This is Most Certainly True

Whew, what a fun weekend! 

I woke up bright and early Saturday and went to a Small Catechism class at Ebeneezer's Restaurant.  What a neat little Irish place that is!  It had been awhile since I'd eaten there.  Last year it was damaged during the flood, but they have done a wonderful job of re-doing the place with it's tin ceilings, lamps and mirrors.
We are studying this book with Pastor Pancoast as our leader.

The book is available at this website. http://store.augsburgfortress.org/store/product/5185/Study-of-Luther-Small-Catechism-Participant

Here is a link to Luther's Small Catechism it if anyone in interested.  http://bookofconcord.org/smallcatechism.php

I've wanted to study the Small Catechism again for quite awhile now. Autumn will soon be in confirmation and I feel I should brush up a bit. 
I did study a little bit of the Small Catechism during my confirmation years in Jr. High, but that was a long time ago and to be honest, I was at that awkward age where Lutheranism meant very little to me.

My home church.  My father took this picture early in the morning.  The sun is shining right on the face of Jesus in the big stain glass window.

I remember disliking confirmation.  All I can remember of the Small Catechism during those days was the memorization.  I remember being so concered about getting it all memorized, that I think I lost what Luther was trying to teach us.  I'm not saying students shouldn't memorize it, I just think more emphasis should have been put on what the Small Catechism could mean for us in our everyday lives, through high school and college, no matter where life was going to take us.  Instead, it felt like something we had to "get through" section by section.  And do I still have any of it memorized? Nope.

So, why do I feel the need to participate in this particular Small Catecism study?  

Is it because of the good company?  No, even thought this group is a very cool, funny, and interesting group of people, that's not why I'm there.

Is it to win brownie points with God?  No

Do I feel my salvation hinges upon it?  No, because "There is nothing we can do". 
                                                                                         
Then why on earth do I get out of bed at the crack of 0-dark-hundred, on a Saturday morning, to go?

Because I want to learn it inside and out!  Luther's Small Catechism is the basic fundamentals of what Lutherans believe.  Every Lutheran should know it and know it well!  I want to be able to teach it with confidence to my daughter because I want her to know it well.  And I want someone to sit across the table from me and explain to me, in plain english, so that I understand it completely.  And I want to do all of this while eating hashbrowns, eggs and toast 'cause that's just how I roll.

Proof you can find a photo of just about anything on the internet!

Have a Happy Day!

The Elmer Project

Elmer by David McKee is a children's book about a very colorful, elephant.  So each year in the daycare the kids get to create their very own Elmer Elephants!  We have such a blast with glue, bits of paper, and crayons.  Next year we will use crayons, paint and sequins!  Fun Fun Fun!

Here are this year's beautiful Elmer Elephants ready to decorate the refrigerators at home

Here is Elmer and his cousin Wilbur where they sit in our "library".

Mini Bolts of Fabric

I'd thought I'd do a quick entry about my fabric storage.  The projects I do are usually quite small, therefore, I don't buy large quantities of fabric at a time.  Instead, I buy little fat quarters here and there and if I don't keep them all together I end up finding them everywhere!  So I did some digging on the internet and found the perfect solution from The Little Green Bean blog.  Here is the link:
http://maluukkonen.blogspot.com/2010/04/new-addiction.html
She uses little foam board pieces and wraps her fabrics around them to create mini bolts of fabric.
Here is how my mini fabric bolt project turned out.

I keep the mini bolts in an old photo storage box in one of my craft drawers.

Here is what the mini bolts look like.  It's so much easier to keep my little bits of fabric organized now that I've done this.  At a glance, I can see what I have.

Easter Egg Embroidery

I've been embroidering again!
After my Saturday morning of cleaning house, Autumn and I took a little walk downtown and visited Margie's, Dakota Antiques (looking for vintage Betsy Tacy books) and the fabric store.  I bought another fat quarter of the black and white fabric I love so much for my puppy dog tea towels.

Here's the fabric I just can't get enough of! It goes pretty well with the puppy dog pattern.  I wanted to make sure I had an extra fat quarter on hand in case they do not re-stock it after it's gone.  Bernina Plus has it in their 1930's vintage collection of fabrics.  They have the best 1930's vintage fabric selection in town! 

I also bought this peachy-orange colored fabric to go with my bunny tea-towel that's in progress (very slow progress).  I'm not sure it goes well with the bunny towel, but I like to use it with my kitty towels so it will get used eventually.

I was recently reminded that I had done these little embroidered Easter eggs a few years ago and I've decided to do a few more this year. Last year I painted blown-eggs for my family.  Not sure I want to do that again this year.

Painted Eggs from Easter last year.  Fun to do, but quite time consuming over my weekends.

This year I'm not really in the painting mood, so embroidered eggs with chicks inside are what everyone will be getting this year.  I still have to make the little yellow chicks that go inside, but here they are so far.

Here is the website I got the idea from.  http://april-makingendsmeet.blogspot.com/2008/03/spring-chick-and-easter-egg-tutorial.html

I made these three over the weekend so they really don't take that long at all!  It felt so good to be taking some time to embroider again after putting the floss away for awhile.  And these are small, simple and nice to work on while listening to Autumn practice piano, or during the winding-down time after supper.   Hopefully, I'll get enough done so I can give many away!

A Complete Day in Radio September 21, 1939

A 1939 Radio found on Radio Phil's Website.

This is a very interesting find.  On September 21, 1939 WJSV, a radio station in Washington DC recorded their entire broadcast day.  It's like going back in time for a whole day!  The day starts at 6:58AM and goes until 1:00AM. 
The morning starts with Arthur Godfrey, a disc jockey who had a very laid-back way of announcing.  I found it funny that while reading copy he'd just start singing some random line from a song!  He talked to his radio audience as if they were having morning coffee with him! 
Here is the link to the Complete Broadcast Day from '39...
http://www.archive.org/details/CompleteBroadcastDay
If you move down to #9 on the list you can hear President Roosevelt's speech to congress concerning "cash and carry" and how we must stay out of this war.  The speech took place at 2:00PM.  I hope to be able to sit down soon to listen to it, as I think it would be quite interesting. (it is very interesting!)
The history of that day happened in real time for the folks listening to their radios that day.  We see it differently because we know what came of that invasion.  We know that we later went to war and we know the outcome of that war.  I'm sure there's a fancy term for the word, but basically it's seeing things through different glasses.  Hindsight is always 20-20????  No, that's not really it, but I hope you know what I mean. 

There is also a National's baseball game and an episode of Amos and Andy. 

Arthur Godfrey

I listened to the Certified Magic Carpet show which was a quiz show.  Shows seemed to be only about 15 minutes long.  There are songs every once in a while, and "soaps" such as The Bachelor's Children and Hilltop House. Soaps were only 15 minutes long as well.  There are commercials mixed in between for products such as Wonderbread,  Old Dutch Cleanser, and Pomolive Soap.  There is also a gong that chimes before they announce the time. 

 I can just imagine as a mom, rushing my kids off to school, then listening to Certified Magic Carpet quiz show while I cleaned up the breakfast dishes.  That is if I had a radio in the kitchen.  I suppose most radios were in the livingroom, and who had time to sit and listen to the radio all day?  I suppose a gal would have to get her morning work done and then might rest for 15 minutes and catch her favorite "soap" or quiz show.

Here is a link about the role of radio soap operas in women's lives.
  http://www.otrcat.com/soap-opera-radio-shows.html#daysoapoperadied

I think about how quiet a housewives day must've been back then, especially if she didn't have children in the house.  NO television, NO computer, NO dishwasher humming (or if it's mine, roaring) in the background, there was only the radio to keep her company.  And maybe it's just me but old time radio seems more quiet than the radio we have today.  Old time radio is almost soothing.  But even with the radio, I think I still would've gotten lonely.  If I were a housewife back in the 30's and 40's I suppose I would've made it a point to get to know the other neighbor ladies around me and to talk to them over the back fence, or have them over for coffee and cake. 

I like this picture from Old Time Radio Catalog's website.  It shows ladies doing the dishes while listening to the radio.  Maybe it's 12:30 and they are washing the lunch dishes while listening to the "Road of Life". 

Oh how I wish there were more complete radio broadcasts.....wait, there is one more!
There is one from D-Day, June 6th, 1944.  It is mostly news but is ALSO very interesting!
http://www.archive.org/details/Complete_Broadcast_Day_D-Day

Enjoy some old time radio and as always, have a great day!

1943 Newspapers

So, back in 2006 my family (mostly my parents, my Uncle and I)  took a few consecutive weekends to clean out my Grandma Eva's house.  It had been decided that she would not be able to return home after she'd taken a fall on the ice earlier that winter.  Going through decades of memories was a difficult task for us all.  But we learned much.  We sold many items, but kept many things that we had personal connections to.  I will probably talk about them often. 
Anyways, one of the things we kept was Grandma's very antique ironing board (actually, I think I encouraged someone to keep it because it was so old and unique and my parents took it home to store as I had no room).  Well, this fall they took it apart and you wouldn't believe what they found!  Under the cover, the padding had worn so Grandma (or Grandpa) had placed newspaper under the cover.  The papers are The Williston Herald from May, June and July of 1943!  One is even from my birthdate in June!  They are so much fun to read through.

Here they are all together.  A treasure-trove of American History!!  Little snippets and snapshots of the everyday happenings of May 1943!  How cool is that?!

Each paper has this little sticker on the front page with my Grandfather's name on it.  Not sure what that was all about.  Was the newspaper put into their mailbox?  I always thought papers were delivered by paperboys who just blindly grabbed a paper and tossed it to whomever.  But these are labeled.

This is adorable!  Look at those cute little spice jars singing away.  I wonder what they are singing?

There were two whole pages of grocery store ads.  I'm thinking this was done every Thursday?  It's interesting that nowadays we have just a couple of the big supermarkets here in town but back then they had a number of smaller "mom and pop" grocery stores.  

If my map reading skills are correct, this grocery store was located where the American State Bank building now stands on Broadway.

 

"Read both figures for the biggest point values"---oh yeah, that's right, there was quite a bit of rationing going on in 1943.  Wow!  A 20lb box of apples for 1.89!  I pay more than that for 1 Lb of apples now-a-days.

"Oh wow! Look at that!" is exactly what I said when I saw this OLDER logo for Red Owl.  I think I got goosebumps!  Nerdy, I know.

Threw this one in so we can see what prices were like back then. 

And (this is cool) in each paper there is an offer for a dress pattern.  I would so wear this dress!  If I had a decent figure I would wear dresses like this almost everyday. 

I chuckled when I first read this lost and found notice for the bottom of a fountain pen.  But I suppose that would be a big deal to lose.

Here is an advertisement for Penney's.  What I would've LOVED to see was an advertisement for Hedderick's of Williston.  I remember going there as a kid.  I remember Penney's too as a kid, and the Woolworth.  We never ate at the Woolworth lunch counter, but it was there, and there were parakeets in the back of the store. 

So that is the issue from May 13th, 1943.  There was much more to be read.  Happenings of the War, local news, actually someone from the Epping area had died in a car-train accident. 

Thank you Mom and Dad for NOT throwing that ironing board away at the time.  And thank you for entrusting these papers (little gems) to me!  They are so much fun!  I will blog more about the other papers later.

For now, Have a Happy Day!

Writing Group, Valentines Day

Okay, it's official.  I think I suck at writing group.  Okay I'm probably not as bad as I think, but I'm one of these people who constantly compares myself to others (unhealthy, I know).  It's not that I can't write, I actually achieved high marks in my college writing classes.  It's just that others in the group are so ridiculously good it makes my stuff look like dog food advertising.  One contributer's writing is so good, it just about makes me cry.  So much of what I have to go on is pure imagination, instead of solid life experiences. 

The words given to us as a starting point bring such complicated thoughts into my head.  How about finding some words that acually evoke happy feelings for me.  Words like strawberry, cabin, or Ed Norton. (giggle) Just kidding.

But it is fun and I will take the criticism, whatever it might be, and will remind myself that #1 I am probably my biggest critic and #2 I am trying to grow thicker skin.  I'm not writing to impress, but rather to learn, grow and get better at it.

Today is Valentine's Day!!  I mailed a vintage reproduction valentine to my Grandma Eva yesterday.  She loves valentines day, and she always told me that it was a valentine that brought her and Grandpa Joe together.  And vintage valentines are just so much fun! 

This is a neat book full of vintage reproduction valentines I got mine from my mom (thanks Mom).  The book is available at Amazon.com.



I just couldn't resist posting this one from Lola's Vintage Blog. 

  Through the years I've always tried to make my own valentines but haven't made any these past couple of years.  Maybe it's because Autumn and I make her valentines together. This year she wanted to make fortune cookies.  She saw the idea in one of her American Girl Magazines and I figured they looked easy enough.

We started with some felt circles about 4 inches in diameter.  Then she typed out her very own fortunes and cut them into little fortune strips.  I took my hot glue gun and folded the felt in half putting a dot of glue on the top where the edges met.  Then you fold and glue again.  There are tutorials online.





These are the valentines I made a couple years ago for my daycare moms and friends.  I wanted so badly to make some again this year, but ran out of time.



Here is the fan folded up.  I used a brad at the bottom to secure the sections together.



Once I have my pattern drawn out I photocopy it and make multiples.  I color each one, cut them out and put them together with the brad. 

These are colored and ready to be cut out.  Next year, I will get my act together and get some of these done!

On a side note:  If you are interested in some good reading about stay-at-home-wives and stay-at-home-moms, check out Apron Revolution's Monday post!  She really pours her heart out in this post.  I so admire her ability to handle the opposition (women who think she is selfish) with such grace and poise.  She IS a lucky lady to be able to stay at home, but we shouldn't resent her for it.  We make the beds we sleep in, and this woman who is being.....well, downright snotty to her should realize that if we (as a society) didn't let ourselves all fall into the "two-income" trap more of us might have the choice to stay home and raise our kids.  Don't get snippy with 50's gal because she has chosen to give up luxuries in order to stay home, instead be upset with yourself that you refuse to do so.  Anyways, 50's gal and I think a lot alike, and it's fun to keep up on what's happening in her life no matter what opinion you have of her. 
http://my50syear.blogspot.com/

Happy Valentine's Day everyone!
Have a Happy Day!




David Wiesner's Poster!

The Children's Book Week poster for 2012 is here and it..is...AWESOME!  I'm ordering mine ASAP!

Isn't it fantastic!?  The way the townhouses are actually books is totally his style, and the parade of different book characters was such a good idea.  There's the little boy from The Carrot Seed with his carrot in his wheelbarrow, Wiesner's own three pigs and wolf, Babar, George and Martha and so many others.  This poster will defiantly be framed and will join the Freefall poster in my "library". It will be perfect above the other bookshelf of chapter books.



A Lap Desk for Letter Writing

I'm reading the book, Betsy and Joe by Maud Hart Lovelace and in the first chapter we find Besty thinking about letters and letter writing.  She corresponds regularly with her older sister who is touring Europe, and now, her friend Joe wants to correspond!  Now, "she was glad she had put sachet bags into her stationery and that she had received for her birthday a sealing wax set, colored sticks of wax and a seal with her initial on it."  and later she writes, "Joe's typewritten letters and Betsy's scented, green-sealed replies went back and forth regularly after that."

Oh how I love all the little goodies that go along with letter writing!

So, here is my lapdesk that I am so happy to have found one hot summer day at a yard sale.  We were rendezvouing at Fort Union and decided to drive over to a local farmer's yard sale.  Our motives were two-fold.  On the one hand my family loves sales and on the other hand it was an excuse to enjoy the air-conditioned comfort of the car for a bit.  I bought the lapdesk for 5$ and painted it a pretty color green to match my bedroom.



I added some pretty Brenda Walton stickers to embellish the desktop.



Here is the inside full of letter writing goodies including a little address book, a stationery folder full of beautiful papers and some flower pens.

A few years ago, Target cleranced out all of their "Shabby Chic" line of stationery 75% off (that was a happy day)!  This little box with a pull-out drawer was one of my lucky finds that day and it holds my little cards and notes. 

Another happy garage sale find is this spiral bound book to keep cards and birthdates in.  Each month has a pocket for greeting cards that need to be sent that month. 

I made this little correspondance record book to keep track of who I have written to and who I have received letters from.  Crazy?  Yeah, maybe a little.

I don't remember HOW I made it, but I know I used some of the stationery I'd bought at Target.  I do remember it must've been fun because I made 2 or 3 different little books using all the different stationery.

Anyways, so that's my little lapdesk that I love so much.  I hope you all have a Happy Day!    

Letter Writing

In one of my Victoria Magazines from long ago, Catherine Calvert wrote, "Nothing brings us closer to fascinating figures of the past than their intimate letters, mingling matters of the heart with details of the day."

 

I love getting letters.

Who doesn't smile when a letter arrives in the mail?  I'm not talking about those friendly little postcards you get from the dentist reminding you of your next cleaning.  Nor am talking about photocopied Christmas letters that we get every year from our friends and relatives that give us a quick run-down of what they've been up to.  I'm talking about real, handwritten, letters, that could arrive at anytime throughout the month or year.

"What a lot we lost when we stopped writing letters.  You can't reread a phone call."  ~Liz Carpenter

I love writing letters. 

I love getting letters.

My very first highschool boyfriend and I wrote letters.  He lived twentysome miles away and we hardly ever saw each other.  Sure, we talked on the phone, but a letter was something special.  Something permanent to actually hold and read whenever I wanted.  Later, after I first moved to Minot, during my college years I corresponded with another close friend who lived in another state and also my Grandmother back in my hometown.  My Grandmother and I wrote at least a hundred letters to each other, maybe more.  I kept every one of her letters and I treasure them. 

Just a few of Grandma Eva's letters that she wrote to me from 1995-2005



I wrote to her about college life and she wrote to me about picking apples, racking leaves and life back in Epping.  She let me know right away what she thought of Shannan after I'd brought him home for Christmas.  Soon I was writing to her about wedding plans and then a few years later, baby plans, and without fail, she always wrote me back.  She wrote about everything that had happened that week, even the most mundane things like her daily trip to the post office seemed important enough to tell.  And I'm so glad she did write it all down because as we all know, time marches on and things change.  The post office in Epping is on the closure list, Grandma's now in the nursing home and her house has been sold. Those busy days of her fixing window screens and tending to the flower beds are all in the past.  But I'll always have a permanent record of what life was like for Grandma, in Epping, during those particular years.  I think Autumn will enjoy them someday as well.

"Letter writing is the only device for combining solitude with good company."  ~Lord Byron

I love writing letters.

I love getting letters.

I love reading letters.

I'm lucky enough to have my Grandfather's letters that he wrote to my Grandmother in the late 30's.  They almost got thrown away, no one understood WHY I would want them.  What I don't think they realized is that love letters written in the 30's are much different than those written say...in the 70's.  They are sweet and innocent and tell of Grandpa's days with the threashing crew he traveled with.

Here are the cigarette tins that Grandma kept Grandpa's letters in.  Apparently, he rolled his own cigaretts.

I love letters.

But not only that, I love all of the letter writing stuff!  You know, the stationery, pens, stickers and stamps.

When I worked at Wicks-n-Sticks we sold sealing wax and Stamps.  They were fun to demonstrate to customers!

Image from the blog "Not Yet Published"

I found this desk in one of my old Victoria Magazines.  It's a tish over-the-top but still amazingly beautiful.  Imagine all the little drawers and secret hiding spaces this desk would have!

One summer, I purchased an old beat-up lap desk at a garage sale waaaaay out in the country.  And tomorrow, I will write post all about it. 

Until then, why don't you sit down and write a letter to someone dear and have a happy day.