The Cardplayers

When Harry and I were first married and living in Salt Lake City, our dear friend Ronnie Horton got us a job ushering for the Salt Lake Symphony Orchestra. We got 4 tickets each time - and we loved doing the job - and being able to invite people to join us free of charge!

Those were great years - we did it for 3 or 4 years I think - maybe we quit ushering after Bonny was born and just went to the concerts? I do not recall. Harry had the opportunity to travel with the orchestra on their South American tour in 1971 - and that was an adventure. I stayed home with Bonny and had a couple of adventures on my own - not nearly as memorable as Harry's though!

The concerts for the orchestra were in the Tabernacle then - and we'd drive in and park on West Temple, on the street. As we walked to the Tabernacle, we passed a large cluster of old apartment buildings. They were fairly well cared for, but were old. Harry's great Aunt Vi had lived in them at one time - and we even visited her once.

Whenever we walked along the buildings, we would look down into the basement windows - we saw living rooms, kitchens, laundry rooms - and usually saw people in them. They seldom if ever looked up at us - and we tried not to stare. But it was intriguing to me!

I am not sure when we first noticed this one elderly couple (and what do you suppose - maybe they were all of 60 years old!!) They were always playing cards! It didn't matter what time we came by, they were there playing cards. When we were walking back to our car after the concert was over, their windows were dark. Maybe they really were old and couldn't stay awake past 10:30!

And so when I first found this old photo of my Grandma and Grandpa Stevens and my Aunt Dot and Uncle Steve - playing cards - my first thought was of the card-playing couple on West Temple in Salt Lake City.

Harry and I can be seen playing cards if you came up close to our kitchen or dining room windows - not every night though - and sometimes it's not cards, but Scrabble or Racko!!

What goes around comes around I guess!

Labor of Love

My Grandma Stevens was a knitter and a crocheter.  I remember getting cable-knit cardigans from her that kept us warm all winter!!  She also crocheted a lovely blessing dress for Bonny when she was born - we treasure it still.  Phoebe wore it for her blessing - as did Agnes and Bonny's girls.

Years later, my mom came across the dress that Grandma had crocheted for me to be blessed in.  It looked pretty hammered - ripped, stained, and unraveling in places.  I was not to be thwarted, however, and made it a project to resurrect the dress!!  And resurrect it I did, as you can see from the photo below, of Eliza wearing the dress.  Hannah also wore it, as did Ida and others.

A few years ago, actually maybe 20, my mom gave me an old bedspread that Grandma had crocheted in the early 40's or late 30's.  It was ripped and stained also.  I remembered it being on my grandparents' bed and was pretty sure it was salvageable.  But I just put it away instead of getting right to work on it.

Recently I came across it again - and this time I got right to work.  The top photo shows me working on it Saturday night.  I have found a cleaners I trust, and I am taking it there tomorrow to get it cleaned.  I was at my mom's, and I would spread it out on the floor so we could spot the errors - as I did the big ones, the little ones sometimes got away from us!  It was fun to talk about Grandma Stevens and all the other projects she'd worked on over her many years as a wonderful needle woman.

Too bad I didn't get interested in crocheting myself until it was too late to have Grandma teach me anything about it.  I would have loved to discuss patterns and techniques with her.

But at least I learned to crochet!!

Some interesting trivia for your reading pleasure!!

I have been hunting for some specific photos - and of course I have not found them yet.  But I have found other treasures.  

This photo is part of a group panorama photo of temple workers at the Los Angeles Temple in 1969.  In the group of three men in the center, on the front row, the man on the left is President Benjamin L. Bowring.  I don't remember the name of the man in the middle, but the man next to the man in the middle is James B. Keysor.

Pres. Keysor is/was the owner of Century Record Mfg. Company in Saugus, CA.  I worked there for 9 months before I headed off to BYU  (9 months because I graduated from high school in January of 1963.)  He was friends with my parents, and he also lived with them in the Burbank Ward in the forties.  His son James Keysor Jr. was the man who hired me.  He and his wife also hired me as a baby-sitter and mother's helper when they had twin girls.

President Bowring is the man who performed our marriage ceremony in 1967.  Of special interest to us at least is the fact that he also performed the marriage ceremony for President and Sister Monson - before 1967 of course!!  He was in the temple presidency of the Salt Lake Temple at that time.

If you click on this photo and look at the woman almost in the center of the photo - on the third row with no one behind her - you will note a woman who bears a strong resemblance to my mother - as well she should, since she is my Grandma Stevens!  She was a temple worker when we got married - and took great pleasure in escorting me around the day we got married, introducing me to all of her friends!!  I now know what a pleasure it is to do just that!!

So there is the trivia trove for today - here's hoping I find the photos I am looking for!!

Happy Birthday to My Grandma Stevens!!

I'm pretty sure I post the same photos and tell the same story. But today is the anniversary of my Grandma Stevens' birth. Alice was born the day after. And I would say, "Oh it's too bad she missed yours by just a day." My grandma would say, "Might as well have missed it by a month, she still missed it!"

My grandma had been a stenographer, and she still had her Remington typewriter. When I was in college, she typed letters to me all the time. I loved it.

She was a wonderful Grandma - we often spent nights at her house - and that was a real treat. And I always thought she wore the most amazing jewelry. Years later, my mom gave me a box of her jewelry for a jeweled Christmas tree I was making. I remembered all the jewelry in the box - and it was all costume jewelry!!

Oh well, she was royalty to me!!