A bit of history

I've been feeling "off" the last 2 days, like my body is fighting something, but I can't pinpoint WHAT is it. Seems like something different is tender or aching every hour. Right now it's my jaw, this morning it was my tummy, last night it was my ear... maddening. :)

Anyhow, I got the red border on today and plan to at least iron the teddy bear border tonight, hoping to cut it too.



Earlier today I was nib-nosing around in my drawers next to my computer and I found my dad's and Pops' side of the family history written in a booklet by Pops' aunt several years ago.

It starts off with my great-great-grandmother and her engagement (no, not the one who made the antique quilts). In those days it was customary for the man to give his fiancee a wedding band before the wedding in lieu of an engagement ring. Mother told me that she was admiring her ring as she was sewing and ran the machine needle through her finger! Ouch!! Must have been a pretty eye-catching ring. ;)

Then many years later, after the kids were gone, they bought a house on 10 acres of land. An old family friend...offered Dad (my great-great-grandfather) a 10-acre place on Camelback Road north of Scottsdale High School. It was a long, narrow place with a little frame house in which we had inside plumbing--our first!! I was a little shocked to realized where they lived, Camelback Road is in Phoenix and it's REALLY long and most importantly, it has the one and only Fish Market in the entire state of Arizona. Can you tell I've been there a few times? ;)

They bought the house on Camelback Road for an "outlandish sum of $5,500!!" in 1937. Their dad died in 1953, and they soon sold the "back-five" acres for $20,000. In 1959 they sold the front-five and house for $125,000. Just think, an investment of $5,500 in 1937 brought $145,000 in 1959! Betcha we won't see that kind of "return" in 20 years... or those kind of prices for housing and land these days! That's a 2636% mark up! :P

Leah