How the Sheep Spent the First Christmas

By Janell Carson

An EXPLOSION of light lit the sky one dark night

Giving sheep and their shepherds a terrible fright!

The shepherds were trembling, the sheep wanted to run

Didn’t know what it was, but it didn’t look fun.

Then an angel appeared in the sky, calmed their fears,

Saying, “The Son of God has been born near here.”

“We must go and see!” the shepherds cried with delight

And off they went dashing into the dark night.

The sheep looked around, getting very concerned,

Being left all alone was ba-a-ad they had learned.

Then another dear angel came walking among them

And they quieted down with the songs that he sung them.

When at last they were quiet and calm once again,

The angel said, “Please let me explain:

The child that was born in the stable in town

Is your Creator as babe in a manger come down.

“He’s starting out small and will need time to grow

And learn of this world and its joy and its woe.

So that’s where YOU come in,” he said to the sheep.

“So listen up good – this is no time to sleep!

“The ewes out among you can show what it’s like

To be fallen, cast down and in fear for your life.

He’ll learn how to help you get back on your feet

He’ll learn what you mean by the sound of your bleat.

“You ovines alone are the ones to convey

How dangerous it is to be gone astray

Away from your herd, lost and alone,

He’ll learn how to find you and bring you back home.

“He’ll see what it’s like to have His heart ache

When one lost lamb, the family tie breaks.

He’ll learn to rejoice and sing right out loud

When the one gone astray is back with the crowd.

“And a small flock of sheep is the one who can show

How the voice of their Master tells them which way to go.

He’ll learn what to say and to call you by name

And show you the way to the shelter again.

“You must also show what it takes to be brave

When you stand for the shearer and wait for your shave.

He will need to know this for a task He must do

The Father has sent Him, it really is true.

“The most serious lesson that He has to learn

Will be from you lambs, and this one concerns

The Passover Feast and your painful role in it

The atonement for sin, this Lamb will win it.

“So you sheep have been chosen to teach Him these things

Until His time comes and a dirge we must sing.

He knows you can do it or He wouldn’t ask.

In fact, he created you for just this task.

“Now don’t let His sacrifice make your hearts sad

Because what it will conquer will make all hearts glad.

God, with all people will be reconciled

And that will make all that He suffers worthwhile.”

And when he had said all that he’d come to say

The angel took flight and went on his way.

The sheep watched him go and then contemplated

All the angel had told them and then they just waited.

When their shepherds returned, in only a while

They were singing God’s praises and smiling big smiles.

Then up went the hand of one of the boys

Asking for quiet, he’d heard a small noise.

“What is it?” they asked him as he looked around.

But the source of the noise was not to be found.

“Must have been nothing,” he said with a sigh,

“But just for a moment, thought I heard someone cry.”

Merry Christmas

Living in CST

No. Not Central Standard Time, but Confused State, Terminally.


So, we morning people finally get our hour of daylight back today, November 3^rd. Here's how it happened at my house.


We have several clocks in our house: two in the kitchen, one in my sewing room, an alarm clock in the bedroom, one on the microwave, one on the coffeemaker, and a wall clock in the living room. Also, the ones in the computer and the cell phones.


I like to change the clocks early in the evening, rather than at bedtime, so I can start orienting myself to the change. I reset the living room clock around 5:30 while watching the comeback of the Century Cornhuskers last second win over Northwestern. That particular clock was about 5-7 minutes slow, but it didn't occur to me to correct that while I had it down and messing with the time.


One of the clocks in the kitchen is needing a new battery and the only time I think about that is when I'm glancing at it and I'll think, “I need to get a new battery for that clock.” And then, I promptly neglect to write it on a list. So I just turned that one around for the time being.


The clock on the microwave has been way off for a long time, because it bounces back to 00:00 anytime the thing is unplugged, which happens when I need to use that outlet for some other electric device, like the vacuum cleaner or electric mixer. The clock on the coffeemaker is correct, but I completely forgot to reset that one to the new time.


With help from the hubs, I got the bedroom clock reset and the alarm set for the time I actually wanted to get up today. I also like to use my cell phone for an alarm. Now the cell phone clock resets itself, but when I turned on the alarm function, I left the alarm set for the time I wanted to get up yesterday (4:30) instead of today (5:30). So, the cell phone alarm goes off at 4:30 and I look at it and think, “How come my cell phone didn't reset itself?” Well, it did, but since it can't read my mind, its alarm went off at the time it was set to go off. Then, I look at the bedroom alarm and it reads 4:30. Forgetting that we had reset it, I thought maybe it might be 5:30 and I'd better get up.


So I stumble into the kitchen to make coffee, and sure enough, the clock on the coffeemaker reads 5:30, the microwave says 3:25, the living room clock says 4:24. I know I didn't change the sewing room clock, so I didn't even go look at that one. The computer and cell phone both say 4:30 and, since they reset themselves, I have to believe them.



How did I ever get this done before I had a computer and cell phone?

Customer Service

I saw this quote on FB:


“Whoever said, ‘There’s no such thing as a dumb question’ never worked in Customer Service.” Well, I work in Customer Service, and here are a couple of things that happened recently:

Part of my job includes weighing packages and putting postage on them for mailing. A young lady approached me with a package to mail and said, “This is a birthday gift for my mother, but I don’t want her to know it’s from me until after she opens it. I want her to be surprised. Would you write her address on it for me? If she sees my handwriting she’ll know who it’s from right away.”

Always happy to oblige, while she answered a call on her cell phone, I wrote the address on the package, weighed it, applied the postage and placed it in our outgoing bin. “That will be $5.60,” I told her.

She lowered her phone, looked up at me and said, “Did you put my return address on it?”

“Ah… no,” I said.

“Well, you have to put my return address on it! What if it gets lost!?”

I wonder how surprised her mom was to receive a package from her daughter addressed to her in my handwriting?





We often get lost cell phones turned in to us and we usually let them sit on our counter and within a half hour or so, it rings and then we are able to explain to the caller that the phone they just called is in the lost and found at our store. They are usually able to contact the phone’s owner and get word to them about where their lost phone is waiting for them.

One day, a phone was turned in and after a couple of hours, it still hadn’t rung, so I picked it up, found the phone’s list of numbers and called the one labeled ‘Dad’. Dad answered and I said, “Hi, this is Janell at Customer Service and this phone was turned in to our lost and found. I found your number on the list as ‘Dad’. Did one of your kids lose a cell phone today?”

“Oh!” he said. “I’ll bet it was my son. I’ll give him a call and let him know where it is.”

“Okay, thanks. Good bye.” About 30 seconds later, the phone began to buzz and tweet and spin on my countertop. I answered, “Hello?”

“Hello?” I recognized the voice of the ‘Dad’ I had just spoken to. “Is John there?”

“Um…. no this phone is in the lost and found at my grocery store. I think I may have just spoken to you?”

“Oh! So you did. You have John’s phone?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, I’ll try to call him and let him know.”

“Okay, thanks.”

Another 30 seconds later, the phone began to buzz and tweet and spin. Caller ID said ‘Dad’.

I elected not to answer it.



This next one didn’t happen to me, but it’s too good not to include.

This happened shortly after the USPS first started issuing Forever Stamps. One of my co-workers, Bea, (not her real name) waited on a young lady, who requested to buy a Forever Stamp. The stamp was handed over and the young lady paid for it, placed it on a letter and dropped it in the out box. She turned to leave, but then turned back and said to Bea, “Now, how will the mailman know to get that stamp back to me?”

“What do you mean?” Bea asked.

“Well, it’s a Forever Stamp, right?”

“Yes.”

“How will I get it back when I need to use it again?”

“Ma’am, Forever Stamp just means that if you still have some of these,” holding up the familiar Liberty Bell stamp, “in your possession next time the price goes up, you won’t have to pay the increased cost. Uh… each stamp is only good for a one time use.”



My favorite one didn’t happen to me, either, but it’s too funny. It came from a computer telephone helpline worker. A caller wanted to know, “Where is the any key?”

Doodling

When some people doodle, they draw pictures. When I doodle, I doodle in words.

For instance, On an excruciatingly slow Sunday morning, I doodled the following on the pages of my grocery store ads.

On the page advertising pasta sauce –

Prego, Barrilla, Basilico, Ragu,

With meatballs, Alfredo or Parmesan cheese;

Or chicken or pesto, whatever you do

Don’t leave me out! Pass the pasta, please!

Don’t serve the spaghetti

Until it is ready.

Don’t let your poodles

Get into your noodles.

Mac & lasgne are best served with cheese

And lotsa meat is sure to please.

But nothing rhymes with orzo….

Tuna and noodles

Followed by streudel

I surely could eat

The whole kit and caboodle.

On the sherbet page –

Sherbet is yummy and fruity and cold

In a cone or a bowl with sprinkles on top

It cheers us up, both young and old.

It’s sweet and makes our taste buds “POP”!

On the snack page –

Does Curious George like Gatorade,

Turkey Hill tea or lemonade/

I’ll bet he’d like carrots in AE Dip

And Kemps ice cream singles and Itti Bitz,

Cookies and popcorn and gummy worms

Too much sweet stuff makes tummies squirm.

Peanut butter and Kettle chips

A slice of bread and a choice of dips;

A pat of butter and lots of jelly

Would be a treat for a hungry belly.

On the “Dollar Days” pages:

Dollar Days and taco shells,

Lunchables and cabbage,

Sour cream and chicken fries

Would crush tomatoes in the baggage.

Yabba Dabba Doo!

And pineapple, too!

Apricots, tomato soup

All for only 2!

By the picture of the Baby Wipes:

Psalm 127:3 “Children are a heritage from the Lord. Blessed is the man whose quiver is full.”

By the picture of the grilled cheese sandwich:

Matthew 4:4 “Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.

On the vegetable page:

Daniel 1:12-15 “’Please test us for 10 days. Give us nothing but vegetables to eat and water to drink. Then compare us with the other young men who eat the royal food, and treat us in accordance with what you see.’ So he agreed to this and tested them for 10 days. At the end of the 10 days they looked healthier and better nourished than the other young men who were eating the royal food.”

The Vidalia onion is the best thing to come out of Missouri since TS Eliot, Sara Teasdale, Bob Barker and Rush Limbaugh!

Corn is a-maize-ing!

By the picture of the applesauce:

Psalm 17:8 “Keep me as the apple of your eye; hide me in the shadow of your wings.”

The wonderful thing about tomatoes is

Tomatoes is wonderful things!

They make sauces divine

Ev-er-y time

For tomatoes lets rise up and sing!

By the bottled water:

Genesis 1:2 “And the earth was formless and void… and the Spirit of God hovered over the face of the deep.”

On the meat page:

I love steak.

Broiled, fried or baked.

But one on the grill

Gives me a thrill.

Did I mention that I love steak?

On the dairy page, by the eggs:

In Zoology, an egg is an “organic vessel in which and embryo first begins to develop.”

On the Wine & Spirits page:

Whiskey, vodka, wine and beer;

We’ve all had way too much, I fear!

We don’t hafta go home, but we can’t stay here

So get outta the car and let the sober one steer.

And finally:

A helpful smile in every aisle,

We’ll wait here while

You shop in style.

You can bring your child,

But if he is wild

We’ll put you on file

And the checkers and I’ll

Surely be riled

And our bouncer named Kyle

Will toss you in a pile!

Here is "Lonesome Lucy."

Her pasture mate, Bubba (at right below) has gone to a fine new home and Lucy needs a fearless teenager to take her in. Lucy is 7 years old, unregistered QH mare, (Poco Doc breeding), dark buckskin. Has had 60 days professional training, but is a bit green due to lack of time. She loves attention, and is very people friendly. Lucy is the one on the left in photo below. Stands well for the farrier. She will be a good mount for someone who can give her lots of trail time. Email me for more contact info.

(Email address is on horsetrailriders FB page.)

Truly, I don't want ot "get rid" of her - I just have to let her go.

So.. a garage sale I participated in ended on a hilarious note.

At the closing hour, Bonnie and her sister, Kathy loaded up the back of my pickup with unsold items to be donated to goodwill. “We’ll help you unload,” they both promised. By the time the loading was done, there was no room for a passenger in the front of the pickup. With a promise from Bonnie and Kathy to meet me there, I climbed in and headed to the goodwill store. Fortunately for me, the goodwill workers were available to help me unload. Meanwhile, back at Bonnie’s, Kathy was sitting in her car wondering, “Where the heck is Bonnie?” and Bonnie was sitting in HER car wondering, “Where is the heck is Kathy?” By the time they found each other, I was done unloading and came back to Bonnie’s in time to hear the story and got a huge laugh out of it!

"To everything, there is a season...

It looks like my season as a "cowgirl" has come to an end, due to financial concerns.

The following two horses are now for sale:

Bubba: 17 year old Bay Arabian Gelding. Registered with AHA. Trail horse. Has been on River City Roundup Northeast 7 times. Other rides we've been on several times: Weekend at Bernie's, Petersburg, The Grand Duke Alexis Rendevous. Been many times to Cunningham Lake, Two Rivers Park, Nottleman's at Macy. Does well in parades (unless firecrackers are involved.) Very gentle, good with kids and greenhorns. He is pictured below at left taking my elderly brother for a ride.

Lucy: 8 year old purebred UNREGISTERED Quarterhorse mare. Dark Buckskin. Has had 60 days professional training. Was imprinted at birth. Needs some trail time. I have her sire's bloodline papers for your examination. Lucy is pictured below at right, taking me for a ride.

Both are very good natured, people friendly, stand well for the farrier. Easy to catch, easy to load. Bubba, being Arabian, does not grow a very thick winter coat, so would be better if he can get in out of winter weather.

Prices very negotiable for the right home.



I love these horses.

Below: me on Lucy at left, a small cousin on Bubba at right:




Here we (me and Bubba) are at Petersburg in '08:



Here they are, just hangin' loose. Lucy at left, Bubba right:



Closeups.
Bubba:



Lucy:






Email me if you are interested.

Doug, the Dog:



A/K/A: The Mighty Haybale Climber.

Actually, it's more of a leap for him than a climb.
He must like this point of view because he gets up there a lot.

September 15-17, Emily and I drove to St. Louis, MO and went to the Joyce Meyer Love Life Women's Conference, along with 21,998 of our closest friends. We had worship times led by Israel Houghton and Cece Wynans; heard Joyce speak during most of the sessions and heard John and Stasi Eldredge. Can't begin to describe how refreshing it was. Hope to be able to go again sometime.
And since it was only a few blocks away from our hotel, we also went up in the Arch.
So here are some pics:

The Edward Jones Dome, where we attended the conference.


A view of the Dome from the Arch:

And - oh yeah - also where the Rams play football.

From the Arch: Home field of the St. Louis Cardinals:


From the Arch; The Old Courthouse, where the Dred Scott Decision was handed down:


Here is the Arch and some downtown buildings. The green dome on the right is the Old Courthouse.


One of the highlights of the trip for Em was spending Fri afternoon at Macy's with a 20% off coupon, compliments of Joyce.


Some sort of a weird double exposure thing that happened in the camera. I kinda like it, tho. Gotta love those 35 mm's.

Part 3
Visitors to 725 Custer Avenue

Just a little addendum to Part 2.
One thing I remember about living at 725 Custer Avenue is the people who “Just happened to be in town, so thought we’d stop by and say hello.” Mom & Dad always welcomed them with coffee and what ever else they could cobble together in a hurry.
Uncle Franty and Aunt Bernice: Uncle Franty was Francis Gatewood. I was as tall as him when I reached the age of 12 – one of my cousins once referred to him as a “tough old Banty Rooster.” In the 1920s, he was a boxer and hosted a “stable” at his home in rural Decatur, a place that trained young boxers and then sent them into Omaha to compete. He was a veteran of the Flying Tigers of WW II. Too short to be a pilot, he became a mechanic and kept those guys in the air. He once told me that he picked up a rock at Ft. Leavenworth, Kansas, put it in his pocket and it went around the world with him. Sure wish I knew where that rock was now. He literally (I assume) sailed the seven seas. He said being on a ship in the ocean was like being at the bottom of a bowl of water – you had to look up to see the horizon all the way around. He also worked for his dad as a thoroughbred race horse trainer.

Uncle Franty (and this makes me a card carrying Redneck) married his Aunt some time in the late 40s or early 50s. The story is that Bernice (we always pronounced her name so it rhymed with furnace) married my grandpa’s brother, Harry. This was her second marriage. They had two daughters and divorced, for reasons unknown to me. Bernice’s oldest daughter, Mary, wanted to learn how to ride horses, so she was sent out to the Gatewood farmstead to take riding lessons on certain weekends with her dad, my Great Uncle Harry. He would take her back to Omaha on Sunday afternoons. On one Sunday, Uncle Harry was not able to get her back to the city, so Uncle Franty was asked to fill in as Mary’s chauffer. Following this, Franty and Bernice began dating and later married. They never had any children of their own, But Uncle Franty raised Mary and her sister Wanda as his own. Uncle Harry, tragically, died of cancer when the girls were pretty young.

Ray & Tamsey: For most of my first 13 or so years, I thought Ray and Tamsey were my Aunt and Uncle. It turns out that Ray was my dad’s cousin, and not my uncle, although Dad once told me it was okay to call them Uncle Ray and Aunt Tamsey. When I knew them, they lived in Iowa, in a small town south of Sioux City. I have no idea where they might have been going when they dropped in to see us, but they usually stayed long enough for coffee, sandwiches and cookies in the mid-afternoon. Being “just a kid”, I usually said hello and then headed out to play with my friends. I must have overheard something during one of their visits, because I remember that for a long time, during my night time prayers (after “Godblessmommyanddaddymyrnasuzie, etc …andeveryoneondowntothegoldfish…) I added “Please bless my cousin Nancy and her husband and their children in Morrocco and please help them get back to America safely.” As hard as a try, I can’t recall what was going on in the lives of Nancy and M’Barak during that time. But, my prayers were answered because they eventually got back to Nebraska and raised their family here. It’s interesting to me that I can’t remember what was worrying me, but I do remember the prayer. I wonder how many of my prayers were answered that I don’t even remember praying?

A weekly visitor to 725 Custer Ave for a time via television was my dad’s cousin (Ray’s brother) Joe. He appeared regularly on ‘Bowling For Dollars’ on a Sioux City station. Bowling For Dollars was aired on Sunday morning, so Mom and I only caught the last 15 minutes of the broadcast when we got home from Sunday School and church at the Lyons Methodist Church. But Dad, (a lapsed Catholic) could always fill us in on how Joe was doing. One day we came home in time to see Joe being awarded a brand new Ford Mustang convertible for winning the bowling tournament.

Back in 1995, Ray and Joe visited me at my home at RR 2, Herman. I was collaborating with my friend Beverly Lydick on our book A Time To Speak: Personal Memories of WWII. Joe was visiting from Florida and took the time to grant me an interview regarding his experiences as a pilot. He had been shot down and spent time as a POW at Stalag 7, Musberg. Joe talked into my tape recorder, pretty much nonstop for about an hour and a half while I scribbled notes. When we were done, I turned to Ray and said, “How many times have you heard this story?”
“Never.” He replied, “This is the first time.”

(Special note: Musberg (and Cousin Joe) were liberated by the unit my Father-in-law, Jack Carson, was in. Lots more stories about his experiences some other time…)

Another visitor my mom always welcomed with her usual “Come in! Come in! Come in!” chant was our Aunt Babe. Aunt Babe was the widow of Mom’s late brother, Milton, who died of cancer before I was born. Once, when Mom and I were browsing through some old photo albums, I commented on some 1920s pictures of Aunt Babe, “Wow, She really looks like a Flapper.”
And Mom said, “Yes. That’s exactly what she was.”
Babe remarried at some point, and she and her new husband, Bob, dropped in occasionally. She and Mom’s relationship was maintained mostly through Christmas letters, birthday cards and any other Hallmark occasion, always signed, “Babe and Bob.”
Mom once confided in me that there was no love lost between Babe and my Grandma Anderson (Babe’s mother-in-law.) And that, even as Milton was on his death bed in the hospital, Babe refused to speak to Grandma. She would brush past Grandma, giving her the cold shoulder and share a cigarette with Uncle Milton. (Can you imagine? Smoking in a hospital room?!?!)

Tom & Marybelle: Tom & Marybelle were high school sweethearts who got married and raised a family of seven sons. They classmates of Mom’s (Class of ’36) and Tom happened to be a cousin of my dad’s. Dad and Tom used to go riding on a motorcycle together to try and beat the Nebraska heat. Tom & Marybelle were responsible for getting my parents together back in 1940 or so and the two couples were lifetime friends. Mom, Marybelle, and two other friends, Norita and Evelyn, were famous in our family for the strange photos they posed for. I wish I could find them and post them for you, but if I stop now and go looking for them, it will derail my train of thought… There is a series of old black & whites of the four of them perched on something. Anyway, the one I remember best is Mom in her bathing suit – sitting on a snow drift – I think Evelyn took it. The last one I remember was taken in the early 1970s in Marybelle’s back yard when the four of them were in their late fifties – so they climbed on it and took up various perches on a swing set and laughed and giggled while the picture was taken. Tom & Marybelle didn’t stop “dropping by” after Dad passed away. They picked up Mom and took her for an evening out to dinner and maybe dancing at the old Peony Park ballroom in Omaha. I hope they knew how much it eased her loneliness during the years of her widowhood.

Delaine: I always looked forward to summer visits from our cousins (Mom’s niece and her family of three) from Colorado. Delaine and her husband, Kem, had three kids: Sue, Gary and Ann. Sue and Shirl were close in age and Gary and I were the same age, and Ann was 3-4 years younger then me, but I adored her. She took gymnastics back in Denver and I was constantly asking her to do her tricks, like walkovers, handstands, flips, and backbends. She was so supple. I once tried to do a walkover and, of course, I couldn’t get my back properly arched so I landed flat on it and got the breath knocked out of me.
One evening, Kem & Delaine and Mom& Dad went out for the evening and left Shirley and Susan in charge of us “little” kids. I don’t remember what Gary and Ann and I were doing that got us into trouble. I would guess we were supposed to be lying down and going to sleep (the three of us slept together on the living room floor) and we were finding things to giggle and laugh about instead. After numerous attempts by both Shirl and Susan to get us to settle down, Susan finally said, “That’s it, I’m calling the police.” I watched in horror as she picked up the phone and dialed a number. Then I heard her say, “Yeah, this is Susan B______, I’m staying in town for a few days with my relatives and we’ve got some kids here who won’t behave.” She paused and listened for several minutes, tossing in a few “Uh-huh”s and “Yes, sir”s and then, “Yes, I will. I’ll tell them.” When she hung up the phone, I looked over at Ann and she was flopped down flat on her back with her arms crossed, rolling her eyes and she said, “Oh, ha ha ha, very funny. I know you didn’t really call the cops.” I don’t think I’ve ever been more relieved in my life! I think we did settle down a little after that.

Every once in a while a strange car would pull up to the curb outside and an unknown man in a suit and tie would check himself in his rear view mirror, run a comb through his hair, get out, straighten his jacket and stroll up to the front door. This was one time Mom didn’t run to the door with her welcoming “Come in! Come in! Come in!” Sometimes she waited until his second knock. She‘d walk to the screen door, not open it and the stranger would flash a charming smile and say, “Good afternoon! I’m so-and-so with the Fuller Brush Company and would like to demonstrate some of our new products for you?” Mom’s answer was always the same, “No, I don’t need anything today.” And sometimes she’d close the inside door before walking away. I don’t remember any time anyone was allowed in to demo his product.

I know there are countless visitors to 725 Custer Ave that I’ve left out – like Shirley’s friends and my friends. Those are memories for some other time.

So… back to 1973 or so next time.

Part three of The Houses That Built Me will appear in a few days. This post is for Katie - and anyone else who wants to drop a bad habit.

Katie’s Manifesto

I, Katie P., devoted wife of Ross and loving mother of Riley and Reece, do hereby declare, ordain and establish that I will become a non-smoker.

I will begin by…. Procrastinating… I will achieve this goal in 40 days.

Day 1: I will light my first cigarette of the day ten minutes later than I did yesterday.
Instead of smoking at 0:00 AM, I will drink one 8 oz. glass of water and wait ten minutes.

Day 2: I will light my first cigarette ten minutes later than I did yesterday, drinking one 8 oz. glass of water instead of smoking.

Day 3: Same as days 1 and 2. I will keep in mind that the water is helping to flush the nicotine out of my system, thereby reducing my craving for it.

Day 4 through 20: same as days 1 and 2. Additionally, I will consume one less caffeinated drink per day, because caffeine aggravates craving for nicotine. I will replace it with cool, clear, cleansing water.

I will diligently seek to eliminate the following idea from my mind: “Just this one won’t hurt. I can get back on track tomorrow.”

I understand that irritability is a withdrawal symptom. Nicotine is a parasite and emotional irritation is its way of fighting to hold on to its place in my body. I will ignore these feelings and remain steadfast to my personal choice to become a non-smoker. I understand that, during these times of irritation, lighting a cigarette will not make a bad situation better.

Day 21: I will skip my last cigarette of the evening. I will avoid alcohol during the next 20 days, understanding that it also has a tendency to aggravate cravings for cigarettes and weaken my resolve to become a non-smoker.

During the next 19 days, I will keep in mind that dropping a bad habit is a lot like breaking up with a bad boyfriend: I am going to miss it for awhile.

I will remind myself that I have successfully quit smoking before; I know I can do it. I will begin taking a daily walk of at least 20 minutes, 4 times a week. I will notice how much easier it is to take deeper breaths and how I no longer become out of breath when I run up the stairs to the time clock.

Day 22: I will skip the cigarettes I usually smoke right after meals, waiting at least 20 minutes from the time I usually light up after eating.

Day 23: I will skip the cigarettes I usually smoke right after a meal, waiting at least 30 minutes.

Day 24: Same as 22-23, adding a 40 minute wait. More water will continue to cleanse my body of the influence of the parasite.

Day 25 - 30: I will continue to add 10 minutes to the time I usually light up after meals.

Day 30: I will not light up during my work breaks. I will look back over the past 30 days and build on my success in kicking cigarettes out of my life.

I will notice that I sleep more peacefully and cough a lot less when I first lie down at might. My walks will become longer and will eventually give way to running.

Days 30-39: I will continue to eliminate one cigarette per day until I am down to 1. I will memorize the following Bible verses so that when I feel irritated and/or am about to give up I will set my mind to CHEER UP (John 16:33) and CALM DOWN (John 14:27).

Day 40: I am now a non-smoker!!

I WILL NOT CELELBRATE BY LIGHTING UP A CIGARETTE!!!

I further strengthen my resolve to remain a nonsmoker by never, ever thinking “Just one won’t hurt…”

I am Katie.

I am strong.

I. Will. Do. it.

PLaces I've lived: The Houses that Built Me
Part two
1962-1970

I think we lived in that little house behind the feed store a year or so until we bought a house at 725 Custer Avenue. It was an aqua blue, two bedroom, house with a bar in the basement (which Mom used to store her canned goods), and a finished room suitable to be a bedroom and a laundry area. The spacious back yard had a nice, built in brick barbecue and a cement kiddie pool that was about two feet deep, five feet long and three feet wide. Mom had room for a vegetable garden here and planted some fruit trees. I remember going to school one morning from the little house by the feed store and my sister, Sue picking me up at the end of the school day to take me to the new house. This house was right across the street from a railroad track and when the trains rolled by, thundering and whistling, the windows rattled! Bob graduated from High School and was drafted into the army while we were living here and both he and Sue got married while we were living there. Grandpa and Grandma Gatewood lived with us occasionally in that house. I remember Shirley having slumber parties here and I had a Halloween party there one year, with a haunted house in the basement. Shirley and I both babysat the four neighbor kids pretty often and had other babysitting jobs around town. She had a paper route for awhile that I helped with once in a while.
I had the chicken pox while we were living here.

Sue was pretty much on her own by then, but came to visit on weekends. I remember her boyfriend, Jerry, coming to pick her up one Sunday afternoon to take her back to where ever it was she lived then. He carried her suitcase for her and opened the car door and called our parents Mrs. Gatewood and Mr. Gatewood. I think they liked him a lot and were glad to see them get married. I also remember once riding in the car with Sue & Jerry, back when the headlight dimmer switch was on the floor, but I didn’t know that, yet. So I asked Jerry (who looked a lot like James Dean) “How does the car know to dim it’s lights when we meet another car?” He and Sue cracked up laughing and then he said, “It’s magic.” And then he proceeded to hit the dimmer switch about a dozen times so the lights were blinking and he and Sue kept laughing….

While we lived at 725 Custer Ave, our family grew with nieces and nephews. Actually, nieces and nephews started coming in 1958 and 1961, but they lived way a long ways away, so I didn’t get to know them very well until later on. We drove to Mississippi for a visit one Christmas and I think Denise and I managed to get into plenty of trouble together while we were there. One thing I recall about that visit was that their neighbors had a rooster and it seemed like it crowed all through the night.

Chantelle (1963) was the first local one to make an appearance and I remember her being a cute little blonde thing, full of energy and whenever they came for a visit, “Aunt Janell, can we go out and play?” I remember once we were all going somewhere with Mick and he let her ‘drive’ – she’d sit in his lap in the driver’s seat and he’d let her steer, which she did with wild abandon. We were going down the street past the fairgrounds in Oakland swerving crazily from one side of the road to the other, until Mom yelled, “MICK!!” and he took over and assisted with the steering, making the ride considerably less exciting. Chantelle’s sister, Tina came in 1967 and their family was living in Lincoln at that time. I remember going to see her for the first time. She was s-o-o-o-o TINY I thought TINA was the perfect name for her. We didn’t stay very long, as I recall, because her mom was exhausted. When Chantelle & Tina’s parents divorced, I (sadly) lost touch with them until recently, although Mom and I went to Lincoln to Tina’s wedding and both girls visited Mom as often as they could. She adored those girls, as she did all of her grandchildren. She said Tina and her husband were doing very well because they were a couple of DINKS – Double Income No Kids for a long time.

Cindy joined us in 1965 and her sister, Tammie in 1967. Both were born while their family was living in Oakland and their mom, Sue would come to Lyons to bowl once a week, so we got to watch the girls. I remember watching Dad tickling Cindy and saying, “Gitchy gitchy goo!” and she’d giggle like crazy. After Cindy started walking, she had to wear a brace on her feet for awhile to correct her from being pigeon toed. It was a flat bar attached to her shoes that held her feet pointed straight out. So she had to go back to crawling and she’d pull herself around on our living room floor, dragging that brace behind her from side to side. It must have worked, because I don’t think she’s pigeon toed now. I wonder if they still treat it that way? Cindy and Tammie both called me Aunt Nell, because Janell was too much of a mouthful.

Deb, Bob’s firstborn, came in 1966. She was born while he was in the Army, stationed in Germany, so he didn’t get to see her until she was a toddler, and he finally got to come home with his discharge papers. Deb was a rough and tumble little girl and a biter. I remember once they were visiting us and Deb tackled me by the ankles, knocking me belly down to the floor and crawled up and was biting me on the back. Bob and his wife thought it was hilarious. I didn’t really see the humor in it, myself.

The next one whose birth I remember clearly is Paulette (1968). I happened to answer the phone when her dad called to give us the news and as soon as I heard his voice, (recognizable by his thick southern accent) I shouted into the phone, “Did Myrna have her baby?” He answered, “She shore di-ud.” And then I think Mom demanded I had the phone over to her so she could get the details first hand. I don’t remember seeing Paulette until 1969, when Dad died and she and Myrna came up from MS for several days. I remember her being a beautiful, delicate little thing.

We all lost a little baby girl named Carol Ann who lived only 6 days in January of 1969. Going to her funeral was one of the saddest things I’ve ever had to do and the only time I ever saw my dad cry. She was Deb’s little sister.


Meanwhile, Mick was starting a second family with Shannon being born in 1971. So my parents had eight granddaughters and only one grandson. We went to Shannon’s Christening in Lincoln and she had the longest, dark hair I’d ever seen on a baby. She was really a precious, beautiful thing.

We finally got some more boys in the family when Deb’s brother, Brad was born in 1972. We got another boy when Sean was born in 1973. I think their family was living in another state when Sean was born.

Cindy and Tammie welcomed a brother, Joe, in 1972 who was born on what would have been Dad’s 60th birthday.

Dad died in 1969 while Shirley and I were both still at home. At some point after Shirl graduated in 1970, Mom sold the blue house and she and I moved into a trailor home.

Places I’ve lived
Miranda Lambert's song The House That Built Me inspired me to record my memories of the places I've lived.

Here is Part One
1955-1963

When I was born in 1955, my family lived on a farm on Highway 51 a few miles east of Decatur, Nebraska. The house is right next door to the A T & T tower. I’m not sure when the tower was built, but I don’t think it was there when our family lived there. My siblings went to school at a nearby country school house called Edgington. If my sisters check in on this post, maybe they can tell more about that place. Did Shirley go to Kindergarten at Edgington? My dad’s sister and her family lived on a farm nearby and my sisters tell stories of our cousins, Paul D. and Jim coming over to play, hiding buried treasure in the woods. My brother told me about horseback riding with them and how Dad never used a stirrup to mount his horse – he’d grab the saddle horn and swing himself up and over to get on.

When I was two years old, we moved to a farm 2-3 miles north of Lyons, Nebraska. I don’t remember this, but Mom once told me that I cried and begged to “go home” the first night we stayed at our new home. I’m trying to imagine what a monstrous job it must have been to move this family in 1957 or so. There were six of us kids by then, ranging in age from two (me) to the eldest at 16. And now I’m wondering about all the farm machinery and livestock that must have been involved in addition to the household goods and possessions? OK, Sue? Myrna? Shirley? Got any details to add?

I have a few memories of living at this place in the Jefferson neighborhood – it is now occupied by Dwight Long. We bought it from Mom’s parents. I remember once I was with Mom in the chicken house and a small airplane buzzed over us. The roar of it scared me silly and I remember running into the chicken house and grabbing hold of Mom. It may have been our cousin Joe Gatewood, who did some flying for an insurance company and happened to be in the neighborhood, so he buzzed us. He became a pilot in the military and before he shipped out to Germany in 1944 or so, he flew up and buzzed Decatur. I also remember that we had a mean rooster for a time and I wasn’t allowed to go outside of our fenced in yard by myself. I was very ill the winter that I turned 4 with whooping cough. We went to see Dr. Tibbles so often that year and I had a navy blue sweater that I called my “doctor sweater” because I wore it every time we went to see him.

We didn’t have any horses when we lived on this place. I remember a dog named Lassie, who must have gotten exposed to rabies because we had to keep her tied up for a certain amount of time, after which she must have come down with the disease and had to be shot. I remember Bob bringing her into the yard so I could pet her a few times during her confinement. We also had a black and white sheepdog type of mutt we called Sport. I wonder where we got our dogs? Probably from a neighbor? Dad milked cows and farmed on this place. I think we also had some pigs. Mom had chickens, both laying hens and meat birds. Mom also took a job at Campbell Soup in Fremont while we were living here. I was sent to a babysitter in town, Mrs. Davis. I would ride in with my sibs and they dropped me off on their way to school. They must have picked me up to take me home, as well, though I remember Mom picking me up some times. One morning, I told my brother I was supposed to go to Grandma Anderson’s instead of the babysitter’s. I must have been a pretty good liar, because he believed me and left me there. Mom wasn’t too happy about that. Grandma was too old and frail to be a fill in babysitter for a (naughty) 4 year old. We were still living on the place north of Lyons when I started school a mile or so away at Jefferson. I learned to read using the Dick & Jane readers. The first word I learned was “Look.” And the page featured a picture of Sally putting on Dick’s galoshes, which were w-a-a-ay too big for her. Why do you suppose I remember that?

In the middle of my second grade year, (1962) we moved to a little house in the town of Lyons, right behind a feed and seed store. I think Dad went to work at the local creamery then. By that time, I think there may have only been three or four of us kids still at home. My brother, Bob and my sister, Shirl and me. Brother Mick got married and started his family around this time, which included a puppy named Chiefery. Sue had graduated high school and was off to the Lincoln School of Commerce. Myrna was an air force wife living in Colorado and then Mississippi and Hawaii, but those are her stories.

Being in town meant I could walk everywhere: to school every morning; to the swimming pool in the summers and to children’s choir practice at the Methodist church once a week. I don’t remember the address of this house, but we always got our mail at PO Box 338. Until they built the new post office when our new PO Box # was 165. When I was in 3rd or 4th grade, Mom taught my Sunday School class. I also joined a 4-H club when I turned 8 and learned how to cook, bake and sew from a lady named Nell Hightree. I don’t think I stayed in it very long, because I didn’t like getting things ready for the county fair every year and I really hated the fashion show, where we had to model something that we sewed. I always thought the things I sewed or baked or cooked weren’t as good as everyone else’s and I didn’t really want to put them on display.

I had the measles while we were living in this house. It might have been in the summer time, as I remember being very hot for a very long time.

Critters in B & W
I discovered a roll of film that hadn't been developed yet. These were taken in the fall & winter of '09.

Taken through my bedroom window-
This fellow was wandering around in our back yard. Jack says it's a woodchuck:


Taken through an unpstairs window-
Squirrelly snack time:



Through my kitchen window-
This hungry fellow was eating pine needles off the snow in our back yard last winter:


Didn't have to shoot this one through a window. This is Little Girl:

Flashback Friday

Tell about TV when you were growing up. Did your family have a TV? I was born on a Sunday and I’ve been told that my older brother went to Sunday School and bragged, “We got a new TV yesterday! And, oh yeah, we got a baby sister, too.” So there has always been a TV in my home.

Was it color or b&w? B & W. And it required a lengthy warm-up time whenever you turned it on. And when you turned it off, the picture would shrink down into a tiny bright spot in the very center of the screen and glow for a few minutes before disappearing with a squeaky little “pop” sound. I acquired a color TV when I bought one for my husband for our first anniversary present in 1977.

How many TVs did your family have? One. We have two now. One would suffice, but the son needs one to play his video games on.

Did you have one in your room? No. I still don’t have on in the bedroom, tho I know lots of my friends do and use it to fall asleep by.

Did your family leave the TV on most of the day or turn it on for specific programs? I think it was turned off until something specific came on that someone wanted to see. My Grandma referred to a couple of soap operas that she watched as “my stories.” One soap I got attached to when I was a teen was “Dark Shadows.” It featured a vampire named Barnabas Collins. And later, a song from that show, “Quentin’s Theme” made the top ten.

Was the TV on or off when you ate meals as a family? It was off during meals. We ate in the kitchen and the TV was in the living room. Later in my life, when my children were toddlers, we used to gather at my in-laws for a couple of weeks during the summer and process chickens. Their TV was also in the living room, but they kept it loud enough to hear in the kitchen – which was VERY loud. I remember finding the sound of it overwhelming.

Were there rules about watching TV? Not that I remember.

What were your favorite shows? I think I was pretty devoted to the Saturday morning cartoon lineup: Mighty Mouse, Donald Duck, Bugs Bunny… I liked all the silly ones as opposed to the super hero stuff. The Flintstones came on weekday afternoons and I always tried to be home in time for that one. Live action shows I watched included My Friend, Flicka; Bonanza; Saturday Night at the Circus with Don Ameche; Lost in Space; when I was pre-teen. Other shows I recall, but wouldn’t necessarily label as favorites were: Happy Days; All in the Family; Mork and Mindy, Roseanne. A lot of the sitcoms I watched, I saw as nightly reruns during the 6:00-7:00 hour while I was in the kitchen fixing supper. I don’t think I ever went out of my way to watch them when they were on only weekly.
My all time favorites would be the first three Star Trek series.
My current faves are Joyce Meyer’s Enjoying Everyday Life and Adrian Rogers’ Love Worth Finding. Dancing With the Stars is a close 3rd.

Are there any particular memories you have of TV in your younger years? Lawrence Welk, every Saturday night. I still like to catch reruns of him on PBS. Lost in Space and The Fugitive come to mind. The final episode of the The Fugitive was aired on the night before the first day of school and no one fussed at me to get to bed. I don’t remember a thing about the final episode, but I do remember being allowed to stay up til 10 PM to watch it! And I was glued to the coverage of Neil Armstrong and crew landing on the moon.

A Flashback Friday (on Monday) Questions courtesy of Linda.


What role did music play in your growing up years? I can’t remember a time when there wasn’t some sort of music playing in the background of my life.

What, if any, music do you associate with early childhood? Swing: my mom ALWAYS had the radio on, tuned to KFAB Omaha in the mornings. Before they became a talk station, they played swing: The Mills Brothers (I’m gonna buy a paper doll that I can call my own…”), I can still hear the trumpets of a band whose name I can’t remember playing “Jesus Christ, Superstar,” but that was during my teen years. And “Who’s Sorry Now?” (Eddie Arnold, maybe?) , “Just Help Yourself” (Engleburt Humperdink?) I can still sing the “KFAB in Omaha” ditty, tho they don’t use it any more. From my very early childhood, I remember my sister and I standing on each side of Mom at the piano singing as she played. Some of the songs I remember: “Just Because”, “I Ain’t Gonna Take it Settin’ Down”, “He”, “I Love You Truly”, “You Are My Sunshine”, “Don’t Fene Me In”… I’m sure I’ll think of dozens more - right after I publish this post!

The other most important music of my childhood was the hymns we sang on Sunday morning. When I was aged 7-12 or so, I was a member of our church’s “Cherub Choir.” I think we sang once a month during Sunday worship and I don’t remember a single one of the songs we sang, but I remember the director; it was she who taught me that two different notes sung at the same time could sound pretty and it was called harmony. From that time on, I looked forward to singing hymns because I could read and sing the alto line. It wasn’t until later in my life that the words began to have an impact on my life and my faith. I’m glad I never stopped singing hymns.

What music style or songs were popular when you were in high school? I guess you’d have to call what I listened to lite rock. My faves were: Three Dog Night, Don McClean, Chicago, Simon & Garfunkel, Neil Diamond, The Mamas and Papas, John Denver, The Starland Vocal Band, Credence Clearwater Revival, BJ Thomas, Olivia Newton John, Janis Joplin… it was the 70s, y’know?

How did you listen to music - on the radio, albums, etc. Mostly on the radio. I had a few albums and started accumulating cassettes when I got out on my own. Now, I own way more cds than I have time to listen to. Which makes me wonder why I buy them? I still listen to radio more than the cd player.

Did you have a stereo in your room? I think what we had would have to be called record player, not a stereo. It played 78s (which we had only a couple of) 45s (a pretty good stack) and 33s. You could load 6-8 45s on it and it would automatically play one and then move the needle off while it dropped the next one. It had a feature where you could play the same 45 over and over, as long as you left the ‘arm’ up. I think I drove my brother crazy with it one day; he came stomping down the hall barking, “Is that the only record you’ve got!?”

Did you attend concerts when you were a teenager? During my 4 years of high school, we had a music teacher who would gather up a group of us several times during the summer, load us into his convertible (top down, of course!) and take us to free concerts at Memorial Park and other places in Omaha. I recall seeing a performance of the musical “Hair” at one of them. I remember a time we went to see a performance of “South Pacific” in an auditorium when a tornado siren sounded and they stopped the show, lined everyone up along the walls and the actors tried to keep everyone’s mind off the storm by singing. It didn’t work. We didn’t get blown away, but it sure was scary there for a while, mainly because they wouldn’t let anyone leave. And in spite of what they say, the show doesn’t always “go on.” They never did finish “South Pacific!” The same teacher took a bunch of us to a Chicago concert in 72 or 73. The Pointer Sisters were the opening band and when Chicago was done, we all held up matches or cigarette lighters until they came out for an encore. Yes, I had a lighter – I was a bad girl and smoked back then.

Another teacher took a bunch of us to see the movie “Fiddler on the Roof.” “How the West Was Won” and “The Unsinkable Molly Brown” were a couple of movies I actually paid money to see more than once. The old musicals are still my favorite movies to watch. The ones I recall are all so charming and clean and full of ‘happily ever after.’

Our high school marching band played Chicago’s “25 or 6 to 4” at all the parades we marched in one summer. I remember playing “La Cucaracha” for all our summer gigs another time. Our director (the same music teacher mentioned above) kept us interested in music by having us learn to play and sing all the pop tunes of the day.

Did the music you liked cause conflict with your parents? If it did, I don’t remember getting into any arguments about it. I was pretty bullheaded, tho, so maybe we argued and I just went ahead and listened to what ever the heck I wanted to anyway.

What song or songs take you back to a certain place and time of your youth? There are a few songs that remind me of people I knew during my teen years who died very young. “Color My World” makes me think of a girl who died in a car wreck when she was 16. “Brian’s Song” reminds me of a girl who died of leukemia when she was 15. One Friday night, a few days after a particularly brutal accident that claimed four young lives, some of the girls on our ‘pep bus’ on the way home from a basketball game, (don’t tell the ACLU) led us in a prayer for the survivors and then we sang “When You Walk Through a Storm” from “The Man of La Mancha.” I think I could still sing it through from beginning to end. Chicago’s “Saturday In the Park” takes me back to my hometown Independence Day parade & fireworks show.

This is a story that's been bouncing around in my head ever since it happened:

I need to make it clear that I LOVE all my managers at my jpb - they all treat me with the utmost respect and support. So it always surprises me at how much they "diss" each other. I've noticed that two of them are especially at odds with each other. Here is a conversation they had a while back during the opening minutes of a shift they were doomed to work together:

MANAGER 1: "Why don't you just punch me in the face right now and get it over with?"

MANAGER 2: "Well, I would, but I'm on probation!"

Now, you might advise me not to hang around with these guys... and I don't ouside of work,







but these are WOMEN!

There is a neat blog that posts questions for "Flashback Friday". It's here if you want to see it for yourself. So here is my contribution to one of her flashbacks, only I'm doing it on Tuesday because I have to work on Friday and won't have time to play in the Blogosphere. Her questions are in Italics. My answers aren't.

FOOD
What were meals like when you were growing up?
I remember that Mom always made a roast beef, ‘taters & gravy, and a Jell-O salad for Sunday dinner. It made the most wonderful aroma to come wafting out of the kitchen to greet us when we got home from church.
Did your mom (or dad) cook (and was it from scratch or from a box?)
Mom cooked, using very few, if any convenience foods. I considered it a special treat when I was able to talk her into buying Rice-A-Roni. I used to love the stuff, but I hardly ever buy it now. I remember she made bacon and eggs for breakfast almost every day and only had cereal once in a while. I don’t remember for sure, but I’ll bet my older sisters helped her a lot in the kitchen. When she was working at a job and Dad had to cook, he would make bacon, eggs, and toast for dinner.
or did your family eat out much of the time? I don’t remember all of us going out to eat together very much, but I’m the youngest of six, so I doubt we did it very often. We used to pile in the car and drive the three miles into town once in a while to get ice cream at a tiny little Dairy Queen. When the other five were grown up and on their own, I remember once going out to eat with Mom & Dad at a place called the Green Lantern in Decatur, NE. They had the best onions rings I’d ever eaten (until my son started making them a few years ago.) The Green Lantern burned down a few years ago, but they rebuilt it.
Did you eat together as a family or was everyone on a different schedule?
I think we mostly ate together as a family, until extra-curricular school activities got in the way.
What did you call meals? (Dinner vs. supper, lunch, etc.)
It was (and still is) breakfast, dinner and supper. Lunch was a snack in the middle of the afternoon, between dinner and supper.
What were some of your favorite things that your parent fixed?
Mom made the best chicken and home made noodles on the planet.
What did you dislike and vow never to fix once you grew up?
I didn’t like liver when I was young, but I like it now.
Did your family have any food traditions, things that were a must on certain occasions (such as Sunday dinners or holiday meals)?
We had oyster stew on New Year’s Eve and ham on New Year’s Day. The usual turkey, etc. on Thanksgiving and Christmas.
Did your parent teach you to cook or did you wing it once you were grown?
I learned a lot of basic cooking skills from Mom, just by watching her. She always made meat, potatoes and a vegetable and I still consider that to be a square meal. Over the years, I’ve learned to cook a lot of different types of foods. I do a lot more international cuisines than Mom did. And my husband likes to have a lettuce salad. I don’t remember having salads much growing up.
How similar or different are your family's eating habits today than when you grew up?
We’ve always had a TV in sight and on while we eat. That’s one thing I would do differently if I had it to do over again. My kids pretty much grew up on mac & cheese and peanut butter & jelly. They had cereal for breakfast most of the time, tho they would have liked pancakes every day. I hardly ever took the time to make them a cooked breakfast, but now I wish I had. As I remember it, they preferred ‘fast food’ to home cooking for dinner & supper. I would be interested to hear their side of it.

Longing to be a part of something larger than myself, I wrote this:

As a fire consumes a sacrifice and draws it to Your Throne;
Let my voice be lost in yours, O God, and my plans consumed by Your own.

Let the single raindrop of my life drown in Your river of Peace
And flow into Your sea of Grace for all Eternity.

May the simple note of praise I bring join Your Symphony;
Until, at last, my voice with Your’s makes perfect harmony.

May the single brushstroke I can be, be lost in Your Masterpiece.
I would that the strand of thread I am, in Your fabric never cease.

Take my temporal earthbound dreams; the things I think I know;
All my silly selfish schemes, I gladly let them go.

“Not my will but Thine be done,” this is my earnest plea
Not my name, but Your’s be praised. “Here am I, send me.”

For Jim
Alder Grove School
Craig, Burt County, NE





We drove past here on our way to making our cemetery visits on Memorial Day and I remembered that you (Jim) said you attended 4-H meetings here. So we stopped and took these snapshots for you. I almost forgot about them until I read your Falshback Friday blogpost about school - which I thoroughly enjoyed and will be posting a flashback of my own some time soon. Where does the time go?

Enjoy!