" (my great grandmother from the paternal side of the family).  This was likely Lela's Motley's wedding portrait (born Novermber 23, 1859, Died July 22, 1921).


And, of course, there were pictures of home life and my kids at various stages of their childhood. I won't bother to show scans of some of those photos.


But I have to include this bizarre photograph of the tombstone for my great grandfather's FOOT from 100 years ago.

Now why in the world would one have a memorial to a part of one's body that was amputated?  Curious, but the proof is in the photo.  You wonder what the story was behind that foot...

The good thing is that several days later, I'm down to five boxes of pictures, and ready to further prune, scan and discard even more of these photos.  Thank g-d for digital cameras and scanners.

Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Howling at the Moon

Ya know when you get to know somebody pretty well?  And sometimes you quit listening to EXACTLY what they are saying because you have heard it before?

My husband, author of livingthegrandlife, a (mostly) anti-politcal blog....rants.  He told me yesterday, after I kinda tuned him out during our third cup of morning coffee... "nevermind, I was just howling at the moon."

I got a kick out of that thought/statement.  How much do we all just "howl at the moon", and who really listens?

Wednesday, May 5, 2010

South Carolina

Yesterday, I was in Rock Hill, South Carolina.  Here is a recorded happening there, according to The Charlotte Observer:
ROCK HILL House painter Jerry Gibson armed himself with an electric drop cord Tuesday morning and took off running after the giant bird that ran 5 feet from his disbelieving eyes.

Gibson joined a fray of dozens Tuesday as word spread about an ostrich - an emu really, but a big bird is a big bird - strolling down Chestnut Street and elsewhere in the East Town neighborhood just east of downtown.


Now that had to be quite a scene, although I was in York, SC with daughter Julie and SIL Jack and FIL John.

Julie has been on home IV therapy for seven weeks. She is scheduled for another surgery May 7, 2010. Your prayers for her well being are again appreciated.


Julie and Jack

Above is a picture of SIL Jack's father, John Heniford, Sr. (92 yr.)  Those are his roses and iris from his yard.  Until this spring, he has been solely responsible for the upkeep of both his and Jack and Julie's lawns and gardens.