![\"Pentecost](\"https:\/\/snicklefritz.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/Pentecost-_023.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nThis is a picture of me and my brothers, Fred, Andy and the baby, David.\u00a0 I also had another older brother, Jack and an older sister, Joanne.\u00a0 We all lived in the little house in the background on our daddy’s farm. It had no air conditioning, no central heating and NO bathroom.\u00a0\u00a0Just think, six kids and NO bathroom.\u00a0\u00a0 We kids didn’t have a room to ourselves either until some\u00a0started leaving the nest\u00a0 Anyway,\u00a0it must have been Easter because Fred is holding a paddle ball.\u00a0 We always got paddle balls in our Easter baskets.\u00a0 Look at those rolled up jeans.\u00a0 The height of fashion in those days. I’ve never seen a dog mug for the camera like that one was doing.\u00a0 Can’t remember his name, but he sure is grinning.<\/p>\n
It was an idyllic\u00a0 childhood.\u00a0 At least it was for me.\u00a0 There was always something to do and animals to play with.\u00a0 There were, of course dogs and cats and kittens in the barn, cows chickens, ducks, pigs and at one time a little old ram I raised for 4-H and later a horse that my brother helped me get when I was around twelve or thirteen.<\/p>\n
During the summers we never stayed inside for a minute.\u00a0 In fact, Mom shooed us outside right after breakfast and we stayed outside until dinner at noon and then back outside we would go again until supper.\u00a0 The only time I spent in the house was when I was helping Mom clean the house or do dishes or when I was sewing on her Singer sewing machine.<\/p>\n
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See that big wrap around porch behind us?\u00a0 Also see my little brother’s droopy drawers? \u00a0We use to roller skate on it, the porch, not the droopy drawers.\u00a0 \u00a0I was so happy when I finally got my first\u00a0pair of skates.\u00a0 You know, the kind with a key you had to tighten over your shoes..\u00a0 I also spent hours on that porch swinging back and forth on the swing as I read one of the many books I got at the library.\u00a0 In the evenings we would sit outside swinging and listen to the adults as they talked about the day.\u00a0 Sometimes we would play hide and go seek or kick the can.\u00a0 We played a game my brothers made up called\u00a0 Battle Station.\u00a0 You see, we lived on a very little traveled gravel road so at night if or when a car would go by and if we kids were out in the yard one of my brothers would yell, “Battle station!” and we would all run and hide.\u00a0 We also looked for flying saucers.\u00a0 Mom was always seeing them or at least she made us believe she saw them.\u00a0 Sometimes as we sat on the porch, bats would fly around above us.\u00a0 I didn’t like that so well.\u00a0\u00a0 I watched the Aurora Borealis from this porch with Mom one evening when the atmosphere was just right and they appeared farther south than usual.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n See that old watering trough?\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The cows drank out of it.\u00a0 That is how close the house was to the barnyard.\u00a0 One time I got into the trough to cool down.\u00a0 My mother was not happy I did that, but I was hot.\u00a0 I love the picture of that old car.\u00a0 I’m not sure whether that was ours or if we had visitors that day.\u00a0 Seems like we had a lot of visitors especially at meal times because my mother was such a good cook.<\/p>\n![\"Pentecost](\"https:\/\/snicklefritz.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/Pentecost-_020.jpg\")
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