Love Connects Generations…

Good afternoon, dear friends!

What  a lovely weekend it’s been…hope yours is going well, too!

I have the last few pages of my mini family album to share with you today…

First, my beautiful Mother, Karen…

My Mother is an amazing woman…she has managed to retain such a childlike love of everything all throughout her life…I love that about her!

She is an incredibly talented dollmaker, (a few of which you can see by clicking here), and has been featured in Dollmaker magazine, but isn’t too concerned about all that…I love that about her, too…

She has loved dolls and stuffed animals all of her life.  When young, and told that they couldn’t afford the things she loved, she simply decided to learn how to make them herself…and she did.

So, my Mother’s page highlights her beauty, her creativity, and the dolls and things she loves so much…

My Grandmother Smith…LaPriel…

A beautiful and gracious woman, who loved all the refined things in life…poetry, proper etiquette, providing a loving home for her family, her favorite color; happy, sunshiny yellow…

Taken away from us to soon…I was only 3 1/2 years old when she passed away from the effects of cancer.  I still remember her, however…a small child’s remembrance of a Grandmother that loved her very much…

And finally, generations earlier…a fourth great-grandmother that I love oh, so dearly…because I feel I know her well…

Louisa Barnes Pratt…born in 1802 in Massachusetts…an accomplished tailor, adventurer, strong advocate for the rights of women, and a prolific writer who wrote her own story in amazing detail, which was published about 10 years ago…which is how I know and love her so well…

…thank-you, Louisa, for telling your story so honestly and beautifully…

The photo here on my album page is a rare treasure for me…she is pictured here, late in her life, with her beloved granddaughter, my second great-grandmother, Ida Francis Hunt, born in 1858…

Have you ever wondered who in your family tree you resemble most?  Being as immersed in my genealogy all of my life as I have been, I’ve wondered this many times…pouring over generations of family photos, I had yet to see anyone with enough features combined to resemble my own in my mind…until I first saw this one, when Louisa’s book was published…

…this is  the face I see when I look in the mirror…almost 50 years old now, I still sometimes see the face of the child I still feel I am inside, her face…

 

(I have to tell you--don’t read this, Mom--there’s hardly a grade-school portrait of me in which my bangs are cut straight—and I didn’t cut them…!)

My album completed…already thinking of the next…I really enjoyed putting this one together!

Images from Crafty Secrets Creative Scraps and booklets, Maya Road Chipboard album (sold by Crafty Secrets),

copies of my family photos, vintage images found online…and all the trimmings and sparkly things I always love to use…

I hope the rest of your Sunday is a lovely and restful one…and remember…

Love connects generations

…it really, really does…

See you soon with something new.

Julie

LiveJournal Tags: Crafty Secrets,family album,Karen Ostlund Smith,LaPriel Riggs Smith,Louisa Barnes Pratt,Ida Francis Hunt