Busy, Busy

1,V.07 - MoM

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY, Marty and Nate!

I really poured it on further all day getting more magazines ready for Nate to pick up tomorrow for their sale. Really being ruthless in getting making bags for recycle and the others sorted and putting together boxes for the others. I made up boxes to determine what they would hold, then put back in reasonable sized sacks for transport. I don't like to have my name and address floating around, so I had to unwrap a lot of them.

I used to read them, but when I started taking my language courses and with the time taken up by the computer, I got further and further behind and finally gave up even opening them. I finally realized I was never going to get to them so I gradually phased out the subscriptions. (Well, the wonderful sun is blinding me again, time to let down a couple of blinds.)

Chris, former neighbor, came by this afternoon to cut the grass for the first time this season. It was after school hours so he had Bennet (Kindergarten) and Sydney (2nd grade) with him. Sidney hung a May basket she had made in school today, and kept the tradition for disappearing. They had a wonderful time playing with the big boxes in the garage -- making them rooms in a house. They are such cute kids. Sidney got her first glasses a couple of weeks ago. (At least she isn't the only one in all 12 grades with glasses. At least, there were two of us when Aunt Dottie got hers. There won't a lot of us in junior high either. By the time I got to high school, I could see fine and quit wearing them.) Later, Chris flattened them and took them to recycle. One less thing for Charlie to have to do. I had taken out the ones of proper size for the mags tomorrow.

Sidney and Bennet were in the fenced in garden. She came back all excited because they had seen a snake. She was very proud and described ii, knowing it was a garter snake. She said, "It was more scared of me that I was of it" and how harmless it was. Bennet was not quite so enthusiastic but was ready to go back again to see if they could find it. I was always apprehensive all the time I worked in there. I almost went out there this morning to dig up some of the chive bed to put in a pot to have at the ready in the sunroom when I do my minimal cooking. That is also why I always stand in the garage doorway and stretch up to the door opener before I go into the garage. I never go in even for a minute without opening the large garage door so I have a large escape route. I don't even want to be challenged by a mouse of the ubiq chipmunks.

My dinner was easy -- the other half of the can of tuna that I had made into salad yesterday. Today, I had it with potato chips for a good dinner. Of course, I had my 11 oz glass of V8 juice and my Boost. I was too busy today to take time to nap. In fact, I didn't even think of it or feel sleepy. But I am going to try to get to bed by 10 p.m.

I currently have a bird feeding station that I watch from my desk/breakfast table and the other one on the deck of by bedroom. When I got out Friday, I am going to get another one for the patio that I can see from my living room chair. Of course, I get nothing like the traffic that Sandy and Charlie do. However, I have been discovered by gold finches at the two I have. This year they are again bright yellow. I love it when they are joined at the feeder in the bright sunshine by my cardinals.

I am very impressed by your FL progress, Suzy! I believe that when (and if) I finally get my bed/closet under control, I am going to be able to keep it that way.

* * * * *

Now, for the rest of the Bauman Family article written by Mabel and put on the net by Sharon Workman, the daughter of one of my cousins.

That first winter, only a cellar had been dug out of the hillside with boards laid over the top to keep out the wintry blasts. My mother told me the bed for the five little ones consisted of a large packing box, likewise covered over with boards thru when snow sifted and coated the comforters covering the children. At that time, wolves were often seen, and friendly Indians came often, always begging for butter or lard, and with a special longing for some of Sarah Cort's soap. This soap was produced by wood ashes in a hopper, thru which water seeped - the lye thus produced dripped into a crock. This lye mixed in proper proportions of grease and heated, furnished a soap which brought linens to the clothesline snowy white - no detergents - no chlorine bleaches. (Why do I tell this? I am sure none of my nieces will ever be tempted to try this!) My grandmother had her own candle-dip and made her own tallow candies. Life was primitive, but satisfying. Grandfather Cort donated the land where Harmony Church and the adjoining cemetery are today."

The author of this article, Mabel Christina Bauman, was born July 12, 1879. Daniel and Sarah Cort were her grandparents; her mother was one of the five children put to bed in the packing box. Mabel was the youngest of nine children. When we wrote this article in 1961, she was 82 years old.