My Brother's Birthday Cakes 1972- 1991

 

I couldn't find a really good photo of the cake from my brother's first birthday. I included 2 from 1982 because part of it got cut off. We have more photos of his cakes than mine.

When I first started my blog, my posts had all of the real names of family members and friends for the most part but over the past couple of years, I have been using entries from my journal story which have had name changes. This post has the former. 

Some of My Birthday Cakes-1970-1990

I have a couple more photos but there isn't that good of a view of the cakes in them so I left them out of this post. I probably should have just posted them in a different way so you can see them better without having to click onto each segment- maybe I will redo it like that another time. This is the photo document that I did of them to print out and put in my Childhood Memories Journal.

 

Figure Skating Show 1991

My mother, brother, and I went to this show at Madison Square Garden. I wish that I had been keeping a journal back then so I would have the details about it now. I did write on the back of one photo that Underhill and Martini did their routine to "Unchained Melody". I forgot to write the names of the skaters on some of them and don't recall who they are. I do know that I had a very good time at this event.

 

Brian Boitano and Katarina Witt-

                             
                                               Barbara Underhill and Paul Martini-

                                                 
                                                                   Others-

                                              
                                                                  Finale-

September 24, 2016- Amusement Parks

I’ve been to Great Adventure 3 times with my family and once with Mom, Helen and Kathy. I also went on my own one day, mostly for the Oak Ridge Boys concert. I did go on some rides too, like the Buccaneer and the Parachute. The water rides are the best ones there.

   Aunt Ann drove us through the safari the first time. They stopped letting people do this 3 or 4 years ago. Fran and Mom went on Lightning Loops but I was too scared as were Mike and Missy. We all did go on the Runaway Train though. I was even scared on that roller coaster; it felt like I was going to fall out of it at one point.

   It was just Missy, Aunt Ann, Mom and I the 2^nd time. I was a little frightened in the Haunted House; that burned down like a year or 2 later. We saw a water show- dolphins must have been a part of this. I wish that I could remember more about that.

   Our cousins Jen, Terry and Mandy came with Mike, Mom and I in the late 80s. The bobsled ride was very cool but they had to keep temporarily shutting it down for repairs. We got stuck upside down in the Space Shuttle ride for a little while which was scary and painful.

   Wow- I can’t believe that it has been 25 years since I was last there. I am no longer interested in going on most amusement park rides so it is doubtful that I would ever return to that place. I’d love to go to Disney World again though; that’s a different story. Yikes- 33 years since that vacation to Florida and 40 since our first time there.

 I was brave enough to go on The Loch Ness Monster both times that I was at Busch Gardens, VA- once with the Girl Scouts in 1982, then 4 years later with my family. The Big Bad Wolf was pretty scary there too but Mom and I kind of liked it. I get anxious and frightened just thinking about being on any roller coasters now.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Note- The Great Adventure 1980 brochure and Map are from the internet.

 

 

 

 

February 28, 2015- Our Town-Part 2

Our Apartments

I loved our old apartment. That place is in most of my dreams probably because it felt like home which this one that we’ve been at since October 1993 never really has.

   Mom’s parents had lived there since the mid or late 1940s. When her father died in 1967, her mother let Mom and Dad have the place. She moved to her brothers’ farm in South Jersey.

  The unit that we lived in had 3 single floor apartments. Dad had lived in the middle one with his family. Mike and I used to sometimes call his mother our grandma-next-door and Mom’s was our grandma-at-the-farm.

   Our grandfather had built a small addition on the front of the apartment in which we kept our fridge and a cabinet. This gave us more room in the kitchen which was pretty small.

    My parents used to sleep on a hide-a-bed that was in the living room when Mike and I each had our own rooms. Mike was in the small one at first and I was in the bigger one. We had to share the big room once our parents moved into the smaller in 1977 or 1978.

   My parents built my brother a room in the basement and I moved into theirs in the early 80s. That sky blue room was my bedroom for a few years. The sliding door closet was so cool. Sometimes I used to hide in there, hugging my Poochie bear and crying when I was very upset about my parents arguing or being picked on at school.

   I was so happy when they built me a bigger room in the basement. It had brown paneling and plush dusty rose carpeting. The other section of it was like a living room for Mike and me. Dad still had his little section near the washer and dryer.

   Mom’s father had built cabinets that were hanging on the wall. We stored all sorts of things inside of them including games, toys, Tupperware, and other kitchen stuff.

   I loved the paneling and carpeting in that apartment. I’m sure that a lot of people would find the former type of décor cheesy, tacky, and very outdated. The township made us tear most of the ground floor paneling down and paint those walls before we moved.

   The 3 of us would still be there if Dad hadn’t moved into his mom’s place during and after the divorce in 1992. No, we really should all be living on our own and it’s pathetic that we don’t.

   We are now in a two floor, 4 apartment unit on the other side of our very small town. There are 3 other kinds of units in it. I can’t believe that we have been here for 22 years. That is almost as long as we were at the old one.

   My room is smaller which sucks. I can’t even really rearrange my furniture in it like I used to enjoy doing occasionally in my basement bedroom. The cellar is small and pretty creepy too. I shouldn’t even be complaining; at least I still have a home.

   I can’t picture living anywhere else but in this town. I have been here all of my life. The 75^th anniversary of it is coming up this fall. They are having a big celebration then. I am already anxious about going to it.

   A big part of me wants to skip out on it like I did for the 60^th one because of this issue. I was at the 50^th but I don’t really remember much about it. My brother and mother know many people in town but I don’t. I don’t even go to our neighbor’s annual barbecue party with them.

Cabinets

 

Furnished basement 1982

Sliding door closet-my room 1984

My room 1991

Mike's room 1985

Front porch 1972

 

Front porch and fridge 1983

Front porch addition 1981

 

 

 

 

 

October 12, 2015- Cute Doggies and Other Animals- Part 1

 I felt like crying when I saw a dead cat in the middle of the road when driving to the grocery store on Sunday. I remember when Mike, Kelly and I were walking home from school and saw a doggie that had been hit by a car. A man went out into the street to help it and told us that we should go home. I hope that the poor doggie was alright but I have this bad feeling that it wasn’t.

  I get so emotional about animals. They are also in the highlight reels of my mind from trips that I have taken. There was this adorable little calf at the Farmer’s Museum in Cooperstown, N.Y. that I was petting. She got some snot on my light blue pants. I have a picture of her and me. I barely remember anything else about that place or the Baseball Hall of Fame.

  We have pictures of me on a pony and petting a deer at the Turtleback Zoo in 1974. I wish that I could remember this. I pet goats at Hershey Park in 1975 and at a farm that had a corn maze that Matt and I went through in 2000.

  On a Girl Scout trip to the Bronx Zoo in 1980, I rode a camel and saw raccoons and otters. We went to The National Zoo in Washington D.C. and saw the pandas and I’m pretty sure otters too. I definitely saw them there in 1997 and even took photos.

   My troopmates and I went horseback riding during a trip to Virginia in 1982. That the only time that I’ve ever done so and probably would be too afraid to try it again.

  Mike and I liked feeding the ducks in Rahway Park when we were little kids. Helen J. bought a bunny rabbit over to our house one day and we were petting that. I held a baby bunny at the vet’s office a few years ago. It was so adorable.

  We buried a dead bird in our yard in the mid-1970s. A baby blue jay went under Mr. C’s deck about 10 years ago. I should have tried rescuing it or asked someone to help me do so. The mommie was looking for it. It must’ve been so scared and lonely. I know how it feels. I feel so guilty about this. Mr. C’s cat probably ate it or it just died of starvation.

  Mike rescued a baby groundhog from the middle of the road. We tried taking it to the woods near our house but it kept trying to cross the street. We took it to our house and kept it overnight. I didn’t think of taking it to the emergency vet place and was waiting until Monday morning to bring it to our vet.

  We didn’t even know that it was a groundhog at first. Mike was calling it a hedgehog but I don’t think that we have those in the U.S.  I thought that it was a guinea pig. I was saying that if it’s a girl I’d call it Molly and if it’s a boy it’s Simon.

  Our vet’s office only takes cats and dogs so we had to bring it to the one in Clark. The lady there said that they could call a wildlife rehabilitation place that would take care of it. The poor thing was dehydrated. It wouldn’t drink the water that we put in a dish for it. I called them a couple of hours later to check up on it. She said “He’s doing fine”.  Yeah!  Simon was okay. We found out it was a groundhog from them.

Calf- Farmer's Museum 1987

Turtleback Zoo 1974

Rahway Park 1972

Hershey Park 1975

Raccoons-1980

Bronx Zoo 1980- otter

D.C.-National Zoo 1997

Simon the baby groundhog

 

Note- last photo is from the internet- I wish that I had thought to take a picture of the baby groundhog!