Beneath the Wraps

I was looking for some photo pages the last week.   As I was searching, I came across a scrapbook that Jenna and I created together – or started to anyway. A neighbor who had three daughters of her own had actually given the album to us.   I don’t know if it was something she intended to fill up eventually and life just got in the way, or if she just really wasn’t interested in that kind of thing – or why it had been in her possession in the first place. I don’t even know how old the album is.   There is a copyright from Lansdowne Publishing.   It was first published in 1997 than in 1998.   The book itself is written and compiled by Deborah Nixon.   Designed and Photographed by Robyn Latimer.   Beautifully illustrated and very thoughtful.   It’s called  Mother’s Memories For my Daughter.   I let Jenna pick out all the pictures that she wanted to use.   As I'd written do...

Winslow Press started the creation of a series called “Dear Mr. President” – I think a wonderful introduction.   I love the five books that were made.   I wish there was more.   I don’t know why it was discontinued – or so it seems.   Winslow Press doesn’t seem to offer publication later than 2002 (that I could see) and it doesn’t appear the site has been updated since May 2009.     Perhaps Winslow Press is one of many businesses that has had to file bankruptcy in the last decade and a half.   The three books I will focus on most are: Theodore Roosevelt: letters from a young coal miner by Jennifer Armstrong, Abraham Lincoln: letters from a slave girl by Andrea Davis Pinkney , and Franklin D. Roosevelt: letters from a mill town girl by Winthrop, Elizabeth. Though the Letters are fictionalized, information provided in the correspondence is based upon meticulous research.   I like how Winslow press refers ...

         You remember that nursery rhyme:                                  Hey, Diddle, Diddle          The Cat and the Fiddle           The Cow Jumped Over the Moon The verse ended with: The dish ran away with the Spoon As a child, I wondered What the Heck that whole thing even meant.   But especially the dish part and the spoon.   It was cute, I guess.   But crazy.   Surely inanimate objects cannot run away – but since I have been married, I have learned that they can. Most every spoon that has lived in our house(s) has been able to sprout legs and walk from room to room.   I had no clue that the majority of them would one day leave the house all together and ...

The weather the past few days have made for awesome biking weather, driving weather, walking weather . . . except for one thing.   There are some drivers who think they own the road and that the rules don’t apply to them.   They can drive as fast as they wish, as reckless as they wish and ain’t nobody in the path that is going to stop them.   Oh, whoops – there was.   Most of this could have been prevented.     I was at the front of the school yesterday – and have to walk a ways to the bus stop and make at least three transfers.   I make my first transfer at the college.   I decided to take the 41 in whatever direction came first.   The first one to come was going eastbound and then I made my final transfer to the 217 – which is the bus I normally take.   But there was a blockage that prevented both northbound and southbound traffic.   The bus had to turn back and take a long detour around that area.   I was at a ...

After my post yesterday, the rain fell off and on. When I left the house to go pick up Jenna, the sky was pouring down water from the sky.  POURING.  I had to return to the house for different shoes so my feet wouldn't get wet. I had grabbed Jenna's umbrella and coat as that morning we had both left the house with just sweatshirts and I knew she wouldn't be prepared.  The spine came out of her umbrella as I was putting it into my bag. Roland had forgotten his phone, but I can text him through an texting system that he set up through his computer at work.  I told him that it was pouring and asked if he could meet us at the school.  It would be an hour wait, but still.  Jenna and I are both okay with the rain, really.  But she is currently taking swim lessons, and I didn't know if the weather would interfere with the bus schedule running on time. When I exited the bus less than 20 minutes later, the sky was barely drizzling.  No one in Salt ...

       Shortly after school started, Jenna found some roller skates at a second hand store and Roland bought them for her.   She would never admit that they were tight on her, but I think they were.           She did try using them on occasion, but never really got the flair for using them comfortably.   After two months of leaving them outside in the cold, I told her to put them in the car and give them to Anna – not that they would currently fit her four-old cousin - but Anna can grow into them, whereas I believe Jenna has grown out.          The wind has been howling something fierce.   Yet the last two days have been like a spring/summer transition.   Neighbor kids were riding up and down the street on bicycles and scooters.   How fun it would have been for Jenna if she did still have her skates – or maybe she'd feel embarrassed as s...

This post was created two summers ago.  I don't know what button I hit that made the post change to Feb 2015. Today the winds blew strong - but it was warm outside.  Go figure.  We did use the air conditioning in the car (never have I done that in February) and although it has been warm today, it hasn't been SUMMER warm. I wrote a few verses about how I am personally handling this heat (not well) and emailed them to a friend who made it into a song.   He’d sent me the chords and the fingering.   But seeing it on paper really doesn’t mean that much to me.   I think it was sweet of him to send it to me. I've had two showers today but my body doesn't know it I've planted flowers and beets but my garden doesnt' show it I wash more clothes in summer than any other season I'm so tired all of the time and summer is the reason Why can't heat just stay away from me Allow my body to breathe free Allow my mind to think clearly Please just...

This week I’ve been wearing my green coat – in case of rain.   Neither one seem water resistant.   But I think the brown coat would be scarred by the rain whereas the green coat would still look the same after it dried. Last week I had dressed in layers.   There was one day when Jenna and I left the house that I had on two sweatshirts, my coat, a hat and a scarf.   I was neither hot nor cold as we walked to the bus stop and waited.   However I felt the need to strip down the second we stepped on the bus. The heat was blaring.   Before I had even sat down, I had removed my hat, scarf, coat and one of the sweatshirts.   They may have both come off except the bus had started moving and I felt squashed where I was seated.   I had gone from quite comfortable to sweltering. I believe that even if I could have gotten away with stripping down to my birthday suit (which I would never do outside the privacy of my home) I would have sti...

On Friday morning, after Jenna and I had parted ways, I decided I would return to the stop where we had got off and take a bus to the high school and transfer there.   I noticed the street was surprisingly clear and I could cross, but first I decided to text the time to see if it was worth the time.   Ten minutes.   I could cross the street and wouldn’t have to wait until I got to the high school. As I was crossing, I noticed lights flashing in all directions from the intersection.   Then it dawned on me – the traffic was light on the side going north because no cars were getting through.   No buses either.   And so I called UTA to find if the detour would skip the stop I was at.   It was a horrible accident .   Traffic was rerouted.   The bus drivers took a route behind the school and over to a road five stops away.   The only stop it made between the two main intersections was the stop where I usually go. To th...