The past couple of weeks have been busy for me. As a family genealogist since 1959 some of our family histories were printed into books and shared in 1980, updated versions shared in about 1998, and last week I sent out updated books on my mother’s father’s Weller family. This week I completed an update on my mother’s maternal Jalbert (French Canadian) side and am ready to mail them off. Most of the families are recorded back to the late 1500s. If you have ever dabbled in genealogy then you know such research encompasses many letters, many phone calls, hundreds of miles driven to visit family, churches and cemeteries, for us in Minnesota and North Dakota, and thousands of hours putting together what is often a puzzle. Losing everything in my home fire in 2001 was devastating. With help, perseverance and luck, most information has been recovered.
The Boeddeker name I have back to 857 in Germany, the Genet name back to multiples of royalty and nobility in Europe earlier than that. It really helped that my second husband’s 5th great grandfather, George Clinton, was vice president under both Jefferson and Madison as the Internet was rife with that history. Duke’s 4th great grandfather was Edmund Charles Edouard Genet, the French Ambassador to this nation during the French Revolution (he remained in this country so he wouldn’t lose his head). Again, much was on the Internet. It took considerable “digging” on my mother’s maternal side in Canada as way back then, churches did not recognize “marriage” to a “heathen” i.e. my Blackfoot ancestry. It is amazing what one can discover about ancestors, some sad, some courageous, some funny, some embarrassing, hard workers all, with a desire to become fully American. But, it has been well worth the journey.
Bob Wagner mowed my ditches again. I had hesitated doing that because of all those noisy gravel trucks on Hwy. 14 every few minutes and seeming to be only inches from the roadside. So, I baked a pineapple upside down cake and took some over to Bob and Dana. Arlene and Rex Boeddeker, Regina Boeddeker (and her son Justin), and Tina Chriss came Saturday afternoon to play Pinochle, with Rex providing a delicious taco supper. Tina said my canning jar giveaway was too much for her so we called Jocelyn Downs over and they divided up the jars and we did some visiting before playing cards. We used to play Pinochle about twice a month but now it was over a year.
Sunday evening Randy and Kim came for supper after hay baling – and a nice surprise – grandson Nicholas and his wife Angel also came. Nick has been working in North Dakota but is home for two weeks. Angel will be taking all my candle making supplies plus a few things I’ve had in storage here for the two of them. Slowly but surely my garage will have less stuff to work around. People tell me my garage looks fine but to me it is cluttered.
Nice surprise Sunday morning when our new neighbors, now living on our original farm down off of AK, showed up for Mass. They are Charles and Beulah Koenig, and their daughter, Carolyn Myers. I had been to the farm (our family calls it The Rock) and had a short visit with them and sadly, didn’t recognize them on Sunday although Beulah and I commented we must have met somewhere (Sometimer’s Disease??) Their son bought the place from Braiz and Helen Lynch and is in the process of building a new house on what we called the south forty, where they have a fantastic view clear down to Arkansas.
God’s blessings on each and every one! Pray for all, and for our nation.
From the desk of Jamey Herd:
I will report what little I have from Pleasant Ridge Baptist on Sunday. I was unable to attend as my heart decided to act up again. Laveta Ray and Susie Dugan took the Children’s Church to Jim and Erma Cudney’s during morning service and blessed them with song. I don’t have a report on how many made the trip.
The young people are getting ready to attend summer camp. We have several that will be going at different times this summer as camp is held by different age groups.
Our daughter, Susan and family from Carl Junction were here this weekend. Susan and Chuck attended Susan’s 25th class reunion in Ava on Saturday. Susan graduated in 1986 from Ava High School. On Sunday our son Ron and family also came out to visit and be with Billy Joe for Father’s Day. Also visiting were Ann Stewart of Ava and her daughter, Cheryl Plummer from Warrensburg. Cheryl and Susan have been friends since grade school and have maintained their friendship through the years. Cheryl’s dad, Troy Stewart is in failing health and prayer is asked for him and Ann.
We were up a large part of Saturday night with the storm warnings. We kept the TV on and kept track of the storms till all the tornado warnings expired or were cancelled. It sounds like more will develop tonight, Monday. It may be another sleepless night around here.
I visited Paul and Wanda Dugan on Friday and Wanda had a bag of fresh lettuce for us.
The haying is not quite finished here. Hopefully it will be finished up in the next couple of weeks. It will depend on the storms and rain. We are really in need of some moisture but we did receive some rain early Sunday morning and this morning, Monday.
God’s Blessing to each and every one till next week.
