Mary Lou and I met through the American Sewing Guild, and her husband Dick’s imagination came up with the name for my sewing product, the Puts-it. While staying with Mary Lou, her granddaughter and I package packaged my Hump Jumpers® while Mary Lou tried to figure out a digital camera.Mary Lou is a kitchen gadget collector. She has draws full of all kinds of gadgets. Cooking dinner we end up playing the kitchen gadget “Guess what this is game.” We take a gadget from one of the many draws, and try to figure out "what the heck it this." She has to remember, while I guess. Anyone ever seen a 1940 ice smasher?"Saturday was a fun day. I drove to Ipswich, MA for a much over due visit and lunch with my friend Olga, another Sewing Guild sewing friend. She lives alone, and still drives her car! Her neighborhood is having a yard sale this weekend, and recruited me to haul items from her basement, and set up shop in the garage because it was time to empty out the basement. It’s amazing what this elegant lady collected. We arranged sewing books, kitchen items fit for an antique shop, discovered her sister’s watercolors and paintings, we found items she had forgotten she even had. The biggest surprise was the box of ties: wide ties, narrow pencil ties, bright ones with flowers, and a few we decided no one would have eve worn. The neighbor sale was Sunday, with great success with gorgeous sunshine.
It’s Sunday and my goal is Ithaca, New York to visit my cousin Kathy, my Dad’s sister’s daughter. She works in the large animal hospital at Cornell University Veterinary College, where my Dad graduated. It was while visiting Kathy at Cornell, I wonder into the Feline Library and researched Alzheimer’s in animals. Yes, animals do get Alzheimer’s and Dementia and Cornell is one of the colleges doing research along with the Baker Institute.
Visiting Kathy is always a treat. She and I enjoy going through old family albums, figuring who is who, what is where, and reminiscing about the great fun we all use to have. Kathy is a great one for this, she and Dad use to spend hours going through the old albums.
Our great grandfather Bee invented the flying mail box. Extending a pole out the second floor window, he hooked a string to his mail box, and using a pulley system the mail box would fly through the air landing where the mailman would insert the mail. Not only did he pull in his mail, occasionally a neighbor would send up some tobacco.
My great grandfather Bee invented the flying mail box. Extending a pole out the second floor window, he hooked a string to his mail box, and using a pulley system the mail box would fly through the air landing where the mailman would insert the mail. Not only did he pull in his mail, occasionally a neighbor would send up some tobacco.
One of the "fun-iest" stops this early morning was coffee with Rick Fiacco at his original 1954 Tastee Freeze stand in Owego, NY. This delightful place will bring back your Tastee Freeze memories, car hop girls, and the jitter-bug while you sip great coffee. While there check out his antiques, and decide if you want to rent one of his ice cream trucks for your next party, or just spend the afternoon playing miniature golf. Maybe visit the 50's style gas station with an old pump. Remember the phone both college kids tried to jam in 25 or more friends, you'll find it here. The professor in me makes this an A+ coffee stop!
Leaving Kathy in Ithaca and the great coffee in Owego, I hit the road and head for Blandon, Pennsylvania to visit my friend Danny, his wife Beth and daughter Kelly. This destination takes me over Pennsylvanian's rolling hills, past scenic rivers, and through coal mining country.
Then it’s off to Alexandria, Virginia and an overnight with my cousin, John. It was such fun. To my surprise he had arranged dinner with my cousin Sheila, and his adorable son, Nicholas. Nicholas is twelve, and programmed my MP3 Player. Oh, to have a twelve year old to figure those things out! I am going to name our dinner conservation Traveling Down Memory Lane. When we were little, all the aunts, uncles, cousins, and grandparents on my Mom’s side of the family would get together in Windsor, Vermont for a family reunion every summer.
Leaving these memories behind I was off to Atlanta.
Happy Travels
Sandy
