Happy Birthday, Mom

 

Happy Birthday, Emily Rebecca

Twenty-something years ago . . . on this date . . . the 24th day of January . . . the 2nd of my three beautiful nieces was born . . . Happy Birthday, Em! . . . Luv ya bunches . . . Auntie Vickie . . .

Click > HERE < to pick up your very own copy of the vintage forget-me-not image used above -- and it's FREE -- from Vintage Scrapbooking!

Tombstone Tuesday :: Today I visited yesterday

This is a little country cemetery in Lee County, Texas . . . it is the one I feel the most connected to . . . I can walk through this cemetery and tell stories about many of the residents . . . the family members . . . as well as the people who were their friends . . . I remember my Dad talking about some of them . . . and I remember Grandma's stories . . . I memorialized this cemetery in my Ode to My Family History back in January of the year 2010 . . . the little one in these photos is one of my grand-nephews . . . he will have these photos to show how he had fun in the cemetery on a spring day when the wildflowers were blooming in Texas . . . I need to write down the story of this day for him . . .

Today I visited yesterday
And walked among the graves
Of family and friends from long ago
Whose memory had begun to fade.

The graves were unattended
As were my thoughts of them
When a vision of the ages past
Brought back my sense of kin.

The vision showed the church lawn
On a crisp summer day
The table spread, the food prepared
And friends who would break bread.

All my relatives were there
both young and old
Grandma and I walked hand and hand
Sharing stories never told.

We laughed and cried
And shared our thoughts
And I found the friend
I thought I'd lost.

As the sun began to fade . . .
The church bell rang out clear
Grandma and the others
slowly disappeared . . .

Today I visited yesterday
And now the memory is strong
Of the family from which I came
AND NOW BELONG . . .

by Pat Conner Rice

The Journal

One hundred fifty years ago today . . . on this very date . . . the 16th day of January . . . in the year 1862 . . . James Madison Hall (1819-1866) sat down in Liberty County, Texas . . . and picked up his pen to compose a few sentences about the events of his day . . .

Thursday, January 16th, 1862. To day I am engaged painting in the new house. Boys are also at work on the house, which is now progressing some better. weather clear and pleasant.

J.M. Hall would continue this practice on a daily basis until his death in September of 1866 . . . these Journal excerpts have their very own blog . . . benotforgot-journal.blogspot.com . . . which will automatically feed to this Twitter account (just in case you would like to follow along there) . . . and they also appear daily on this Facebook page . . .