pretty dresses, hip spectacles, and real-live bunnies

these are lovely photos from the family archives...
my sweet mom and her family from the 1950s-1960s.
this is nostalgia at it's best, yes?
i certainly love seeing my cute little mom with her dimples
and sparkling eyes {which, of course, are still my favorite features of hers}.

i am wondering about that bunny...
celia jane tells the story often of when she was a little girl
and her family had a couple of bunnies : one particularly hot day
her and her sister became quite in a panic as they worried
their little bunnies were over-heating in all of that fur
on the hottest day of the year...
they proceeded to poor buckets and buckets of cold water
on those bunnies...i won't tell you how it ended.
i only hope that the bunny pictured here had a better life.
{hoping you're not planning on getting yourself a bunny,
unless, that is, you happen to be a bunny-raising-extraordinaire}.

today also happens to be earth day...
i love that this weekend is full of ways to celebrate life
and all that this earth and beyond have to offer us.
life is sweet, isn't dear readers?

happy weekend!

'tis the season: at celia jane's {part two}

christmas morning:

dolls, dolls, dolls!

oh, the excitement!

entranced by the train

going round and round,

wrapping paper ripped open and forgotten.

this photo is a few years later...
now there are boys in the family.
don't you just love their serious faces?!


then comes that silent moment after the craziness of gift-opening
when everyone is lost in their new toys.
{notice superman playing with his new farm!}


then the cousins come over,
and the excitement continues...

and here comes the little drummer boy.

thank you celia jane for such a wonderful legacy!

'tis the season: at celia jane's {part one}

this is christmas eve circa 1950.

aunt connie on the left, my dear mother, dianne, on the right.

singing christmas carols on christmas eve.

aren't they so cute?!

grandpa newel always has a train around the tree.

the sight of it going round and round the presents

warms my heart.

{notice their tv...first one in the neighborhood, right mom?}

don't you love my mom's blue eyes?

we kids were lucky and inherited them.

it's the first thing anyone ever compliments me on.

i immediately tell them they are my mother's eyes.

{and those curtains! amazing!}

oh, the lovely celia jane!

red shoes, red lipstick, red nails all the time.

connie, baby margie, celia jane, and dianne.

the three sisters.

my mom is the only living sister.

it's really so sad that her sisters left us

at such young ages

{connie was in her 50's and margie was in her 30's}

i thought it was quite fun to see some

of the gifts they were given that year.

love the stockings hanging on the door

bulging with an orange at the bottom.

more vintage christmas photos to come in the next week!

hope you love them as much as i do!

happy thanksgiving!

thanksgiving, originally uploaded by Ann Marie Whittaker.

we are leaving early in the morning to visit family.

can't wait!

i love,love, love this photo
{some of you may remember it from last year!}
it is of my mom's thanksgiving when she was a little girl.
that's her in the lower left corner.
celia jane is right behind her.
and annie is in the far right lower corner.

i am oh so very grateful for everyone in my life.
all of you make my life so rich.

happy thanksgiving!
{i'll be back here next week}

listing gratitude {part four}

..........
am grateful indeed to be a granddaughter
of celia jane
who knows how to live
a simply beautiful life.
..........
am so thankful to have farming
in my blood.
a strong heritage.
..........
am grateful for
mary, eliza jane, and rhoda...
their eyes alone tell me
they were great women.
..........
am thankful to belong
in a line of women
who know who they are.
...................................................

manifesto monday: home remedy

her hand would go thoughtfully to the cupboard,
above the electric stove.
small plastic canisters with round, red lids
labeled: cinnamon, nutmeg, and ginger
were retrieved.

i was either sick or tired.
either way there was always one comforting remedy
on those quiet, dark, and muffled fall/winter evenings:
"pearl tea."

it began with great-grandma, annie.
a midwife and a wonderful cook.
my namesake.
celia jane, her daughter, would naturally use pearl tea
to cure my mother of a cold,
or to help her end her tossing and turning.

i don't remember having pearl tea often...
but i know my mom always made it when i needed
its comforting sweetness and spice
to aid my little body.

a warm drink before bed.
every night.
both celia jane and dianne choose
to have hot cocoa almost every night...

i especially love the pearl tea.
this home remedy,
generations old,
helps me sleep every night.
this i believe.

{photos by me. ocotober 2009}

manifesto monday: i know who i am...

last night, after digging through some boxes that have been stored away for a few years, i wondered at my attitude and behavior pre-marriage as i looked through some old photo albums. oh, no, it was not nostalgia that overcame me...it was a bit of disgust to be honest with you. i remember the confusion and the numbness that engulfed me for many, many years (and which i am only now beginning to get my head above the trees to see it all). those years were full of sarcasm and falseness: false confidence, false loves, false goals. i remember being a copy-cat to the extreme. i wanted to be everyone else. so-and-so spoke korean and graduated in international development...so would i. so-and-so loved rock-climbing...so did i. so-and-so was a multi-media guru...so i would try. good things, for other people. not me.

a week ago i picked raspberries with my grandpa newel from his bushes behind his pretty little yellow house. for the past few years i have been realizing what it is that i love (and what i never really loved in the first place). i have been picking raspberries from grandpa's bushes ever since i can remember...the flavor of raspberry anything immediately transports my mind and heart to that lovely back yard years and years ago. i realized that's why i favor raspberry jam, raspberry tarts, raspberry syrup, raspberry chocolate over any other fruit. raspberries are grandpa's berries. and they are mine too...because i am his blood.

there was a memorable day when i knew what i wanted to do with my life...when i realized how nostalgic i was for my ancestors and days gone by. history and story would be my passion. the more i find out about my family and my family of generations gone by the more life has meaning for me. the more i love, the more i learn, the more i am. i am the blood that runs through me...an amalgamation of irish farmers, german philosophers, british stewards, alchemist blacksmiths, american frontiersmen/women, and on and on. i am a steward, a farmer, an academic, a mystic, a musician, a writer, a mother, a sister, a historian. i know who i am. this i believe.

first polaroid of me with grandpa newel picking raspberries. september 2009. photo taken by mom.
second polaroid of newel's grapes that have provided jelly and juice for years. september 2009. photo taken by me.

let me tell you about my cabin...the myth, the legend, the history

this is my paternal family cabin.

this is the side of the family i see least,

but i know more of its history & legend:

lunatics, alcoholics, hidden identities...

this family is full of secrets.

today i'll just tell you a little something about

a place that i am most in love with:

"the green cabin"

generations ago my great-great grandmother

owned thousands and thousands of beautiful land

in north-eastern utah.

it's a story of the west:

her husband died, things got tough,

another man took advantage of her desperate situation,

and bought the land for much less than its value.

the family kept a small fraction of the land.

at least we have that much.

upon that land, my grandfather and other family members

built this cabin.

yes, it's green...and i hope they never change that.

as i grew up, and met cousins in the surrounding cabin

i learned that there were great myths about our cabin:

about murder, ghosts, and scandal.

it scared and intrigued me all at once.

this place is dripping with stories.

just across the dirt road are where cousins keep their horses.

they've always been there.

perhaps this is where i began to dream that heaven is a meadow where i will ride horses all day long.

that shed, above, has always been the source of scary stories for us.

just down the road is another shed of a cabin,

this other one is known as "the bea's nest"...

where crazy aunt bea used to be kept away.

ooh, the stories the family has about her!

the area is surrounded by beautiful lakes and rivers.

hiking to them is a yearly tradition.

i only wish we could spend more time in this amazing landscape.

here is the meadow where, it is joked, that "bambi" was filmed...of course, a cartoon is not "filmed", but i like to think that this is bambi's and his mother's heaven...what a lovely meadow indeed!

(that's me in a blue hat and a blue dress...i guess you could say i like blue!)


everywhere you look there is something fantastical about this place.
i always look at this cabin here, thinking that i'd like to go in someday

oh, the lakes!
the colors, the air, the view!


every afternoon a great storm rolls in...
dark clouds
& lots of thunder.
oh, heart!
when do i get to live here forever?


behind the cabin is a little river...
we spent days and days and days playing in it...
now, i think it is quite a lovely refuge.
seriously, when can i move in permanently?


the best part of all, of course, are the people we get to see here.
ceej loves to rest on the porch...looking at a place that he knew long before he met me {you see, he grew up with cousins of mine, and was visiting the area with them...perhaps we ran into each other when we were younger...i like to think we did}
and here is my nephew. 7-years-old. we talked all the way home from our hike about harry potter. that's what good stories are for: they bring together the old and the young...we talk about love being the greatest of all, not fearing death, etc. what a lovely conversation to have with a 7-year-old.

later this evening i have just a few more photos to share with you.
so please visit again!

my name

my name, ann marie, was influenced by my great-grandmother, annie. in every picture i have of her she is wearing one of her many aprons. i am grateful to have one of her aprons, pictured above. i use it when i'm making bread, or when i'm making a family recipe...one that annie would have made. i wonder what songs she would have hummed while cooking. i wonder what the women would have talked about while the bread was baking. celia jane might be able to tell me, but it's getting harder for her to remember.
annie was a midwife. she took care of the women in the neighborhood. i think to be a midwife is to be in one of the highest of callings in life. i believe i would have truly enjoyed her company.
who were you named after?

The Annie Anthology

(above) Annie Peck

(above) Annie Thayne

(above) Annie Peck...me with Celia Jane.

Nostalgia

Why is it that all of us 20-something women are knitting, sewing, cooking, gardening, putting bows in our hair, moving back to the city limits for walkable communities, and wearing clothes our mothers wore when they were growing up?

I think it's because we feel we missed out on something...a lot of things. We're learning the lost art of homemaking (it truly is an ART). We want to grow things ourselves and then can our produce in the fall so that we can have fresh eatings in the winter. Most days when I look in the mirror after dressing I think, "man, I look like my mom when she was a little girl"...why? Because that style was and is so pretty. It's fun to wear skirts and put on red lipstick. It's fun to use Grandma's old rollers to get those ringlet curls...it's fun to ride trikes if you ask me.

My mom commented that there's not much original writing going on these days in books, TV, or movies. I agree. It's all a repeat of when she was growing up. For good reason. What does my Nintendo generation have to offer? Not much. (I'm sure I can think of something that we can offer culturally, but I'm in a "nostalgic" mood).

Those little girls: my mom on the back, getting a ride from Aunt Connie. Beautiful girls who became beautiful women.

A Day of Miracles

A few minutes ago I recieved an email from my Uncle David (the boy pictured above). He is a professor of English, and obviously a good one because he is so generous. I last saw him at my grandparents house during the holidays. He shared with me words of wisdom and kindness concerning my senior thesis (that thing which has consumed my thoughts to the point of anxiety). Today I received an email from him with more words of encouragement and kindness. Hooray for people who ease our burdens and make them light!

I often find that when looking for miracles, it's not that something hard or sad has gone away, but that I am changed in one way or another to be able to bear it. Today I know my heart has been transformed to bear the things that have been oh so hard.

On Grandparents

My Grandpa, Newel, grew up in Declo, Idaho. He has the kindest eyes and the softest heart. My Grandma, Celia, is a Salt Lake City Girl. She has the loveliest laugh, and cares most that we are all well fed and keeping warm. Grandpa always supplies good advice and Grandma always leaves us with Cadbury chocolate! Both have entertaining stories to tell, and wise words to share: living simply and taking lots of naps!

I am from...

I am from the Isle of Man. Well, at least that's where some of my ancestors are from. I have never been there, but talked with those who have. Some day soon I'll go there. Perhaps tonight I'll watch the Secret of Roan Inish. I'm feeling a strong pull towards the British Isles today. I'll probably spend the rest of my day listening to fiddles, reading about King Arthur, and watching Fiona fix up her old thatched-roof home on the island.

What I imagine Christmas to be in 1950

This is a most beloved photo of my mom, Dianne, and her sister, Connie with Santa Claus. This photograph says Christmas to my whole being. It makes me want to have been born in 1946. What do you think? I think my mom was the most beautiful little girl (she's the one on the left)-which is why I think she is now the most beautiful woman I know. One of my favorite things about my mom is her simplicity and her love for simple things. Her bedroom is painted a lovely light, but intense, blue (the color of her eyes). She has a few books, all of which are insightful or pretty, or both. But I must admit that my most favorite thing about my mom is that when she was a little girl she used to pray every night that she would wake up the next morning as a faerie. She wanted wings so that she could fly. I think I inherited the faerie gene. Three cheers for a lovely, imaginative, and wise woman!