Palm Sunday 2021

 TERRY

Not much news about Terry.  I have a chart starting today to mark each time she uses the walker to walk the distance from the bedroom to the living room and back again.  We will see how many times she can do that.  When she does walk she says her legs hurt but if something has not been used for a year that is to be expected of course.  It is one day at a time and we hope each day will be a tiny bit better.

We are near the end of March and I promised a summary of each of the grandchildren by the end of the month!  Yikes!!!  We have #10, Elspeth today and I will need to get the last 4 in the next three days.  Here we go with Elspeth 

As are all the grandchildren, Elspeth is pretty darn special.  She can think on her feet like no one else.  A couple years ago the kids were playing the piano for us and of course Elspeth wanted to get into the act too.  So she sat down and commenced to make some noise on the keys.  I asked what the name of her song was, which was no song of course, and she stated without missing a beat, "Molly going to St, Paul".  Now that is quick thinking!!!   Elspeth is cute, smart, and I think a big help too when she is needed.  In the last picture she has flour on her face as she had been helping make lefsa!

On to the years of about 1955-1960 or so

I do not have any certain thing to write about today but there are many memories of these years.  Many of them are about Ronald, Glorine, Janet and John.  I was in grades 2-7 during those years and being the ages of 8-13 many memories are of older siblings coming home to visit.  I have said this before.  For some reason Dad was prone to having these spells where he was quiet, NOT TALKING, and he seemed to be distance.  He would go through these times and they would last a few days.  Then one morning we would come downstairs and he would be back to himself.  Well my older siblings, including their spouses, were always a breathe of fresh air during these times when they could come home in the middle of one of Dad's spells.  He would, at the sound of an approaching car, become happy and engaging again.  I have often wondered if us younger kids were that bad or if the older ones were that good!!!   Anyway here are sometimes that I remember as if the day(s) were seared into my brain:

• I remember in about 1956 or so Ronald came home and had something for me.  I was so excited.  He reached into the trunk of his car and handed me a 22 rifle.  I thought I may go airborne I was so excited.  Of course we had several guns in the house as Dad was a huge hunter but the guns were off limits to Dave and I.  Here I had my very own gun and to think that my brother Ronald felt I was responsible enough to have one was frosting on the cake.  He then went on to explain it was actually a target 22 rifle and he had cut the stock down and the barrel down to fit me.  It was a day and a gift to remember.
• This next event is a bit later than my dates as I am pretty sure it was the fall of 1961.  Our band leader Mr. Phiel signed our band up to march in the homecoming parade in Ellendale.  I am guessing Janet and John were at the time in Kulm but they were at the homecoming.  They had this cute convertible car and John let Dave and I drive it.  We were the envy of the entire band!  In my mind I said to myself, "Our family is the best"!
• I would be remiss if I did not mention the times Janet/John and Ronald/Glorine came down in the fall for pheasant hunting.  I THINK they both were married at the time but not sure.  We would walk the trees across the road as Dave and I served as bird dogs!  By the time we had walked the entire length of the trees we would have several dead birds.  We would then walk back to the farm, which was just across the road and John, Ronald and Dad would clean the birds.  We would then drive to other places to hunt knowing that when we returned home Mom would have a feast waiting for us of home grown potatoes with creamy delicious pheasant which was the BEST ever.  Come to think of it we may have gotten more than our limit during the day!!!
• I know more than once we drove to Ellendale to have a picnic with Ronald and his guy friends.  Mom would pack a lunch of home made pie, homemade potato salad and and home made bread as sandwiches.  We would go to a park and just sit blankets and enjoy the outdoors as we ate.  I was always in awe of Ronald and his friends.  
• Of course I have written about this before but will add it as it was a banner day.  The day Ronald drove into the yard with a TV in the front seat.  After attaching an antenna to the wind charger stand on the roof we had TV for the first time.  Now we could watch Friday night wrestling and Saturday afternoon baseball with Dizzy Dean where a line drive to the outfield was a FROZEN ROPE!  It also brought snowy conditions to out house in the summer as at times the TV went kind of white.
• I will end with the BOATS.  Both Ronald and John had boats and they would, at times, bring them down to the farm.  It was behind those boats that I learned to water ski.  I would sit in the water and then stand up at the boat started.  John or Ronald would then make a loop and as we came back to near where I started I would flip a ski off and go with one.  The most fun was If there were others at the lake and they could see me on one ski!!!  I mean there even were girls at times that seemed impressed!!!

Enough for today.  Here it is 10:45 and the morning is almost gone.  The FP is history and the day is mostly ahead of me so I will sign off.