When Grandma Was A Little Girl - #52

52-Mrs. McDaniel – a sweet old lady that had a house that smelled kind of funny

Do you know a sweet elderly lady that you enjoy visiting or talking with her?

My mother loved this sweet little old lady, a widow, who used to live in our town of Tularosa where I grew up. Later they moved to Alamogordo, 12 miles south of us. Her husband was a doctor. I don’t know exactly how my mom and Mrs. Mac Daniel became friends, but they were very good friends. My mother always found a lot of joy in visiting with her. They only had one child and her name was Olive Jane. Olive grew up and married and her husband’s name was Romeo. How charming! She too only had one child, a daughter named Jeanette. Mrs. Mac Daniel was like a surrogate mother for my mom.

Mrs. Mac Daniel was the sweetest little old lady. She was about 5’ tall with gray hair and she wore it pulled back into a loose bun at the nape of her neck. She always had some stray whisps of hair around her face. Her eyes were blue and she wore glasses. She had an older persons kind of gravelly voice but it was a sweet voice. She had the kindest face and eyes. She was a gentle person and full of love. I loved to hear her laugh and it seemed as if her eyes had a twinkle. My mother would go over and visit her. In the summer months, sometimes I would go with her. Her house always smelled funny, like an old person’s home does, kind of musty and funny. Mrs. McDaniel had a wicker basket that had a few toys in it. I always like to go see what was in it to play with. She also had a little black and white Boston Terrier. It barked sometimes but for the most part was quiet and a very good little dog. Mrs. Mac Daniel loved her little pooch. I can’t recall the dog’s name. That was another thing about her house; it also smelled just a little bit like a dog.

My mom would visit Mrs. Mac Daniel a couple times a month. Usually before or after mom went shopping. She’d just drop in a visit her. My mom would visit Mrs. Mac Daniel because she said that this sweet, dear old lady was lonely. Whenever she saw us come up to the door to visit she always smiled and welcomed us in and was always ‘so glad to see us!’ We would visit for an hour or two and then go home. I don’t remember too much about most of their conversations. Sometimes it would be about us kids and how we behaved. Mrs. Mac Daniel would laugh her sweet laugh and tell her, “Jane their just kids. Enjoy them!’ Later my mom would tell me how much she enjoyed her visits with Mrs. Mac Daniel and how she always felt better after visiting her. She was like a mother to her.

One day my mom got a call from Olive Jane, Mrs. Mac Daniel’s daughter, and she told my mom that her mom had passed away. I can’t remember exactly how old she was, but I’m pretty sure that she was in her 80’s. I remember my mom crying and that she was sad because she was really going to miss that dear sweet soul.

I think it is sweet and special to love someone like her. She was special to my mom. When I am old I hope that I can emulate that kind of elderly person Mrs. Mac Daniel was and that people would want to remember me like my mom and I remembered her. It helps remind me not to grow old and crotchety and be unhappy and be a grumbler. I hope that I grow old being kind and sweet.

When Grandma Was A Little Girl - #51

I am using my granddaughter LaRue Newby as a model for this story. I don't have a picture of myself when I cut my hair at her age. So 'Thank You' LaRue for being my model! :o)

51-It’s time for a haircut – not my own version this time!

At some time or other, most little kids will cut their own hair. It’s a sad experience for their parents.

I was about 5 years old when I cut my hair. I remember it vividly like it was yesterday. It was a Sunday morning. Now when I was little I had very blond hair that was thin and stringy. At least I had hair. I remember getting up that morning and I wanted to cut my hair. I was going to surprise my mom and cut it. I think church started at 10:00A.M. In those days you went back to church for Sacrament Meeting at 4:00P.M. My mom said she was still in bed deciding whether to get up to go to church that morning.

Well…I had just finished cutting my hair and was so proud of myself. I remember reaching up and cutting it all around my head. I put all the hair in a pile on a big envelope. I knocked on my parents’ bedroom door and walked in and was so pleased with myself and presented this pile of hair to my mom. She was in shock, gave a little scream…and we did not go to church that day! She said she almost fainted.

I was scared and thought I was in trouble. She had me look in a mirror at my hair. Up until then it had never occurred to me to look at the haircut I had just given myself. I just remember being so pleased about it all. I looked into the mirror and started crying. It was awful! My hair looked like it had big bites of hair missing. I did a superior job ruining it! It looked like a mouse had chewed holes in my hair as there were patches missing and short pieces here and there and mighty short bangs. It was awful, just awful! I did this all over my head too! (*I have to say that my granddaughter LaRue did a fairly good job cutting her hair 'evenly' and only left a few big stragly long pieces.)

I remember my mom saying over and over…”it was finally growing and it was thin but it was finally growing and now she’s cut it all off!” Then she cried some more. I vaguely remember my dad saying it would grow back. My mom said that now everyone would think I was a boy. She had to cut my hair really short. I do remember some people calling me a boy. I hated that and vowed I would never, ever, cut my hair again!

One good thing came out of all this. When my hair started growing back in, it came in thicker and grew a little faster! I was so relieved when it grew in again. So was my mom! She also hid her scissors; well at least she thought she hid them. I knew where they were but had zero interest in wanting to cut my hair!

When my oldest daughter Michelle was about four or five years old she cut her hair and showed me her terrific work while I just stood there. I couldn’t say anything and I wasn’t going to scold her because I immediately had a flashback to the day I cut my own hair! The memory was vivid! I just looked at her and said something like, “oh my, you gave yourself a haircut.’ I’m sure if I ask her to recall the moment, she’d have a much better explanation. I took her to the hair dressers and had her hair cut. But she only cut a few pieces of her hair, nothing like the job I did on my own hair. She was much more conservative. Oh I was sad, because she too had very thin hair and it grew slow. Again, something good came of it; her hair grew in thicker and a little faster too.

Then Julie cut her hair. She wasn’t quite four years old. She loved her Grandpa Darrell Guptill and wanted to have her hair look like his. He had a crew cut also called a flat top. Well she wanted to look just like him. She took the scissors and cut her front bangs off to the scalp! Again, no scolding, my vivid flashback to my first haircut. Oh well. She too had a visit to the hair salon and had a hair trim. I’m afraid it took some time for her front hair to grow back in and it wasn’t too fast either.

Lisa took a little snip off the side of her hair, but no trip to the hair salon. It would grow back in a few months.

David also took a little snip out of the top of his hair near the front, but not too much. So all my kids have had a hand at cutting hair!

Doug never cut his hair, however…read the following story!

My daughter Julie was watching a friend of ours, their little girl Tiana. I think Tiana was about 6 or 7 years old. Michelle used to baby sit her but was not around at this time and Julie babysat her. She babysat her at our home this particular night. Tiana was in the bedroom playing with Douglas and David and I think it was Lisa that came out and said Doug cut Tiana’s hair. How nice of him not to cut his ‘own hair.’ However, we never thought he would cut someone else’s hair! Tiana had two ponytails, one on each side of her head. She too had slow growing thin hair. Fortunately Doug did not cut the ponytail off at the scalp. He only cut about two inches off the end of the ponytail. I think he told me they were playing barbershop. Doug told me that Tiana said that it was okay for him to cut her hair. I’m sure he probably convinced her it would be okay to cut her hair. She was a shy, timid girl.

Julie was so upset at Doug for doing this. My worry was to tell Tiana’s mother Cindy when she came to pick her up. Well she came to the door and I told her that Tiana had a great time but Doug cut her daughter’s hair. I just decided to spit out the truth and get it over with. Cindy’s face immediately changed from a smile to horror! Her eyes and facial expression said everything! Tiana was afraid to come out and face her mother. Doug was afraid to come out and face her mother! I assured Cindy it wasn’t that bad. She said that Tiana’s hair had grown so slow and was so thin and that Tiana’s hair was finally getting some length. Well, Tiana’s ponytails were only about 5 inches long, although the one side was now only three inches long. I had Douglas apologize to Cindy and he was so sad and said he would glue her hair back on and felt awful about it. Cindy was so sweet about it but told Doug it wasn’t okay that he cut her hair but it would grow back and not to ever do that to anyone again. I don’t think he ever did that again. The next week I saw Tiana and her hair was cute. Cindy had taken her in to get a haircut. They cut it and it framed her face and came just under her chin and she looked so cute. Her mom was still sad she didn’t have longer hair with ponytails but came to accept it and in time Tiana’s hair grew back but it was never very thick.

And now...my grandchildren are cutting their hair! So the cycle is now complete!

When Grandma Was A Little Girl - #50

50-Paper routes – yuck!

Have you ever had a job you thought would be such great fun and it turned out that you hated it?

When I was about 12 years old I was a papergirl. I had a paper route of about 25 customers that I took the Alamogordo Daily Newspaper to them on my bicycle. At first I thought this would be a fun job. I would do it after school. I was the first papergirl in my town to deliver papers. My brother Geoffrey had a paper route too and had way more customers than I did. I only lasted about 6 months and gave that job up. It was something you had to do every single day, rain or shine. I didn’t mind delivering the papers so much; it was the ‘collecting’ for the paper. It was 75 cents per month. You’d think that would not be such a financial burden on people to collect would you! Some people wouldn’t answer the door and I had to go back several times and ug, I hated it! Most of my customers were so nice and would always pay and a couple of them would tip me a quarter. I liked that part!

Well I had a bad experience one day. One customer we had lived a quarter of a mile down the road from us and I went up to the door as usual to collect and he invited me in (he was about 50 years old) and I said, ‘no thank you.’ I was there to collect for the paper. He got out his wallet and gave me a dollar but then he said he wanted to give me a hug. I wasn’t too sure of that and hesitated and started to back away from the door. He sort of grabbed me and gave me a hug and then pinched my chest and started for my top button and I wrenched away and ran for my bike and went home and told my parents. That scared me to death! My mom told my dad when he got home from work and boy oh boy was he mad! He called the man up (my dad knew him and they were friends) and I will not repeat the conversation on my dad’s end of the phone, but I stopped delivering papers and that was the end of that job.

I can remember having to walk to school and I was so afraid to walk past his house. I remember I would run like the wind for several blocks going past his house and I never saw him again. My dad later told me that the man’s wife really gave him a bawling out for what he did!

My brothers, Geoff and Doug, and Gayle all delivered the El Paso Times and Herald Post and Alamogordo Daily News. That El Paso Times was a morning paper and the Herald Post was an afternoon paper. The Daily News was an afternoon paper. They had over 300 customers. They delivered papers on their motorcycle. It was a source of income we all needed to help buy school clothes and gave them spending money. Our family did that for 4 years. We all HATED having the paper routes! The morning route the boys got up around 5am to deliver papers, 7 days a week! I remember it was so cold one winter morning and it had snowed and my brother Doug came back on his BMW motorcycle and he was almost froze and so cold. That did it. We ended the paper routes shortly after.

All my kids had an interest at one time or other to deliver papers. We strongly discouraged it because we knew what was involved! I think it was Douglas who helped his friend Amelia Holland one summer deliver a weekly paper for a month. I had to go with him and I could still wrap a newspaper in 3 seconds and rubber band it! It was a skill that never left me. Once you’ve folded newspapers, you never forget how. After a month of doing Amelia's route for her, when she came back, he did not want anymore to do with it.

Lisa took on a paper route while she was pregnant with LaRue and had it a few months and gave it up. It’s a thankless job. Very few people appreciate the effort and many like to complain about the service, but they do enjoy reading their paper.

* Correction! Oops! Glad someone reads these to keep me on task!
This just in from Lisa--
Well LaRue was actually about a year and a half old, I don't think I would have had the energy to get up in the middle of the night every night for five months if I'd been pregnant. No way.

Way to go Lisa!

Wow! That's wonderful news about your Brobee monkey and the invitation. You are so talented! I'm excited the Talent Producer wants to know if you'll make the whole Brobee family! You're awesome!
Love ya!
Mom :o)

I'm in awe!

This post isn't about me. I usually don't have anything exciting to write about. I read all my daughters blogs and several others and they are always such a joy to read!

I know they read mine and I just want to say 'Thank You' girls for being such wonderful people! I also want to say 'Thank You' to all your friends who read your blogs and support you! I am so touched.

Lisa has a darling 'Monkey Business' where she makes hand sewn monkies. I'm in such 'awe' at all the support she receives from everyone all over (in and out of our country) that post and support her monkies!

I just want to say 'thank you, thank you, thank you' to everyone. It really touches my heart down deep. :o)

When Grandma Was A Little Girl - #49

Can I make choklat milk?

When I was about 6 years old I wrote a note to my mother asking if I could make some chocolate milk. She actually kept that note I wrote in one of her cookbooks. Above is a scanned copy of that original note. It’s a little hard to read. But it says:

Dear, MoMMY you are swet.plesey May I have some cocemote cose you nise and MoMMY I like you to

I wrote that on Wed, April 16, 1957. I was 6 ½ years old! I cannot believe my mom kept that note! One day I was visiting her (I was married and had 3 little girls) and was going through her cookbook and ran across that note. I told her that I couldn’t believe she kept that note that I had written. She said that it was sweet and was a wonderful little memory and she kept it in her cookbook!

I have to say that I don’t recall any of my children writing me notes to make anything. If they had, I would have kept it. One thing that 'I DO HAVE' are some clay figures and plaster handprints that they made when they were in elementary school and about 9 years old. They are sweet and a wonderful memory!

When Grandma Was A Little Girl - #48

My parents had a 1949 Plymouth. It looked very much like the picture above.

I think my parent's car color was a light green. My brother Doug was 17 years old at the time and could drive. He was probably a junior in high school. My dad let him drive that car around. He wanted to make a hot rod out of it and my dad let him do it. The car wasn’t running top notch and it was old and my dad just let him have it to do whatever he wanted with it.

My dad said that the ’49 Plymouth had some kind of engine trouble and they couldn’t fix it but the car did run. My brother Doug said that cars back in those days did not last as long as the cars today. Back then after 80,000 miles you had to replace the car or overhaul the engine. My dad had bought my mom a little Studebaker so they weren’t driving the ’49 and let Doug have it. That car had a wind visor across the top of the windshield. It was a four-door car.

My dad had his own welding machine. It was a Sears Craftsman. Doug cut the roof off the top of that old coupe and then it looked more like a convertible. The problem was that being a four-door car the roof supported the doors so they would open and close. Doug welded the doors shut and that solved that problem. Then he took spray paint and painted the car black and he also spray painted ‘oval’ shapes over the white wall tires. It was so funny to look at when the car was going down the road because the wheels looked like eggs rolling over end-to-end and it looked crazy! It was funny! People would stare at it going down the street.

One day the town sheriff came by and asked my dad to take the car off the streets. It wasn’t safe driving a car around without a roof and the wheels were a distraction to people on the road. He thought it would cause an accident from people not watching where they were driving due to looking at the funny wheels on that car. It wasn’t running really great so Doug so just parked it. Later it was hauled off to the junkyard. It sure was a lot of fun seeing that ‘modified’ Plymouth driving around!

(*I called my brother Doug and he told me what he remembered about this car and I have incorporated his comments in the above story.)

When Grandma Was A Little Girl - #47

47-Kites and box kites – Higher! Higher! Higher!

When I was little, we made our own kites to fly. Have you ever made your very own kite? It’s fun!

Since we didn’t have a lot of extra money to spend, we were resourceful. We would buy a kite and then we made a pattern off of it (after it had crashed to the ground!) and make our own kite. The store bought kites we had were made of paper and so if they got caught in a tree, the kite was pretty much wrecked!
I loved to see how high the kite would go up in the sky. Sometimes we put an extra long tail on the kite.

My brother Geoffrey liked to build box kites. He was probably about 15 years old at the time. They were the shape of an oblong box. He started out with small box kites and they flew very well! He would use balsa wood because it was sturdy but lightweight. You had to use lightweight material so it would fly. If you used heavy wood it wouldn’t fly. Geoffrey likes to think ‘BIG!’ So he decided to make a box kite that was about five feet tall! He was quite skilled when he built things. He got all the materials and built his BIG box kite. You have to have ‘wind’ for kites to fly. He waited and there was enough wind. He would have us hold the kite up, it took two for that size of kite, and he would run as fast as he could and ‘up’ it went! It was quite something to see it fly! He used nylon string to fly it. Most of our kites just had cotton string. Cotton string can knot and get tangled. The kids in the neighborhood would be in awe to see that big kite fly. He would fly the kite in an empty field next to our house. Kids would try to throw rocks at it and jump up and touch it. He wouldn’t let it get that low for them to do any damage to it. Geoff had a lot of fun building kites.

He also had another fascination. He liked to build T.V. antennas and the ‘bigger the better’. He would build them from aluminum pipes that were the thickness of your fingers. Back when I was growing up you had to have a T.V. antennae in order for your T.V. to get any reception. Today you just hook up to a cable network. The problem with antennae was stability. If you have a strong windstorm, they were often blown down, bent or damaged. Geoff built them and put them on poles that would take a cyclone to blow them down! He believed in ‘over the top!’ He built them to last for a long time! My dad and mom would get after him about building ‘too big’!

Picture of our home, finally! :o)

So I am finally uploading some photos. They are long overdue! I also decided to use a new photo, me, for my facebook photo.

anywho...
If you go to dropshots.com/degup you can see the other photos Neil took today of the house.

I hope you will forgive our 'mess' as we are still figuring out where to put everything! We downsized from 2,060 sq ft to 1,440 sq ft. The garage is full! So we have all winter to glean and clean out stuff! Neil has already left off several things at DI! :o)

We love the area, the new house, the 'one level' and 'no stairs!' That's a major plus! The yard is flat so it's easy to mow. We had a tiered back yard at the other house we sold.

Neil put up his shed yesterday. David and Angela were over so David helped his dad shingle the small roof and did a few other things as well! They did a great job! The only thing dad has left to do is put the trim on the shed and he will be done! He has already moved the things into the shed that were under a makeshift canopy, which is now dismantled and gone! Neil is now wishing he had gone with a 8x10 shed and I said, "Then you would have wanted a 10x12 or 12x12!" We always want 'more' don't we?!

On a side note . . .
As you can see from Kirsten's picture, she is recuperating from being sick all day yesterday. She's like a wilted flower. We had a member down the street come over last night and assist Neil is giving Kirsten a priesthood blessing. Another one of God's tender mercies. This was about 9:20p.m. last night. Our ward had a big harvest dinner affair and so nobody was home until late. Within 5 minutes after the blessing, Kirsten started to perk up an did not throw up anymore. I'm sure she dropped a few pounds, which she absolutely cannot spare! It will take a month to recover those pounds!

Thank you for being patient!

Well we have been in our new home for 1-1/2 months and I am ashamed to admit I have not posted any photos! It was my intent to do it today. But it won't happen until next week. I was on the clean up brigade all day today because Kirsten has been throwing up! She either got exposed to some bug yesterday between school, her appt with the Dr. or our errands after school. I kind of think it was just taking her in and out of the car for a few errands and it was a little cold. On the other hand, she's not usually sick this long. She gets over it in a half a day, but this has gone on all day and not much change.

Dad and I were scheduled to talk in our new ward in Sacrament tomorrow, but it will only be me. (I'm farther ahead on my talk. He graciously volunteered to stay home with Kirsten, although he gives 'great talks!) Kirsten is in no shape to leave the house tomorrow.

David and Angela were here today. David helped dad shingle the roof of his shed and hang the door and a few other things. Dad and I propped up the walls on the floor this morning and dad finished nailing them together and put the roof on. The shed matches the house. It was actually a beautiful day today and sunny and about 62 degrees. Perfect weather to get a jump on putting up his shed. While the guys were outside, I was showing Angela some new crafts and we worked on a few things and I so much enjoyed her company!

We've had some nasty rain. You may have heard our area had flooding. We did not in the area we live, but farther out the Puyallup River flooded and took out 100 feet of the dike. We had an enormous abundance of rain over the past few days. We have flood insurance, a requisite of mine before we moved here.

We have an attorney now and are under way filing for legal guardianship to be our daughter Kirsten's Co-guardians. Imagine that! We are the parents but have to file for legal guardianship because Kirsten in handicapped! The process takes about 2 to 3months. So hopefully by February it's a done deal!

I promise to post pictures of both the inside and outside of the house next week. Thanks for being so patient! :o)

When Grandma Was A Little Girl - #46

46-The ride to the sawmill – someone falls out of the car!

My dad built a trailer to haul wood and other stuff. It had high sides, which were made from about one-inch pipe he welded together. The trailer was big enough to hold about three cords of wood. We had a fireplace in the living room and a coal oil stove in the kitchen. These were our primary sources of heat until years later when my dad had gas heat installed. In Alamogordo they had Prestrige Saw Mill. They cut tree logs into lumber. The lumber was hauled down from the mountains in Cloudcroft above Alamogordo. They would have long rows of slag and log ends, etc. left over after cutting the logs into lumber. Sometimes they burnt this stuff but mostly they let the public come down and buy this slag, etc.

My dad would hitch the trailer to the back of his car and off we went to load wood. I can’t remember how much he paid for a trailer load. It was cheap and you had to load it yourself. We wore gloves. There is nothing that hurt worse that getting jabbed with a piece of wood and having a big fat splinter in your hand or fingers. It was rough cut so it was jagged and you had to be careful. I was somewhere between eight to ten years old at the time. My dad would have all four of his kids help him load the lumber. I liked going as it was an adventure and it fun to explore and climb around on these piles and throw the wood into the trailer and my dad would stack it so he could get in as much as he could. The not so fun part was when we got back home and had to ‘unload’ the wood and stack it into piles. I always hated to go get wood for the fireplace because spiders like to hide in that cozy woodpile. Yuck!

One Saturday we were on our way down to Alamogordo hauling the trailer to get another load of wood and we were about half way there. My dad had a Studebaker. It was a light bluish green car. The back doors were call suicide doors because they opened backwards. The doors did not open and swing out to toward the front; they opened from the middle post and back toward the back of the car. We all had seat belts on. My mom gave specific instructions that Gayle, my twin brother, was to sit ‘in the middle’ and ‘not’ near the doors. He had a fascination about opening car doors while the car was moving. Well dad was driving and we were chatting and somehow Gayle reached past his brother (I can’t remember if it was Geoffrey or Douglas-I was sitting near the door on the right side) and got the door ‘open’ while we were going down the road. Well surprise of all surprises when Gayle opened the back left door, the door opened and it ‘took him with it!’

I screamed, “Gayle fell out of the car!’ I immediately looked out the back window, as I was horrified that he would get thrown under the trailer and get run over and to see if other cars were behind us and they might run over him. Well, God was watching over Gayle that day. He did not get thrown under the trailer and no cars were behind us. We watched him roll like a log down the highway. Dad stopped the car. He had to stop carefully as he did not want the trailer to jackknife or fishtail. We saw Gayle get up and he started running toward the car. He was so afraid we were going to leave him behind. When he was rolling he had brought his arms up (like you were go to lift weights) and that protected his face. When we got him he was crying and his arms were badly burned from rolling on the asphalt highway. Instead of coming right home, dad cleaned him up and asked if he was all right and Gayle said that he was and off we drove to the sawmill! He was just so glad we didn’t forget him! We loaded up the trailer with wood and home we went. We took Gayle into the house and told my mom the whole story and she was horrified and upset that dad did not turn around and bring him home!

Mom cleaned his burns and put tannic acid powder and salve and bandaged his arms. You cannot buy tannic acid now. Back when I was a little girl, you could buy it. It was a brown cocoa colored powder and you got it from the pharmacist. Now they use it in creams, etc. That helped heal Gayle’s arms and he didn’t have any bad scarring. He never touched the car door ever again. We also watched him like an eagle!

This reminds me---
of another story--- with the same Studebaker.
We were about the same age, around ten. We were washing the Studebaker one morning. Gayle was on the top of the roof cleaning it and I was washing the doors of the car. I can’t remember why I needed to go into the house, but I went to shut the car door and slammed it shut but it didn’t close, so I slammed it again. By this time Gayle let out a blood-curdling cry. I turned around to see what the fuss was about. His foot was hanging over the edge of the car roof and I had slammed the door on his big toe! OUCH! I felt awful. I don’t think his toe was cut but I was worried I broke it. He got down off the roof and mom came out and examined it. I don’t think she took him to the doctor. But Gayle has always had a slightly bent big toe. It doesn’t point straight like his other toes. I’m sure it was because I shut the car door on it!

One last thing this reminds me of---
When we lived in Hawaii---
We had 5 kids and I took them to have their pictures taken at K-Mart. I had a 4:00P.M appointment and was running barely on time by the time we got there. The kids got out of the car and Julie was the last to get out. I can’t remember if she shut the door or someone else shut the door but her fingers got trapped in the door and the door jammed and ‘would not open!’ A security guard came and tried to open the door and he couldn’t get it open either and poor Julie was in tears and her fingers hurt. I got inside the door and kicked that door as hard as I could and it dislodged it just enough that the security guard got the door open. We went into K-Mart and they had a little eatery just inside and I asked for a cup of ice for her fingers. They gave me the ice. Like my father and the ride to the sawmill---I took them into the photo studio and took the pictures. Then I took her over to Kaiser Emergency and they x-rayed her hand and thankfully she did not have any broken bones. Julie was a little mad at me for going through with the pictures being taken. I do remember telling her,'Smile and pretend your hand doesn’t hurt!' She smiled. How awful of me as a mother! My goodness! I did the same thing my dad did, a chip off the old block! I think back on that and can't believe I did that! I just cringe when I think of that incident.

When Grandma Was A Little Girl - #45

45-The hayride - Snipe hunting!

Have you ever been ‘Snipe hunting? I have! It’s a lot of fun!

When I was about 13 years old I had heard about ‘snipe hunting.’ You go out into the wilderness; we called it boondocks or boonies, when it is dark and you take a small gunnysack or bag and a flashlight. You called out into the dark…'here snipe, snipe, snipe’ and shine your flashlight to spot them and then you capture them and put them into your bag. Well I asked my brother Douglas about going snipe hunting and he said, ‘Don’t ever go.’ and then he told me about snipe hunting. I laughed.

Well, our church youth group was having an activity that was a hayride and snipe hunting close to Halloween. It was going to be at a church member’s home. They lived a little ways out of Alamogordo and there was desert and shrub and mesquite, etc., a perfect spot for snipe hunting! I invited my girlfriend Elaine to come with us. I told her how she had to bring a flashlight, and a paper bag. She was exited! I loved going on the hayrides and told her how much fun it was going to be. When everyone had arrived we told them what snipes looked like. They were white and had red eyes and ran quick but if you shined a flashlight at them it would blind them and stun them and they would sit still and you could just scoop them up and put them into your bag. They were quite harmless and about the size of a big rat. The older teenagers took out all the ‘greenies’ to go snipe hunting. The rest of us stayed back on the hay wagon.

We were all so excited for the others to get their snipes. Then after the older kids had led them out about 50 yards from the house, they all quietly snuck back to the hay wagon. You could hear the other kids out there calling, ‘Here snipe, snipe, snipe. Here snipe, snipe, snipe.’ We were all rolling in laughter! Pretty soon I heard my girlfriend calling out, ‘Diana, come and get me, I’m going to die out here! I can’t find any snipes! Where are we?’ We were just howling with laughter! It was so funny! Right about now you are probably thinking, ‘How mean!’ Well, at the time we thought it was pretty funny.

After about 15 minutes the older kids went back out to find the others and brought them all back. We were all very serious and asked how many snipes they all caught? No one had found a single one! Then we let them in on the joke. They didn’t find it very humorous. They are no such things as snipes. However, they couldn’t wait to try it out on their friends later on!

We had doughnuts and cider and sang songs on the hayride and everyone had fun. Then we all went home. What a fun and memorable night! I have never forgotten it!