Dennis Prager Q & A At University of Denver

ancestry

Elliott and Leslie have both worked on our family ancestry. Elliott is really dong so right now. There are some interesting stories and pictures. It is fun to go back and see where everyone in the family fits in and how far back the lines of both Parker, Potter and Smith go. In reading and looking I have found things I knew nothing about. Verrry interesting. Read about James Parker. Sue Franz Haltom is going to the Chico University to look in the archives of the Chico Enterprise and see what else she can find about the problems James had. There are so many different names in the family that I had never heard of before. If you get a chance and want to see where you fit in go to http://ancestry.com. They ofer a 14 day free trial and you just have to be sure and cancel before the 14 days are up if you don't want to pay the price. It has been fun tracing all back in time.

Happy Birthday Katy & Annie

We had a birthday dinner for Katy and Annie. Fun time with all of us. The birthday candle was a hit as it was a sparkler and you can see from Katy's face she liked it. Wish you could have seen all of the kids faces. Should have gotten pictures of all of them. I made Annie her dress and she had to put it on right away. It would be so much fun if all of the family could get together for birthdays but know that is not possible. I can dream though!

For Chelsey

Potato Soup

5 medium potatoes, peeled and chopped
1 large onion, chopped
1/2 cup celery, chopped 5 slices bacon chopped
2 cans Swanson Chicken Broth
1 qt 1/2 & 1/2
S & P to taste
1/2 c Swiss cheese grated.
A few T of Potato flakes


Place potatoes in pan with 2 cans of chicken broth. Cook till tender.
In the meantime saute bacon until slightly crisp and set aside. Drain
all but 1 T fat from pan and saute celery and onon till tender.
When potatoes are tender add vegetables and bacon. Pour in 1/2 & 1/2.
Mix potato flakes with some of warm 1/2 &1/2-add to soup if it is not
thick enough add some more potato flakes mixed with some more of warm
1/2 &1/2.

You can add cream corn for corn chowder or clams for clam chowder.
I usually put some of soup in blender and then back into the pot.

Really good served with sour dough bread buttered and warmed .

Today is a red letter day.
Happy Birthday David
My favorite Middle son. Love you very much
Time flies so fast and it is hard to believe that
you are now a grandfather of 14 soon to be 16.
You are so loving, giving, honest, caring,and special
to all. You are a wonderful son, husband, father and
grandfather and I am so grateful for you.
I love you very much.

old family picture

Old picture of my father Walter, Aunt Dorothy and Aunt Winifred
Walter's sisters. My cousin Cameron sent me these pictures. The one
on the bottom right has my grandmother Bessie Smith. The bottom
left is Aunt Dorothy and my father.

nothing much

Goodness time goes fast and now it is the middle of January. We have been busy cleaning up Christmas decorations and finding a place to put them all. The house always looks so bare when they are all put away. Good time to deep clean before putting other things out. Bill has been cleaning out the file cabinet and shredding old papers before he starts our income tax. I have been cleaning drawers and getting everything put away in our new closet. Do love have a closet to hang my clothes. The remodel has made the downstairs as comfortable as it was upstairs. Don't miss my room upstairs now.
Next week I will make some things for Stephanie's baby and get them made before he arrives.
Then it will be Ginger and Mimi. Lots of new babies! Amy's is due the end of this month or the first week in Feb. She is having her first girl after 3 boys.
Baseball is starting at Chapman soon and so Bill will be busy going to those games. Tonight is a basketball game and of course he will go to that as well as the girl's game tomorrow. He does love Chapman athletics. Sometime I go and sometimes I don't.
Just read Julianne's blog and am excited for her to go to Germany and live. I know she wants to be with Tony and have a normal relationship. Wish we could have met him but all the family really like him and of course if Joojie picked him he must be special. Happy for her.
Rain here all next week and we really need it. At least it isn't really cold and no snowy.
Will try to post some pictures next time.

Merry Christmas

These pictures didn't come out real clear. It was a great evening with all of the kiddos. Max wore a brown outfit to dinner because he wanted to be the donkey. Emma was Mary and Joseph was Jack. Ethan wore the funny colored hair wig for one of shepherd and Sadie wore a crown to be a king. Sophie was the angel. Annie was an angel too. Max sang a solo and so did Annie. All climaxed when Santa rang the bells and they ran to see what he had brought. Oh, because Andrew doesn't believe he was a good sport and played along. He also did a great job of reading the story.
Dinner was tamales, salad, chocolate nutty cake and choc chip mint icecream. It was so wonderful having Elliott here and was a great surprise. Hope we mad some memories.

another red letter day!

Today is Leslie's birthday and therefore it is a
special day for her. As she is one of my very special granddaughthers I want her to have a wonderful day
filled with lots of love. I know she is very busy as this was moving day weekend but hopefully because
it is a special day she will do something special. She is a loving wife and a super mom with 3 for my very beautiful and handsome great grandchildren. Love her very much.
Happy Birthday Leslie!!!!!!!!!

Some of the trees that I decorated for the Orange Republican Women Federated's Holiday Fantasy.
They raffel them off and with all of the other trees that others have decorated it is a good fund raiser.
There are 30 trees in all and I only have done 5. Don't have a picture of the last one but these were
my favorites. The silver/blue one is the presidents tree and each of the past presidents donates $25.00
and I will put 20$ bills in clear balls and hang them on the tree. This one brings in the most money.
Just glad they are all done.

Red letter day!!

Happy Birthday to a wonderful Granddaughter. Today is her special day and hopefully she will get to do
something special to celebrate. I remember when we use to go shopping and the come home
to show Grampy what we had picked out. That was a special time for a special
girl.
Have a wonderful day and I will think about you.
Love you lots.
Grammy

Just a year ago!

Special day!!!

Two of my very special grandchildren have birthdays today October 2nd.
Mimi married our grandson Lincoln and became a wonderful granddaughter.
Elliott our very first grandson is a wonderful husband and father as well and a great grandson.
Happy Birthday to you both.

We love you both very much.

Sean's birthday

This is for Sean because tomorrow the 24th of September is his birthday. He has been not feeling well so hopefully he will feel good on his birthday. Love you much,
Grammy

one christmas

Barbara and Betty at Grandma and Grandpa Smiths at Christmas. I think I was 8 years old but don't remember. We loved these dolls and grandma made the dresses and knit the sweater, caps and booties. I remember one time Betty insisted that "toodles" had a cold and she rubbed vicks all over her chest. From that day on we could tell which doll was which and which was hers and which was mine. The vicks really discolored the clothe body of the doll . Grandma always gave us a new doll at Christmas.
The pictures was taken on the board walk in front of the house. You can see a bit of the Christmas tree in the window. The house was on the Pennisula in Long Beach with Alamitos bay on one side and the ocean on the other. One time during a terrible story before Long Beach put in the breakwater a big log was washed up by the huge waves and it went right through the front window. They don't have tides anymore since the breakwater.

great grandfather's wedding certificate

This is the wedding certificate of my great grandmother and great grandfather., Judson Losse and Alice Flagg. It is very hard to read as I only have a scanned copy but I copied what it said below. My grandmother was Bessie Losse and her father was Judson Losse. They had 3 children Gracie, Bessie and Harry.

My Great Grandfather & Grandmother Smith

These pictures were taken around 184o in London, England.
My grandfather Percy was b0rn in Sussex, England in April 1881.

Percy Hirst Smith

More old pictures. This is multiple pictures of Percy Hirst Smith. He was born in England and came to the USA.
A couple of these pictures were taken in British Columbia. I am not sure of any of the dates. The picture in the middle is how I remember him to look. Cameron sent me all of these pictures to which I am grateful. There are still more and I will blog them in a few days. The copies she sent were a bit larger but it takes a lot of room and printing so I condensed them. I haver seen any of these pictures before and the last time I say Grandpa Smith was in 1947.