Favorite Color

I like jewel tones -- I recently took a picture of my closet which is mainly filled with greens, blues, grays, blacks, and dark purples. I do like to wear a little red and pink on rare occasions. My favorite picture as a child was always black and I still really like black. My favorites are clearly jewel tones.

Red always makes me think of my Aunt Reeny because she loved the color Red. Otherwise, nothing else that I can really think of about colors.

Memory Board

I think my memory board would be an overall of my life -- my life as a child.

Me in high school.

 as a young bride in 1978

as a mother and grandmother

One of my many surgeries

 

and my weight loss Journey!

 

Hobbies

One of my main hobbies since I was a teen and still is my main hobby ---- genealogy. I started as a teen and still enjoy this hobby / obsession! I have also been doing needlework since I was a teenage. I still knit or crochet. My mother taught me how to knit and crochet. I also took a class in tatting which my grandmother use to do. I have done needle point and crochet. I have loved computers since I was thirty -- I had one of the first Tandy Computers when my thirty year old daughter was an infant. This was a passion I shared with my dad. The only thing I collected was porcelain dolls which I still have but no longer have any interest in them.

One other hobby is photography!

The feeling of home

Home is exactly that - a feeling. Home is not a place it is a feeling. After my grandfather died my parents moved in with my grandmother so she could stay in her home. My brothers lived in my parents home and eventually one of my brothers bought the home and still lives in it with his wife and son. The house no longer resembles what it looked like when we lived there. They have made it their own. Mom and dad lived with grandma for a number of years. During that time, my own house came to be home. Home feels comfortable and safe. Home is where I can be myself. Your home can not be dependent on others because they may not always be there you have to make your home your own.

Who do I miss

There are a lot of people I miss around the holidays and always. I miss my dad who has been gone for five years now. My Dad didn't really like the holidays, but we always knew we could count on Dad if we needed him. He had an excellent sense of humor and was a very intelligent man.

I also miss my grandparents. Holidays were always split between my grandparents' homes.

 

 

 

 

I miss my Aunt Reeny -- she loved us to a fault! 

First Gift

Prompt 18 - First Present or Gift

I can not remember anything at all about a first gift. I do, however, know what the first gift is that I can remember -- a jewelry box. I think that what made it so memorable was that I had asked for a jewelry box and it had my sister's name on it. That was apparently a mistake by "Santa"! It was a black jewelry box. I not longer have it, I do have the replacement that my mom gave me several years ago.

Toys and Games

I still have a doll that was mine as a child which I have put a sweater on that was mine as a baby. I still have a few of my games and toys. Several years ago my mom had us go through all the stuff she had saved and no one really wanted any of it. It was really kind of sad. Made me feel like I should go through my storage in the basement and get rid of stuff cause no one is probably going to want it any way. We did play board games, mainly Monopoly. We also played some Clue. We played cards a lot at my Grandma and Grandpa's. I can remember playing office and using a plastic banana for a phone.

Prompt 17

Message in a Bottle

Prompt 16 - Message in a Bottle

First - I would probably not put an actually message in a bottle and throw it in the water due to the littering. I don't live by an ocean. I do live a couple of miles from a river that eventually empties into the Gulf of Mexico. I am not going to actually do any of this ... so there will be no secret email or anything else. This does not catch my fancy at all. I suppose the only interesting part would be sending a message out to someone I have never met. I had in the past had a pen pal in Japan and I did enjoy that.

Snow

 

This is how I feel about snow!

 

 

This is a picture of my front yard -- the tree my daughter brought home in first grade.

 

 

This is the front of my house. As you can see, we have plenty of experience with snow! We routinely have snow. I imagine I had seen snow in the first year of my life. I have no recollection of this experience. We made snow men, snow horses, snow forts -- you name it. Of course we threw snowballs, but not a lot. We went on snowmobile rides, sled and toboggan rides.

 

We went out to my aunt and uncle's farm, Reeny and Pat, and they had some amazing sledding hills.

To me, snow just feels cold and wet. It is beautiful to look at, not so much to live in!



My twelve special people!

This is a very hard blog to do .... do you pick something you never met or do you get a chance to see loved ones again? First I would invite my dad. Two weeks ago was the five year anniversary of my Dad's death. I would love to see him again and have him meet his newest great grandson whom he would love! I would like to show Dad the new technology that is available. My Dad loved technology and advances.

I would love to meet one of my grandparents, my great, great grandfather, Carl Matzdorff. I would love to know exactly where he came from in Germany. He is one of my brick walls.

Carl's wife, Sophia Krabbe was born in Germany. She came over with her children after her husband had already immigrated. I know nothing of her history or ancestry. These two are serious road blocks.

I would also like to meet my great, great grandmother, Marie Dupree Diefenbach. The story about here is that she was from the Alsace-Lorraine region. She came over here with her husband and young children. According to her death certificate she strangled herself while in the hospital. Family story is that she had been diagnosed with cancer and didn't feel they could afford treatment. I really don't know anything about her and she is another of my brick walls.

I would like to meet her husband, valentine Diefenbach and find out more about his ancestors.

Wilhelm "William" Schluntz is my great, great grandfather. He was born in Mecklenburg, Germany according to what I have found. Again, nothing further is known about him.

Heinrich Philip Heck also a great, great grandfather has some secrets for me. Besides the secrets of his parents, did he really father an illegitimate child in Germany and he moved to Germany to escape responsibility from this child?

I would love to see my grandparents again: Alma and Albert, Joyce and Ted.

I would also like to meet my great, great grandmother Susanna R. Gearhart who died in childbirth.

Obviously with this list it would be a German meal -- Perhaps Grandma's coffee cake and lots of fried potatoes!

Daily Routines

Small update -- I am nine posts behind -- I will try to make these up in the next few weeks!

Daily Routines
Post 22


My routines obviously have varied through the years. In my early years, my family had a couple of firm routines that lasted for years. It seems now as though everyday we went out to my Grandma and Grandpa Grashoff's home for "coffee" after school. Most of my Aunts and Uncles and some cousins would be there. Everyone gathered in the finished basement of my grandparents home usually around the kitchen table. The had two stories above the basement that were only used for holidays for the most part. The basement was the location of choice. Every Sunday noon was spent eating "dinner" at my grandparents home at noon of course. Most of the day was spent there playing card games. They were pleasant times, although, there was always plenty of "lively" conversation and debate to be had!

My routines as a young mother were involved with child care. I stayed home while I had small children and provided daycare services for my nephews. Then when my youngest was three years old I started doing medical transcription at home for our doctor. I stayed at home until he went to school and then I started working in the office. Since that time I have worked in the office. I usually work from 8 to five although that does vary. I get up around 6:30 a.m., ride my exercise bike for one-half to an hour, shower, go to work. When I come home I ride my exercise bike for up to a half an hour. Then it is off to my office otherwise known as the "command center"! Time spent doing laundry, dishwasher, cleaning up, so on.

 

I spend a lot of my day at home here! Then at the advanced time of  8 to 9 p.m. I head to be and do puzzles on my iPad for an hour and then off to sleep and then the routine continues.