Last week we went on a picnic… Our financial advisor held a picnic outdoors under a tent in the parking lot. They handed out box lunches, and had a duo playing guitar and singing quietly in the background. It was nice.
We were first to sit at our table. Then we were introduced to a local pastor and his wife who sat down across from us. As we chatted, the places where we grew up became a topic of conversation. They spoke first and they said Columbia Heights and Fridley.
McKinley Street Northeast Minneapolis
I immediately responded I was familiar with that area because I grew up on 35th and McKinley… then Gordon, the pastor, said with much surprise, that he did too, until he was six years old! We discovered we lived four houses away from each other. He is four years older so I would have been two years old when his family moved away, but he did remember playing with my older brother and all the neighborhood boys his age. There were seven or eight of them!
He also said he remembered my mother, and her name, Ruby.
What a serendipitous moment. We were excited to discover this fact, and had fun reminiscing about that great neighborhood in Northeast Minneapolis.
Later I asked my brother if he remembered Gordon, and he said yes… playing ball together.
We have had success putting unwanted items on the curb, free for the taking. I like that it helps keep things out of the landfill, and people can find another use for what we no longer want. Our latest item on the curb was our old Coleman camp stove…the classic old-style green one. It still worked, but was in rough shape so we thought some young folks might like it as a starter stove for camping. Apparently, someone did – it was gone the next day.
The camp stove served us well. Gary already owned it when got married, and we finally replaced it last year, in 2021, therefore it was over 44 years old. A few years ago, it converted easily to using one-pound propane tanks.
The camp stove holds fond memories. We used it on numerous camping trips over the years. Mostly when our two sons were younger. We liked to camp in Minnesota State Parks, and we liked to take road trips to the National Parks throughout the United States; from Acadia, to Great Smokey Mountains, to Yellowstone, to Zion, to name a few. We had many good times together on our camping trips…sometimes with friends, sometimes just the four of us.
Our firstborn son was three-months-old when we decided to go away for a camping weekend. We didn’t go far from home but one still needs to pack the almost the same amount of gear as for a longer stay. We made it to the campsite and got the tent (we always used a tent) and site all set up. After dinner, it started to rain…pour…so we quickly took the tent down, in the rain, and headed home. Camping in the rain is never fun, camping in the rain with a three-month-old is even more not fun.
But, we made up for it by taking several camping trips over the years…instilling a love of nature and the outdoors in ourselves, and in our sons.
Camper cabins are cute and cozy.
We did buy a replacement stove, but doubt it will get the same use. Although we love to camp, we like being off the ground these days, so we try to stay in camper cabins. We discovered you need to collect the same amount of gear -just minus the tent- for camper cabins, but it’s much more comfortable than sleeping on the ground which we did all those years.
I’m grateful we were able to take these camping vacations. It made great memories for Gary and I to look back on now that our sons are on their own, making memories with their own families.
It was a dreamy evening, the other night…after dark…sitting on the deck, watching the lunar eclipse. It was called the blood moon. I learned, “a “Blood Moon” happens because the sunlight shining directly onto Earth passes through the atmosphere and is projected onto the moon–giving it a red tone during the eclipse.*” It was amazing to watch. I’ve always been fascinated by the moon……
Photo of a postcard, with a moonrise watercolor by Dee Teller.
This was happening after a long day. We had driven up north of Brainerd – and back home again – to attend my uncle’s memorial service.
The cover of the memorial service brochure. All the stockings of this family hung with care. Christmas 2021.
Uncle Bob was 94 years old when he died, last December. I last saw him in August. He was in fairly good health (he drove us to his granddaughter’s cabin down the road a couple of miles), although his hearing had deteriorated a lot.
A favorite photo of Uncle Bob in Norway.
My uncle, my dad’s brother, was a kind and loving man. He was special to both Gary and I, and many others. His memorial service was well attended. They had a wonderful program and fun photos all around. During the luncheon afterwards, some of the grandchildren handed out a scrolled-up piece of paper with a ditty about…If you find a penny think of Bob. I dismissed it as cute…but not apropos.
Some of Bob Kallestad’s family.
Later, as I was sitting on the deck and going over the day’s events in my mind, I found myself lamenting the fact that I didn’t have an elder in my life to talk things over with anymore. I found myself talking to Uncle Bob a bit that night on the deck, in the dark, watching the moon disappear – and soon Gary came and joined me as we watched the lunar eclipse together.
When we went in for the night, I stepped into my closet for something and as I reached to turn out the light there was a penny on the closet floor. An unlikely place to find a penny.
Recently, in my writing session, I learned about a new (to me) writing pattern… syllables crescendo up and then decrescendo back down. In my poem that follows, I started with two syllables in the first line, and worked up to seven syllables, then repeated seven, and worked back down to two.
The house my dad built in northeast Minneapolis, where I grew up.
The prompt: Describe a day in the life of your childhood.
Get up.
Eat breakfast.
Do a few chores.
Go outside and play.
The neighborhood gang waits.
Play until it’s time for lunch,
then go out to play some more.
Go inside for supper.
Go out until dusk.
Then in, once more
Go to bed.
Repeat.
Obviously, this is exaggerated, but I do look back with fondness and gratefulness for my childhood. Which was so very different than my husband’s, who grew up on a farm in Pennsylvania. His was a happy childhood, too.
My friend wrote a story about ants, which prompted a memory from my childhood involving ants. I grew up in northeast Minneapolis. Across the street from me lived my two best friends: Donna and Diane. This story, and many childhood memories, involve them. I don’t have many pictures of the three of us…but I found a couple pictures from Christmastime with the three of us and my brother.
This photo was taken in 1958 of my brother, Donna, Diane and me (L to R).
Here’s my story: Ants
I don’t remember whose idea it was to sneak treats up to the cabin, but we thought it would be a fun thing to do. My “partners in crime” were my best friends at the time, two sisters who lived across the street from me, Donna and Diane. Our parents were good friends…they met when there was a surge of families moving into a new neighborhood in Northeast Minneapolis, in the early 1950’s.
We moved into the house my dad built when I was six months old, and I grew up there, with the same neighbors for the most part. There was a huge gang of kids in the neighborhood. And it was a fun place to grow up. I didn’t move out of the house my dad built, until after high school.
My parents had a large group of friends (with young families) that connected on a regular basis. They had coffee together, played bridge together, went camping together and rented cabins at the same resorts together. It was a family of friends. And Donna and Diane’s family, as well as mine, were a part of this group from the beginning.
Donna, Diane and I played together daily. We played outside, we had overnights, we played dress up, we played games, we had fun together, we grew up together. So, going up to a lake resort was a common outing for us. I now understand what a privilege it was to go to the resorts…but I guess since our family didn’t have a cabin – yet my parents wanted the cabin experience – the next best thing was to rent one.
As our parents planned another trip, we three girls planned our own shenanigans. I’m pretty sure we had enough to eat on these weekend get-aways, and probably more than enough snacks, so why we thought we needed to buy more snacks to sneak up to the cabin on this trip is a mystery. I know, at the time, we thought we were so clever and sneaky.
We must have pooled our allowance to get money to buy a few treats…maybe chips and cookies …I don’t remember anything other than the watermelon. And it was a half watermelon. Cut and wrapped in saran wrap. That’s a hard thing to sneak into a car, but we were determined.
When we got home from our grocery shopping excursion, we needed to hide the goods until the next morning when we were to leave for the cabin. So…we hid the snacks, including the half watermelon, in the bushes in Donna and Diane’s backyard. It made sense at the time…
Until the next morning when we took our pillows along to retrieve our treats and hide them in our pillow cases. What we discovered was a half watermelon, full, blackened even, with ANTS!
And we were so surprised!!! Little did we know the ants would show up. We learned a lesson that day…do not leave watermelon outside overnight under a bush – or anywhere!!! It’s a fun childhood memory.
This photo was taken in 1969…me, Diane, Donna and my brother (L to R).
Unfortunately, all of our respective parents have died, so we cannot get their take on this story.
I was surprised by tears the other night, when I sold our vintage baby bassinet.
The bassinet was handed down to me from my mother, and I only assume, she and my dad bought it, or were gifted with it, when I (or my brother) was born.
The vintage bassinet.
I’m not even sure why I became a little emotional when I put it on the front porch, because we used it more as a decoration these last three decades than for our newborns to sleep in. At one time someone suggested I put a fern in it and let the fronds drape over the sides. That sounds pretty, but I didn’t do that. Mostly I filled it with all our stuffed animals.
There is an endearing story about the stuffed animals in the bassinet. We had a sweet kitty cat named Caramel Corn (that was her coloring). She was a cat that liked people, and the indoors. When we moved to our house in Northfield, she oriented herself to her new digs. One day, shortly after we moved in, I couldn’t find her. I looked everywhere and she was not to be found. I thought, although it was highly unusual, maybe she snuck outside. So I waited, and hoped she’d find her way home.
A few hours later I went upstairs and out the corner of my eye I saw some movement towards the bassinet. I went over to check it out and to my surprise, there was Caramel Corn snuggled with all the stuffed animals in the bassinet! She looked so cozy. I was relieved she was safe and in the house.
Our precious Caramel Corn.
The new buyer wanted the bassinet for that very night, but she couldn’t come at a time when we were home, so she asked if I would leave it on the porch for her to pick up. I placed the bassinet on the front porch (without the stuffed animals) and decided to trust her to leave the money under the mat (she did).
As I set the bassinet on the porch I thought of my own babies, and then about the baby that was to sleep in it that night. I figured, even if I didn’t get paid, it was a good feeling knowing a baby was going to be sleeping in the bassinet once again.
Time for spring cleaning
It is a lot of hard work,
But satisfying.
When it’s done, I’m glad.
But, there is always more to do.
For now, it’s enough.
As spring emerges~
It’s time for new adventures.
Wonder what they’ll be?
A clown with many faces.
As we were spring cleaning last week, I brought down a clown that sits on a high shelf, to dust it off. As I was dusting it, I was transported down memory lane.
This clown was from my mom’s collection. She had quite a fun collection. I wish I had taken a photo of all the different clowns she had at one time. Whenever I see a clown figurine, I think of her. She died in 2009.
I kept one of her clowns. It’s a wonderful clown, with masks that can be put on and off its face. Not only is the clown a nice remembrance of my mother, but also, it evokes fond memories from when we would go visit her when my boys were little. They would always ask grandma if they could change out the masks on that clown. She would say “yes”, and they boys would carefully put on a new mask.
After cleaning up the clown, we put it back up on the shelf, where it stands tall (ready to perform for us I think) until the next time.
As we hear the horrible news of the continuing Russian invasion of Ukraine, my thoughts go out to the people I met there on three separate trips in 2004, 2005, and 2008. The main purpose of the trips were to facilitate small groups of young students in an English Language Camp. Our days were busy and tiring, but fun. We also had free time to explore the area, and socialize with adults, after the camp day ended in the afternoon.
The set up for a lovely meal together in Cherkasy, Ukraine.
One of my fondest memories is a gathering at one of the leader’s home. There were many Ukranians present to be with our team of eight Americans. We shared a picnic-style meal together, outdoors. As the sun was setting and we were sitting around visiting, one of the Ukrainians got out his guitar and we started to sing hymns. We were singing and harmonizing the same lyrics in two different languages. I remember tearing up and thinking what a beautiful sound we were making, blending our voices together and creating sweet music. It was an emotional experience, which today elicits a peaceful and serene memory of my time with the many wonderful folks I met in the Ukraine; a beautiful and peaceful people.
My heart breaks when I think of all the destruction of lives that is ongoing. I pray for an end to the violence in Ukraine and that peace can be restored.
We still get a newspaper delivered to our house on the weekends. Gary especially likes to read the paper. I skim it and read articles that catch my attention. Occasionally I will read an article in the newspaper and want to share it with a friend. So, I fold in newspaper, get out of my chair, go to the drawer where we keep our scissors, unfold the newspaper and starting cutting out the article.
An interesting article in the Star Tribune, February 27, 2022.
Every time I get my scissors out and start cutting the newspaper, it brings me back to elementary school. For homework, we would have to clip news articles and bring them in to share with the class. For some reason, I enjoyed doing that, and still enjoy the act of cutting out an article today, and sharing it.
Gary enjoyed having that assignment as a kid too, and we wondered if they do that anymore in elementary school…probably not, because I would imagine most younger adults don’t get a newspaper, and if they do, they get it online. We only get the Saturday and Sunday editions of the newspaper, but that’s enough because we, too, get news online.
I have a friend who also enjoys sharing articles, and every once in a while, we send one to each other. I know now-a-days it’s easy to scan an article, but that’s not as much fun as getting the paper copy, especially via snail mail.
Gary and I also remembered getting the Weekly Reader in elementary school, which we is another assignment we both enjoyed. I remember our sons got a version of the Weekly Reader when they were in elementary school, so I’m assuming it still exists in some form these days.
My interest in flowers did not start when I was a child. Although my mom had indoor plants and some flowers growing outside, it didn’t seem to influence me much. I do remember beautiful window boxes filled with flowers outside the large picture window in front of our house– pretty to look at from the inside as well as the outside. I must have been influenced by that. I have had flower boxes on my decks for 40+ years.
I plant petunias in my flower boxes…this deck gets full afternoon sun and petunias can take the heat! And they are colorful.
I remember my mother’s purple clematis (probably a wonderful, old-fashion Jackmanli) on the side of our house on McKinley Street, along with some other flowers.
This Jackmanli clematis grows along the side of our house in Northfield.
There may have been a small garden plot in the back corner of my parent’s yard, but I don’t remember the kinds of flowers growing there. I did not have to weed flowers, but I did have to weed around the Poplar trees that lined our back yard.
A different clematis climbing the arbor…the lilac bush is behind the hanging blue, glass ball…
My mother did plant a lilac bush and I took a small section from her bush and planted it at our house in Burnsville. When we moved from Burnsville, I took a section from that bush and planted it in our yard here in Northfield. It’s still growing and blooming after 27+ years.
Looking off our deck into our back yard. The lilac bush is near the wagon wheel by the shed.
Such lush green…so amazing to look at right now while outside snow is falling and the ground is white!
I do remember, as a child, picking some tulips from a neighbor’s garden to bring home to my mom…then I had to turn right around and go apologize to Dorothy for not asking permission to cut some of her flowers. Whoops.
Star-gazer Lily, Coral Bells, Rudbeckia
Recently a prompt from a writing session led me to thinking about when my interest in flowers began. I remembered giving a friend an eight-pack of starter begonias as a housewarming gift. I have no idea why I picked begonias or how they would grow …but when I went back to her house later that summer there was pot on her front porch, blooming with beautiful begonias…the ones I had given her earlier that spring. I had no idea they would grow and fill out so much! This was back in high school. I’ve learned a lot since then.
Cone flowers in front of Quick Fire hydrangea.
My Quick Fire Hydrangea, later in the season. When this hydrangea begins blooming it has white flowers (see photo with purple cone flowers above) and changes to mauve by the end of the season.
My interest and knowledge grew when we moved into a new house with a vacant yard, almost twenty-eight years ago. As I mentioned, I have always had flower boxes to fill with colorful annuals, so we included that into our deck plans, but I created a few flower gardens, too, and have been playing in the dirt ever since.
I call these corn lillies.
And now I love flowers…tending to them, admiring them in gardens all over the world, and taking pictures of them…
My favorite…Stargazer Lilies
(These photos were taken in my yard at different times and years.)
