Memorabilia #18, aka, I Lied. . .

So, it turns out I lied. A few weeks ago I posted, bragged even, about not having a lot of "stuff". I even called myself a minimalist. After spending the entire day yesterday in the attic, I have to hang my head and take it all back. I am a pack rat. Ok, maybe it's safe to say I'm a recovering Pack Rat because I purged a ton of junk today. I texted my sister at one point and said, "I have unopened junk mail in a box in my attic. What is wrong with me??"

Well, I managed to trim it down to things I just can't part with. Starting with baby clothes. Even though they are not really mine, I'm the one that has the sentimental attachment to them so I have to consider them part of my "stuff". Believe it or not, I even got rid of several boxes of Zach's clothes. I'm pretty sure I only have 4 boxes left. . .

I narrowed it down to my favorites. . .

My sister did the artwork on this one:


This is the premie outfit Zach wore home from the hospital, weighing all of 4 lbs, 13 oz:


I'm especially sentimental about Zach's baby sleepers. They all had to have a little hole cut in the fabric at the crotch because he was on a monitor until he was 7 months old due to sleep apnea and the little cords that were attached to his sides needed an outlet. The apnea and the monitor weren't very cute but the hole in the jammies still makes me smile:

Really, I shouldn't need to keep all of these shoes, right? But they remind me of Grandma Bert who loved to buy Zach shoes. That's how I justify it, anyway. . .

Grandma Bert also bought sweaters. Darling little sweaters. . .

. . . and sweet little two piece church outfits. . .

And how could I possibly toss Zach's first little swim trunks???

Funny thing is, I only have one box of pretty little pink Gloria clothes. Zach's babyhood was the only time period that he possessed more clothing than his sister. . .

Before I show the following pictures, I want to reiterate that I threw away/gave away a TON of stuff. This is just the IMPORTANT stuff:

This was embroidered by my Grandma Violet:

I kept one box of high school memorabilia including my year books and my cap and gown:

A little bit of wedding stuff. My sister-in-law, Colleen, made all of the floral arrangements and they are still almost as pretty as the day she made them:

These are dolls that my mom made. L to R: Golly Wog, Tommy, Tom and little black Raggedy Ann and Andy. I loved them all.

I literally loved the stuffing out of my Raggedy Ann. My mom added the hair at some point but I loved most of that off, too. The baby looks kind of creepy (Gloria called it the scary baby from Toy Story!) but I carried her everywhere when I was little. It's hard to see the little dogs but they are Roo dogs. They were all the rage when I was in grade school and I had quite a little collection. The doll in yellow was something I begged and begged for for Christmas one year. The hippo was another handmade item from my mom. Gloria is trying to convince me to let her keep him. . .

And then there is Cuddles. I think I still might have slept with Cuddles in college. The thing I remember most about this bear is that it really had no gender. I always refused to label it as a boy or a girl. Just Cuddles. Weird, I know.

I was a big collector of Fisher Price toys and saved a few items for my own kids to play with. They did play with them for quite a few years but they've been in the attic for quite awhile now. The castle, the city and the farm are mine, the school, the boat and the house are Rob's. . .

This is a very big tote that is VERY full of Fisher Price little people. I've see some of these go on Ebay for big bucks. . .

Most of my time in the attic was solitary but Gloria took a break from painting her room with grandma to see if I'd found any of her treasures. . .

I found her baby book that I had forgotten all about. It's too bad I only kept it up for 4 months. It was pretty sweet. . .

These Raggedy Ann pictures hung on my wall probably up until high school. Maybe even during high school. . .

I found lots and lots of Valentines proving my point that Valentine's Day is a very critical time in a young girl's life. . .

Doesn't everyone keep their very first library card???

Good thing I kept all of these ribbons since I don't remember what most of them are for. . .

I have boxes and boxes full of personal papers. I really did manage to toss a bunch of stuff that wasn't worth carrying around all these years but I had to keep my diaries and journals, of course. I guess it's not surprising that I like to blog! There isn't much I'm willing to share from my personal writing but I found this entry so humorous that I had to post it. I'm sure I wasn't meaning to be humorous at the time but I was in the sixth grade when I wrote it and, I'm just saying, clothing and hairstyles might change with time but girls' interactions with boys probably never will. . .

When I was in the third grade, I was out of school quite a bit with strep throat so I didn't have a chance to say good-bye to my friends when we moved from Idaho Falls to Mountain Home halfway through the school year. My mom did a really cool thing and took an autograph book to my school for all of my friends to sign.

This one is from my teacher. Apparently I was "some mischievous"!!

I hadn't seen my junior high year books in a very long time but I found them at the bottom of a box full of other junior high stuff. This is 7th grade. I am the last picture in the first row on the right hand side of the page:

8th grade. I am the last picture, third row from the bottom on the right side of the page:

9th grade. Third picture on the bottom row on the left side of the page:

I was a Letter Girl in the 9th grade. Not to be confused with a cheer leader. We got to cheer for sports like wrestling and girl's volley ball. Whatever.

I played a lot of sports in Junior High, not because I was so athletic but because it was a small school. Of course, I didn't know that until we moved to Borah my sophomore year. This is ninth grade basketball:

My very first camera! It was the latest and greatest at the time- a fancy, schmancy Polaroid camera! I even earned it myself. I sold greeting cards door to door one summer and I earned enough points for this!

I found another box of notes and papers from my years at BSU. . .

If this floppy disc doesn't make me feel old . . . Wow. . .

And last but not least, I found (and kept) two items that remind me of my high school hopes and dreams for the future. First, this picture is of a group called The Northwesterners from NNU (NNC at the time). I saw them in concert when I was in high school and decided that I would be a part of this group someday, no matter what. Ya, it didn't happen. I even had the right hair and everything. . .

My other dream was to join The Soundsations at Edmonds College near Seattle. The school hosted a jazz festival every year and our jazz choir attended a couple of times. I had two friends who were planning to go as well but one of them decided to go on a mission, the other one went to the college her parents agreed to pay for and I got an unexpected scholarship to NNC. My hopes were dashed.

Ah, memories. . .