Family Photo Album – Birthdays and Presents

I continue to go through photos, albums, and other family items in order to document things for future generations.  Next up, a family photo album that was stashed away in my parents’ home.  To start from the beginning, click here.

For most kids, birthdays mean presents and what kid doesn’t like presents?  But in our family, it also meant pictures.  I think it’s been pretty well established that my dad loved to take photos even if, at times, they weren’t the best.  I’m sure happy he documented us growing up!

The next page it titled Cary is six, First party in new home. 



My big sister is right in the middle behind the girl with blonde hair.  I’m not sure but that just might be me sitting next to the blonde.  I just love the way the little girls were all in their fancy dresses to go to a birthday party.  It was a big outing in 1958!  I have no idea who any of these kids are but maybe my sister will know one or two of them.

Another shot.  It’s fun to see our house right after we moved in and sold 55 years later after my mother’s death in 2013.  Most people wouldn’t notice the difference but for those who have been in the house, notice the sliding glass door out to the backyard on the left which was later converted into a step down into a great room.



Presents! 



Turn it around so we can see what you got!

I don’t remember my mother ever baking our birthday cakes but I do remember some pretty cute ones.  Look at this doll cake.



And the birthday girl at the table.  Oh, oh, oh – I recognize the girl right in front of the doll cake but I can’t come up with her name.



My family will appreciate the hutch in the background – look how clean it is!  Again, proof that my parents didn’t spend a lot of time updating their house is the picture I took a few weeks after my mom passed away.  We left the house just like she’d left it when she went into the hospital and a few weeks after we’d left, we came back to start the arduous task of cleaning out the house.  I don’t know why but something told me to go around the house and snap a photo of some of the rooms before we started tearing it apart.  And here’s the same hutch frozen in time.



Next was my birthday about 8 months later!

Queen Deb is 4

Pay attention to the white bench I’m sitting on.  More on that in a minute.

And she gets more and more

Oh shoot, I can’t make out what that gift is.  And, sadly, I have no idea who any of these girls are.  The one to my right could be Merle Axelrad.  We were friends early in elementary school, which I hadn’t started yet, and went to Temple together.

I guess I can never complain that I didn’t get presents even though my birthday is 11 days before Christmas and, often times, right smack dab in the middle of Chanukah.  I can’t tell what this is – maybe it’s just the ribbon and bow?



And my sister finally jumped into the act.



Back to the white bench I was sitting on above.  I remember that bench was always on our front porch and over the years we used it for many pictures.  Check out my daughter in 1976 all dressed up for Halloween – little devil!



And the following year it got a little spookier.



When we were splitting up things while we were cleaning out the house, my sister’s daughter wanted nothing more than to take that bench home as it held sweet memories for her of visiting Grandma and Grandpa.  And last month when I visited my sister, the bench was on her front porch.  Wonder how many more kids will sit on that bench and pose for a picture?