10 random things you may or may not know about me

This is a meme going around Facebook that I participated in. Since it includes a bit of my own personal history, I thought I'd include it here on my blog.

1. I grew up in the country and remember the outhouse. It always creeped me out because there were spiders. Also going out there in the dark was scary because it was far from the house. I had nightmares about that place, the earth cracking and opening up and millions of spiders pouring out from the cracks. brrr. I still shudder to think of that dream.  I remember when we got an indoor bathroom, how luxurious that was. I don't remember where we took baths before that.

2. Mom's counter tops and cupboards were orange crate boxes stacked on top of one another with a board on top and homemade curtains on one of those spring curtain-"rods" to hold them in place. I got under the curtain and wrote my name in chalk on the orange crate in my 4-year-old hand writing. On the wall of the kitchen was a saying which I will never forget which read: "I had no shoes and I complained, until I met a man who had no feet." We looked at that while we did dishes every day.

3. I remember having my tonsils out, when I was four. The doctor came to my room the night before the operation and knelt down by my bedside and said a prayer for a successful surgery. I was comforted and wasn't afraid. But when they put me under with ether, I could hear my name echoing, and my hand-printed chalk name floated in all sizes before my eyes. It scared me.

4. I remember a trip to Pennsylvania when I was two. I remember loving the tunnels and standing on the bump between the back and front seats (there were no seat belts) and exclaiming, "come anuder hole!" I also remember when we got to Pittsburgh, I was looking for the "clock shop on a corner in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania", like Perry Como sang. It wasn't until just a few years ago that I found out it was a "pawn shop"!!!!!! all these years I thought it was a clock shop on a corner. I remember asking my mom where the clock shop was as we passed all the corners in Pittsburgh. My parents giggled. I listened to Perry Como and Tennessee Ernie Ford in my young life. I always thought I would marry Tennessee. I was in love. He taught me much of what I knew about my Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ through his beautiful songs.

5. I attended a four-room/8-grade school with a hot-lunch cafeteria in the basement. Mrs. Lolis was our beloved cook. I know this makes me sound ancient, but I don't feel that old. . . There were two grades per room/teacher. Our principal was also the 7th and 8th grade teacher. My first and second grade teacher, Mrs. Winslett, owned a skating rink, and Friday nights we would go roller skating. She was there, ringing the bell and turning the crank on a display board which would say, "Reverse Skate, Backwards Skate, Girls only, Boys only, couples only, etc".  Mrs. Winslett saved the boxes from the candy bars and put our phonics cards in them. I loved Phonics, maybe it was the association with the chocolate smell?

Once, my best friend and I were sent to the Principal's "office" for giggling in class. We had to write our times tables from 1 to 12 in front of the 7th and 8th graders. It was mortifying and I learned them permanently that day, never to forget. But our Principal, Mr. Gauthier was also an amazing gymnastics coach, and when our country school was closed, he moved onto our Jr. High, as a science teacher, where he taught my friend, a few other girls and myself to do many gymnastic stuff. We loved that man. We had ink-well desks in 5th/6th grades, but more modern ones in the first four grades. I still have some of these ink-well desks from when the school closed down.

6. I gave birth to my third child alone in the bathtub after I drove myself to the hospital and they sent me home, telling me that I was NOT in labor, even though I was a week overdue. . . When Dave got home (he had to call for a substitute so he could leave the control room of the power plant) and found me with a brand new baby in my arms, he turned almost as white as the wall and slowly sat down. The hospital took us serious when we showed up with a brand-newborn baby in our arms. . .

7. I LOVE dolls, and have several walls in my sewing room filled with stacked boxes of Barbie dolls on display which includes all the princesses and princes, and the two who sing in harmony. I also own the Carol Burnette one from their skit, Went With the Wind, with the curtain rod and curtains draped over her shoulders, Farrah Faucett and Jack Sparrow (yum).  I own three Patty Playpal (three-year-old dolls) and usually have one in the front room dressed for the season. For Halloween, I dressed her in the costume I'd made for my own three-year-old son. She sometimes freaks people out because she is so life-like. But I think she's cute.

8. I sang my first solo when I was five for my dad's shop Christmas party. I have sung in a beloved 100-voice SATB choir, the Choral Arts Society of Utah, in Salt Lake for the last 10 years, driving 300 miles round-trip every week, and sometimes up to three times in one week on the week of performance. I served 7 or 8 years on the board of directors as the Executive Secretary and still have many business cards to prove it. 

We have sung in Carnegie Hall, at Larry Miller's funeral, the Kennedy Center on Memorial Day, in Montana with the Helena Symphony Orchestra, in Austria for Mozart's 250th birthday, along with 4-6 performances every year around the community. Our beloved and very talented choir director, Sterling Poulson, is also the channel 2 news meteorologist. This Christmas I will sing in my very last concert with the choir (I am moving out of state) and our guest performer will be Colin Raye. Previous guests have included Nathan and David Osmond, sons of Alan Osmond, George Dyer, Bar-J Wranglers, Michael Ballam, Joseph Paur and several others I can't think of. I also sang in an 8-person backup choir for Lyle Lovett.

9. My hubby and I met at the student branch of our Church, and were friends for two years before we married. We have been married for 39 years and are still best friends. We have six children, three boys and three girls, and twenty grandchildren, ten boys and ten girls. When the last grand daughter was born she evened out her family to two girls, two boys and the grand children's numbers. When her dad was born, he evened out our count as well. The oldest boy and girl were born in March, the youngest boy and girl were born in February and the middle boy and girl were born in January.  They are scattered from the east to the west coast and several in between. They have awesome spouses I love them all.

My husband recently retired so I have twice the hubby and half the pay check and it is just fabulous. We have such a great time together and are still very much in LOVE!
I spent 8 years as a farmer's wife, helping out with the lambing, cattle drives, driving tractor, irrigating, and canning 30 bushels of fruits and vegetables every year. I miss the beautiful scenery from that farm. We are moving to a home on 5 acres on a mountain-side, so we might be able to pick up the fun parts of farming again. . .

10. My sister and I went on a 2000 mile road trip for a month when I was 23 and she was 19, in Ted Bundy country, camping out at nights in our car at the road-side rest stops. In the years before cell phones, we called home every night from a pay phone using the operator and person-person long distance. Somehow the code would include where we were, and my parents would say that person was not there and not accept the call most times unless they wanted to talk. Years later we discovered we fit the profile of Ted Bundy's victims.