My Christmas Secret...Do You Believe?

My Christmas Secret!

Shhhhh!...When I was growing up. I had a Christmas secret that always made me smile. Not the I-can't-wait grin of anticipation, but the cat-with-whiskers-full-of-cream variety. You see...I believed I had an "in" with the Big Guy Up North...a connection no other child possessed. My very own grandmother was an official North Pole employee with the title "Santa's Helper." Her name was Patta Gray.

Patta and Richard Gray on their 50th Anniversary

Santa's Helper at Work...

She confided this to me when I was very young, and I believed her. Why wouldn't I? Her house was filled with dolls and toys all year long! Not to mention she excelled in making gingerbread cakes and cookies with brown sugar topping. And she was soft and pink and smelled delicious...just like Mrs. Santa Claus must.

Shirley, Mike and little sister Patti on a visit to Grandma Patta's.

Sometimes I got to visit for a few days. Grandma Patta and I spent the time up to our elbows in fabric scraps and patterns. The bodice of grandma's dress was studded with straight pins in lieu of a pincushion, keeping her hands free to cut and stitch the tiny clothes for all of Santa's dolls. With my awkward "help" she made designer outfits for Barbie, chic Chanel-style suits with real mink collars...just like Jackie Kennedy wore. Ruffled dresses for Chatty Cathy were next on the list, adorned with yards and yards of lace trimming. Even G.I. Joe got a new uniform or two! (Grandma hated Joe's big floppy feet...it made him hard to dress.)

Chatty Cathy...I didn't like her for some reason...she looked kind of bratty.

In the evenings, Grandpa Rich would get out his tools and work on the Barbie-size furniture he designed. He made four-poster beds and pink vanities with little gold knobs. The closet had sliding doors and rods filled with little pink hangers. With a hammer and wee brass tacks, he patiently upholstered miniature sofas and chairs. I was lucky enough to receive some of his furniture for Christmas one year.

My first Barbie looked like this one.

My first Ken had this fuzzy hair that came off if he got wet.

A Test of Faith...

I felt so special being let in on such an important secret. There were times I was tempted to brag about Grandma's unique job. But the kids I played with were starting to say awful things about Santa...that he didn't exist! Grandma had a saying...something about pearls before swine. Her secret was too precious to waste on non-believers.

As the years went by, it became more difficult to keep the faith. The pressure was on from friends and siblings to admit that Santa Claus was a hoax. But I stubbornly clung to the hope that they were wrong. One Christmas Eve I lined my dolls up on the couch so Santa could see that I took good care of my toys. My brother Mike teased me for being such a baby. "There's no such thing as Santa," he snickered.

Patti Play Pal.

I found out the hard way one Christmas morning that Grandma Zetta's lipstick is forever!

Poor Patti Play Pal!

A few minutes later, Mom came into the room and told us to get ready to go to Grandma's. It was almost time for Santa to come and pick up the doll clothes and take them back to the North Pole. He was a bit behind schedule and the elves needed to get the dolls dressed. I smirked when I saw the startled expression on Mike's face. He'd see!

Still...something deep inside nagged at me all the way to Lehi, where my grandparents lived. "He's not coming," the voice of doubt informed me. "He's not real." I remembered everything my friends had told me. They said it was all a big lie...our parents bought the toys and pretended to be Santa.

Miss Revlon had pierced ears!

Waiting and Waiting...

While the adults visited at Grandma's, I squirmed on the sofa. Anticipation and dread played tag in my stomach and I couldn't eat the cookies grandma had made. When you are a child, minutes seem like hours, and waiting is torture. He's not coming.

As I squeezed my eyes shut and focused all my faith into a wish...I heard the silver tinkle of sleigh bells. I knew that if I opened my eyes, the magic wouldn't work. But the sound of boots on the front porch stamping off the snow seemed real enough. Grandma hurried to the door.

How I remember Santa...so many years ago.

"Merry Christmas!" a hearty voice boomed. When I opened my eyes, a man in red stood in the doorway shaking snow off his whiskers. I watched in awe as Santa reached into his sack and pulled out a candy cane for each of us. My little sisters danced about with excitement and forgot to say thank you. But I remembered! He winked at me, restoring my faith for another year.

Grandma made doll clothes for many years after that, taking orders from neighbors and friends. Even when I was finally too old to believe in Santa Claus, she still personified the Spirit of Christmas. I wish my own children could have known her.

Cute little brother Tommy and sister Lisa came along some years after this story.

Look at their sweet little faces. I miss these little kids.

"May your days be merry and bright,

And may all your Christmases be white..."

It's Snowing!

Merry White Christmas!!

I have posted this story before...but like "The Night Before Christmas" and other holiday tales...it gets taken out of the Christmas box, dusted off, and shared again and again.  This is my most cherished Christmas memory.

St. Nicholas Day...December 6!

St. Nicholas Day...
This Sunday, December 6, is known throughout Germany and many European countries as St. Nicholas Day.  Children in those countries put their shoes on the front step in hopes that the kindly gentleman will fill them full of treats.  Traditional gifts include chocolate, fruit, small toys and gold coins...chocolate coins most likely.  The legends about St. Nicholas begin with the story of a poor man with three marriageable daughters.  He could not afford to provide them with a dowry...in those days girls could not get married without a cash dowry.

Wooden shoes filled with treats...

Passing by the home of the poor girls one winter's evening, Nicholas was moved to pity by their penniless state and wanted to help them.  Wishing to remain anonymous, he secretly tossed a bag of golden coins into the window of the girls' room.  The story claims that the coins fell into some stockings hanging out to dry by the fire.  This is how the tradition began of filling stockings with gifts.  Next year on the eve of St. Nicholas day, it might be fun to have your children put their little shoes on the front porch.  Wouldn't they love to find a little bag of gold chocolate coins in their shoe when they get up the next morning?  Be sure to tell them to leave a carrot out for St. Nicholas' white horse.

A fun new tradition!

Our family tradition of celebrating St. Nicholas (Nikolas) Day only lasted a few years...but it was fun while it lasted.  We wouldn't wait until morning...St. Nicholas came just before bedtime in our little corner of Germany.  Children would get ready for bed and put their shoes on the porch.  Then there was a special program on television for them to watch while one of the parents filled their shoes.  Bedtime television featured a character call the Sandmännchen or "little sandman."  I suppose the purpose was to make children sleepy.  They might show a cartoon, then the Sandmännchen would tell a bedtime story.   When the Sandmännchen said "Gute Nacht...und schlaf recht schon" it was time to see if St. Nikolas had left candy or a switch in their shoes.  Nikolas had a helper named Knecht Ruprecht, a dark and sinister character who just might put naughty children into the big sack on his back.  There are many legends and traditions about the Knecht Ruprecht character...in some he later became "Der Weihnachtsmann," the German version of Santa Claus.

Der Weihnachtsmann shopping at the Christmas Market.

He could also be wearing blue or brown.

Christmas Eve in the home of our German friends, the Dahnkens, was the time when the Christ Child...or Christkindl...decorated the tree and left presents.  They didn't use Christmas stockings, but the Christkindl left plates full of cookies and candy.  In other homes, gifts were left by Der Weihnachtsmann. 

I loved learning the customs and traditions of Germany.  Thank you for letting me share the story of St. Nicholas Day.

Frohliche Weihnachten!

Note:  This is a repost from December 2013.

Moments in Time...Memories of the Old Alpine School!

Gone, but not forgotten...
In the misty landscapes of my dreams, the old Alpine School still waits at the top of crumbling steps.  Rough grass has sprung up through the cracks in the surface of the deserted tennis court and the merry-go-round has rusted in place. On the old flag pole, where we lined up at the bell, a tattered flag flutters like fingers waving goodbye.

A wild October breeze whistles and dances through the bones of the rickety fire escape as if laughing spirts have flown down from Cemetery Hill to play hide-and-go-seek.


Hide and Seek...
My friends, Kim and Cathy Pam, are inside the school somewhere, but I cannot find them.  I search for them through dark and dusty hallways.  Maybe they are hiding in Miss Greenwood's cloak room.  No...I must have just missed them.  The kindergarten room looks the way I remember it...as if the children have only just gone out to recess.

The playhouse still sits in the corner near the Story Time Rug.  Empty milk bottles line up like little glass soldiers on Miss Greenwood's desk, next to the Magic Wand used to waken us from nap time.  I so wanted to wave that wand over the other children, but I was too noisy to be the Naptime Fairy.


The Stairs...and Mr. Nicholes...

Echoed giggles drift down the stairs.  How I hate those stairs when I dream.  No matter how badly I need to reach the top...they keep growing steeper and STEEPER.  I am so afraid I am going to fall that I crawl up them on my hands and knees.

If I fall and hurt myself, will someone take me to Mr. Nicholes' office and bandage my knee?  Little kids were taught (by the big kids) to be afraid of the principal.  But he was the nicest man in the world, I thought.  He always had a kind word for shy little girls.

In the picture on the left, Mr. Nicholes and some of his students bid the old school goodbye.  Alpine was growing and there were only four classrooms...for grades K through 3.  The older grades took a bus to school in American Fork.

An old photo of children playing Maypole.

The dream shifts...and I find myself in the old gymnasium, where the corners are hidden in shadows.  My imagination is working overtime because I see little boys in dungarees and little girls in shirtwaist dresses holding the tattered ribbons of a long-faded Maypole.  They skip gracefully in and out to silent music...never getting tangled in the ribbons like I used to.

The children disappear and I'm all alone in the gymnasium...where it's been festively decorated for my Aunt Jane's wedding reception.  It's a western theme...with wagon wheels and driftwood as part of the decor.  I'm wearing my flower girl dress, twirling around and around in the middle of the floor singing "Someone's in the kitchen with Dinah" at the top of my lungs.  I only know one verse...but it's repeated ad nauseum.  It's a good dream.  I dread waking...because when I do the school will be gone.

A trip down Memory Lane...

The building was of red brick with a granite foundation.  The sign over the arched entry read "Public School 1899."  More than 100 years have passed since it was built with such high hopes for the children who would grace its halls.  A school may be only boards and bricks and mortar, but it is the caretaker of our childhood.  We spent more hours within its walls than any place other than home...and it's forever gone!  It breaks my heart every time one more landmark of my life is reduced to rubble.

The Monument...

One day, feeling nostalgic...I drove slowly down the street where the school used to stand and pulled into the parking lot at Kencraft...a candy factory that used to make candy canes and fancy suckers.  In a park-like setting stands a sandstone and bronze monument created by sculptor Dennis Smith to commemorate the old school and the children who attended it.

Running my finger down the list of names on the plaque, I'm pleased to find my Father's name and well as my own and my brother Mike's.  It feels rather strange, because people who have their names on monuments are usually dead historical figures...not middle-aged housewives.  Still...it's comforting to know that there is a little piece of Alpine history with my name on it.

I hope you have enjoyed this trip through the past.

Where do your treasured memories lie?

Note:  Before I start on my Father's school days stories I wanted to repost my story on the old Alpine School that both my father and I attended. The first four photos were taken from the book "Alpine Yestedays" by Jennie Adams Wilde, one of Grandma Zetta's oldest and dearest friends.



A Day to Remember...Flag Day!

                                                

An American Summer...
An American Summer is red, white, and blue.  Beginning with Memorial Day and on into July, these colors are inseparable from our vacation days and celebrations.  Today is Flag Day and the streets of my home town are lined with flags.  The Boy Scout Troops in the LDS Wards set up the flags for each flag holiday throughout the year...this is how they raise funds for their activities.  They learn flag ettiquette and how to care for this precious symbol.  I'm so proud of these young people and I admire the example set by the boys' leaders.  Only the hardest of hearts could fail to swell at the sight of so many flags.

                                              

Flag Days Origins...

Flag Day was officially signed into law by President Harry Truman in 1949, but has been celebrated for over 200 years.  But what are it's true origins?  From the National Flag Day Foundation website I found the following information:

"The “Stars and Stripes”, the official National symbol of the United States of America was authorized by congress on that Saturday of June 14, 1777 in the fifth item of the days agenda. The entry in the journal of the Continental Congress 1774-1789 Vol. Vlll 1777 reads “Resolved that the flag of the thirteen United States be Thirteen stripes alternate red and white: that the union be thirteen stars, white in a blue field, representing a new constellation.”"

"In Waubeka, Wisconsin, in 1885 Bernard John Cigrand a nineteen year old school teacher

 in a one room school placed a 10” 38 star flag in an inkwell and had his students write essays on what the flag meant to them. He called June 14th the flag’s birthday. Stony Hill School is now a historical site. From that day on Bernard J. Cigrand dedicated himself to inspire not only his students but also all Americans in the real meaning and majesty of our flag."

God Bless Our Flag!

I am so grateful for the opportunity to live in this great country and for the flags flying over every home town reminding every citizen that today is Flag Day. May we each take a moment to consider the meaning of those colors....Red, White, and Blue.

Have a lovely Flag Day!

First posted June 14, 2012

Collecting Vintage Christmas...Snow Domes!

Vintage Christmas Snow Domes!

 The Kitschier the Better...

One of the things I loved about Mary Engelbreit's Home Companion was the "Finders Keepers" feature in each issue. One December article was about plastic snow domes (or globes.)  Plastic snow domes became popular in the 1950's, made in Japan or Hong Kong.  Some of them are so cheesy and cheap looking that you can often find one at the thrift store for less than $1.  Seen together...in a collection...they are colorful and very, very fun!

My Small Collection...

Five Figural Snow Domes

I had already started a small collection of figural snow domes before the magazine article came out.  I was please to find out that figure-shaped domes are hard to find.  Some shapes, like an elf with a gnome and mushroom in its tummy is really rare.  I have a Santa with a Nativity scene in his tummy...how tacky is that?  The tipsy Santa hanging on a light pole is really a funny one.  I don't think any of my little guys are particularly valuable to anyone but me.  I don't always display them, so it's fun to post them here.

Love, Shirley

I'm reposting this from November of 2011.  I hate being lazy, but this is the third year in a row that I've gotten sick the first week of December.  My Christmas Spirit has been sadly lacking and my computer is having issues since Comcast dropped off the new router.  Hope to be back in good spirits soon. =D

Pilgrims and Pioneers...My Family History at Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving in old Alpine, Utah...

Autumn brings with it the desire to put away food, fuel, warm clothing and bedding, along with feed for livestock against the harshness of winter.

The days shorten and feelings of urgency grow stronger.  There are no longer enough hours of daylight to get everything done.  Many hands make for lighter work.  If everyone in the village helps out, there will be plenty for all.  When the work is done, there will be time for fun and celebrations.  A time of Thanksgiving.

The hardy settlers of Alpine and Highland, Utah found ways to mix work and fun during harvest time.  When the fruit trees in Alpine started to produce, those with orchards shared with others.  The ladies came with paring knives and pans and worked for hours preparing fruit to be dried.  It would be placed on clean cloths upon the roofs, slabs on sawhorses, or whatever else was handy.

The men brought their husking pegs and shucked corn while the ladies did fruit.  The children enjoyed these occasions and anxiously waited for the piles of corn shucks to increase, as they had several games they liked to play among them: hide-and-seek, run-my-sheepie-run, and tag.  At the end of the day, a delicious dinner would be served under the apple trees on tables made of boards laid on sawhorses.

Note: Turkeys in Alpine were raised by the Watkins family.  Hertha, left, is admiring that year's fine flock.

Other autumn activities which combined work and recreation were quilting bees and "rug-rag bees."  No materials were wasted.  If the cloth wasn't too worn it was patched into quilt tops.  What wasn't good enough for quilts was torn into rug-rags and the remaining scraps were clipped into small pieces to stuff bed ticks, pillows or cushions.

I remember some old quilts Grandma Zetta had from the time when her family raised fruit in Fort Canyon.  In those days whenever a quilt began to wear out, she simply recovered it in another layer of fabric.  Women like my grandmother definitely followed Brigham Young's counsel to "make it do, or do without."  They were born recyclers!  Those quilts were extremely heavy, though, as well as damp and musty.

When Thanksgiving Day came in Alpine, it was generally celebrated rather quietly.  People spent the day at home with their families.  Later they added an afternoon dance for the children.  An adult dance and ball game was held in the evening.

The Pilgrim...

Going back even further in time, I learned the First Thanksgiving in Plymouth, Massachusetts, was a traditional English harvest festival to which the colonists invited Massasoit who was the most important sachem (leader) among the Wamapanoag Indians.

The festival was celebrated in response to "God's favorable Providence" in times of plentiful game and bountiful harvest...with no little thanks to the Indians, who had introduced the settlers to native food plants and animals, and deserve much of the credit for keeping the Pilgrims from starving.

Among those gathered at the feast in 1621 was a man named Francis Cooke and his 14-year-old son John.  Francis' wife, Hester, was still in England.  She would follow in 1623 on the Anne with her three other children, Jacob, Jane, and Hester.

There isn't anything particularly remarkable about this family.  If Francis and John had not sailed on the Mayflower in 1620, no one would have remembered them at all, except maybe their descendents.  But this is where it gets interesting.

The Pioneer...

One of Cooke's direct descendents was a Mormon pioneer named John Joshua Tanner who came to Utah in 1851 and settled in South Cottonwood in the Salt Lake Valley.  The family of John Joshua Tanner now numbers in the thousands...hundreds of which live here in northern Utah County.  He is my ancestor as well.

Both men...Tanner and Cooke...were men of conscience and conviction, a remarkable family pattern to hold up over such a long stretch of time.  The Pilgrims were refugees from religious persecution in England, just as the Mormon pioneers traveled west to practice their faith in peace more than two centuries later.

I became a member of the Daughters of Utah Pioneers in 2003.  Since then I have learned many things about my pioneer ancestors.  Because of what I have learned, Thanksgiving has a special meaning for me.  Family history is kind of like an archealogical dig.  Among the dirt and stones a single golden nugget of information could be hiding.  Discovering my  family genealogy is a blessing for which I am eternally grateful. 

At the top of my list of things for which I am grateful this season, I am placing the names of Francis Cooke and John Joshua Tanner...the Pilgrim and the Pioneer.

Blessings to you and your families this Thanksgiving.


Note:  This is a repost from November 2011.

Tea Sets and Violets...Memories of Mother

Memories of Mother
"Sweet Violets
Sweeter than the Roses
Covered all over from head to toe
Covered all over with Sweet Violets"

I cannot hear this song, or smell the sweet scent of violets without thinking of my mother.  Violets were her special symbol, chosen when she was a young girl.  They were her Young Women's flower and painted on delicate china cups and saucers stored lovingly in her cedar chest with her wedding gown and treasures.

She was like a violet herself then, small and delicate with the dark eyes of a fawn.  I can see in my mind the sepia photograph of her as a lovely young girl of 12, gazing serenely into the camera's lens.

She was a pretty child and the darling of her family; the lone girl in a pack of boisterous brothers who alternately spoiled her or teased her mercilessly.  And boy could they tease!

When I was very small, Mother gave into my care the remaining plates of a green Depression Glass tea set.  This tea set had been her most cherished possession when she was pre-school age.  One day, as she carefully carried her little dishes into the living room, one of her brothers sneaked up behind her and yelled in her ear.  With an earsplitting crash, the little tea set was dashed to the floor.  Tearfully, she gathered up the plates that remained unbroken.  Somehow through the years, those plates survived.  How they survived my childhood is another miracle.

I was about five years old when she gave them to me and told me how special they were to her.  I am still amazed that she trusted me to care for them.  True to my stewardship, I kept the little plates carefully wrapped in newspaper and stored in a small box.  It was such a treat to occasionally unwrapped those treasures and imagine playing "tea party" with the pretty little girl from the Depression.

When Mother was a girl, Grandma and Grandpa made for her a wooden treasure box covered in pretty wallpaper that matched her bedroom.  As the oldest granddaughter, I inherited that box.  Inside were special dolls and toys that I kept at Grandma Patta's, safe from my boisterous brothers and sisters. Only I could play with the things in that box. 

When I visited my grandparents I spent many sunny hours playing under a tree in the backyard, or on the upstairs landing on rainy days. My favorite game at the time was to imagine that my mother was still a little girl, just my age, and that we were friends.  We played for hours, her in an old-fashioned dress from the 30's and me in shorts and a tee-shirt, reading old issues of Children's Friend and designing our dream houses with pictures cut from Better Homes and Gardens. Sometimes she watched me make Barbie clothes from the bag of sewing scraps that Grandma saved for me.  She only watched...because Mom could not sew worth a lick!

My grown-up mom was not on friendly terms with her old sewing machine.  Any sewing project made her so stressed-out that we kids used to hide whenever she put in a zipper!  It's kind of funny, because her mother made beautiful gowns for antique porcelain dolls and I've made quilts most of my life.  I guess some things skip a generation.

But she loved collecting dolls almost as much as Grandma Patta did.  And the countless gifts of dolls from her children and grandchildren gave her a lot of pleasure.  Especially during those last years...that endless stretch of time when she couldn't go out, but could only sit in her doll room surrounded by memories.

I have many warm memories of my mother, but I always like to think of her as the small girl whose unsteady little legs carried her and her tea set into Grandma's living room.  And that memory is always accompanied by the scent of violets.

In Memory of Rhea Lee Gray Devey

April 7, 1935-November 6, 2006

I wish to acknowledge my sister Lisa, who designed the little memory pages.  She made each of the sisters a beautiful miniature scrapbook.  So much love and effort was put into them.  I will always treasure mine.

I am grateful today for the love of my Father in Heaven.

"I am a child of God

And he has sent me here

Has given me an earthly home

With parents kind and dear..."

Note:  This is a repost from November 6, 2011...the fifth anniversary.

Halloween Greetings!

Halloween Greetings from Zetta's Aprons!

Sweet Kitty Alice!

"Soft Kitty, Warm Kitty,

Little Ball of Fur..."

The Real Kitty Alice!

"Evil Kitty, Hissy Fitty

Lucy-fur!"

Happy Halloween!

You know there can never be too many pictures of cats on the interwebs...lol!

 

Happy Halloween!

I'm out the door...Vegas bound!

(That's where the truly scary things are...)