Today is my grandma’s 123rd birthday. No, she is not here to celebrate. She passed away 40 years ago this August. Though I turned 12 just a few days before her passing, I have relatively few memories of her. She was placed in a nursing home when I was about 9 and spent the last few years of her life there. Though the facility was actually within walking distance of my home, I let one traumatic experience keep me from visiting as I should have. I regret that but also acknowledge I did the best I could at the time. This story isn’t really about that though. I have written quite a lot about my grandma – perhaps out a deep sense of guilt for not visiting – I am going to map out a rough sketch of the things I know.
Continue readinggenealogy
Remember: your family name is for future generations, too
I’m proud of my family name. Both my paternal and maternal names that make up, well, me. While my ancestors were not perfect by any means I always enjoy encountering a family name in a history book. It doesn’t happen often but occasionally with local history books I do bump into an ancestor. It got me thinking, what would it be like to share a family name with a notorious figure from history?
Continue readingGeneral Conference thoughts: Family History Work: Sealing and Healing
by Elder Dale G. Renlund
It’s all about family. In the end, it’s all about family, what else matters? Continue reading
My Names
I am proud of my name
but also my hidden name.
Two lines mixed together
and both I claim. Continue reading
Little Lady Catherine
She welcomes travelers home above,
Her face is the first many see.
It is a duty she does with love,
Comforting the sad and lonely.
Do me a favor, don’t call it work, call it history
I’ve always been interested in family history. Sort of. More on my terms than any useful, practical terms of actually doing the work. Maybe that’s it. I liked hearing the stories but I never wanted to do the work to find the stories out.
Hmm. I think that’s called laziness.
Huh.
Tough Enough
Life is messy, life gets hard
sometimes you don’t want to press on.
How will you ever make it
when you don’t feel strong?
Here are a few words
of encouragement for you
because you do have what it takes
to help you make it through.
Because she’s a part of you –
tough enough to raise her children all alone.
She’s a part of you –
tough enough to leave and set out on her own.
She’s a part of you –
tough enough to give birth while rain flooded the Green.
She’s a part of you –
tough enough to start her family at seventeen.
So you see – you will succeed.
Look behind you –
They are walking with you.
Reach inside you –
they are a part of you.
Heartache will come your way
but you will make it through the day –
because you’re already tough enough.
Genealogy. I am (thinking) of Doing It. Someday.
Please excuse me for not posting last night. I did repost one of my personal favorite blogs. Sometimes I crack myself up. If only I could get fake gravatars so that I can like my own blog incognito. Yep, I’m that conceited.
ck's days 