A case for keeping buttons

Every time I take a personality test I end up with the same maddening result: Neither/nor, or sometimes either/or. If a question came up that said, "If you had a chance to take home a collection of buttons, some of them matching but in varied sizes and colors and you had no immediate use for them, would you keep them?"

I would surely answer a scoffing "No thank you."

But then I would keep them in real life, because I did. 

I love throwing old useless "stuff" away or just not acquiring it in the first place--I get a thrill from dropping things off at D.I. But shoot, I love these buttons. Both of my kids are absurdly entertained by them. And no, Norah doesn't try to eat them; what can I say, she's an anomaly. They came from Grandma Stricklan's sewing supplies that I swiped inherited, and although all of my sewing projects with buttons have been furnished from this collection, I just like to keep them around for fun. Stacking, sorting, dropping, throwing (not allowed), and cleaning them up again. 

I still generally throw things away rather than keep them for posterity, but I am extremely thankful that my parents and grandparents and Nate's parents and grandparents didn't do that (or else I'd never have anything to wear on Sundays--about 75% of the time I am wearing something or other that came from the Clarks' basement to church.)

The Piano

We acquired the piano! The piano I wrote about here. I was sure I had written something about it; it's a family heirloom. I just forgot to mention that we Petersons have obtained the instrament and moved it into our cozy* house with us. It's been here for months, but it's just as well that I didn't post about it before since I just took that photo of Norah last week, and it would have been a shame to leave that picture out of a piano post if I had written it previous to the photo existing. Right? Right.

*Code word for tiny

Not only has this piano been across the plains to Nebraska and back with my family, but my Aunt Evelyn also took it to Denver with her when she moved as a young woman, and then it moved around with her until she gave it to us in the early 1990s. She was actually the one who picked the piano they were supposed to get--she just told me that today. She was upset that it wasn't the right one, that this one was "too red," but "Mother" just said, "Nevermind," because she didn't want to cause a fuss about it. (She told me it cost $1,000.)

As it turns out, this is a great piano and Evelyn loves it, but her 8-year-old self was not impressed with its ruddy color. She would probably have been glad to know that it has faded considerably over the last 60 years. She took lessons on it until she was 14, at which point she got too busy lambing and didn't have time to practice. She would go from school to the lambing shed and then stumble to bed at about 10pm, at which point my grandma would take over for a few hours until the hired man would wake up for his shift in the wee hours of the morning. When she told me that she said, "I'm probably making it sound worse than it was," at which point I just laughed because I am sure I have never worked that hard in my life. She sort of gave up piano in earnest at that point, but she can play hymns and I always remember her playing this piano in our house when I was younger.

"When you read a book as a child, it becomes part of your identity in a way that no other reading does."

Kathleen Kelly from the movie You've Got Mail has about twenty boatloads of one-liners, and that one about reading is one of her truest. I don't presume that Toby and Sue will grow to have enormous significance in my kids' lives, but these books are some of Calvin's favorites lately. I am grateful to have them, and to know that Calvin's great-grandma Patti read them and probably laughed at Sue's funny lopsided dress hems and the children's idea that their mother would rather have wild baby bunnies for her birthday than a bouquet of flowers.

I have tried to collect several of the really significant books from my early childhood and youth, such as Hop on Pop (a classic!), Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good Very Bad Day, and The Witch of Blackbird Pond. I don't yet have any Babysitters Club, but I've got about a truckload of Nancy Drew, and by the time my dad's done gathering them, I'm sure we'll have them all. This is not to say that my kids will be interested in reading any of these obviously superior books, however; I know of my mom's distinct appreciation for the "girl and her horse" genre, absolutely zero of which ever interested me. (That seems a shame to me now, because it is such a charming genre, but at the time they would have been age-appropriate for me I couldn't be persuaded to even go near them.)

I would really love to know the significant books in my predecessors' lives, the further distant the more so. What were yours?

Thedford, Nebraska home where Dave and Juli Stricklan live. April 1989. Andy Stricklan 1 yr. Juel Aikele and Melissa Stricklan, 4 yrs.

Caption is the title of this post, written by my grandma Ada on the back of the photo.

Here are my brother Andy and I at the same ages my kids are now. Four and one. True, I was a closer to five than four since this is labeled "April," but I am surprised at how much I remember about that place. And that dress, which I loved to shreds and have thought about trying to duplicate hundreds of times.

Jocelyn and I lived in that upstairs room you can see with the gabled window. We thought it was really awesome because the ceiling was sloped and there was a little cubby closet area. (I still think those things are cool.)

Once I was running through our room and I caught my knee on my dresser handle and it gouged me straight in. I remember the yellow stuff my mom put on the wound. I also remember getting my kindergarten shots while we lived here, and they tuckered me out "sick" for the day. I lay on the couch, and felt very coddled.

My mom tried really hard to rid me of my finger-sucking habit in this house. Mittens, foul-tasting concoctions brushed on my fingernails. It must have worked eventually because I don't suck them now. Jocelyn learned to ride a bike and tie her shoes here, but I didn't. I actually don't remember learning those things at all.

I remember the upstairs landing. It was in the middle of the top storey, and our room was to the left and the bathroom straight ahead. Downstairs, the kitchen had a built-in bench seat, I think, around the table.

Jocelyn and I started our scavenger hunts while living here. My dad would make a list of things to find, and off we'd go on a walk to find them. White car, maple tree, lime green house with upstairs gable. I remember Andy's big Easter meltdown when he won a huge Easter basket at the local market, but that was probably the following Easter after this photo was taken. He cried and cried even though he won, and they took our family picture for the paper or something I believe. It is funny what you can't call to mind, however, and I don't know if he was howling in the picture or if he wasn't in it at all. Let's all read the comments to see what my mom has to say on the subject.

Things I don't remember: it being crowded, though it must have been with six Stricklans living there; it being hot, though it must have been because I doubt there was air conditioning; lots of dishwashing, though my parents must have done because I doubt there was a dishwasher. Those are my main housing concerns these days, by the way, until I remember they really don't matter an extreme amount in the long run if even I and my elephant of a memory can't remember anything about them.

My Calvin boy has the craziest memory I've ever witnessed. I hope he will stay that way and come across pictures of our little house and say that he remembers the crazy blue shag carpet before we ripped it up, and the day we got our new toilet because he kicked the lid off the old one, which ricocheted off the wall and smashed the bowl.