Poinsettia

 The poinsettia I purchased for Christmas 2020 kept growing so in the years since then I have repotted it to a large pot.  Summer time it sits on the front porch.  It's become a bit scraggly and leaves are tiny compared to what they were but I don't have the heart to toss it.

Especially now that it has red "bloom" leaves showing.

I have two more poinsettias that I got this past Christmas and I may just pot them in with the 2020 plant.

What would you do?

The final set from 50s, 60s, ad 70s.

 Must send a big thank you to Marilyn who keeps me informed with all these oldies and goodies she sends me.

1st-2nd I walked a mile each way to school and came home for lunch each day.  That was in Lancaster, PA.  In Kensington, MD for 3rd - 6th grade I rode a bus but 7th-9th I walked and it was farther to the junior high than to the elementary school.  The only time I walked or ran home from elementary school was for a civil defense drill.  They had us practice running home and as I think back on that it was to die at home with our parents if we had a nuclear attack. We lived in a suburb of Washington, DC.

I still carry a road atlas along with us because the GPS doesn't always get it right.

Who still has one?

I do remember eating at McDonalds when it was something new. They had walk up windows. I do remember thinking how good the hamburgers and fries tasted.  Now? Can't remember the last time I had either of those.  Have had breakfast there when we've been traveling and that's all that was around.

It takes a village ...

Never saw one of these.

They always did.

Hope you liked this look back.  I didn't include all of them - just the best.

I do have one apology about these photos - they only feature people of one color. There must be a source that shows the diversity of our country's experience during the 50s, 60s, and 70s.  Anyone know of one?

I went looking after I wrote this and found three on this site.  Here's one which I would title Sandlot Baseball.

An Old Photo

 My one surviving uncle, by marriage, on my father's side just celebrated his 100th birthday.

The photo below was from June 1946 when John married my Dad's youngest sister, Ada Reba, youngest of 9 children. 

My paternal grandparents are on the left, Omar, age 61 and Ada, 60. I don't know the ages of Uncle John's parents, but they look older than my grandparents. Her dress may indicate she was Old Order Mennonite, but I don't know for sure.

My grandmother was dead before this couple celebrated 10 years of marriage.  I remember my mother crying when she got the phone call that Grandma had died.  It was a very long distance call from Lancaster, PA to Dumaguete, Philippine Islands in 1954.  I was just 3 years old.  I have no recollection of this grandmother as we left the US to travel overseas when I was going on 2.

I haven't seen my Uncle John since 2013 when my mother died.  I send him a Christmas card every year and did send a 100th birthday card in January.

Hope

 

The amaryllis I got for Christmas is sending up two stalks with buds.  There may be another in the middle too.

In other news the Arctic cold front hit us hard here yesterday and into today.  We stayed in all day Friday as wind chill factors were low.  The high for the day was in the early hours of the morning and the temperature just kept dropping.  By dinner it was minus something and by 9:30 it was -17º.  I think it may have gotten to -21º overnight.

What was tough was losing power!  We had an inkling that it may happen early in the evening so I put my flashlight in my robe pocket and kept iPhone close by as we watched Midsomer Murders. Right at the end of the episode as we found out who did it the power went off. 

I called our utility company right away to report it.  We grabbed some extra quilts to add to the bed and headed upstairs not knowing what the night would bring.

From upstairs I heard footsteps on our gravel driveway and then a knocking at the door.  Our son in law had bundled up to come check on us.  They were out of power too but had a heat source: their woodstove. Our woodstove is still a work in progress if you recall. We told him we were okay for the night but knew we could come there in the morning if still no power aka no heat.

It was hard to fall asleep, not because I was cold but because of the wind, the extra creaks from the cold, and underlying worries.  Eventually we both did.  

At 3 am or so I was awaken by I don't know what and realized the clock was lit.  Hurrah the power was on.  Dan went down to the basement to turn on the water heater again and looked at the furnace thermostat.  It read 48º! Needless to say the furnace ran for the rest of the night to bring the house back up to 68º

It was -17º when we got up and as I write now it's 0º.  The sun is streaming in through the south facing windows and the house is comfortable again. 

That woodstove is really going to be a godsend if this happens again as we know it will.

How did you fare in the winter chill?