3 January 2012 by Libbi.

Played this list while at a friend’s house, and she really liked the mix:

 In a way it is a soundtrack of my life from grade school to now….so if anyone writes a novel about me and wants to listen to the music of my life, this is a good start. 

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19 December 2011 by Libbi.

Crowe Family Christmas Card

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all! I have decided to do only email newsletters/holiday cards this year. Less waste of gasoline and paper!

2011 brought some pretty wonderful things. Marianne and Ryan were married in Key West in February, my brother Bill and his wife Kathie (and Springer Ria!) came to see us in June and Matthew passed his prelims for his Ph. D. in September. We went boating a lot and camped out on the lovely coastline where we live. From Destin to Pirate’s Cove in Baldwin County, we had a blast on Crowe’s Nest this year.

We hope all of you are well and happy, and will come to see us in the new year!

Below: Matthew, Libbi, Mark, Marianne in Key West!

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13 July 2011 by Libbi.

52 Weeks of Personal Genealogy & History - Week #28

 Summers in Alabama in the 50s6s and 70s were hot, muggy and filled with sounds of cicadas, locusts and crickets.

I remember lots of camping trips to Davy Crockett  State Park, in the hills of Tennessee where it was somewhat cooler than Huntsville. We sometimes “joined” a swimming pool, or the YMCA, but usually got ear infections from it.

But most of all I remember watching sunsets from the back porch, which overlooked downtown Huntsville.

When Jul 9 – 15, 2011

Where http://www.geneabloggers.com/tag/52-weeks-of-personal-genealogy-history/ (map)

Description Week 28: Summer. What was summer like where and when you grew up? Describe not only the climate, but how the season influenced your activities, food choices, etc. We’ll list a new challenge each Saturday which should be completed by the following Friday. 52 Weeks of Personal Genealogy & History (http://www.geneabloggers.com/tag/52-weeks-of-personal-genealogy-history/) by Amy Coffin is a series of weekly blogging prompts (one for each week of 2011) that invite genealogists and others to record memories and insights about their own lives for future descendants. You do not have to be a blogger to participate. If you do not have a genealogy blog, write down your memories on your computer, or simply record them on paper and keep them with your files.

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25 April 2011 by Libbi.

This blog is in response to Week 17. Pets. Did you have any pets as a child? If so, what types and what were their names. Do you have pets now? Describe them as well. If you did not have pets, you can discuss those of neighbors or other family members. This challenge runs from Saturday, April 23, 2011 through Friday, April 29, 2011. Amy Coffin of the We Tree blog (http://wetree.blogspot.com/) is responsible!!!

We have a long family tradition of puns as names for our pets. Or at least descriptive quotations. Some examples:

• The first dog I remember was a rat terrier mix. She was a great watch dog, my father declared. Her name was TickTock.
• After TickTock we had a fluffy little dog with various degrees of spitz, some sort of herding dog, maybe Corgi, and many other breeds. The dog’s name came from his white feet and an old  TV show: Sugarfoot. Sugarfoot made the news. He bit a child, so we had to take him to the pound. the pound tried to test out a new tranq gun, I believe it was, on him. Sugarfoot was too fast on his feet for them, they never landed a shot on him. He made the Huntsville Times and someone adopted him. If I ever find my childhood scrapbook, I’ll scan in the newspaper article.
  
• When our rector gave us one of a litter of kittens, of course we named the cat Lucifer.
•  When we had a cat that couldn’t seem to see at night very well, bumping into beds and other furniture, his full name became “Long Leggety Beastie and Thing that Goes Bump in the Night”, usually shortened to Long Leggety.  That’s from an old prayer, “From ghoulies and ghosties and long-legged-ty beasties, and things that go bump in the night, may the Lord protect us.”
  
• We had a cat who would purr, knead and slobber on a wool afghan we had, for all of his long life. He was EddyPuss.
  
• When Mark and I were newlyweds, we got a cat, a purebred Himalayan. We stopped by a friend’s house on the way home to show him off. The friend, who at the time managed a Long John Silver’s, put together our name, the Siamese look of him, and came up with Simon CroweCat.

Yeah. We’re sick people!

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8 February 2011 by Libbi.

Week 6: Radio and Television. What was your favorite radio or television show from your childhood? What was the program about and who was in it?

Of course, Twilight Zone, Star Trek and The Outer Limits.

Grew up in a town where everyone’s dad was a rocket scientist.

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1 February 2011 by Libbi.

Here’s this week’s challenge:

Week 5: Favorite Food. What was your favorite food from childhood? If it was homemade, who made it? What was in this dish, and why was it your favorite? What is your favorite dish now?

 My favorite food is still one of my favorites: Mama would make a dish of white sauce, onion, mushrooms and pimientos, with a drained can of tuna added in. This would be put on biscuits, toast points, or English muffins for any meal of the day, including breakfast.

Actually Mama would cook anything for breakfast, as long as she could get us to eat before we left the house. Soup, milkshakes made with egg and fruit, even scrambled eggs with catsup (my brother Bill loved those!) would be considered fair game!

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25 January 2011 by Libbi.

Week 4: Home. Describe the house in which you grew up. Was it big or small? What made it unique? Is it still there today?

This challenge runs from Saturday, January 22, 2011 through Friday, January 28, 2011.

I’m jumping in a few weeks late, but here goes!

This is a picture of the house I grew up in, as it looks today. This house was built 1960-61 by my father, who acted as his own contractor. This meant that all the specs were at least a bit above the requirements. The plumbing was top grade.The wiring (Daddy was an Electrical Engineer with a degree from Georgia Tech) was too, and in the attic,   the wires are laid completely straight, and labeled. In the Master Bedroom is a panel of toggle light switches which control every light in and outside the house, with one big Master Toggle, where Daddy could turn off all lights just before going to bed.

The family jest was that when Daddy called for the city to come inspect at various stages, the city guy would say, “Aw, Mr. Powell, you know you just want to brag.”

The house is on the side of a limestone hill, and the foundation in the front right corner is tied to the bedrock, meaning it has not shifted down the hill since construction, as so many even well built houses in Huntsville are wont to do. When we moved in, Mother insisted it be painted blue, her favorite color. Later on, we repainted to a deep brown with a goldenrod color on the trim. For many years, the front  door was bright red, in the tradition of protection and good  luck.

When we moved in, on the right property line and on the left by the driveway were two large, very old, cedar trees. The massive tornado outbreak of April 4, 1974  ripped both trees out of the ground (cedar trees do not bend) and laid them across the front yard. The same tornado twisted the house just a little, and the chimney leaked ever after that. Similarly, the house is a little closer to the street than those on either side, because Mama and Daddy wanted to save a particular  Black Walnut tree just outside the master bedroom window. Five years after we moved in, lighting struck the tree, but it did not fall on the house. Daddy saved the wood and made some items from it such as a nut scoop.

The house has a basement rec room and a cellar. The cellar, when I was small, was large enough and empty enough for me to roller skate in on rainy days. Later it filled up with Daddy’s wine making equipment.

The kitchen is in the front, an unusual design, because the back, where the living room and dining room are,  has a beautiful view of downtown Huntsville. I used to sit on the back porch, watching the sun set as Mother cooked supper, or at night looking at the stars and listening to the cicadas and crickets.

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