Sunday Stealing - When I Was Younger . . .

 

Welcome to Sunday Stealing. Here we will steal all types of questions from every corner of the blogosphere. Our promise to you is that we will work hard to find the most interesting and intelligent questions. Cheers to all of us thieves!

We're going into the new year by looking back. Randy at GeneaMusings encourages us to reminisce. 

When I Was Young

1.    Tell us about a time when your family got a newfangled invention (your first air conditioner, color TV, VCR, microwave, computer, etc.). Before Mark and I married (over 40 years ago), we were blessed with many wedding gifts. We kept 12 place settings of everyday dishes, china (actually kept some extra plates), silver, and crystal. We returned all of the extras. We had a $500 credit at a local department store and we purchased our FIRST microwave. It was massive in size. We spent the whole $500 on a microwave. Now a countertop microwave is much much cheaper. I remember getting a big console tv – stereo in one end and radio on the other end – tv in the middle. I was a kid and I remember that it was a big deal!

 Is there a particular song that sparks a childhood memory? I’ve written about this before. In our neighborhood, we would swing and sing. We played kickball and wiffle ball and rode bikes and did all of those things, too, BUT we would swing and sing. I remember singing “This Land Is Your Land, This Land Is My Land” at the top of our lungs!

What is something an older family member taught you to do? Mark’s mother taught me to bake Brown Sugar Brownies (among many other things) and I still make them often. My mother died when I was 15 so I don’t remember many things she taught me. My dad died when I was 25 – same thing. They did teach us to be honest and that sometimes you have to do hard things that you don’t want to do – but you do them, because they are the right things to do.

Back in the day, what name brands would we have found in your family's kitchen? Are we talking back in the day when I was a kid? Or back in the day when Mark and I first married? When I was a kid, I have no idea. I know my mom had a stand mixer – I think it was a Sunbeam. Any new furniture purchased by my parents would have been from Miller’s Furniture store. When we were newlyweds, goodness . . .china is Lenox, crystal is Gorham, silver is Chantilly by Gorham. Our everyday dishes were a stoneware. I let Mark have a “say-so” in picking out that pattern. I never really liked it – it was too masculine – haha! We used it for a LONG time. I know some of our appliances came from Sears. Our kids wore everything from Kelly’s Kid’s clothing to Osh Kosh to Feltman Brothers to clothes smocked by me and sewn together by my mother-in-law.

As a child, did you collect anything (rocks, shells, stickers, etc.)? For a short time, I collected thimbles. I even had a little wooden display case. Why? I have no idea.

Thank you for playing! Please come back next week.