Five Days of Family Photo Stories: Miss Mulligan's Girls

Recently Gail Dever wrote about a very cool idea on her blog. Her post is called Writing about your life — and your ancestors’ lives — in five photos She inspired me to follow suit in a blog meme called Five Days of Famiiy Stories 

Just choose 5 photos that you love from your collection of shoeboxes and albums. Feature one each day on your blog or in your personal journal. Tell the story of the photo - where was it taken, who is in it, who took it, what year was it taken, what emotion does it invoke when you look at it, etc. 

 

This is my last photo in this series

This is a photo of my beloved grandmother, Ruth Simpson, in Miss Mulligan's Girls, in the Ellington School in Ramsgate Kent England. It was taken circa 1902 when she was 8 years old. Grandma is the young girl in the middle of the back row.

I am lucky enough to have a few photos of Grandma in the dance group in other years. What surprises me is that she never mentioned this to me. Yet she was the story-teller.

As I a little girl I would listen, fascinated, to her stories of her childhood, of her parents and grandparents, and of leaving England for Canada at the age of 19.  

These photos came to me a few years ago from her youngest daughter, my 93 year old aunt.

Five Days of Family Photo Stories: 5 Sisters in Hats

My friend and fellow blogger Gail Dever wrote about a very cool idea on her blog. Her post is called Writing about your life — and your ancestors’ lives — in five photos

She inspired me to follow suit in a blog meme called Five Days of Family Photo Stories.

Just choose 5 photos that you love from your collection of shoeboxes and albums. Feature one each day on your blog or in your personal journal. Tell the story of the photo - where was it taken, who is in it, who took it, what year was it taken, what emotion does it invoke when you look at it, etc.

Here is my photo and story for today:

 

Cabinet Card taken ca 1905 St. Mary's Ontario Canada

This photograph is of four Purdue sisters - Margaret born 1875, Louise born 1881, Nellie born 1882 and Carolyn 1877. The sisters were milliners in Toronto Ontario, and these wonderful hats are their own creations.

I love the variations they created with two very flamboyant hats in the back, one on the right front much more restrained, and on the left front, one very simple hat. I've often wondered - do the different styles reflect their different personalities or was it simply due to inexperience versus experience in hat making! 

All in all this is one of my favorite photos. 

The gal standing on the right strikes a casual yet cocky pose with her arm resting on the chair and her head tilted slightly. She seems to be saying "Okay world, here I am. What are you going to do with me!" I find it significant that her hat is the most flamboyant. I suspect she was a very confident young lady. 

By contrast the sister seated on the left seems to almost disappear. She is rigid, her body seems so very tiny and insignificant. That simple and tiny hat on her head also adds to the idea that she may have been shy and timid.

 

Five Days of Family Photo Stories: Ribbons and Bows

Recently Gail Dever wrote about a very cool idea on her blog. Her post is called Writing about your life — and your ancestors’ lives — in five photos

She inspired me to follow suit in a blog meme called Five Days of Family Photo Stories.

Just choose 5 photos that you love from your collection of shoeboxes and albums. Feature one each day on your blog or in your personal journal. Tell the story of the photo - where was it taken, who is in it, who took it, what year was it taken, what emotion does it invoke when you look at it, etc. 

This photo was taken in a studio in Guelph Ontario in 1923. Just look at the bows in my mother and aunt's hair! How on earth did my Grandmother find the time to make them look so sweet? And the ringlets are amazing. I wonder if they had electric curling irons back then or did Grandma have to heat the irons on the stovetop?

I wonder if Grandpa Fuller helped out or did he make himself scarce while Grandma was getting her three daughters ready for this photo? Grandma could get pretty stressed out so I suspect she was a tad irritable during the process. No doubt my mother had strenuous objections to being all dolled up and having her hair put in curls! Mother is the middle daughter sitting down and she's 7 years old in this picture.

Although photographers often had standing subjects pose with their hands on the person seated in front, I'm thinking that older sister Lily's hands on my mom's shoulders were to make sure my mother stayed in her seat!  

Do you think Grandpa took them all out for ice cream afterwards? I hope so but knowing Grandma I doubt it. No doubt she would not want their dresses to get messy. Maybe they got to go home and change. I imagine Grandma had a headache and would want to lie down so it's very possible Grandpa took Lily and my mom out for a treat. I never knew him but according to his daughters he was pretty laid back and easy-going. 

Do your ancestors have a story to tell? Maybe it's time to give them a voice through a photo.

Five Days of Family Photo Stories: An Engagement Outing

Recently Gail Dever wrote about a very cool idea on her blog. Her post is called Writing about your life — and your ancestors’ lives — in five photos

She inspired me to follow suit in a blog meme called Five Days of Family Photo Stories.

Just choose 5 photos that you love from your collection of shoeboxes and albums. Feature one each day on your blog or in your personal journal. Tell the story of the photo - where was it taken, who is in it, who took it, what year was it taken, what emotion does it invoke when you look at it, etc.

 

This is a photo of my mother and father, probably in the spring or summer of 1935. They aren't married yet and Dad is giving Mother a lovely bouquet of flowers. Look at her happy face! Mother rarely smiled or laughed as a parent, and this picture lets me know that she once had a life that made her happy. Dad looks like he's hamming it up! Dad was 23 years old and Mother was 19 in 1935. I love seeing them so young and obviously in love.

Standing next to my father is my Grandfather (Mother's dad). It looks like he's pinning  a flower on Uncle Joe's sweater and Uncle Joe looks pleased as can be. Uncle Joe was Dad's younger brother and he would have been 10 years old. The young girl on the far right is my mother's youngest sister Eileen. Auntie "I" as we call her, was 12 years old that year. I think how nice it is that the two families have gone on a picnic or an outing together. 

I bet Mom and Dad are newly engaged and the families are getting to know each other. I think my Grandmother (Mother's mother) must have taken the picture and even that is hard to imagine! But she is missing from the picture and should have been there if the families were on an outing. 

My Auntie "I" is the only person in that photo who is still alive and that makes me ponder life so this is my thinking photograph. There they all are - young and happy and enjoying the day, but time moves on, and as it must, it extracts its toll and ends for all of us. The poignancy of this moment, frozen forever in a snapshot, says so much more than it appears on first glance.  

It reminds me to embrace every moment with as much joy as possible for life is fragile and fleeting. This quote springs to mind:

"Be happy for this moment. This moment is your life.” ― Omar Khayyám, The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám

Five Days of Family Photo Stories: Two Little Girls in 1917

Recently Gail Dever wrote about a very cool idea on her blog. Her post is called Writing about your life — and your ancestors’ lives — in five photos

She inspired me to follow suit in a blog meme called Five Days of Family Photo Stories.

Just choose 5 photos that you love from your collection of shoeboxes and albums. Feature one each day on your blog or in your personal journal. Tell the story of the photo - where was it taken, who is in it, who took it, what year was it taken, what emotion does it invoke when you look at it, etc.

I'm going to start with this photo - one of my favourites for several reasons. It is a studio photo and was taken in Guelph Ontario in 1917.

My mother Joan sits on the left holding a large stuffed cat. Her older sister Lillian looks quite frightened and is clutching a doll in one hand and pulling at the hem of her dress in the other. It's a familiar habit isn't it? Children who are nervous or shy will often pull at their clothing when faced with something that causes that emotion in them.

I love the looks on their faces - so somber. I can just imagine my Grandmother Ruth dressing them that day. What an ordeal it must have been to iron those dresses and try to keep the girls clean until they reached the photography studio! But Grandma always dressed herself and her girls beautifully.

Joan's hair is neatly parted and slicked to the side. I can picture Grandma wetting a finger with spit and slicking that hair down.  It looks like she even managed to curl Lily's hair! I can't imagine trying to get a 3 year old to sit still long enough.

This photo makes me smile. It's also humorous in some ways because my mother was allergic to cats so seeing her hold a stuffed on strikes me as ironic. I wonder if the cat and doll were the studio's toys or Joan and Lily's favourite toys at home? I'll never know. 
 
Both my mother and aunt are gone now. I can't share this photo with them anymore. But I can share it with others in my family and perhaps they too will smile when they see it. 

Sharing Memories Week 27: First Loss

Uncle Ern in front of his store Toronto Ontario

Join us for Sharing Memories - A Genealogy Journey We focus on memories of our parents, grandparents and others. We write for our children and grandchildren, that the memories are not lost over time. I hope you are keeping a journal, whether it is private or public, and joining us as we write our memoirs.

The prompt for this week is First Loss. 

We've all experienced it - the first passing of someone close to you. Yes it's devastating. It's hard to talk about sometimes. But it is part of our own journey through life and it's a lovely remembrance of someone you held dear. In my case it was one of my grandmother's brothers. The first death was such a shock to me. I was 11 years old and no one in the family had died so I had no experience with death. And at 11 you don't generally think about losing relatives or friends. 

But suddenly Uncle Ernie wasn't coming to visit anymore. I don't recall being told he was gone but it certainly impacted on our lives. He and his wife used to drive from Toronto to see us quite frequently. I remember him as such a jovial friendly man - somewhat short in stature but big in heart. 

This is one of my favourite photos of Uncle Ern. It was taken long before I was born and is a picture of the store he opened when he first came to Toronto from England. By the time I knew him this store no longer existed. I am lucky enough to have dozens of photos of Uncle Ern and his family and they span 60 plus years. 

Uncle Ern's passing was just the start of me learning how to say goodbye to family and to friends. There were several deaths in the space of the next 3 years - my father, my grandmother, more uncles and a school friend. But this sharing memory is about the first loss I experienced, and that was my very kind and good-hearted Uncle Ern.

What was yours?

Creating a Hand-Made Journal for a Diary or Life Story using Flip-Pal Mobile Scanner (Step 1)

Yesterday I went around my home with my Flip-Pal Mobile Scanner in hand. I was looking for patterns. Patterns can be found anywhere - in floor tiles, couch fabric, sofa cushions, carpets, wallpaper, drapes, wall tiles, kitchen and bathroom counters, etc.

I wanted to scan patterns to create pages for a journal I want to make. I want this hand-made journal for my Life Story that I plan to write. It's an offshoot of my weekly Sharing Memories blog posts here on Olive Tree Genealogy. Right now it's an idea glimmering in my brain. It's not well thought out, but I do have a sort-of kind-of plan on how I plan on creating my journal with beautiful hand-made pages which I will make.

Usually when I do project like this, I create the entire thing first, then I share it here on Olive Tree Genealogy blog. But this time I thought it would be fun if others joined me! Of course you can use your journal for anything you want! As a diary. As a Life Story book. As a Sharing Memories book. Those are just a few ideas for a hand-made journal.

So if you have a Flip-Pal Mobile Scanner, and you'd like to create your own journal (for yourself or for gifts), why not grab it and find some patterns in your home that you might be able to use. (If you don't have a Flip-Pal Mobile Scanner you really should get one)

It will also be really helpful for us to share our ideas -what works and what doesn't work, as we go along. You might figure out the solution to a problem as we create our journals. Or you might find a great pattern that others can duplicate. For instance I know that my white lace tablecloth makes an amazing pattern but I forgot to scan it so I'll pull it out and get that done before I make any final decisions on which of my scanned patterns I will use for my journal pages.

I've already scanned over 40 patterns (32 are shown below) and I've printed off about 10 that I like for the pages of my journal. Take a peek at the patterns below and let me share with you a few of the ones I really like for my pages. 

Some of the patterns I scanned are too dark to use as pages I can write on. I might use them as borders on other pages or as the inside covers or even the outside cover of my journal. I'm not sure yet. And while I love that blue-purple Kleenex box scan, I don't have anything that I feel matches or complements it to be able to use in my Journal creation.

Oh, and where you see the word "REDO" as part of the file name, it means I didn't notice the dog hair or crumbs or specks of dirt and dust until I'd finished scanning! So I have to rescan after I do a little cleanup. So I can already give you a tiny word of advice - be sure what you are scanning is free of dust, dirt, lint, pet hair and so on! Unless you like the abstract and real feeling to your pages if you've scanned in some cat or dog hair, then by all means keep it natural.

If it weren't winter in Canada I'd have gone outside looking for more patterns to scan - the gravel in my garden, an old pot, the wrought iron patio table, the welcome mat, the birch tree bark... I bet I could find lots! I'll be interested to know what my readers find outside if you choose to accept my challenge to join me on this project.

I've decided to create pages using light beige and white patterns. Some of the patterns above are too small for you to see the great designs on them so I'm going to show you a few below as larger images.

Wooden Closet Door painted cream

Stucco Ceiling

Bedroom Wallpaper

See how pretty those patterns are when enlarged? They're going to make beautiful paper if I decide to use them for my journal pages.

How to Scan Patterns with Your Flip-Pal Mobile Scanner

Take the lid off your scanner. It pops off very easily. Then find a pattern you want to scan and put your scanner over it so that the object you are scanning is against the flat bed.

Here I am scanning the patterned fabric of an antique parlour chair in my living room.

Cover the other side of the glass (it will be facing up or out towards you) loosely with the scanner lid or the Flip-Pal Mobile Scanner black cleaning cloth. Hold the scanner very steady if you are scanning a wall or ceiling.

You can see the end result of the scan in the first image of the thumbnail patterns at the start of this blog post. It is called ChairYellowPattern.jpg and is in the second row, first on the left.

Don't worry about anything else right now except finding and scanning patterns. These will be the basis of your journal pages. You might do more than just print them off later as pages so keep an eye out for darker patterns and different patterns that you might add as borders to your scanned pages. I've got that part figured out in my head (sort of) so we can play around with that idea later.

This is going to be fun! I hope you'll join me for this project. As soon as I create my pages, I'll be posting again.

I See a Dragon in My Future!

Dragon Dictation is a free voice recognition application for the iPad (also for the Iphone or Ipod Touch). I'm using it to write this blog post. I'm not typing this, Dragon is typing it for me. How cool is that? It's very easy to use and within seconds of downloading it on to my Ipad I was dictating an email.

I'm thinking about different genealogical uses for Dragon. I'm going to be attending the RootsTech conference in February (I'm an official Rootstech Blogger) and it seems to me that I can continue to write my daily blog posts using Dragon and that it will be much easier and faster for me then using my iPad keyboard.


Dragon allows me to speak punctuation commands such as "period" or "new paragraph". This lets me format my writing exactly as I want it. That's the part I'm having trouble getting used to but I assume it gets easier the more you use Dragon.

By dictating this blog post into Notes in Dragon I am able to pause and then resume where I left off. When I am finished my blog post I plan to correct any typos or errors and e-mail the post to myself. I could e-mail it directly to blogger to be automatically published on my Olive Tree Genealogy blog but this time I prefer to e-mail it to myself and copy and paste it into Blogger.

I experimented with Dragon last night by sending tweets to my Twitter but it seemed a little strange to be speaking to my Ipad in front of my husband!

And so this ends my first blog post typed entirely by Dragon as I spoke into the microphone on my IPad. I'm liking it and believe I can find many other uses for it in my Genealogy world.