My age: I’m Beyond. . .

One of the segments on the Today Show a few days ago was “How to look good in your 30’s, 40’s, 50’s and beyond.”  Wow, my age is beyond!  BEING a beyond is not a problem, but did I like being clumped into beyond?  Well, I wasn’t so sure, so I googled “50 and beyond” and came up with a wealth of BEYOND:

A magazine article Hairstyles for Women 40-50 and beyond is quite positive but still manages to convey the beyond group as being pretty anonymous:  “Women who are over forty, over fifty or beyond should wear their hair in any style they choose.  If your hair makes you feel good and you like the way it looks, wear it with confidence”  Even though I have this hair that does what it wants to with no regard to my choice, this is still good helpful information for beyonds! So far so good.

 Loving Life at 50 ~and Beyond  This is really a pretty nice blog with a great watercolor background. 

Staying Slim in your 40’s, 50’s and beyond.  This blog has some good information which is divided into two categories: “40’s” and “50’s and beyond” 

A workout video by Angela Rippon Fabulously Fit at 50 & Beyond (No, I don’t workout so didn’t even watch it all the way through!)

Weightwatchers even has a group called FABulously Fit B4 50 & BEYOND!

I found a Beyond 50 Radio blog.

I like the description of Susanna Starr’s book Fifty and Beyond, New Beginnings in Health and Well-Being
“A non-authoritarian approach to fitness and well-being, aimed especially at people approaching and beyond age fifty (50). An inspiration during a time of mid-life for those who are ready for new beginnings. Clear and insightful suggestions for developing our potential through expanding the mind, caring for the body and celebrating the spirit.”

I read a few of this blogger’s very moving posts on Zero to Sixty and beyond and will be following her.

SOOO. . . my conclusion: although it feels somewhat like being in a grey cloud, beyond is not such a bad age.  While I have nothing against my chronological age I just may have changed my age to beyond!

Gary & I before we were beyond.

And here we are, both age beyond.

I saw my first moose in Maine!

Well, it isn’t a real moose but it is life size!  A man we talked to in this little park by the Meduxnekeag River (NO, I can’t pronounce Meduxnekeag  and YES, I had to look up the spelling!) said that if we stay in Maine very long we will see a live one.  I’m on the watch!

Other moose we’ve encountered in our travels:

1998 at Denali National Park in Alaska.  This was before digital cameras were readily available---I wish I’d had the 26X zoom Nikon camera I now have!

She(?) was enjoying her lunch! This was taken in 2002, the summer we were docents at the Brig Museum at Farragut State Park in Idaho.  We were on our way to visit the Carnegie Library in nearby Wallace and spotted her in a lake beside the highway.

By this time I’d had my Sony Mavica digital camera for a few years and used the 3X zoom to take this photo.

Thanks for stopping by to see my moose!

Why oh why isn’t the plural of moose, meese?

I’m going to make books! Correction: I’ve made a book!

I found this book in the gift shop of the Renwick Gallery, the Smithsonian gallery which features American craft and decorative arts.  Umm, I can do this; I have no artistic talent but am creative and can follow directions very well!  Rather than carrying the book around that day I waited, found it on Amazon.com and saved about $10 over suggested retail.  I LOVE a deal!

The layout of the book seems to progress from very simple to difficult so I started by making this instant book from Chapter One-Instant Books. 

Instructions for making an instant book are quite simple and I mastered it very quickly.  Fold, fold, fold, fold, snip, pull apart and re-fold into book form---that’s it!  A book! 

Combining this newly acquired bookmaking skill with my computer skills I printed an 8-1/2” X 11” sheet of paper with graphics of a daisy, a birthday cake and birthday greetings to my sister. First go-round I had the birthday cake upside down so had to go back to the drawing board/computer. Second attempt was a success!

OK, that’s a little bit TOO simple, I’m moving on to the chapters on accordions, stab stitch, chapbooks, mutant (mutant. . . that sounds intriguing!), long stitch and Coptic books.  I’m working my way through the “How to Make Books” book.

Wait a minute!  I almost forgot that I made accordion books for our three children a few years ago. . . and I made them without any instructions!  I’m glad I took pictures of them.

A message to the kids is on the inside cover. 

Three copies of each of the items in her wallet await assembling in the accordion books.

The covers are a stiff cardboard covered with black fabric to simulate the black plastic of Grandma Mary’s wallet. For the title on the front cover I found tiny scrapbooking frames at Michael’s Craft store.

Black poster paper was just thick enough but still folded quite easily into accordion “pages.”

Reverse side of the replica of a wallet photo holder.

I wonder how close I came to author Esther Smith’s method?  I’m not going to peek ahead; will wait until I get to that chapter!

This has absolutely nothing to do with books, but have to show you the wonderful lobster we had for dinner last night.  Price:  including a quart of (the best) clam chowder, the dinner for two was $36.84!  (yes, we are in Maine)

Happy Memorial Day

Hope everyone has their Old Glory flying!  Gary dug out the flag my Mom gave him a long time ago and has it suspended from our awning.  He’s had it so long that I asked him if it had 50 stars!

As always we have our American, California and racing flags on the front of the fifth wheel.

And look at the cute stylized banner I bought the other day at the Lobster Shack at Two Lights where we had lunch. I thought it would be perfect for Memorial Day.  Food Note:  the lobster rolls were to die for!

We had lunch today at The Lobster Claw here in Saco, Maine. . .as you can see they are also decked out for the day!  Food Note #2: my clam strips were wonderful as was Gary’s haddock!

Is there a better way to honor our military and remember our loved ones on Memorial Day?  I don’t think so!

HAPPY MEMORIAL DAY!

Eleanor Roosevelt. . .a Blogger before Blogging?

We have been visiting the presidential libraries and museums and, so far have managed to do all but Eisenhower, Ford and, of course, since I’m a Californian, Nixon and Reagan’s.   (George Bush’s is still in the planning stages, I believe.)

Some are more interesting and personal than others but last week I really enjoyed the home tour and visit of Franklin D. Roosevelt home,  Presidential Library and Museum in the quaint little village of Hyde Park, New York.  I was struck by the level of Eleanor Roosevelt’s importance and influence in her husband’s career, especially after he was struck by polio at the age of thirty-nine.   She served as his eyes and ears while traveling to places he wasn’t able to go.  She not only has a wing in the Museum/Library dedicated to her but she is the only First Lady who has been honored with having a National Historic Site dedicated to her!   Eleanor Roosevelt National Historic Site  is the location of Vall-Kill, her retreat and later home from 1945 until her death in 1962. 

As I browsed her wing in the presidential library I noted that among her many works was a syndicated column she wrote six days a week from 1935 to 1962.  Reading a snippet I noticed that it was quite short and written in a chatty personal manner.  “Hey, that sounds much like the blogs of today!”  Later on-line I found that the columns have been preserved and found subjects as Housewives, the Peace Corp, White House weddings during WWII, various causes she supports and her life and travels.  The same type things we all blog about although we don’t generally throw names like  “the new king of Saudi Arabia (1954)” and Fidel Castro into our blogs.  I liked My Day February 14, 1954 where she mentions attending an executive committee meeting of the United Nations and then later shares the Girl Scouts recipe for s’mores!

This is her May 3, 1943 column: (just happens to be my birthday)

WASHINGTON, Sunday—I have just read a book by Ethel Gorham: "So Your Husband's Gone to War!" It is entertaining and full of good common sense advice. I think pages 122 and 123 should be read and reread by every woman. It is a universal experience and sometimes it isn't only what happens in marriage.

Sisters and brothers, mothers and sons, girls and their sweethearts have sometimes found that furloughs were not all that they had planned. The men they were with were not the men who went away. Somehow, they were entirely different—moody, perhaps too gay, quite evidently covering something by the gaiety, anxious to forget instead of telling all the experiences which they want so much to hear.

This is just a sample of many other things which you will find useful in this little book and which, on the whole, is quite delightful to read. I loved the little bit about the woman who tried to give up her home and send her child away and found that it created for her husband, off at the war, only a sense of terrible insecurity, because he felt he had no real home which he remembered anywhere in the background to which he could cling, and for which he was actually fighting.

Many a husband would not have been honest enough to stop his wife in time. He might have thought he owed it to the woman to let her do the thing she thought wisest. Yet, as a matter of fact, all she needed to make the effort to go on living as usual, was the knowledge that the home he knew meant security to the man somewhere for beyond her ken.

What it must mean to those men so far away to be able to turn their thoughts for a minute to something they feel is fixed and stable in their world of home, something they love, something that is their real life, not this interim which, somehow or other, they must fight through.

And now, to something in lighter vein. Franklin P. Adams has just gotten out an anthology of light verse. It is called "Innocent Merriment," and while I know these poems are his favorites, I am sure you will find plenty of your own there, too. Who does not like Christopher Morley': "The Gospel of Mr. Pepys," ending:

"When kisses are a shilling each
We should adventure on a few."

No one could grow up without, somewhere along the road, having enjoyed Lewis Caroll's "Father William." So, when you want a pleasant hour, pick up "Innocent Merriment."

E.R.

(COPYRIGHT, 1943, BY UNITED FEATURE SYNDICATE, INC.)

Reads like a modern blog doesn’t it?  If you could like to read more: “My Day”

Eleanor Roosevelt’s serene and peaceful Val-Kill.

Our nation’s Capitol. . . cleared security and cleared security and cleared security again!

Security checks have been the norm at pretty much all of the Smithsonian and government venues we’ve visited during our month in Washington, D.C.  Normally they involve a bag check and maybe a walk through a security sensor but during the course of the tours of the U.S. Capitol and Library of Congress we went through SEVEN security checks, and that’s not including the cursory check as we exit the Library of Congress.  They begin as we enter the Longworth House Office Building to meet at Congressman Farr’s office.   I “beep” when I go through, am “wanded” and pass muster. . .we are in the building!  We met our tour guide, an intern from UC Santa Cruz, and set out on the tour.

This is just the beginning!  We walk down a long hallway between the Longworth and the Cannon House Office buildings, then another underground hall to the Capitol, stop at the security desk in the Capitol where we are issued clip-on badges and also stick-on Capitol tour badges. 

On to the galleries of the House of Representatives and Senate chambers.  On the way to the House of Representatives we wait in a line to surrender cameras and other electronics.  (I was relieved that I had left my purse with our phones in Congressman Farr’s office.)  We walk through the security check point,  I “beep” when I go through, am “wanded” and pass muster and we are seated in the House gallery.

Walking through one of the hallways our group is nabbed by a security person:  “you don’t need those” and takes the clip-on badges.

We leave the House gallery, wind our way back to the security desk, pick up the camera and follow our tour guide back to the (same) elevator. . .hey, that’s the security person we just passed!  Are we stuck in a maze?

Then we are back into another line to surrender my camera --- is that the same room where I surrendered it for the House?  No, this is for the Senate.  I have no idea how we got here!  We weave our way up to the entrance for the Senate Gallery and, you guessed it, walk through another security check point where I “beep”, am “wanded” and pass muster (again,) and we are seated in the Senate gallery where we watch our senators at work.  They are taking a vote on a judicial appointment but don’t sit down and vote.  Instead they wander in, verbally give the clerk their vote and wander back out of the chambers.  We see John McCain!

Us, with Andrew Jackson in the National Statuary Hall in the Capitol.

At the Library of Congress our belongings go through the conveyor belt and we walk through the sensor.  Yes, I “beep” again but, OOPS, I forgot about my IPhone in my pocket!  Back through the process again and I pass muster!

The Great Hall of the Library of Congress. . .one of the most beautiful buildings I’ve ever seen!

During the War of 1812 the British burned the Capitol and the Library of Congress.  Thomas Jefferson had acquired the largest personal collection of books in the United States and offered to sell his library to Congress as a replacement.  Congress purchased Jefferson's library for $23,950.  A second fire on Christmas Eve of 1851, destroyed nearly two thirds of the 6,487 volumes Congress had purchased from Jefferson.  Now, the Library of Congress is attempting to reassemble Jefferson’s original collection and it is currently on special exhibit.   Couldn’t take pictures but it was awesome standing among books that he actually owned, touched and read!  (I know I’ve digressed from my “security story” but he is one of my favorites!)

As we are shooed out of the Library when it closes at 5:30 p.m. I must again open my bag for a final security check!  Whew!

Note:  At one of the security “wandings” the guard asks me if I have an artificial knee or other part. . .I say no, I am in possession of all of my original parts!

Just an ordinary day in Washington, D.C. . .Wow!

After visiting the off-the-National Mall beaten path Smithsonian Renwick Gallery we walked by the northern side of the White House.   While planning for the President’s House George Washington felt that it should be “Not too grand but grand enough” and that’s what it is.

So, since we were there we thought we might as well walk a little further (my feet weren’t hurting THAT MUCH  yet) and go around to the southern entrance.

Security personnel soon moved us away from the sidewalk saying it was a periodic thing they do.  When we noticed that the snipers on the roof of the White House and a couple of the nearby office buildings seemed to be especially vigilant we decided to hang around and see why they had shooed everyone away. 

Soon we saw people gathering on the lawn near the entrance. Something was going on!

Then one lone helicopter made a pass but flew on by.

Followed shortly by three big copters which flew east to west but these three also flew on by. (Sorry, but I couldn’t get all three in one photo.)

and then behind us from the south came ONE, then a SECOND both of which flew over the Washington Monument and the White House, and THEN a THIRD approaching much more slowly.

--- it was Air Force One with the President aboard!  I’m guessing that he was returning from the Ground Zero trip to NYC.

Coming in for the landing.  I could see Secret Service agents moving out to various places on the lawn.

On the ground at precisely 4:00 p.m.  The observers were clapping and taking pictures.  He debarked on the far side but I'm sure I saw his shoes!

A quick couple of minutes and Air Force One took off directly toward. . .

and over our heads!

Quite a special happening we hadn’t planned for. . .WOW!

Lunch. . .and another Carnegie Library!

Found a Carnegie Library by accident yesterday wandering around D.C.  We were driving on Pennsylvania Avenue in the Southeast section of the city when I caught a glimpse (as coach John Madden once said “out of the corner of my right eye”) down a side street. . . Carnegie Libraries have a distinctive architecture.  I told Gary to hook a U, which in the traffic took several blocks but we maneuvered back and there it was....sure appeared to be a Carnegie so I snapped a couple of photos through the window.  When we got home I looked it up and, yes, it is the Southeastern Branch which opened in 1922.  I will have to try and get back and see the interior.  This brings my total to seventy-one.  I don’t know how many are still standing but Andrew Carnegie gave grants for 1,689. . .I have a few more to visit don’t I?

Had lunch in a Cheesecake Factory in Chevy Chase - Eggs Benedict is probably my favorite breakfast and mine was SO good! Gary had a Monte Cristo sandwich he said was delicious - wish I could have had both! (but no, I didn’t!) We were too full for dessert and passed on their delicious cheesecake but wish I had gotten a piece to-go 'cause it would have gone so good last night! Oh well, saved the calories.

Hoopskirts and homes. . .antebellum Natchez

It was a pleasant surprise to arrive in Natchez, Mississippi and learn that we were there for the annual Spring Pilgrimage. (Of course I had no idea what a spring pilgrimage was but it sounded good.)  I soon learned that it has taken place since 1932 and features tours of thirty historic homes and gardens.  Spring Pilgrimage also includes crowning of a king and queen, a Historic Natchez Tableaux, Jazz and Juleps, Flags on the Hill at Sunset, Southern Road to Freedom musical and more but I really just wanted to see the homes.  Natchez lays claim to having five hundred historic homes, not all of which are antebellum, but driving around it seems that many many qualify as antebellum!   We purchased a six-tour ticket package at the Natchez Visitor Reception Center and later added three more of the antebellum homes to our itinerary.  Thought I would share all of the photos I took. . .I’m joking, that would be WAY too many!  Instead, here is an exterior photo and a feature I found to be unique at each of the nine.

House on Ellicott Hill

1798

The docent in the first room of this house said it was ok to take photos. . .after I took this photo in the second room this docent quite firmly informed me that NO photos were allowed!  I like muli-purpose things so found this to be really intriguing.  Behind the top lid is an area to store water and a spigot to fill the wash basin.  The water drains out into a container below the wash basin and you can see what you have when you open the bottom drawer!  No need to use the outhouse during the night!

Texada

1792

Because the exterior walls had disintegrated  into disrepair, during restoration each brick was removed and reversed.

The present owner of Texada costumed in period 1790’s attire.

For decades this fan has been carried by the brides of Texada.  Each bride has signed the back of the fan.

This docent’s nickname is “Jiminy Cricket.”

Beautifully costumed docent in the doorway of Greenlea, the 1855 home across the street from Texada.

The kitchen of Texada.  Amusing that behind us in this room is a modern kitchen with refrigerator, microwave etc.  (Oops, see the flat-screen TV?) Loved her hoop-skirted costume with its yellow sash.

Elms

1850

Elms was originally two-and-a-half stories, with two rooms on each floor.  Later, the rear gallery was enclosed and then again later new two-story galleries were added to completely surround all of the renovations of the house.   Gary remarked that this should have been a “tear-down and re-build” as the interior is quite disjointed!

The home features many many items of sterling silver.  In this room the docent gave complete approval for photos, then in the next room another docent issued a stern NO so I and others in our group gave up.  Elms is now a bed and breakfast so I’m sure the guests take pictures!  Note the wrought-iron circular staircase in the background.

Magnolia Hall

1858

I thought it was interesting that the owner stuccoed  and painted this home to imitate the brownstone homes back east.

An ornate ironwork aquarium/fountain in the garden at Magnolia.

Elgin

built 1792-1840

Unlike most of the other homes we toured which were town homes this is a plantation home.  Owners preferred to live in Natchez and their plantations were across the Mississippi River in Louisiana.

We were greeted by the costumed present-day owner of Elgin.

Jib doors functioned to turn a window into a door.  I wonder why their use hasn’t lasted?

A punkah fan over the dining table served to circulate air and also shoo the flies away.  Of course, it required having a slave to constantly pull the rope!  It is said that very rich folks had one slave dedicated entirely to operating the punkah fan.

Elms Court

1837

Fourth generation owner of Elms Court (in turquoise) chose not to dress in costume but talked extensively about the history and architecture of her home.

A cistern in the background and stairs to nowhere in the garden.

Auburn

1812

Freestanding spiral staircase to the second floor.  The bannister is one continuous piece of wood going up one side and back down the staircase.

Table set for breakfast.  The white cone-shape on the napkin is sugar and the snippers are used to carve off the desired amount.  The black block is tea and is very solid-so different from my loose tea leaves.

No one noticed that they had placed this huge mirror upside down until it had been installed.  No way were they going to risk breaking it so it stands---upside down!  You can see the costumed docent in the mirror.

How would you feel sleeping under a “coffin” style canopy? EWWW!

Melrose

1849

This home was acquired by the National Park Service in 1990 and is probably the most completely preserved antebellum home in the Natchez area.  The columns are in the process of being renovated.

Many of the furnishings in this home are original.  This parlor is splendid with its gilt and bright green draperies and upholstery.

This punkah fan over the dining table is made of wood and, according to our park ranger guide, very heavy.

Do you suppose this sofa was designed to keep courting couples at a distance?  (Just a guess on my part!)

Very romantic room designed by the owner for her daughter Mary Elizabeth as a honeymoon suite.  She continued to live here while her husband Captain Farar Conner fought for the Confederacy.  After the war he walked back home only to learn that Mary Elizabeth and two of their children had died.

Mary Elizabeth’s beautiful pink and ivory silk wedding dress which was created in Paris by the fashion house of Charles Worth who was THE fashion designer of the time.  Because of its age and fragility it is only occasionally displayed-I was lucky to get to see it.

In this letter apparently this slave owner was renting out ten of his slaves to another plantation.  Note that he says “ship” as if they were cargo.

Longwood

construction began in 1860-never completed (and never will be according to the terms of the donation)

The brochure states that it is the largest octagonal house in America.  The war halted construction and Mr. Haller Nutt died in 1864 but his wife Julia and their eight children continued to live in the basement which isn’t a dark dank space but a rather opulent space which opened out into the gardens.

Looking up at the six-story rotunda.

The original packing crate sits where the  Steiff piano was uncrated, in what was to be the parlor. The piano is in the basement home.

Construction stairs which would have been removed had the home been completed.  The brick walls were slated to be covered with stucco.

The loom appears to be in working condition.  All four of the runners which converted the buggy to a sleigh still hang on the wall.

I kept waiting for Gary to throw up his hands and say enough is enough but he surprised me and seemed to enjoy the home tours almost as much as I did.  (At one point several years ago he did this, saying “I’m museumed out!” ) So, for a change we were in agreement-of course lunch at fun places, the Pig Out Inn, La Fiesta Grande, Fat Mama’s Tamales and his favorite Big Momma’s Barbecue, between tours helped keep him interested!