Happy Birthday and Blog-aversary!

This blog is 3 years old this weekend!  When I started it in 2007, this was the first picture I posted.  It had been taken on the trip to Gloucester we had taken a few days before:

And this is how that little family has grown in the last 3 years from a picture I took just a few weeks ago:

I thought this was really cute.

Happy Birthday this week to Uncle Tim!

Happy Halloween!

Have a great Halloween everyone!  Happy Birthday shoutouts to Breyen and Ryan!

Centennial Celebration

Yesterday October 25 2010 was Nanny Flynn's 100th birthday.  This is a picture of me with Nanny and Gammy Nevins (Nanny's mom).  I recently learned that Gammy Nevins spent at least some time as a nurse and this outfit looks a little bit like it could have been that--or not in those days!  I like the way they are each perched to snag me if I step off that curb.

Gammy Nevins is Caroline Brown and I've blogged about her before.  Her father was our Civil War soldiers William S. Brown (or Grampie Brown as Nanny called him).  In all the research I've done over the many years I had never found any record of Caroline living in the same home with her parents.  This has bothered me a great deal--like she was lost and needed to be reunited. 

There are many factors lending to this problem, not the least of which is trying to find the right William Brown in the city of Buffalo at the right time.  Caroline's mother died when she was very young so there's a very small window of time even available to me for finding them all together.

BUT my trip to Boston proved very fruitful in this area.  I paid an extra $5 for special "consultation" time at this conference and gave them this problem to look over for me.  I was honestly not expecting much in return for my saw-buck (that's a five, right?)  The staff found Caroline (Carrie) in the same household with her father and stepmother in 1892 when she was 17 years old.

This is a HUGE find for me and well worth every penny!  I feel as though I've become like "The Locator" on TV--have you seen that show?  Except I'm dealing with dead people.  Makes me just as happy though.  Now I have Carrie reunited with her father.  I think if you double click to open this, you'll see them in the very lowest right hand corner of the pages. 

One more brickwall knocked down!  It's like a birthday gift for Nanny.  I wonder what she'd think of this.

Homecoming 2010

Gloucester Report

We have just returned from a really great trip to Boston and Gloucester.  I decided that we'd treat ourselves to a nice weekend to celebrate our birthdays and this just so happened to coincide with a genealogy conference in Boston.  More on the conference later--great breakthrough achieved!

The conference was in Boston Saturday so we travelled there Friday night; found ourselves and Irish bar right near the hotel for dinner.  This place sat right smack on the water and had great food.  Jim spent the day loose in Boston while I conferenced.  He visited our nephew Drew at Boston University and found himself in an Obama rally.  He did find his way back to me though and we had a late lunch at the place next door to the Irish pub--and this place had the best wings I've had outside New York State EVER. 

Off to Gloucester.  Our Rockport hotel was right on the water with a big wide window open to the sea.  We left the windows open in the night to hear the surf against the shore throughout the nighttime.  The hotel provided a self guided auto tour of the area so we could find our way to the Eastern Point Lighthouse and Dogbar breakwater.  The guide states:  "If you are hardy and fleet of foot you can walk out to the end of the breakwater."  And even though at least one of us doesn't meet those guidelines, we did indeed walk out to the end.  It was a beautiful but windy day. 

I think some of you have been here, but we never have.  Then off we went to Halibut Point State Park--what a hidden treat that is (at least hidden from us!).  It's an old granite quarry that sits at the edge of the ocean.  So we became hardy and fleet of foot once again and dared the fates by setting the camera to auto timer so that I could dash across the boulders in time to have our picture taken together to mark the day

Oops!  The camera never lies, they say.....but we did get a pretty good picture at the Cape Ann Brewery (not everything required being windblown)

This should probably be our Christmas card!

We spent time with Tim, Emmy, Chris, Cathy and Julia.  We did not get to see Kevin or Peter but got adequately caught up on their adventures.  Everyone looks great.  Julia drew a picture of us very carefully noting the color of our clothing.  It's on our refrigerator.  She's going to be Minnie for Halloween and they are planning a Disney trip in the spring so I guess I did most of the talking during that conversation.  She's taking piano lessons and played a little bit on the keyboard for Jim.  She most definitely has Tim wrapped right around her little finger.  It was wonderful to see everyone and enjoy the splendors of fall and Cape Ann. 

Gone Fishin'

Heading out to Gloucester this weekend so here's a 3 generational reminder of our roots (even though none of these is from Gloucester!)

And yes, I know it's backwards......but I'm in Gloucester and you're not!

10/10/10

Well, it's official now!  Jim is a full 55 years old and retired.  He had a grand party for himself yesterday at the Binghamton Mets stadium to celebrate.  Ryan stayed around for part of it and got to see his Dad relive some of his youth. 

Paula, Judy and I went to the baby shower for Sarah and Kevin Kelly's baby.  Sarah's family is pretty big and there was a good turn out, including about 5 babies.  It was a pretty day for a drive and got me thinking about grandmothers and grandchildren.  So Paula O'Brien, this picture of Paula Nevins and her grand kids is for you:

Of course, the rug is very familiar and I have the dark wood bookcases here at my house.  They ALWAYS remind me of Nanny and Weenie's house.

Because Paula was on my mind and my mind wanders significantly, I thought I would share this story from Dad's cousin Tom Foley.  "Growing up I didn't get too acquainted with your Dad since he was about 8 years older.  I do remember going to a High School play and I recall him playing the part of "Peter Pan".  I think it was obligatory for the entire Pierce side of the family to go to the school to show our support.  In the big scene, Peter Pan was suspended about 5-6 feet of the floor of the stage and came flying across iton some sort of pulley rig.  I will never know if he got the part because he was very good, or it it was because he was the smallest and skinniest guy available."  Paula, weren't you in Peter Pan on the Main Street school stage?  The very location of the Grape Festival contest and Scheherazade performance????

I also remember from that auditorium getting the "girl talk" while the boys were in the gym.  The Moms were invited.  We also got our musical instrument assignments there while we all sat patiently for each of these momentous announcements. 

You know, sometimes when I start these blog posts, I don't really know where they are going and this is a good example.  What do you remember about the stages and auditoriums in your past?