I have been absent as of late. Not because I have lost my
love and zeal for genealogy and blogging, rather, I have not learned to balance
family and genealogy research. It seems
for me it is almost an all or nothing activity. I will share with you the past
few months of my life.
I worked with the Preserve the War of 1812 Pensions campaign
for 3 years. I loved the purpose and the
activity of searching the files and finding living descendants. When the funding was accomplished, my
activity there was little needed, and I turned to other projects.
At the same time, my children decided they and their
children needed equal time with me and this is a bit of my journey into
creating family history with my grandchildren and as I have written about
before, bridging the generations.
During the summer, we had our first family reunion. This was important for those who could go
because family had not gathered as a unit since my husband, their father, died
in 2008. All but two of 6 children could
make it. The single son who was working and a daughter who was pregnant and
expecting her 4th child any minute.
There were 28 plus myself, who made it. Two grandchildren were working
and could not attend. Since no one other than myself had ever visited the
California family’s home, that was the focus. They planned 4 days of activities
for the children and I was excited that they included some time for
themselves.
The trip started with my 20-year-old grandson and I leaving
Texas and driving to Salt Lake to meet the Idaho family whose father was flying
in. They needed to send one child with me as their car only seated 7 and they
had 8 with dad. The connecting 3 different groups at the Salt Lake terminal was
a story. The trip from Salt Lake to California and then back to Idaho was an
awesome memory for my three grandchildren and me.
In California, we went to the Sequoia Forest, the beach, and
learned about railroads going over the mountain grades. The young and new
grandchildren were able to create relationships with the older ones. These are
a couple of pictures from that family activity.
Once back at home, the two daughters in Texas decided since
I had taken time from my genealogy activities for this, I must be up for grabs
for activities at home. The Idaho daughter not to be out done scheduled every
Monday in September for a Skype class on World War II ending in a lesson and
stories about their great grandfather who served and I have written stories
about him here.
The classes were successful, and one Texas grandson sat in
on a lesson. At the time I was not sure
who was listening, but as the months go by, questions and statement tell me
they were. One of the grandson’s chose to be his great grandfather for
Halloween, dressed up like a WWII army soldier.
Cool right. History and family stories passed down two generations. I also helped with the Black Watch Costume and made the sporan for that grandchild. One is Pipi Longstocking and one is a Nerd... they LOVE reading.
I went with another daughter to see the preview for
Christmas lights at the Houston Zoo. We
took one of my other daughter’s children with us. There was fun, sharing, and
memories made with young and old.
This week I went to a Civil War reenactment at the TexasLiendo plantation that served first as a Confederate headquarters, then when it
fell, as a Union prison camp.
My grandson, who is 10, began trying to sort in his mind who
and what generation of his family served in the Civil War. We had fun talking
about both sides of the war and how he had those that served on both sides and
one in the Confederacy that died in Savannah. His 3th great grandfather from Michigan served in the Michigan 3rd Cavalry Regiment
from 03 Oct 1861. He was promoted to Full Qtr Master Serg on 19 Jan 1864 and mustered
out on 12 Feb 1866 at San Antonio, TX.
We also visited a blacksmith tent and that gave us the opportunity to talk about his great great grandfather who was a blacksmith and we have his anvil.
So there you go, while I am AWOL occasionally, I am keeping
the dream alive trying to share with the generations following, so the story is
not forgotten.
