Advent Calendar - Christmas Cookies

Who does not like Christmas Cookies? My sisters and me would make a tipical sugar cookie recipie but the most fun was decorating them with frosting and sprinkles. As teenagers, we made cookies with these cookie cutters. The snowman and the tree were the most fun to decorate. We always had a lot of fun and giggles as we saw how each other decorated the cookies. More great memories of "sister time."

As young children and living overseas I do not recall making Christmas Cookies. I'm sure we must have made them but it does not stick out in my mind.

What does stick in my mind are the Sour Cream Drop Cookies my Grandma Lyon used to make and send to us. I remember these cookies when we were very young before going overseas. When we came back to the US she would mail some to us.

In the 80's I specifically asked her if she would send me her recipe

and and few days later I received this in the mail from her in her own handwriting. I think it is a treasure now. She has been gone for many years now. (Eleanor Fahl Lyon)

Ancestor Approved Award

Wow! What a surprise when I received an e-mail from Cheri Daniels of Journeys Past who awarded me the Ancestor Approved Award. I am excited, shocked, surprised and amazed since I consider myself new at blogging. Thank you Cheri! I will consider this a birthday present. (I'm a December child)

This award comes with the requirement that you pay it forward the following two ways.

1. List 10 things that you have learned about your ancestors that surprised, humbled or enlightened you.

2. Pass the award to 10 other genealogy bloggers.

So here are the 10 things I have learned about my ancestors.

1. Even though my great grandpa (Andrew Davis) is a brick wall I have been able to figure out where he was born from his Civil War Military papers, that he was wounded in the war, and that he was a flag holder in the Grand Army Parade. His parents are still a complete mystery.

2. My great grandparents who came from Sweden had a child that died before she was two years old. It was a thrill to visit all of their gravestones in Crown Hill Cemetery, Ruthven, Iowa.

3. I was amazed to learn from the obituary of my great great great grandmother (Anna Quivey) that sixty teams (of horses) followed the procession to her burial in Hazelwood Cemetery, Grinnell, Iowa. This is a cemetery I visited and was able to actually stand beside her gravestone. It is an amazing feeling to stand where so many ancestors stood mourning their loved ones.

4. It was thrilling to actually see a photo of my great great great grandfather Linus Quivey. This came from a fourth cousin I found. He was on a horse!

5. The new cousins are fantastic! I just love finding the cousins and comparing information. Three new ones cropped up this year.

6. It was a mystery how my great grandfather David H Quivey died at the age of 30 years old, leaving five children and a wife who never remarried. He died of typhoid fever. This coming from a dear fellow genealogy lady in Iowa who did some research for me.

7. Another great great great grandfather John Merritt, came to Iowa and staked his claim on a parcel of land by tearing off a big chunk of bark from a tree and writing his name on it. He then went back to New York to bring his family to the newly discovered land. It is awesome the bark and claim was still there, waiting his return. This information came from a new cousin who had really done some fantastic research. I will post about this later because it is such a cool story.

8. It is fun finding relatives even my father has never met from different sides of his family and am able to tell him about them.

9. I enjoy sharing the finds with my sisters, who are thrilled they are not the ones doing the research, but love hearing the stories.

10. I love finding out where my ancestors are buried and especially if I can get a picture of their gravestones. Future generations will not have that option since so many people are cremated these days and their ashes scattered.

Whew!

Here are the blogs that I chose to pass the award to.

1. Branching Out Through the Years

2. Heritage Happens

3. Genealogy How To

4. We Tree

5. Genea's Genealogy

6. We Tree

7. Destination: Austin Family

8. Mountain Genealogist

9. Roots'N'Leaves

10. Gen Wish List

Advent Calendar - The most unusual ornament!

Ornaments

When Mike and I got married - way back in '75 - we hardly had any money and lived in a little shack on his parents 10 acre property. The shack came with the property when they bought it and the in-laws had not yet moved out there as they were waiting to put a mobile home on it to live in.

Anyhow - the first Christmas season - Mike took off one day with an axe. It was cold so he chopped down the first doable tree he found. It was a scrawny little thing, but it did fine for our first Christmas. We did not have ornaments so we put lights and a whole bunch of tinsle on the tree. It was missing one thing. A topper. What were we going to put on the top of the tree?

Mike had a great idea. He took some cardboard and cut out a perfect star that was about 5 inches in diameter. Then he covered it with tin foil. It looked great, but how was he going to get it on the top of the tree? Then the most hilarious idea popped into his mind. He took the round cardboard part from a tampax tampon and pasted that on the back and wa-la - it slipped perfectly on the top spike of the tree! He even put a hole in the very center of the star so we could put a little light in it.

The weirest thing of all? This year will be the 35th christmas we have used this star! Wow!

Advent Calendar - Holiday Foods with Cranberrys

Christmas tradition food.

At Christmas time we always remember and serve Grandma's Cranberry Salad. It is supposedly a Swedish recipe perhaps from Grandma's mother who came from Sweden. We really enjoy it and most of us girls make it every year for our families. Here it is.



Grandma's Cranberry Salad
1 lb ground cranberries
1 cup sugar
1 can crushed pineapple
1/2 lb marshmallows
1/2 pint whipped cream

Mix - Set - Done!

Advent Calendar - December 1, The Hilarious Christmas Tree

I tell you, when we lived in Singapore my family had the most hilarious Christmas tree ever! It was made entirely of plastic. It was white, however, had a hint of blue to it. The branches were hilarious too. They were covered in snowflakes for the leaves. It was supposed to look like a tree with snow on it. It looked the very best at night with all the house lights off and the christmas tree lights on and of course with all the presents underneath it. It worked for us all of the six years we lived there.

I wish I had a picture of it to show you.

Talented Tuesday - My Grandpa the Ventriliquist

This is my Grandpa, Willis Harold Lyon in September of 1955, three months before I was born. Just recently this picture was uncovered from a box in the attic and I was so happy. Up until then there were no pictures of Oscar the dummy that I had seen or of Bud, Grandpa's second dummy.



So here is Oscar. My Grandpa went around to schools all over the country and gave temperance lectures to high school students about the effects of alcohol and ciggaretts speaking through Oscar and Bud. Oscar was the dummy that was not addicted to these, but Bud was an addict, a rambling drunk and he smokeed cigarettes. I wish I had a picture of Bud so show you. He was a bigger guy that wore a hat and an old overcoat and beat up shoes.



When us girls would spend the night at our Grandparents home a couple of us slept in the basement. Sometimes when I came up the stairs during the night I was scared out of my mind because Bud was standing there!



My Grandpa did a good job at his craft and really enjoyed the students. Unfortunately, Oscar was made of wood so did not survive the years. He had been eaten by termites . He was kept in a suitcase. I remember the suitcase. But what happened to Bud? I'll need to ask my Dad.



Yes these are fond memories.........

Super Sister Sunday - Indonesia

This picture is one of my favorites that consists of myself (on the left) and my eldest sister Nancy although we did not realize at the time it was taken it would someday be a favorite.

Here is the story. We lived in Bandung, Indonesia at the time. We were 8 and 9 years of age. Our mom would send us away in a "betcha" or rickshaw to take piano lessons from a nice Indonesian woman. Nancy remembers that day was really rainy and dreadful, but we went on the ride and took the lessons anyway.

The piano teacher had a son called "Sinchepu", a teenager, who was enthralled with us. While we waited for the other one to complete lessons he would show us weird things. Like, the

Indonesians would take a rubber band and rub it back and forth on their arms to remove the hair. It really hurt! Bad!

Sinchepu had a camera so on this day he decided he wanted to pose Nancy and I so he could take our picture. We were not in the mood, and ordinarily would not have posed like that but we let him anyway, therefore the non-smiling picture. He was very proud to give us the picture the next time we went for our lessons. Somehow it made it back to the U.S. with us and it has become a favorite of mine.