National Sibling Day

Today, 10th of April is the National Siblings Day of 2012. It is the day to make happy and cherish our siblings which are truly a special blessing. Claudia A. Evart was the founder of this day, who initiated National Sibling Day after the tragic deaths of her brother and sister.

Nancy, me and Susan while living in Virginia just before Jimmy was born - 1958 or 1959.  Mom liked to have us dressed in matching dresses many times.  This time it was Susan and me. 

The emotional bond between siblings is often complicated and is influenced by factors such as parental treatment, birth order, personality, and personal experiences outside the family.

Susan, me and Nancy (1959).  We are standing in front of our old Chevrolet station wagon who was named "Betsy".  Each of us girls is also holding a little purse that Dad made for us while he was on TDY in Tulle, Greenland.

This is my little purse that I still have 53 years later.

This day celebrates one of the longest relationships most people will ever know that very special lifelong bond with brothers and sisters.

Front row...Nancy, Susan, me and Jimmy who looks like he needed to find a bathroom. 
Back row...Virgil Mix and Grandmother Mix (Cattell).  This was taken at their home in
Mountain View, Missouri on our way to Japan.

Siblings are the intricate fabric of our lives from birth to death.

At the Grand Canyon on our way to Japan.  Love Nancy's Flintstone's shirt and Susan's Huckleberry Hound.

We can share those special and not-so-special moments and memories in our lives which only a brother and sister can understand.

Celebrating Grandmother (Beulah Marinda) and Granddaddy (Dewey Cleveland) McGhee's 60th wedding anniversary.  Susan and I wear wearing corsages because we were helping serve refreshments. (1969 or 1970?)  I made all the dresses that the females are wearing.

I have three siblings.  I am the oldest, Susan is the middle daughter, Nancy is youngest daughter and Jimmy is the only son.

This picture was taken after church one day shortly before Susan was getting married to Dale. 
Look at the hair on Dad's head!

Each of us are definitely different with our own unique personalities.

This was taken the day Jimmy got married to Galena.

It's very sad to me that the older we've gotten the more we seem to have grown apart.  I seriously doubt that any of my siblings will ever come visit me out here in Wyoming.  I also doubt that I will be making too many trips down south when Mom and Dad are no longer with us.  I love my siblings and have many wonderful memories of things I've done with each and every one of them.

Today In History...7 Original Astronauts

April 9, 1959…NASA announced the selection of America's first seven astronauts: Alan Shepard, Virgil "Gus" Grissom, L. Gordon Cooper, Walter "Wally" Schirra, Donald "Deke" Slayton, John Glenn, and Scott Carpenter.

Today In History...End of Civil War

April 9, 1865…In the parlor of William McClean's home at Appomattox Court House, Virginia, General Robert E. Lee surrendered his Confederate Army to Union General Ulysses S. Grant. Although Confederate armies were still in the field, the war was officially over. The four years of fighting had killed 360,000 Union and 260,000 Confederate soldiers.
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This original letter was written by a J.F. Preston during the Civil War in 1862.

This is my transcription of what was written in the letter.

Today In History...POW Day

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam_War_POW/MIA_issue

These are some momentoes I have from the Vietnam War era. 

It is not conspiracy theory, not paranoid myth, not Rambo fantasy. It is only hard evidence of a national disgrace: American prisoners were left behind at the end of the Vietnam War. They were abandoned because six presidents and official Washington could not admit their guilty secret. They were forgotten because the press and most Americans turned away from all things that reminded them of Vietnam.

In 1973, after the peace accords, Hanoi returned 591 American prisoners and said these were all the prisoners they had. Yet more than 2,200 American military men are still missing and unaccounted for from the Vietnam War. Half or more of those men are known to be dead though their remains have never been recovered.

But then, there are the others. The Defense Intelligence Agency (D.I.A.) has received more than 1,600 firsthand sightings of live American prisoners and nearly 14,000 secondhand reports. After reviewing them all, the D.I.A concluded that they "do not constitute evidence" that men were still alive.

PBR Rodeo - 2012

Last year we had tickets to attend the Professional Bullriders Rodeo.  We went, but Joe kept having too many medical problems and was having to use the bathroom so many times, that I finally said we just needed to leave and we did.

This year I wanted to go, but didn't want to take him since he would have to maneuver the steps and that was just too dangerous.  So, this year I invited one of my girlfriends, Liz, and we went and had a ball.

Introduction of the riders

Look at those chaps!

This is the guy that is supposed to lasso the bull when it doesn't want to go back out of the ring.

This is the cowboy clown that tells really dumb stories and jokes.

Getting ready to let out the bull and rider.

This bull got rid of his rider and now he's looking for someone new to throw.  He's a little too close and personal for me.

"The Wave" after it had come by us already.

Even the rodeo staff got into The Wave

The clown decided to ride his own bull a little later in the competition.

Rider and bull went down on this ride.

This guy got hung up in his rope.

Still hanging in their - like a helicopter.

Still trying to get loose.  I think his arm stretched a couple of inches.

Some of the evenings entertainment.  These guys were doing barrel races.  They were supposed to look down towards their feet and follow lines on the dirt.

There were occasional collisions between the barrels.

Now that's a beer belly!

Got his hat, got his big belt buckle, got his boots and got his beer.

Run, run as fast as you can!

This bull did not want to wait for his rider.

I think it's been awhile since this bull has had a bath.

Here's his dirty cousin.

Have Your Cake and Eat It Too?

I come from a long line of excellent cake bakers.  Somewhere that talent seemed to jump over me.  Case in point...look at these pictures of a cake I recently made.  What a mess!

A friend had given me some diced fresh pineapple.  We were having company come for dinner and I thought I'd make a cake and add the pineapple.  It started out to be good idea.  I used Mom's cake recipe using a carrot cake cake mix, added a box of instant chocolate pudding, (didn't have any vanilla on hand), added her specific ingredients and then added the fresh pineapple.

When the three layers were cooked, I attempted to remove them from their pans.  However, the pineapple caused the cake to be soooo moist that it would not leave the pan.  I even let one of the can pans cool and then try again.  Nope, that didn't work either.  So, I was left with trying to piece the layers together as best as I could using cream cheese frosting.  This is what the poor cake looked like at its completion.

P.S.  The sad thing is that a total of seven people ate from this cake, but all said it was absolutely delicious!

Love That Catfish!

I recently found a package of catfish that I'd brought back from Georgia a long time ago when digging in our little freezer.  I decided that the best way to eat them was to cook the only remaining zipper peas, also brought back from Georgia, and eat them along with some tater logs.  Yum , yum!

First Day of Spring 2012

Firefighter's Day

From the time he was 5 years old, Corey wanted to be a firefighter.  I'm so glad he got to do what he aspired to do at least for a time in his life.

One of the scariest experiences I had when Corey was still living at home and doing some firefighting was one very cold winter night - near Christmas if I remember.  He'd not been feeling well and had been on some cold medication.  He got a call about a fire not too far from our home.  I told him that if he had to go to the fire, then I would drive him myself and wait in his truck.  That wound up being a bad idea.  Not because it was cold sitting in the truck.  Not because I sat in the truck for a very long time.  No, it was watching the extent of the fire and knowing that my son was in or around the burning inferno.

It was then that I decided I didn't need to know everything Corey did when it came to fighting fires.