We are wishing you a wonderful Thanksgiving Holiday. Thanksgiving is about families, and this year we are spending the holiday with our daughter, Renee and her family Neil and Georgia Ann.
I can also think back to years past when our children were young and we had Thanksgiving with either my or Judy’s parents. From there I can think back to even more distant Thanksgivings at my Paternal Grandparent’s home in Spokane Washington where my Aunt Elaine and Uncle Dietz would join us. I can also remember back to trips to my Maternal Grandparent’s in the backwoods in the far northeastern corner of Washington State near Colville. Those trips were quite the adventure. Our family car until well after “The War” was a green 1938 Plymouth. Remember when the windshield wipers ran off the engine vacuum. I remember worrying that my dad wouldn’t be able to see good enough as the car clawed and climbed its way up the hills into Bear Creek. The wipers would always quit working on the hills. The roads were little more than logging trails and Dad would always worry about meeting a log truck or load of hunters on a blind corner. He blew the horn before rounding some of them. More than once we had to back up to the last wide spot to let a log truck go by.
The old Plymouth’s heater was somewhat anemic, so my Dad would rig a five gallon cream can between the front and back seats and fill it with piping hot water. Us three kids would hunker down under a few lap robes and snuggle up to the warmth. We would entertain ourselves by counting deer and skunks along the route. You didn’t even have to see the skunks to count them. One year Dad hit a skunk, and for the rest of the season our skunk counting was somewhat derailed. If someone is still driving that old Plymouth, I would guess that on the first rainy day after a long, dry, hot spell you would still be able to detect that skunk.
Georgia Ann is creating the headlines today. She has been taking a step now and then, but today she is starting to take a dozen or more steps and crossing large gaps between outstretched arms. At just over 14 months she is the same weight as our twenty pound Thanksgiving turkey. She is really getting into solid foods, and her favorite food right now is the little black bugs in the coleslaw salad. She eats everyone’s raisins, and waves for more. Photo below. We expect to teach her to eat olives off her fingertips today.
We will close with another “Happy Thanksgiving” and we also take time to remember our armed service people around the world who serve that we might enjoy our Thanksgiving in peace. God bless us all.
Gary, Judy, Renee, Neil, Georgia Ann and “Tom” Turkey from Oregon.
