Category: Entertainment

March 3 — Do you share a first name with one of your female ancestors? Perhaps you were named for your great-grandmother, or your name follows a particular naming pattern. If not, then list the most unique or unusual female first name you’ve come across in your family tree.

Have I mentioned yet how much I love writing prompts. I wouldn’t be lying to say I excelled at essay questions in school. Give me a question and a blank piece of paper and I’m ready! Of course, I’m not sure my teachers needed a full page on some of those subjects, but that’s what I gave them none the less.

So to start off, I was not named after anyone in my family. Partly to blame is the fact that I was born before there were “spoilers” in the birthing room. So my Momma was completely positive I was going to be a boy. Thanks for that Mom. ha. Being that she was so sure that I was going to be a boy, she had a name picked out for me. I was going to be Matthew Thorward. Since I’m not Matthew, my Mom and Dad had to scramble for a name. The doctor who delivered me suggested a good irish name of Kathleen and my mom chose my middle name. That my friends is the story of my name and how it came to be.

When I started doing my research, I ran into a lot of Marys, Elizabeths, Jennifers and Janes. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with those names but then I came across names like Llewellyn, Emogene, and Hazel. Once I started researching back further in the Kentucky side of my family tree, some other interesting names came up. These names were interesting to me, but they weren’t unique to the area at the time. These names taught how even back in the 1800s, there were changes in name popularities. Names like Arminda, Clarazene, Dulcena, and Effie were all very popular in the rural Kentucky area that I was researching. Maybe they are all linked to my family in some way, maybe not. These names were all a little different though.  Now if I could only figure out the 100% real name of Zeroah Black-West on my Mom’s side of the tree, I might get somewhere on that side of the family research!

Note: Yes, I added the picture of the unknown baby photo because I backed out of posting my own baby picture. While I was unable to post my own baby picture, I have no conscience when it comes to posting other peoples.

Week 7: Toys. What was your favorite childhood toy? Is it still being made in some form today?

It goes against everything in me to only choose one thing. I have no idea why I’m like that, but I am. So I’ll just make a brief mention of the other toys I loved. My Little Pony. There I said it. I had more My Little Ponies than I did Barbies. I had Barbies too though, and my Momma made their clothes. How awesome was she? I also loved, loved, loved C.U.T.I.E. figurines. If you do a google image search you can find them but I have a link that does better. There was another toy I loved, they were little clear, plastic princesses I think but no one remembers their names. It reminds me of when I was trying to remember the name of a cartoon I watched as a kid. All I could remember was the little girl in the yellow dress flies out the window with a koala bear. My momma was stuck on David the Gnome. She sure loved David the Gnome. HA. It was called Noozles by the way.

Back onto the subject, I’m here to talk about my number one love. They were called Little People and they were made by Fisher Price. I loved these things. I loved them to death. I even talked about them way back in Childhood Car memories week. This one is made out of wood, and it was bought off eBay probably around 10 years ago. I don’t know what happened to my Little People. Most likely they were given to a family friend who had little girls, much like my Barbie collection. The set I had were plastic. If you want to read about the complete history of these (I’m the only one right? haha), there’s a great write up of their evolution here: link. On that page, the ones I’m familiar with are at the bottom of the History page. I had a million of them though and I had all kinds of accessories. It was my most played with toy and it’s the one I associate with my childhood.

My favorite thing to do was make families, and have them go about their day to day. I’d pick up the kids with the school bus and I’d drop them off all over the house on the “bus route”. It’s probably why I’ve switched to The Sims 2 as I got older. Same concept, just on a computer!

Sadly, Little People are no longer how I remember them. A quick trip to the Fisher Price website will show you how they’ve changed. Visiting the website made me want to go out to the shed and dig out the school bus and house (also from that eBay purchase) I know are in there somewhere. It could be fun to compare them right?

Little People today. Picture from Fisher Price website

52 Weeks of Personal Genealogy & History is a weekly series thought up by Amy Coffin and hosted by GeneaBloggers. It encourages genealogy bloggers to share their own memories and history, so that we don’t forget that one day, our own stories will be important to future generations.

Week 6: Radio and Television. What was your favorite radio or television show from your childhood? What was the program about and who was in it?

I must preface this post by saying I was in no way raised by the television. It’s going to look like it briefly but I promise I wasn’t. You’ll just have to take my word for it. Every featured show is there for a reason that I’ll explain. There were plenty more but they weren’t as important as the ones that I am actually featuring.

Saved by the Bell: Saved by the Bell is probably a staple of every child of the 80s and 90s childhood. I remember watching it every Saturday morning through it’s entire run and then even moving onto Saved by the Bell: The New Class. This is probably the first show that I loved enough to watch it every week. It was definitely one of many shows that was played on Saturday mornings but this one was the staple. The others came and went (California Dreams, City Guys, One World) but this one was perfection.

It dealt with real teen issues and is still played today and I still watch it if I catch it on! Zach Morris, played by Mark Paul Gosselar, was cute and charismatic. He was a schemer you just couldn’t help but love. Just like the television audience, Zach’s friends and family couldn’t help but laugh at his antics. Yet Zach definitely had a heart and knew when he was in the wrong. I think my favorite episode was when he was writing a report and made friends with the Indian chief who passed away. Out of all the episodes, that’s the one that still sticks with me. Probably because of the genealogist I didn’t know was in me yet!

Little House on the Prairie: I have a confession to make with this one. I used to watch this one in syndication when I was home sick from school. I wasn’t supposed to watch TV if I was sick but I did anyway. If Mom is reading this now, she’s probably laughing because I doubt I pulled the wool over her eyes! What little girl hasn’t seen this show and loved it? I remember reading at least the first book, but I don’t think I ever made it through the others. The show is what hooked me, and I didn’t know at the time it was a true story!

I think the casting of Melissa Gilbert was perfect. They’ve tried to remake the series again and again but nothing quite measures up. The show was a perfect mix of wholesomeness and history. Looking back, I think this show too was part of the road to my genealogy future. I’ve always been fascinated by the time period this takes place in. I also loved the length of the show and how you saw everyone grow and mature, even Nellie Olson!

Road to Avonlea: This is one of the lesser known shows but it rounds out my top 3. I actually got the DVDs from eBay because I love the show that much. I think I’m still missing the last two seasons but I’ll get them eventually. This was shown on the Disney Channel. It’s a Sullivan Entertainment production, based on Prince Edwards Island in Canada. It’s actually a somewhat continuation of the Anne of Green Gables story. Unofficially of course. The show itself is an original out of Canada and Disney bought distribution rights to it I’m guessing. If you have a little girl that loves the Anne books, this is definitely going to be a hit!

Once again, I was interested in history before I realized what a huge part it would play in my life. The thing I loved about this show was the family dynamic. I didn’t grow up around my cousins and aunts and uncle. So this show was really as close to an extended family as I was getting. I just loved to how Felicity was a brat to begin with but by the end of the show, she was mature and the star! Sarah was a free spirit who had lived a privileged, lonely life only to have it crumble down around her. They started out as foes and turned into the best of friends. Alec and Janet King were Felicity’s parents and Sarah’s Uncle and Aunt. They gave her the family and stability that she needed at the time in her life that she moved to PEI.

Also thrown into the mix, you get little snippets of Anne Shirley! Rachel Lynde is a constant presence and probably as much of a foe to Sarah as she was to Anne! Later you see a softer side when Marilla Cuthbert and Rachel take in orphans Davey and Dora Keith.

Punky Brewster: I’m not going to lie. I’ve always been a bit eccentric. I didn’t realize until recently how much, but it all started with Punky. It’s because of Punky I’m not ashamed of my crazy socks! Don’t get me wrong, they’re always matched, but they are never boring!

Punky is about an orphan who ends up living with Henry. A widower who is a bit of a grump. He can’t resist Punky for long though! Punky is definitely unique with her own style.

Full House: I saved the other kahuna for last! It’s definitely not last place in my heart though. This is another show that I grew with. I remember Michelle Tanner (Olsen Twins, respectively) as a baby all the way through the end of the show. This was a show I never missed!

There’s not much I can say about Full House that everyone else doesn’t already know. It dealt with family issues, school issues, sibling issues, everything! In fact, life imitated art more than once in our house! Once after being entirely fed up with having to share my room with my older sister, I too “moved out” into a less habitable part of the house like DJ. I even played a Full House trick on my Dad when me and my best friend accidentally broke something. We sent him on errands to try and buy time for us to fix the problem! In the end, just like the show, you’ve got to fess up and take your punishment.

52 Weeks of Personal Genealogy & History is a weekly series by Amy Coffin and hosted by GeneaBloggers. It’s purpose is to promote writing your own history down to be preserved for future generations.

Tomorrow I’ll be participating in Super Indexing Sunday. It all started on Facebook and spread from there. I think this is a great idea and what a fun way to spend a Sunday!  Today I’m going to be busy with laundry, cleaning and getting myself ready to take a whole Sunday for myself! I don’t know how many records I’ll end up indexing, but I’m sure whatever I get done will be appreciated.

Continue reading “Super Indexing Sunday” →

52 Weeks of Personal Genealogy and History: Week 4

Describe the house in which you grew up. Was it big or small? What made it unique? Is it still there today?

Now this could get emotional! This week my task it to talk about my childhood home… or homes as I remember it. I’m very fortunate to have not moved very often in my life. I’m hoping that trend continues, but only after I move to a nice, quiet town where I want to spend the rest of my days. I know I’m a little young to be thinking about the rest of my days, but as the town around me grows, I can’t help but realize city life is not for me.

My family tells me we lived in a small trailer when I was born, but moved to the bigger one I do remember later. I’ll have to trust them on this because I was only a few months old at the time and my memory ain’t what it used to be if you get my drift.  We lived in this trailer from my early baby years until I was in Kindergarten. I remember the circumstances around the end of our time there so clearly.

Continue reading “Week 4: The Childhood Homes” →

It’s time for another 52 Weeks of Personal Genealogy & History post! This week the topic is cars.

Week 3: Cars. What was your first car? Describe the make, model, and color, but also any memories you have of the vehicle. You can also expand on this topic and describe the car(s) your parents drove and any childhood memories attached to it.

I don’t have a drivers license so I don’t have any first car memories yet. I’ll just stick with cars from my childhood. There are two that I remember well, but my family had a lot of cars before that.

Continue reading “Week 3: Cars” →

It’s time for another Personal History entry from me! This week’s topic is:

What was winter like where and when you grew up? Describe not only the climate, but how the season influenced your activities, food choices, etc.

Winter is never really the same around here. We’ve had periods of snowy winters and periods of no snow.

Continue reading “Week 2: Winter” →

This year I’ll be participating in the weekly series, 52 Weeks of Personal Genealogy & History. It’s a joint effort between GeneaBloggers and Amy Coffin at the We Tree blog. Every week there will be a new topic for me to write about my own past and family history.

Week 1: Did your family have any New Year’s traditions? How was the New Year celebrated during your childhood? Have you kept these traditions in the present day?!

For as long as I can remember, we’ve always done movie marathons on New Years Eve. In fact, that’s our family activity. When we were little, Dad would take us to the video store and we’d have to agree on one movie and then he’d get a “grownup” movie. It would be all of us, and then as we got older it was just me and my sister. We would actually stay up and watch whatever marathon was on TV whether it be a Corey Haim/Corey Feldman marathon on TNT or it was the top 100 music videos on MTV. We weren’t real formal about it.

This tradition has evolved from a marathon night to a family movie night. Now we usually just watch one movie (this year Inception), and we make snacks and drink sparkling cider. I know it’s tame but it’s our little tradition and I can’t see us ending it anytime soon! One day I’m definitely going to instill this tradition in my own family. My best memories growing up are the family movie nights. Whether it be New Years, Halloween, Christmas, and of course birthdays!

The above image is a free clipart image from the Microsoft Office website. I do not own it and am not using it to make money. I am just incapable of having an image free entry.

Thanks for your opinions on my dilemma yesterday! Both on twitter and in the comments. 🙂 I decided to have a little fun today before I got started on work and last minute wrapping for Christmas.

I’ve been catching up on The Generations Project. I’ve been recording it on my DVR for the last few weeks and I’ve finally found some time to catch up. While I was watching, I realized I’d like to see if there were previous episodes available to view online (there is!). While I was there, I decided to do some of the fun activities they have on their site. I usually skip by those things but for some reason I decided to do them this time. As a website designer I really want to make more of an effort to view bells and whistles on other websites so I can learn more!

Continue reading “Wednesday Fun!” →