Memories

It’s been brought to my attention over the past couple of days that more of my friends and family read my blog than I had thought.  This just tickles my heart as it helps me realize that my words are being heard.

I’ve been trying to come up with ways to get more personal interactions from my blog – similar to the interactions we have on Facebook and other such sites.  It was suggested to me today by one of my international pen pals to write about my earliest memories and ask my readers to tell me about theirs.  I loved that idea – so here you have it!

I think my most prominent early memory is of teasing my baby sister.  She had very fine blonde hair that my mom would put into a ponytail at the top of her head.  My other sisters and I would pretend like it was a water fountain and “drink” out of it.  Around the same time frame, we had a golden retriever named Toby.  One Sunday while we were at church Toby was chained to a tree in the back yard.  The female dog in the yard next door was in heat and Toby jumped over the fence to get to her.  His chain got hung up on the fence and he hanged.  My baby sister was so traumatized by this that for weeks all she would say was “Toby jump over the fence…Toby jump over the fence”.

My oldest sister was usually the babysitter when my parents weren’t home.  One day she was cooking dinner for us and I noticed how RED the burner was.  I asked her why, and she told me it was because it was HOT.  I didn’t believe her and wanted to see for myself, so I put my right palm flat on the burner…OUCH!

We went to Disneyland for a family vacation during this time.  Mom and Dad put the seat of the station wagon down so that us girls could lounge back there for the long trip.  We stopped somewhere to eat and I had thrown up all down the front of my shirt.  My mom washed the shirt out in the restaurant bathroom and I was able to ride bare chested while my wet shirt hung out the window to dry.  OH THE FREEDOM!  We stopped at a hotel on this trip and all of us girls were so excited that we couldn’t fall asleep.  Mom told us that if we would just close our eyes for 5 minutes we could stay up and watch TV, I don’t know about my sisters, but I didn’t ever make it to the TV watching…I was instead watching the dreams in my mind.  What a smart Mom I have.

When we got to OC we got lost trying to find the campground we were supposed to stay at.  I remember Mom and Dad arguing about directions.  We found the campground.

Wow – I’ve always thought that I didn’t remember much about my childhood but just writing these few memories has brought back a flood of others!  I’m going to stop here or I would be going on for days.

I would love to hear some of my readers memories!