Friday, May 18, 2007

Carnival of Genealogy, 24th Edition




Welcome to the May 18, 2007 edition of the Carnival of Genealogy. The topic for this edition is Mothers! We have wonderful tributes and tales of the women who have for better or worse had a hand (or a gene ;-) in making us who we are today. They come in all shapes and sizes, races and religions, ages and eras. They live in our hearts and in our minds and now in our Carnival too. Let's hear it for moms!

Starting us off, Bill West shares with us a touching tale in HOW I LEARNED TO RIDE MY BIKE posted at West in New England. Here's a mom who used her head instead of her feet to help her son learn to ride a bike. Very ingenious of her! She sounds like a lovely lady, Bill. Thanks for sharing her with us.

Next up, Randy Seaver presents My Tribute to Mom - Betty Virginia (Carringer) Seaver posted at Genea-Musings. Betty is remembered and honored by a son that leaves no doubt of his respect, love, and devotion to her. She did well by you, Randy. Thanks for sharing her life with us.

Next, Tim Abbott presents "Every Picture Tells A Story, Don't It?" posted at Walking the Berkshires. When I look at Alice Jane I don't see "stoic", I see a poet/intellect. I see a classy lady who knew her own mind. A woman of conviction. What do you see? Thanks for sharing Alice Jane with us, Tim.

Christina Geyer shares with us two fascinating articles. First McGimpsey letter from 1854 , which consists of a mother's letter to her son back in 1854. Wow! What a treasure! And also Happy Mother's Day, an tribute to an immigrant mother from her immigrant daughter. Both are posted at Shaking the Tree. Rich, thought provoking articles Christina. Thanks for sharing and giving us a bit of international flare!

And next, Janice Brown presents My Tribute to A New Hampshire Mother posted at Cow Hampshire, saying, "Every mom deserves a tribute." Some writers have a knack of writing things that pull at your heart strings (which in turn causes your eyes to well with tears). Janice is that kind of writer. A lovely tribute. Thanks so much for sharing your mother with us, Janice.

Katie kindly shares with us A Mother's Day Tribute posted at Begat Chat. Everyone should have a mom that helps them read a thousand books! Here's a down to earth, from the heart, tribute that says "thanks mom" in a very moving way. Thanks Katie, it's so nice to meet your mom!

Next, Jasia presents My Memory Bouquet posted at Creative Gene. With my mother having passed away less than a month ago my grief is still deep and raw. This was hard for me to write but it does capture at least a handful of my favorite memories of her.

And next, Cheryl Schulte presents A Grandma's Faith posted at Two Sides of the Ocean. Cheryl manages to write a mini family history in one post! This wonderful article takes us across oceans, and across generations with great pictures too. I'm especially delighted to discover a fellow Detroiter with Polish ancestry who blogs! Yeah! Thanks so much for submitting your article, Cheryl!

Miriam Robbins Midkiff presents Eight Generations of Mothers posted at AnceStories: The Stories of My Ancestors, saying, "A photo gallery of my children's maternal line." Wow, this is an impressive collection of photographs! What a fine visual tribute to the mothers in your family. Thanks for sharing them with us, Miriam!

And now, Becky Wiseman presents Mothers and Grandmothers posted at kinexxions. Becky has some great photos to share and an impressive list of mothers from her family tree. What a nice way to get the names of all these women on the 'net! Thanks Becky!

Following next we have Denise Olson presenting A Soldier's Mom posted at Moultrie Creek. Denise reminds us that there are soldier's moms who spent Mother's Day in prayer for their sons' safety or grieving for their sons who died serving our country. How sad that even now, four days after her post, some of those moms still don't know the fate of their sons. Take a moment, say a prayer, remember these mothers and their sons. Thank you for reminding us, Denise.

Schelly Talalay Dardashti shares two articles with us, The legend of Little Grandma and Raising the curve: Nane-jan in Teheran both posted at Tracing the Tribe. I just love stories of immigrants and the resourcefulness they used to help acclimate to life in a foreign country. This is one of the best... here's to you Little Grandma! And Nane-Jan was resourceful as well, selling jewelry to the women in the shah's harem... how exotic! Great women, great stories! Thanks for sharing, Schelly! (Your email address didn't come through so I couldn't write you back. Email me at: imjasia at yahoo dot com)

And last but certainly not least, Susan A. Kitchens submitted While There is Yet Time: Mothers Day 2006 posted at The Elder Storytelling Place, saying, "This is a story written by Fred First of Fragments of Floyd [http://www.fragmentsfromfloyd.com/] at Ronni Bennet's Elder Storytelling Place, part of her site, Time Goes By. It's the story of how his mother recorded her memories and gave the tape to her son, the writer of this post. It's utterly fitting as part of our carnival theme." Absolutely wonderful. Thank you Susan!

And, Susan A. Kitchens offers a couple tributes to moms, Articles | My Mother tells me about HER mother posted at Family Oral History Using Digital Tools, saying, "I offer two reprise posts from my site-- the main one, which is a movie I made out of the recording I did with my mom last year on Mother's Day. -- wherein my Mom tells a story about her mom. And then this other one, I'm so glad you did this. So glad about doing my boyfriend's Mom's oral history, and the experience of listening to it right after she died last fall. This year, my observation of Mother's Day was mostly to take care of my boyfriend, as this was his first Mother's Day without his Mom. (we went walking in a nature/scenic spot in a "tourist in your hometown" kinda way). My Mom, in solidarity, was totally down with that." Thanks for sharing your article and video, Susan. You are the techno-leader of our little band of COG participants.

These are all the articles that I received from the BlogCarnival.com web site for this edition. However, there are a couple others that I think should be included here. I don't know if the author forgot to submit them, did submit them but I didn't get notified, or simply didn't choose to submit them. But here they are anyway...

Craig Manson wrote, The Mothers of Me and a follow up, The Mothers of Mine posted at GeneaBlogie. Obviously Craig has already done a good deal of writing about the Mothers in his family. Here's a nice, concise post that remembers them again and mentions a few he hasn't gotten around to writing about yet.

If there are any articles that were submitted on this topic but don't appear here, please let me know and I will add them ASAP.

That concludes this edition of the Carnival of Genealogy. Thanks to all who submitted articles and shared something about the moms in their lives with the rest of us. And now it's time for a Call for Submissions! The topic for the next edition of the COG will be: Who inherited the Creative Gene in your family? We're all aware of someone on the family tree who was/is "the creative one" or "the talented one"... the painter, musician, poet, wood carver, interior designer, writer, knitter, singer, calligrapher, or such. Tell us about their creative pursuits. Let's hear it for the creatives! Please submit your blog article to the next edition of Carnival of Genealogy using our carnival submission form. The deadline for submissions for the next edition will be June 1st. Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page.

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