The Past, the Present, and the Future

This weekend I had a fantastic time reminiscent of Ebenezer Scrooge, who has a very unfortunate name. Seriously? Ebenezer Scrooge? Yikes.

The Past

I had the opportunity to wave a direct descendant card and view some original documents and a journal that was written by my great, great grandfather in the 1850s. While I didn't actually take notes or read much from it, I loved the chance I had to see the originals. Sometimes I like to go on tours of my own life, of who I am and where I came from. There is no organized tour group to take me from location to location about my personal family history, so I get to make my own. If you've never done that, you should try it sometime. It's like historical geocaching. I just made up that term. Use it. Make it popular.

Some of the papers I decided not to touch much. It was really brittle and clearly very, very delicate. The journal, on the other hand, was still in great condition. I read a little bit of it and turned some pages. I like to see what people were doing on my birthday years and years before my birth. It was a Sunday (incidentally, I was also born on a Sunday), and there was much snow on that morning. It was a cold, late spring. He "preached" at a church meeting, which my father also did on the day I was born.

My great, great grandfather had excellent handwriting. His cursive was flawless. It's beautiful to see flawless cursive, especially since we use computers so much these days. I hope the next generation doesn't lose the ability to read cursive, even though I do think that printing is a better standard. I could tell that there had been some restoration done on the journal, and it made me really appreciate the work that people go through to restore documents of my personal history. The people who do this don't even necessarily know the value of those documents to an individual, so I appreciate that they work on it for me without knowing me or others who will find the documents to be valuable.

The Present (and Presents for Dub)

My sister Dub got married. I have a new brother-in-law! I'll have to come up with a good name for him for my blog if I ever talk about him on here. Suggestions? Anyway, the ceremony was beautiful, the weather was perfect, and it was so great to be around my family. I am really happy for my sister, my new brother-in-law, and for my family. I am also glad to not wear those shoes anymore. Some heels just don't work for me, I guess.

I love spending time with my relatives. My immediate family is awesome. My extended family is so fun to be around. I am so thankful for my family. I am so blessed to have them in my present. I learn a lot from all of them, and I really think it was so good for me to have been born in such a unique and interesting family. I occasionally find myself counting down the days or the hours until I get to hang out with them.

The Future

We also celebrated the birth of a new nephew! Well, the birth happened a while ago, but my new nephew was blessed at church today. It was really great to be around my family for that and to contemplate my adorable nephews and nieces and the possibility that the future holds for them. It will be interesting to see what each child chooses for his or her life. It's amazing to think of the changes that have occurred in the world in my lifetime, and I can't comprehend what will happen in their lifetimes.

I currently have 14 nieces and nephews, and that number will change to 15 by the end of this year. When we all get together, craziness ensues, but I love, love, love it. The cuteness and hilarity is all worth it. Hooray for family!

So, what did YOU do this weekend? Did anyone else have a Scrooge-like weekend?