Living In the frozen north - Minneapolis

When I heard about the bridge collapsing in Minneapolis, my thoughts were about how many times we have crossed that bridge and enjoyed the riverview and St. Anthony's Falls upstream. You crossed the Miss. River on this bridge to get to the twin city of St. Paul, the capital of MN.

This is our home, on a hill, in Wayzata, MN, about 12 miles west from downtown where Jim worked (Vice Pres. of Manufacturing, Vassarette Women's Div) at the Munsingwear Headquarters. We transferred from Texas in May and everything was green and lilacs were blooming and it was beautiful. We didn't know we would be going up this hill in several feet of snow in the winter! I had a neighbor with a snow plow (he was a contractor) and he found out I could sew and repair his Eddie Bauer down jackets, so we bartered right away. He plowed our driveway when it snowed and I mended his jackets when he snagged them while working. Our home was split level with a basement where we would stay in the summer when it was hot on occasions. We didn't have air cond. I really enjoyed living near Lake Minnetonka and we learned to go cross country skiing on Cargill Grain corporate headquarters property adjoining our property nearby or on golf courses.

Our mentally handicapped son James was still attending public school in Crystal, several miles away. The roads were plowed during the night and his school bus (van) was never late and never missed a day because of weather. Jim was traveling to plants in Texas and AR and LA, so he was gone a lot and hated to return to the cold weather. He was happy when he was offered a job with Bali, Div. of Hanes, in Winston Salem and we moved there after two winters in MN. I attended VP Hubert Humprey's funeral while living there. We had met him earlier at the sheltered workshop his granddaughter attended. The quality of life in Minneapolis was great! And I loved the summers there - so many blue lakes all over the city. The winters were another story. We left two sons in Texas, in college, when we moved and later the youngest son, Bill, got a job in St Paul with KSTP TV station for awhile. I still have two friends there that I hear from on special occasions.

Home, Sweet Home- 33 years ago in Paris,TX

1975

Jim and I have lived in a lot of places during our almost 54 years of marriage. We were in Paris, TX while the boys were growing up and for them this is their home town. Jim worked for Vasserette Div. of Munsingwear and I got my B.S. degree from Texas A&M at Commerce (had 1 year from Troy State) while we were living there. We built this new house in 1974 and only got to live in it 2 years before Jim was transferred to Minneapolis, MN.

2007 - 32 years later

Occasionally we hear from friends back in Paris and we talk about going back for a visit - but it's a long drive from Elba. I had an email this week from one of my friends and I asked if she'd go by our old house (over 32 yrs old now) and take a picture for us. That's what you see here. The tree on the left side of the house is a sycamore and I bought it for 25 cents at Gibson's (now Walmart) and set it out - never dreaming it would get this big. The roof is a different color now. Otherwise it looks pretty much the same. You entered our garage from an alley behind the house. The room on the front right was the "music room" where the boys would gather with friends and play their musical instruments. It was a "sound-proof" room so we didn't have to listen to them practice. Bedrooms were on the opposite end. We loved living in Texas and go back often to visit our son and family who live in Austin. We are going to Austin in October and spend a couple of days on the Frio River, west of Johnson City where Pres. and Mrs. Johnson are buried.

The same family who bought our house still live there. I'm glad they are taking care of it!

Our Sweet Autumn Clematis is blooming

We cut this vine to the ground every spring and it comes back around May and grows so fast. It provides shade for our swing arbor in the afternoon and on the east side we have confederate jasmine which is a slow grower but smells so good when it blooms. Our clematis blooms don't have much odor this year. I thought that last year they smelled so sweet.

It's a hardy vine. We don't have to water it very often. The bees love it, and the pink coral vine in the background.

I got a start of this vine from Dr. Bill Cowart down the street. He has one that climbs a trellis in his yard. My favorite flowers are the "pass alongs" that people have given me.

Flower garden at birthplace home of Gov Big Jim Folsom

The birthplace of former Gov. "Big Jim" Folsom was moved to Elba in Dec. 2003. Vandals were destroying it out in the country. The house was deeded to the city to use as a museum. Work on restoring it has been slow. So far all that has done is a new chimney has replaced the one that had to be torn down during the move.

A front yard flower garden was planted in 2005 while waiting to restore the old country home. I got the high school welding class to design and make the wrought iron fence from iron donated by Dorsey's. High School Key Club members laid the brick walkway from old bricks.

I have planted many antique plants and bulbs (over 50 years old). Climbing roses are growing on the iron fence. Pictured here is a pale pink climbing rose that dates back to Savannah, GA about 200 years ago. There is a Cherokee rose on one fence, some antique red roses, and a chinquapen rose in a corner of the yard. The white sand yard is kept free of weeds and grass and swept as they did in 1900, using yard brooms made from gallberry bushes. In the fall the yard is filled with lavendar daisy mums from long ago.

Many years ago Gov Folsom bought and placed a granite marker near the old house and that marker was moved to Elba when the house was moved. In Sept. 2007, representatives from the Ala. Historical Commission and Lt. Gov Jim Folsom's office are coming to Elba to offer advice on how to restore the old wooden frame house and perhaps use it as a museum for school children to visit to see how people lived in early 1900's. The house was located on city property next to the old jail.

This is a special project that I enjoy working on. I placed an old bench under the big pecan tree in the yard and when I'm working in the flower garden, I sit on the bench and drink cold lemonade. Sometimes people stop by to visit or wave as they drive by.

Lazy Saturday

Nightime at our home with the dim solar light to help us get around in the front yard.

Last night we went outside and looked up into the dark sky to see the international space station cross overhead. It was on schedule at 8:18 PM CST. It was a little overcast so we didn't see the bright light until it was overhead. Then the bright light popped out of the clouds and it was fun watching it move very fast across the sky up high with the stars, until it was out of sight. What an experience. I cannot imagine living on that space station.

I will be glad when it is cool enough at night to take a cup of hot tea outside and sit in the swing arbor with Jim and look at the stars and listen to the night sounds. I'm glad we don't have any dogs in our neighbor to bark and ruin the quiet, peaceful evenings. An occasional car goes by but not too often after about 7 pm.

Jim went to a community men's breakfast at 8 A.M. where men from the local churches all meet monthly at one of the churches for fellowship and food, and occasionally a speaker.

We did odd chores throughout the day including spraying the climbing roses with a mixture of water, baking soda, and Ivory liquid soap to combat black spot disease. This mixture coats the leaves and the fungus spores cannot grow. This happens when it is hot and humid and you have to spray weekly to keep your roses from losing their leaves and eventually they will die. It seems like something always need spraying; either for aphids, powdery mildew or fungus.

Back to reading my book, Immaculee Ilibagiza's book "Left to Tell". It's so good.

August 4th was a good day and will soon be history.

Our 5 granddaughters

We flew to Maine in the summer of 2006, where we met our 5 granddaughters, to attend nephew Doug Johnson's wedding to Michelle, a wedding on the ocean front. It was a very cold day (note the sweaters).

Our son Bill joined us there also. Then the 9 of us spent several days in the Boston area, sightseeing. We stayed in Salem, MA and took the commuter train to Boston every day, and traveled about the city on the subway. It's hard to find a place to park in the old historic district.

Our granddaughters live in Florence, SC and Austin, TX. Pictured here, left to right, are sisters Nerissa, Caroline and Katie. Next are sisters from Texas, Elizabeth (Lizzy) and on the end is Allison (Ally). We don't get to see them at the same time very often and this was such a fun time to all get together. We were all together last Nov. for our son James' 50th birthday party. I hope we can do something like this again before they graduate from college and get jobs, get married, etc. The oldest, Lizzy, goes to the Univ. of Texas and is a biology/pre-med major; Ally is in her second year at North Tex. University in Denton, TX; Nerissa is interested in some field of nursing and will start to Clemson Univ in SC on Aug. 18th. Katie will be a Jr. at West Florence HS in Florence, SC and Caroline will turn 12 just a few days after school starts and will be in the 6th grade. She asked if Grandpa and I would be able to attend her high school gradation. She must think we are getting old!

Jelly making for church bazaar in Nov

Our Concord grapes were made into low sugar jelly yesterday. I only got enough juice to make 10 pints total. The drought this summer almost killed the vine. But we have a bumper crop of scuppernongs coming along (top left) - in about 2 weeks - red, small and large bronze ones. I made this jelly for our Methodist church bazaar in November. We sell the jelly for $5 a pt, or $3 half-pint. So far I've made enough jelly and fig preserves to make $100 for the bazaar. I'll make some pear preserves later and maybe some purple scuppernong jelly that tastes like grape jelly but not as tart

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