Wordy Wednesday

 

I seem to have a JOY theme going on.

Weekly Roll

 

Cake, I made for Nonna's Birthday

Yummy and Easy

Recipe from Senior Center Newsletter

Linky Love

Librarians 45 Best Nonfiction Books of All Time- Some that I have read - Everything is Tuberculosis and Boys in the Boat

Cece Moore and Genetic Genealogy and Nancy Guthrie Case (youtube.com)

Roots Tech 2026 - online and in person genealogy conference is coming up 

52 Ancestors - Clues in the Census

 52 Ancestors in 52 days prompt last week was Clues in the Census. 

I have been researching Joseph Wise Easterday and what intrigued me about him that his occupation in the census was "gardener " specifically in the 1900 Census. 

This piqued my interest. The majority of my family tree has tons of farmers.  I started thinking gilded age gardens etc. (The Blue Garden) This ultimately lead me down some gilded garden rabbit holes. However, when I looked at the 1910 census it says house farm and Joseph Easterday as a gardener. 

This led me to some more research into Gardens in Indianapolis. This led me to discover that Marion County had a large number of greenhouses that grew tomatoes and bib lettuce.  I think most likely Joseph had one of these truck farms. His farm had a green house so he was a gardener not a farmer.

Even his obituary has him employed as a gardener.

German Greenhouses and Truck Farms in Indianapolis

Indianapolis Greenhouse History

Wordy Wednesday

 

What I Read in February

 I am linking up with Modern Mrs Darcy's Quick Lit. Check out what everyone is reading. 

Wards of the State by Claudia Rowe

Claudia Rowe does a great deep dive of foster care mainly through the lens of Washington State. Claudia discusses in depth why the correlation between foster care and future imprisonment.  That poverty is not neglect and why even with insufficient/neglectful/abusive fair far better staying with their parents. I think this a discussion about foster care that needs to be had. I think there is a prevailing view that children need to be removed but does the state do a good job. This is another broken government system. The statistics are startling.

107 Days by Kamala Harris

This was our book club book.  I probably wouldn't of have read this one on my own. I think what made the most impression on me was first. Kamala was just living her Vice President life when she got the call that she was running. She was getting up to make pancakes for her nieces.  Secondly, civil rights activist Claudette Colvin passed away recently and she gave up her seat on the bus before Rosa Parks. Claudette Colvin, a teenager at the time, did not know she was going to make history. There is nothing that Kamala did that wasn't going to make history. This book is the result that good, bad, indifferent Kamala was going to be making history. I think there is more pressure to get it right. I feel I have a much better idea who Kamala is than I did during the election. When you have only 107 days to run there is almost no time to run successfully. I am looking forward to the discussion and the author meet.

Weekly Roll

 

Going through my old Valentine's I found this gem from my nephew.  I love the handwriting.

Spicy Older Lady Blazers Fan Club

We the OGs (Old Gals) approve of this. It was a glorious win. It was Dame Time!

Deep Thoughts

I love this graphic that Brandi Kincaid made.  The world seems very loud and overwhelming at times. I hope through my chaos my love can be louder.

My Valentine this Year

 Every year I make a homemade valentine and remail it from Loveland, Colorado.  I have been doing this for a very long time. My hometown is Loveland.  This year they are celebrating the 80th year of Valentine Remailing Program.  I was lucky enough to drop off my valentine's there in Loveland.

I usually just mail them in a giant envelope to the Loveland Postmaster. There the volunteers stamp the outside with a special cachet, and the post office cancels with the Loveland postmark. 

Usually, I have a new idea for next year's valentine after I have mailed this year's valentine. I usually go through a few drafts before I settle on an idea. 

1st draft

2nd draft - mainly work with the Cricut

I got a Crayola marker air brush for Christmas.  I was influenced by Kristan at Friendsartlab.  

It is such a blast to play with so below is my design for 2026.