Sunday is here

I don't remember what time of the year we moved to Florida but I remember the disappointed look on my Mother's face when my Dad showed us where we were going to live and what he was going to do. My Dad bought a small cement block building with a beer joint in it. Cob webs were everywhere. The building was divided in the middle by a wall. In the back part was a restaurant type kitchen with a grille and the other part of the back room was for storing beer cases. The front part is where the bar was. The bar went across the wall and had many bar stools around. There were three or four tables with chairs and in the middle of the floor was a pot bellied stove with a tea kettle on it. I guess that was used for heat when it got cold in the winter. There were no windows in it. It has chicken coop windows covering on the pull up windows. Chicken coop windows you couldn't see through. They had a wire cage type weaving in the middle and it was covered by a thin type paper that would let the light in. You would have to pull up the window by a cord and secure the cord. The bathroom was outside and there was a men's and women's toilet and sink. Leading to the bathrooms was a red cement patio.

There were 4 motel units on the side standing by themselves. In the far back part of the property facing the next street was a house. There really wasn't a street back there. It was mostly sand and seldom did a car go down it as it would get stuck in the sand.

The house had a small kitchen, a living room, bath room, and three bedrooms. I don't believe the house was that old. My Dad had great ideas for that house but I hated it from the time we moved down there and I believe my Mom did too. Dad thought it was great and they started cleaning and remodeling the place right away. Since my Dad was originally a carpenter when he was very young, he knew how to do all the building and replacing. He was a "Jack of all trades" meaning he could do just about anything.

I remember the first night sleeping there. We had only pillows and our jackets and it was a little cold. We had beat the truck down there that was carrying our few items that we brought there. I remember being cold that night. Our radio, bedding and clothing came the next day. By then, since we were the new owners, my dad was tending bar. Beer is all that was sold except for cigarettes and snacks, like chips and pickled pigs feet, (Yuck). There would be a large jar of them sitting on the counter. My parents didn't keep the pig's feet after the jar was emptied. Mom and Dad started cleaning and fixing up the place and they named it "Azalea Courts".

Yesterday I looked through my scraps of fabric and came up with enough scraps to make a quilt that I had bought a pattern for a few months back. Today I will do a few more cuts of fabric and will start sewing it together. It is a raggy quilt so it will look better when it is washed and dried. I also want to dust mop the floors today. Cleaning the house is a pain as I have to keep taking breaks to catch my breath.

I have put down a lot of memories of growing up in Hinsdale, Illinois. The memories of growing up there with my brothers around and the family, the whole family of aunts and uncles, cousins are wonderful memories. Christmas's, family cook outs, family picnic's in Rocky Glen (now Waterfall Glen, named after a friend of my fathers, Bud Waterfall), playing with friends, are all such wonderful times that I had growing up. I sometimes wish I could go back and relive them all. It was a real happy time in my life. There are a million more memories buried in my mind and occasionally one sneaks out but by the time I start to type this, it disappears back into my memory section of my brain. LOL

When we sold the house in Hinsdale, everything got sold, all the furniture, dishes, all that we took was bedding, a stand up radio and clothing. We moved to Chicago as I said before and I hated it and couldn't stand not having anything to do. I went to school which I hated and came back to Grandma's house, which I hated. Nothing was the same. I don't remember seeing my Dad too often either. With him living at Aunt Anna's and us living at Grandma's, there never seemed to be time to see my father. He was also taking trips to Florida to find a business that he could go into. I remember him looking into a Trailer park but know of no other ventures. I sometimes wonder why my father looked only in that area. Was it because the dog track was only a mile away?

Anyway, Chicago living was miserable for me and was glad to finally hear that we were moving to Florida. When we traveled, Mom always fried up lots of chicken so we would have something to eat on the way. I don't believe there was a cooler in the car, we just ate the chicken until it was gone. It is amazing that we never got
E Coli. She would also buy a lot of fruit. And my Dad would stop at every ice cream stand on the way. My Dad loved ice cream. In those days ice cream stand were quite popular. They were everywhere.

My Dad bought a 1947 Cadillac and we drove that to Florida. I hated driving through the mountains. In those days the roads were narrow and only two lane. I would try to sleep the whole trip. We would wake up really early in the morning about 5 AM and get on the road and drive for about an hour and then stop for breakfast in a small diner either on the side of the road or in the middle of a town. There were no expressways and you traveled from town to town. Dad would drive and stop for ice cream.

My dad always drove fast and always wanted to be first. He was always passing up a bunch of cars just to come across another bunch of cars. He was not always the most courteous driver. I remember him cutting off someone because he didn't like the way he drove. I also remember him making someone go off the road so that he cold punch him. Dad was scary at times but never at home. I would usually sleep on the floor of the car when we went through the mountains because I didn't like driving on the side of a cliff. If we were to go over the side I didn't want to see it. LOL Interesting, we always made it over the mountains in one piece.

My Dad would drive until about 3-4PM and then would stop for a motel or a hotel if we were in a big city. We went out to eat and then usually we would go out to see a movie and then back to bed. I believe it took us over 3 days to get to Florida in those days.

Friday January 29, 2010

It has been a boring last few days. The weather is cold so I don't feel like venturing out and I really don't need to many things. I will eventually have to go out and pick up a few groceries but I am trying not too. I need to save some money so it is best to stay home. I have gone into the sewing room and straightened the room and did a few small projects but just can't seem to get into anything. I want to make a quilt as you go quilt next but have no idea what pattern to use and I want to be able to use up some scraps. I also thought about making a doll but just can't seem to get into anything. I haven't seen people in days. Carol was here last Sunday but that was the last day I saw anyone. Poor me. LOL

It has been interesting reflecting on my growing up in Hinsdale. What a great feeling to be young and not have to worry about anything. Hinsdale was a great place to grow up and things were so different in those days. A young child could go out by themselves and would only have to worry about bullies which were far and few between. To walk a mile by yourself when you are only 6 is amazing. Now you have to worry when your child is just down the block and in some neighborhood the child can't even got out and sit on the front stairs. Holidays were always so much fun. And playing in the snow and building snow forts by packing snow in a cardboard box, using it as a mold for a brick. Christmas when Mom made a full wardrobe of clothes for a doll that I found out later in years that she had put a new wig on an old doll. She even knitted a snowsuit for the doll. I was about 5 or 6 then and I remember losing some of the clothes at a friends house and she said she didn't have them and I found out she did. She didn't stay a friend long.

Under the Christmas tree would be a town with ice skaters, sledders, houses the train running around the tree. The ice skaters, sledders, etc were made out of lead in those days and so was the paint on the walls. I survived the lead!!! Yea!!!!

Our house always smelled of bakery. My Mom was a great cook and a baker. She would make tons of stuff on Saturday for the company we would be having the weekend. The house always smelled wonderful. Strudl and Hoska were made weekly.

On weekends we would go into the city (Chicago) to see Grandma Triska and sometimes Grandma Krech although we didn't see Grandma Krech that often. Grandma Triska was warm and cuddly and alway rocked the babies, me included. She had long grey hair pulled back and twisted into a bun. Her house always had wonderful smell of cooking too. We always spent Thanksgiving with her. The whole kitchen would be tables as the family was so large and I remember the dressing tasting so good. Wish mine tasted like that. I know I am using the same ingredients but never seem to get that taste. I also remember Strawberry soda. It was such a treat getting the strawberry soda. I carried out that tradition for many years but I was the only one that cared so eventually quit it.

When we were in the city visiting my grandmothers, Mom would grocery shop on 26th street. My uncle had a butcher shop so we would get out meat there. We would go out for lunch at Lurie Brothers. They had a counter in the front. I loved their mashed potatoes and gravy. Mom and sometimes Teta would always have a bohemian meal of some sort. We would stay at Grandma's what seemed to be late to me and on the way home we would always stop at White Castle for hamburgers. I would be tired but never too tired to go in and get some burgers. Yummy!!!

Monday the start of a new week

It is the start of a new workweek for most people but for me the start of doing whatever I feel like. Today may be a sewing day and it may not be a sewing day. I have a friend in Florida that would always give me inspiration but she is in Florida and even an email from her doesn't give me the inspiration that I used to have years ago. The weather is getting cold again today and snow is expected but not too much or so the weather forecasters say. We are expecting under an inch of snow today with dropping temperatures. At this time of the year it seems that everyone is ready for warmer weather, at least when you live North.

So far today I do not know what I am going to do, the clothes are washed, the house is as clean as it is going to be. Maybe it is another day to walk into the sewing room and either sew or do a little straightening. Time will tell.

I don't think I talked about the Fourth of July in Hinsdale. When I was young there was always a parade in town and then from there would go to the park, I believe it was Madison School where they would have all kinds of races and contests for the kids. I remember my brother Chuck always going in the pie eating contest. I don't think he ever won but he got his share of pie eating for that day. In the evening we would all go to Madison School to sit on the hill and watch the fireworks. I always hated the ones that made a large bang. The fireworks were held there for many years, even took my babies to see them there but they had a mishap one year when it was damp and a firework didn't go up right and ended in the crowd and burned a bunch of people. Thankfully I wasn't there at the time. I was down the street at my sister-in-law Marian's parents house. Fourth of July was always a fun holiday.

Today was a cleaning/wash clothes kind of day. I let my laundry go to long and ended up with 4 loads to wash which is a pain with me trying to go up and down the stairs. I did get 3 loads done and the 4th load is in the dryer. I also need to wash some area rugs but I will do that next week.

The weather was warmer today, in the 40s. I can finally see the sidewalk again. The driveway has two icy patches and I hope the rain that is expected tonight will get rid of them. Tomorrow the weather is supposed to start turning cold again. I guess that winter is still here.

Now for some more memories. We used to go into the city to my Uncle Joe's bakery on 25 and I believe St. Louis but not sure. I know that it was only a few blocks from my Grandma Triska's house. Aunt Fran and Uncle Joe had a house on the lake in New Buffalo, Michigan. We used to go there for the weekend. It was a small cottage and I remember sleeping on the second floor in a room that had twin beds and it was really hot in there. You could hardly breathe when the weather was hot outside. Aunt Fran and Uncle Joe were not really Aunt and Uncle. They were my Dad's cousins, at least Uncle Joe was. Their last name was Karlovsky. The had a daughter named Ellen Ann who was a couple of year older than I was. It was alway fun to go to the beach and play in the sand and Ellen Ann had a large log that we would take into the water and hang on. We also used to have inner tubes (the inside of car tires) that we would put over our heads and under our arms and float in with the waves. Ellen Ann and I would also go to the Sokol Camp that was next door. There we could play ping pong and there was always a bunch of kids there. When we went to Michigan we always went very late at night as my uncle had to bake the pasteries and bread and Hoska before he left as he only had one other man helping him bake. The oven was a brick oven with wood fire underneath it, I think. It seems as if it took all night to get to New Buffalo in those days as there were no expressways and we had to take two lane roads to get there. We always had a good time there, playing games, laying in the sun and day dreaming of what our life was going to be when we got older. I was probably 4-9 years old when we went there. I always wonder what happened to Ellen Ann. Aunt Fran and Uncle Joe moved to New Buffalo, Michigan after they sold the bakery. I was much older than, high school, I believe. Uncle Joe got killed on the expressway on the way into the city (Chicago) where he had gotten a job after he sold the bakery. There was road construction and someone made a mistake and caused a 13 car accident killing Uncle Joe and another man in the van. Aunt Fran stayed in Michigan until she passed away many years later. I remember many family picnics there and we always had a great time.

I tried to download this picture on the last post but I couldn't get it to work. After I decided to try again I realized what I had done wrong. Oh well, at least I learned what to do next. i also realized today after I took pictures of the deer that my camera is also a video camera. I guess I should read the directions now, LOL My motto is, "If all else fails, read directions". I guess that is really a bad habit. I usually try first and keep trying to figure it out when it is probably easier to just read the directions first and learn that way.

A few posts back I thought I was through writing about growing up in Hinsdale but the more I think about Hinsdale the more things I remember.

We had a large field across the street then. Now the field is filled with houses. In the beginning of the field nearest to the street were gardens that alot of the neighbors planted vegetables in the summer. The rest of the field was filled with daisies and Black Eyed Susans. I would love going there to pick a bouquet of flowers but was always afraid of snakes. I HATE snakes and still do. In about a block was a little swamp with tree trunks you could walk on to get to the other part of the swampy part. It was a nice place to play.

My Godmother Teta' (not sure if that is spelled right)which means aunt in Czech lived in a beautiful house that they build off of Ogden Avenue in Hinsdale. It was called "The Pines". The house is still standing and has been in the newspapers many times because the house is so unique. You would go down a long street to the house and once you got near it there was a circle driveway. The sidewalk was cobble stone. You walked into a kitchen through the back door and by todays standards it was a small kitchen. It had green cabinets and there was a table in it. I remember making cookies or baking and helping Teta make something. The kitchen also had a spot on the floor by the cabinet to sweep the floor into and it would go in the furnace and burn up. There was also a paper shoot in the kitchen which also went into the furnace. Off of the kitchen was a very large dining room. I wonder if it was ever used. The dining room led into a huge living room. The walls were hand scupted with grecian figurines. The room hand a two story bay window that looked like a large spider web. The living room also had a balcony which was off of the master bedroom. Off of the living room was a greenhouse where some of the outside plants were kept in the winter. She also had a parrot that would sing "Let me call you Sweetheart" and "You are my Sunshine". He also would call "Ma" all day long. He was kept in the greenhouse.

Next to the living room was the front door which was rarely used. Off of the front door was a stairway to the basement and also one to the upstairs. The staircase was spiral up and down. The basement had a very large kitchen where the canning and a lot of the big cooking was done. Off of that kitchen was a large knotty pine room, like a family room. Hidden in the wall was a safe but you had to look really close to be able to see the safe.

When you went up the staircase off the front entrance you came to a bedroom. It was a really large room with build in seats by the windows. The room also had a full bath and it was a really large one. I think it was in green tile but not sure I remember. I do remember playing in that room alot. This room, I believe, was Frankie's room whom had passed away.

Up another level was two bedrooms and the master bedroom. I don't remember much about the bedrooms. I do know that the furniture in most of the house was hand carved and I believe some of it was done by my godfather. The master bedroom is the room with the balcony over the living room. There was always a shawl that hung on the railing of the balcony.

In the middle of the hallway of the upstairs level was a trap door in the ceiling. When you pulled the chain a stairway would come down. When you went up the stairs into the room there it was filled with stuffed animals. I don't know if my godfather had killed them or where they all came from but there was fox, birds, deer heads, etc.

There was a sprial stairway even up in that area and the stairway lead to a tower that when you went up to the tower which was outside you could see all the way into Chicago. I believe now you would not have that view because of all the building that are now built. To me the tower was scary as there was only a short wall up there and I never like heights and still don't.

The gardens in the yard were beautiful. The had a live in gardener who had his own small house down the hill from the big house. There was also chickens raised there and woods behind the house where we went mushroom hunting. There was a large swimming pool and also a large cabana but I never saw water in the pool. There was also a gazebo in the yard which was always fun to play in.

The front yard was beautiful with flowers everywhere and the beds were immaculate. There was a flagstone walkway to the front door and there was also a pond with goldfish in it. In the middle of the pond was a large statue of a boy and girl under an umbrella. In the summer Teta used to let me walk in the pond with my bare feet.

On one side of the front yard there was a grassy area that went between pine trees all the way to Ogden Avenue about 1 1/2 blocks from the house and on the other side of the front yard there was a garden for vegetables and a vineyard with grapes everywhere. I loved eating the grapes in season. I also loved the springtime as I could pick Lilies of the Valley, Peonies, Tulips and Daffodils and Lilacs. It was wonderful going home with large bouquets of flowers.

As I have said the house was magnificant and very impressive to a young girl to remember all the details of the house and gardens. It would be wonderful to go back to those days just to go there.

Teta was always good to me. She always either slipped me some money, or bought me clothes or just plain let me bake with her. She was a great Godmother. I know that she was always good to my Mom too as she kind of adopted her as a young girl.

When my Mom was young and living in the city, Teta had a milk store across the street from where my mom lived. Teta took a liking to my mom. They would do many things together as I was growing up. The used to clothes shop on 22nd Street in Berwyn and go to Madame Slavka. Not sure of the spelling but she was a dress designer and she would custom make my Mom's clothes and also Teta's clothes.



Then you went up some

It is Friday and the weekend is almost here

I want to start today with saying how much I enjoy talking on the forum at Quilt 'N' Stitch. Although I know I will never see any of them, I feel that they are becoming my friends.

I had a pleasant surprise when I walked into my kitchen this morning. I had two doe in my front yard within 5 feet of my kitchen window. Then I watched them walk around the house and go into the back yard. One of them came very close to my office window. That is what is nice in this house. I love the wild life. And I also love my birds. I will have to keep my camera ready and take some pictures of the birds also. I have a very large variety of them.