Happy Mother's Day, Mommy

 Thought I would take a few minutes to remember Mom today, on our annual official Mother's Day of the year.  Above is Mom, Bernadine Adele, at about 18 months of age.  Who would have thought she was already heading to be one of the best mom's of all time.

 Here's mom with her dolly - don't know it's name or where it may have ended up.  What a little cutie.

 And here's me and mom a few decades later.  I was a bit of a handful, I do believe.  Even what I can remember gives me pause these days. 

 This is the Ole Tangen and Kathryn Vandervort Tangen family when the kids were all grown up.  Mom is the one on the left behind the grandparents.  Two of the other siblings are gone, but fortunately the three younger ones are going strong and should be running around the track for a few more years.  Grandpa Tangen's family had been in the US from Norway for a couple of generations. Grandma could trace her family back to the founding of New Amsterdam, now Manhattan.

 Our parents took us all on a cruise to Mexico in March I think it was in 2000.  Little did we know that Dad wouldn't make it past the summer.  But we had great memories from the trip.  Silly old men.  I mean, he had heart trouble anyway but could still mow the grass on his nearly 2 acre home in Happy Valley, OR.  So the engine quits.  He and the old man next door (obviously sharing cognitive abilities) decide to pick the front end up and "take a look."  They didn't think to set the brake of course and so Dad fell.  He had a lot of pain but no apparent fracture. But off he went to rehab and apparently while the OT and PT were doing wonders for his gross motor skills, they also let lose the blood clot that resulted in his double pulmonary embolism.  But he would much have preferred to get through dying quickly as opposed to dragging it out.  The staff at the rehab center were great but also commiserated that these old guys "think they can do what they did in their 20's."  Everyone but me has gotten older since the photo above was taken.

 Looking good, Mom!

 Grandma and the "Selfie Queen" on our cruise to Alaska in 2003. 

Mom on our last Tangen Family Reunion for which she was still alive.  My late sister was also there and we were having a lot of fun cruising on the Mississippi River.  At the last family reunion in 2013, we remembered both of them at the memorial.

 

HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY MOM -- LOVE YOU STILL!

The Incredible Traveling Bible

What an amazing week! Last Tuesday August 4th, I received an email through Ancestry.com from a woman who wanted to know what my relationship was to James R Vandervort. I wrote her back and explained that I was James' great-great-great granddaughter (mom, grandma, g-grandpa Charles Lorenzo, GG James Baker, GGG James R - fyi). She informed me that she had acquired a Vandervort family Bible which she had bought on Ebay. She also said that she belonged to a geneology group that had a project of acquiring "orphaned" family Bible and returning them to their families. Once I had assured her of my connection, she said that she would send the Bible to me. To my surprise as well, I had already planned a trip to California because I needed to get my daughter to LA by the 9th. So we arranged to meet on Sunday the 9th. In the meantime, I notified a group of other Vandervort descendents. We all email each other with information! Then Jackie, our internet angel, sent nine photos taken of the Bible and its content. I forwarded them on to the group and Arlyn began working on making those photos even more legible and sent them back around. No one could believe our fortune! It was simply amazing.

So Thursday evening we began our road trip to California. We had fun driving down and visitingfriends. On Sunday we (my other daughter and I) said goodbye to Ash and she and her group left for Mexico. Beth and I then headed down to meet our orphaned Bible contact.

What a fun afternoon! We followed the directions to Scott and Jackie's house and "met" the Vandervort family Bible. There are pages of information, most of which centers on cousins. The entries in the Bible began with the marriage of William E Vandervort and his bride Katie Katura Medd and includes births, deaths and marriages that occured during their lifetime and after. There is also other geneology information on the family and even a photo of the lovely Nina Vandervort Murphy taken in 1904. What a treasure trove!

Not only did Jackie and Scott refuse payment for the Bible -- which they got for a bargain of $26 on Ebay!, but in addition they took us to a terrific and authentic Mexican lunch! We visited Old Temecula and wandered through antique stores and even visited the old town jail which was covered by a cascade of brilliant bouganvilla. What a delightful afternoon. After we went back to their house, we chatted a little longer. Jackie had taken all the additional papers that had been scattered through the Bible and put each item in a protective plastic sheet and put them all in a three-ring binder.

I can't say thanks enough to Jackie and to the Orphaned Bible project! They write "We buy old familiy bibles and then research each family to find living descendants of the original owners of the bible. When we find a home for the bible, we send the bible to the familily. We do not expect anything in return. Knowing that the bibles have returned home to their families is very rewarding to us." For more information they do have a website listed for more information -- http://www.ajmresearch.com/Orphaned_Bibles.html .

Following our time with Jackie and Scott, we visited other friends and then began the long trek homeward on Monday morning, arriving Wed morning at 1:00 AM! Back to work and squeezing in fun projects between responsibilities. I'm now in process of scanning everything so that I can pass the best copies possible on to my VDV (Vandervort) Gang!

I have begun posting my family tree on Ancestry because altho I have a personal family tree computer program, I am hoping that the information, photos and letters posted will be always available to family members in the decades ahead. It is so easy for information to disappear as our older generations pass on and are no longer available to answer our myriad questions. Jackie has contributed much to our family tree by rescuing this old, fragile Bible and returning it to those of us who care. Perhaps we will know someday how it came to migrate from California to Oaklahoma where it was bought at a garage sale and later offered for sale on Ebay. We are so grateful to Doug -- who and wherever he is --that offered it for sale and did not leave it silent and neglected.