Coastal Carolina State Veterans Cemetery

A cemetery?  Why did you go to a cemetery?  Well, honestly, mostly because it was right across the street from the Lejune Memorial Gardens from yesterday's post.  But also because I like genealogy, and old cemeteries. 

I stayed in the front half, which is the old section.  The grounds are very tranquil. 

I set my tracking app and went for a walk. 

It's funny; I didn't think of North Carolina as a southern state until I got here.  They were, however on the southern side of the Civil War, and that was reiterated several times during my visit.  There are Civil War veterans buried here. 

I was doing my wander, when I noticed a couple of familiar names pop up. 

I have Dixons and Allens in my family tree, but when I cross checked with Ancestry.com, predictably, none of these were my people.  I knew the odds were slim.  Still, wouldn't that have been neat? 

Now remember, it's super hot and humid.  I read this headstone and started to giggle.  Go ahead, click on it and see what you think it says at first glance. 

I found myself thinking. "Wow, how bad must it have been to put that on her grave?  Did this poor lady have celiac or some other undiagnosed digestive disorder?"  Then I realized that last line says, "To PART no more."  Oops. 

In my defense, when I showed it to Sam later, he thought it said the same thing.  As did Eli, when I got home and showed him.  So either that P is not as clear as it used to be, or my children inherited my twisted sense of humor. 

This me, trying to be artsy in the heat.  As in, not willing to actually get down on the ground and do a better job framing the shot.  I call it New Life Among The Dead.  

I know; two rather gloomy posts in a row.  Tomorrow's post is a museum, I promise!  

Natural History Museum of Utah - Dinos and Native Americans

Okay, I'll admit it.  I went a little crazy with pictures on this day of vacation.  So I'll break this down into a couple of posts so it's more than just a giant photo dump.

We went to the Natural History Museum of Utah, which is affiliated with University of Utah.  Even from the outside, it's a neat building.  If we lived nearby, we'd totally have a family membership.  I could see myself spending a lot of time here.

There were fish fossils,

And leaf fossils,

And a glass floor exhibit, like the one we have at our local history museum.

But unlike our local museum, this one has DINOSAURS!

Great big dinosaurs,

and an array of dino skulls.

Can you imagine being responsible for putting in order all these almost identical vertebra...

...to make this long, long tail?

This little guy down in front?

Weirdest looking bones I've ever seen.

In addition to the large, majestic dinosaurs, there were some little ones, too.

Even a few flying dinos!

Okay, so the big guy with the long tusks is a mammoth.  Look down.  To the left in front of him, you can see a baby mammoth.

That's this guy.  I was reminded of Manny the Mammoth from the movie Ice Age.

Remember how I said I loved the building?  The views!  Omigosh, it was amazing.  You can see the capitol.

And there it is.  We saw it closer up when we were out driving around, but I didn't get a picture of it then.

You might want to read this sign.  In a couple of days, I'll be talking about the drive from Utah to Nevada, where we pass by the Bonneville Salt Flats, and get to see this area.

More awe inspiring views.

And then we were in Native American exhibits.  Baskets and pottery and petroglyphs and all sorts of interesting things.

My boys would have liked seeing the weapons, of course.

This was pretty cool.  The museum had a lot of hands on areas.  For instance, you could try your hand at assembling a rubber version of a dino skull, or piece together some faux pottery shards.  This was an area where you could go down into the excavation pit and poke around and get a feel for what it's like on a real dig.

One thing that struck me about the shoes is how small they all seemed.  I'm sure some of it was shrinkage with the age of the leathers, but it also seems like folks were smaller back then.  I didn't see any moccasins that would fit my size 9 feet.

When I was a kid, there was a little Native American museum that I used to walk past sometimes.  I remember seeing obsidian arrowheads and woven baskets there.  Seems arrowheads can be made out of lots of other materials, too.

We stepped out onto a couple of the terraces to take in the view.  There are critters in the area, so I stayed on the patios.

But it's very pretty, if you can get past the lack of flowers.

Paul took lots of pictures, too.

This guy reminded me of Mr. Beaver in the Narnia movie.

Another terrace had mirror like windows.  We didn't get many pictures of us together on the trip, so I snapped this dorky one to prove that we were in the same place at the same time.

I enjoyed the Native American exhibits.  The stories about the disappearing culture and languages were compelling.

And the craftsmanship in the beadwork and other handiworks was beautiful.

I have to admit being a little disappointed when I got my Ancestry.com genetic testing results back, and I discovered I have no Native American ancestry.  My grandmother (who was an equal opportunity racist--she distrusted everybody) used to call my grandfather a "dirty old Indian" when I was a kid, so I always assumed there was some trace from him.  There's not.  Although I discovered that his grandfather was a Freemason, which was also kind of interesting.  I hope to do some more family tree research after the kids start school.  I have this fantasy that I'm going to have all sorts of free time then.  We'll see how realistic that ends up being, given that I've been getting involved with various volunteer organizations.

Coming next:  the Viking Experience at the Natural History Museum.  Which does have ancestral relevance for me.  I felt like the Viking exhibits deserved their own post.


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Weight Loss, Ancestry, and Travel

This is basically just an update on me.  You know, the stuff that doesn't really make it into my Our Week posts, because those are mostly photo inspired, and I'm always the one taking the pictures.

Weight
For Christmas 2014, Paul upgraded my phone.  This newer version has a "health" app included, and I began tracking my weight at that time.

A couple weeks after Luke left again, I decided I was fed up with being fat and out of shape.  When Jack was a toddler, I lost 40 pounds using the Spark People website and doing Stroller Fit, so I downloaded the Spark People app and started keeping track of what I ate.

I've been eating 1200-1550 calories per day, and drinking more water.  I was trying to get out and walk regularly, but that fell by the wayside when our Little Visitors came back.

When I hit 10# lost, I ordered myself a new dress to celebrate.  By the time it got here, it was too big for me!  (I sent it back to exchange for a smaller size, but the new one isn't here yet.)

I've recently hit another milestone.  Remember how I've been keeping track of my weight on my phone?  I now weigh less than my lowest phone weight.  So I'm the lowest I've been in at least 21 months.  Just in the last week, I've started wearing things I haven't been able to wear for a while.  I've dropped a little more than a size.

Starting weight     &     down 8 pounds

These pictures were taken beginning of June and beginning of July.  I put this same dress on a couple Sundays ago and couldn't wear it because it was too big.

I'm now officially down 25#.

Family Tree
In my genealogy research, I've realized something.  As the result of an unplanned pregnancy, I've always felt like I was "an accident."  That I just sort of happened because 2 people had sex.  In looking at my ancestors as far back as the 1600s, it occurred to me that I am who I am because of all of these connections.  Each marriage provided a piece of the puzzle.  I happened, not because 2 people had sex, but because of generations and generations of people did.  Sounds simplistic, but it made an impact on me.

I mentioned in a review that I found a Revolutionary War ancestor in my research.  I'm working on documenting the lineage so that I can join DAR.  It's slow going, as I have to wait for documents to arrive before I can turn around and use them as proof that I'm entitled to the next set of documents.

In digging around records from small town Colorado in the early 1900s, I came across this 1918 photograph, called Unmarried Ladies of WW1.  My great grandmother is in the front row of this picture.

I'm really enjoying learning more about my ancestors, and I imagine it will keep me busy for quite a while.

Travel
Exciting news, I'm heading back to China!

This trip will be similar to last year's trip, except instead of staying in Beijing the whole time, we'll be going to 3 provinces, and it's 2 weeks instead of one.  I'm super excited about it!  Hopefully, I won't have the chance to get lost this time around.

I should be returning from my adventure just in time to get over jet lag before taking off again to see Josiah graduate from boot camp.

So that's what's up with me these days.


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The Loyal Heart

I've mentioned before that I'm getting into genealogy.  When the Little Ones were visiting their mama, I had a chance to do some work on our family history, and I found a Civil War ancestor.  So when I picked up The Loyal Heart the next day and started reading, I was pleasantly surprised to find myself in a Civil War era POW camp.  The pact that wartime friends make over their friend's grave turns out to have lasting importance for them.

The bulk of this story takes place in Texas.  Phillip (one of the pactees) has died.  Another of the pact members, Robert, goes to his home in Galveston to check on his widow and see if there is any way the remaining pact members can help her.  The widow, Miranda, was pretty much at the end of her rope when Robert shows up.  She is managing her late husband's estate by turning their home into a boarding house.  The people of the town have spread viscous rumors about her.  Someone is sending her threatening letters.

The Loyal Heart is by turns suspenseful and romantic.  Robert and the other members of the wartime pact are able to help Miranda redeem her reputation and Phillip's honor, as well as keep her home and find happiness.  This was a good book, and I will be passing it on to my 16 year old daughter to read, as well.   We have enjoyed many of Shelley Shepard Gray's works of fiction.

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Our Week with Safety Town

If you follow me on Instagram, you may have seen the busy color coded schedule I posted last weekend for this week.  Summer is an interesting mix of relaxed and crazy.

Lots of naps continue to happen here.  Jack loves these Paddington books.  I think we have 9 now.  I'm so thrilled to see him reading for pleasure!

Best news of the week:  New dishwasher!  We've been without one for months, and everyone is happy to have one again.

Hopefully this one will last a while.  We are so hard on appliances.

Little Miss Katie started Safety Town this week!

Brianna is getting her community service hours in as a teen helper.

I'm grateful for her observations of Katie.  She has mentioned some behaviors that make me realize that keeping Katie at home this coming school year is the right choice for her.

Katie is learning to operate in a group of her peers, and learning to bring her "homework folder" to and from "school" each day.  She's also learning about lots of different facets of safety: traffic safety, bike safety, personal safety, water safety, fire safety, home safety, poison safety, and on and on.  It's a pretty impressive program, and both girls are enjoying it.  I'm glad they're interacting with our community police officers in such a positive way.

You can't see him, but Eli is sitting in the van after practice one day, waiting for me to get out of the UPS Store.  Unfortunately, I picked the store with the world's slowest notary, and there was one other customer ahead of me.  I ended up being there for half an hour to get a single document notarized.

No, we're not adopting again.  I'm digging up documents to prove lineal descent from an American Revolution ancestor (his military record was in the envelope above), and the Sworn Statement I needed notarized was for a vital records request.  I've really enjoyed digging into our family history, and I'm pretty excited about all the interesting things I'm finding.  This week, I discovered a photograph of my great grandmother, and a variety of news articles from a small town paper that mention that branch of the family tree.

Wheelie is avoiding the heat by napping on my bed under the ceiling fan.  It got to 106* here this week.

Hannah made the word FREE out of Legos.

And I finally sewed up the pillowcase I've been promising to make for Jack.  Paddington fabric I bought when we were reading the first book.  In February.  It shouldn't take 4 months to make a pillowcase.

Katie and Brianna practicing one of their Safety Town songs for me.

We pulled the Magnatiles (affiliate link) out last week, and they've seen almost constant use since then.  They really are a favorite around here.

Next week is more Safety Town.  I'm also hoping to make the time to walk with a friend.  I've lost 11 pounds since Luke moved.  His birthday is next week, so he's been on my mind a lot lately.  He seems to be settling in well with his new family.

We have a couple of fun reviews in the works, as well as a couple of more involved curriculum reviews to work on, in between all the running around we've been doing.  

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