* WHEN IT RAINS IT POURS *

I chose today's blog post title for three reasons:

 

1) It's been raining here so hard, for so long, that I just keep thinking, When it rains, it pours. (and when will it ever stop?)

 

2) I love the Morton Salt logo and slogan!

 

3) Let's call it "Nostalgic Thursday!"

 



 

Morton Salt girl - 1956
 

This is the Morton Salt image that I remember as a little girl. Our home always had a container Morton Salt. Mother not only cooked meals, she baked all kinds of goodies, and every recipe called for salt then, didn't it??

And maybe one of the reasons I loved looking at the little Morton Salt girl was because she looked like me....or I looked like her!


P.S. Our dad always got a kick out of the fact that my brother and I could sing all of the cigarette commercial songs! Boy, how times have changed.

Do you remember any slogans or logos from your childhood? Please share!

* Nostalgic Sundays *

Time for Another Nostalgic Sunday

Last year on November 30th, I wrote about Doris Day. It had to do with coming across a blogger's profile which said she loves Doris' movies. I have to admit I've probably watched every single movie of hers, numerous times. When I was growing up, I wished I looked like her, could sing like her, and be in movies like her. Well, we all know that didn't happen!

(Doris in the 1950s - courtesy Google)

BUT, as I also wrote in that November post, she did save my life!

(Doris in the 1960s - courtesy Google)

I actually wrote to Miss Day many years ago, telling her that reading her biography gave me the courage to get out of a bad marriage. A chapter in my memoir, Doris Day, A.E. Hotchner, and Me explains it all.

Would you believe I received a reply?? I sure did! She thanked me for writing. (I imagine she had a secretary who answered all her correspondence, but there was her signature.....as far as I know!) And can you also believe I have misplaced that note?? Yep. But, I know it is here, somewhere. I've looked in all the places I would keep something as important as that. I actually kept it in the same file for years. Why and how it got moved, I have no idea. Finding it is high on my List of Things to Do.

I'm writing about Doris again today because her 88th birthday is April 3rd. I have other blog posts already planned for the week, and where better to depict her than Nostalgic Sunday?

* Welcome to my newest follower, Gwen Buchanan. I hope you'll stop by often and always enjoy what you read and see! Thank you! * (A funny side note: I reached 300 Followers with Jessie, on Wednesday the 28th, and right away lovely Gwen became 301....until today, that is. Somewhere along the line, I lost somebody, so now I'm at 300 again. And that is perfectly OKAY. I understand those kinds of things. So, Gwen, if you'd like to receive a tiny gift for being my 2nd 300th Follower, please let me know!!

Que sera sera
Whatever will be will be
The future's not ours to see
Que sera sera



Doris Day Saved My Life

As I blog hopped the other day, I came across one that really intrigued me....but do I remember whose it was, or how I got there? Of course not. One of the things I liked about this particular blog was that in her Profile, she said she loved Doris Day movies. But it's not because of Doris or any of her leading men. I think it had something to do with the furniture decor in the 60s, and she may have mentioned Doris' costumes, too....but I'm not sure.



(Doris in the 1950s - courtesy Google)



When I first saw the name "Doris Day," I thought, OMG, another Doris Day fan! But it wasn't the case, and that's okay. I won't hold it against her! ☺



(Doris in the 1960s - courtesy Google)

Just last night I read an article about Doris releasing a CD this Friday. What a surprise, because she chose to walk away from the Hollywood lifestyle many years ago.

And as far as Doris saving my life.....I can honestly say that she did, in more ways than one. A chapter in my memoir explains it all.

Welcome to my newest followers, Laura Barnes & Cheryl. I hope you'll stop by often and always enjoy what you read and see! Thank you!


Que sera sera
Whatever will be will be
The future's not ours to see
Que sera sera

* Nostalgic Sundays *

Happy Nostalgic Sunday, Everyone!

After looking at some charming "way back when" photos on Kathy's blog yesterday, I decided to attempt to post some of my own here. The problem is....trying to take a picture of a picture, and with MY camera, the results aren't very good. I couldn't get half the ones I wanted because it just wouldn't focus. But...for Nostalgic Sunday.......

This is my mom. Isn't she adorable??
She has on a tiny necklace and what looks like a mesh shawl.
This would've been taken in early 1916.
(Yes, she was almost 40 years old when I was born.)

These are my two (older!) sisters and me. I'm in the middle.
[I think it's obvious we hadn't fixed our hair yet!]
To my left (purple shirt) is my deceased sister Jo Ann.
To my right (navy shirt) is my sister Marian, who lives in Atlanta.
This was taken in March of 1983 when we were in Iowa.
A little over a year later, Jo Ann died from a brain tumor.
(She didn't even know about it at this time.)

Remember my Illinois neighbors I wrote about on October 9th?

¸ ¸ ¸¸¸

Well, here they are at my 3rd Birthday Party!!

The little boy in the striped shirt and the girl in the checkered dress next to him.
I don't know if that's me in the back right corner, or not.
But the little boy in the back, by the door, is my brother, Mike.

 
"Oh, for the good old days when people would stop Christmas shopping when they ran out of money." ~ Author Unknown

* Nostalgic Sundays *

Thoughts about Nostalgic Sunday:

When I was a young girl, Sundays meant going to Mass. Sometimes my mom made homemade donuts after we got home. That was a special treat. Other times, we had bacon and eggs, or pancakes. No plain old cold cereal on a Sunday. (We never went out to eat for breakfast! Whoever heard of such a thing?! In fact when I was really young, I'm pretty sure the only times we ate out was when we were on summer vacations, and stopped at those roadside restaurants. That, too, was special.)

Sundays meant the "funny papers" or just the "funnies." Even when I was too young to read, I still loved to lie on the floor and look at all the colorful drawings, trying to figure out what each little story was about.

Sunday evenings also meant certain TV shows: The Ed Sullivan Show. The Wonderful World of Disney. Lassie. I wasn't very old when I'd already figured out that Lassie lived with a bunch of not-too-smart humans. (Whenever our previous dog, Tiger-Gal, would bark at us because she obviously wanted something, The Ronald and I would say to her, "What is it girl? Is it Timmy? What?? He fell down the well?! OMG!")

And that brings me to the submission I sent Friday evening to Chicken Soup for the Soul. It's the humorous story about our first dog, Rocky, and his encounter with a houseplant. ☺

(I Can't Believe My Dog Did That!)

"Now, Andy, before you go traipsing around the country on any manhunt, you come along home and have dinner first." -- Aunt Bee        

* Nostalgic Sundays *

It's time for another Nostalgic Sunday.

 

This time of year when it begins to be a bit cooler and the sun sets earlier, I get in the mood for good, old-fashioned comfort food. (which is what Aunt Bee prepared every day, I think!) On Friday, I wrote about making meatloaf for Lynn's blog so what did I do today? Bought fresh ground meat! I'll be whipping up a meatloaf dinner today, complete with baked potatoes, and various veggies.

I also have a new chili recipe I'll make soon....in my crock pot. And I have a few casserole recipes to make and freeze for later. Yummy goodness! Mmmm. Is your mouth watering? Mine sure is.

I also have to mention the fabulous Andy Griffith. During my quick lunch today, the TV was on and I came across the movie: No Time for Sergeants. I only watched for about ten minutes, but during that short period of time, I laughed out loud at his backwoods, naive ways, especially when he described trying to take the reading test. There's no way I could explain it and do it justice, you'll just have to watch the movie sometime. ☺

Also, Welcome to my newest follower, Jennifer Shirk. I hope you'll stop by often and always enjoy what you read and see! Thank you!

Andy Taylor: Opie! Time to come in, son.

Opie Taylor: Aw Pa, just a little while longer... please?
Andy Taylor: Well, OK.
[to Barney]
Andy Taylor: Daylight's precious when you're a youngin'

* Nostalgic Sundays *

It's time for another Nostalgic Sunday.

I think I've mentioned more than once that I love iced tea in the summertime.

No matter what cold drink you sip or guzzle in hot weather, the drinking glass (whether it's really glass or plastic, etc.) tends to get tiny droplets of moisture on the outside.

When I was a little girl, in the 1950s, no kitchen was without very important, priceless items, made just for that little inconvenience.......

Little Terrycloth "Sweaters"!

How many of you remember these? You wouldn't believe how time consuming it was to find a set of these in the twenty-first century! I have a set of four: hot pink, pale pink, bright yellow and pale blue.

How I love drinking my iced tea, or Diet soda, from a glass filled with ice cubes.....using my "little terrycloth sweater"!

P.S.  After posting this, I searched online for somewhere to buy these cute little terry cloth covers, and I hit the pay dirt when I wound up on The Vermont Country Store, because they not only have the adorable covers, but also the fabulous, colorful aluminum tumblers of my childhood! These are the drinking glasses we had and used the "sweaters" on!! ☺

(Both photos courtesy The Vermont Country Store)

 "Summer is the time when one sheds one's tensions with one's clothes, and the right kind of day is jeweled balm for the battered spirit. A few of those days and you can become drunk with the belief that all's right with the world." -- Ada Louise Huxtable

* Nostalgic Sundays *

I'm a nostalgic gal. I love old TV shows like The Andy Griffith Show (only the B&W episodes, ya know!) I'm particularly drawn to the lovely citizens of Mayberry because this fictional town reminds me so much of the real-life hometown of my parents and grandparents: Greenfield, Iowa.

When I was a little girl we went to Greenfield every summer for vacation. It was a magical time. The late 1950s, life was slow and easy, we young kids could walk or ride bikes all over town. I have such fabulous memories of those days, some of which will be included in my memoir.

Today I thought of trying to begin another weekly post and call it Nostalgic Sundays. I'm not really sure what I'll post or if I can even come up with something every Sunday, but I'm going to try. And if any readers decide to post something nostalgic on their blogs on Sundays, let me know and I'll be sure to stop by!

That's it for this Sunday, and surprisingly I've already thought of topics for at least two more Sundays.

"There is a lovely warmness about feelings of nostalgia as though in one's head one is putting on a pair of comfy old slippers and curling up in front of a fire."  - William E. Geist

** Bits & Pieces About My Mother **

As I said last week, I posted a lot of memories and photos for my (deceased) dad's birthday, but I kind of just skipped right past my mom's and I certainly didn't intend to do that. She was born on August 6th, 1915. (If you noticed the date of my dad's birth, she was nine years older than he was.) She would've been 95 years old! Happy Belated Birthday, Mom!

Mother was a true homemaker in the 1950’s kind of way.

(courtesy: countryinthetown. blogspot)

She cooked homemade meals and made wonderful baked goods. She always let me help, too, even if I really was more of a hindrance. I couldn’t have been happier for those first few years of my life, but then my carefree days came to an abrupt end when my dad decided to leave.

(Mid 1950's - summer vacation)

She had already endured the loss of one husband. Her first husband was killed in World War II. And then, her second one decided he didn’t want to be married to her anymore. I know she was devastated by both losses, but probably more so by my dad, because he chose to leave. She never did get over that. I remember feeling sad and helpless sometime because I couldn’t do or say something that would make her happy again.

Looking back on it now, I'm sure she suffered from depression. There wasn't a whole lot of joy in our house from that point on. There weren't the kinds of medications to help then, either.

There's so much more to the story, but that my dear friends, is all for now. The rest is in the book.....

**After reading the first few comments, I decided to post the link to the story I wrote about my parents, that was accepted and published in Chicken Soup for the Soul; Divorce & Recovery. I've mentioned it before, but many readers may not have seen it.  It was also chosen to be published on Belief Net.

"I was very mad at my father and I wanted him to die so I could remember him the way he was before he left us, not what he had turned into." -- Written by a nine year old in www.divorceandkids.com

( I can remember thinking the same kinds of things....It took me many years to forgive him.)