A Trip to the past!

I learned a lot from my week-end in Shreveport. I learned that I have ancestors from Ireland on both my Mother's and my Father's side of the family. I learned that we are decendants of "William the Conquerer" and that we have royalty in our bloodlines.

Well, that explains the attitude!!!!!!!!!

I also learned that this is a picture of Chief Moshulatubbee, a Chactaw Indian chief and he is my great-great-great (maybe one more great) Grandfather. Cool Huh?

Apparantly, he married a white woman and changed his name to "Bottoms". Their daughter was my Grandpa's, Grandma.

My niece, Lou Ann has done an extensive family tree for the Allison/Woodard children. She did a wonderful job, I am extremely impressed with her perseverence and hard work. Not to mention the hours of research and patience that this project has taken.

I also learned that I am not the only one of my three siblings that is going deaf in one ear. One of my brothers went to the doctor and found that he had 60% hearing loss in his right ear. My other brother also suffers from hearing loss in one ear and my niece, Lou Ann has hearing loss in her left ear. Mine is my left ear. My brother Roger called it the "Allison Curse". Luckily, Beth is not an Allison. It is some kind of hereditary bone deformity inside the ear!

See kids, sometimes I really don't hear you when you speak. You thought I was just getting senile.

Well, no worries about that.

I had a great time visiting with my Mom, my favorite Step-Dad, and my sweet little sister. I visited with my brother and his wife, and Mom and I went to the Cemetary and put yellow roses on Rogers' grave.

We spent a lot of time just talking, playing on the computer, looking at the family tree website, with my niece and drinking coffee.

I think, I have Beth convinced to come for a visit this Summer and maybe I can really get Mom and Eddie away for a few days.

Mom, I love you so very much, I am so proud to be your daughter. You are an inspiration to me. You have been through so many trials in your life and you still manage to have compassion for others. You still show nothing but love for those who hurt you. You continue to give help to those who are in need, even though they might use you. You are what the Bible tells us a Christian should be. I am blessed to be your daughter!!!!

I am looking forward to your visit this summer!

Easter Weekend Adventures

Friday night after work, we met Cotton and Krysta for dinner at one of our favorite places, Genghis Grill. Jacob and Lucy really seemed to enjoy their food. Eating with chopsticks IS a lot of fun.

After dinner, the little ones decided they were going home with Grandma and Papoo. So... we loasded up the carseats, Lucy rode with Papoo and Jacob rode with Grandma. We went to Walmart, spent too much money, then Jacob and I went by their house and picked up some PJs and a change of clothes for each of them. On to Grandma and Papoos house, we set up the tent, played with Spiderman "Dash and Crash" race cars, ate cereal, ice cream, Barbie Pop Tarts, chips and dip. Finally, we went to bed. Lucy slept on the couch, Jacob slept in the tent and I slept on the floor next to the tent. Saturday morning, we went to McDonalds for breakfast. Then we took two, apparently still sleepy, little munchkins home to Mom and Dad. We all had a blast. It is soo cool that they are getting big enough now to tell us when they want to come over and big ehough to stay all night.

Saturday night, I had to work, 10p. to 6a. When I got home from work. My sweet hubby let me sleep for a few hours, then we were off again.

I had promised to go fishing with him on Sunday and he was ready to go.

We were going to try out a new place, Coffee Mill Lake. Sounds cool, right. We stopped at McDonalds in Bonham for lunch. Jerry stayed with the boat, I went inside. I got in line behind a group of seniors. That's always interesting?!! 10 minutes later, I got to place my order. I ordered our food. Mmmmmm, Hamburgers. And cokes!!! When i tried to get our cokes, something was wrong with the machine and the cokes tasted terrible. No CO2. I asked the girl to fill them from the other side because the one on my side wasn't working. She said,"Oh, I guess, I should have told you, we are waiting for the CO2 man to come. We have bottled water, HiC, Power aid, or iced tea."

NO COKE!!! How can you eat Hamburgers with out a COKE?????

Jerry thought it was hilarious, he drinks iced tea most of the time anyway. I drink cokes. Hamburgers just don't have the same effect with iced tea. Well, I ate it anyway. Then we stopped at the bait shop and bought cokes. It just wasn't the same.

Okay, now we are on the road, we drive around and around the country side. We see cows, horses, mules, goats, dead coyotes hanging on a fence, and lots of pretty open fields and old houses, but no lake. We drive some more, still no lake. I don't think there really is a lake. Lakes are big. They're not that hard to find. If there really is one!!!

We gave up and went to Bonham. We were not even in the water good, when I caught the first fish. Then I caught another one. 4 nice crappie, in the first 10 minutes. Jerry was so busy taking fish off my hook. he didn't have time to get his wet.

Then, the contest was on for real. I ended up with 12 keepers. and threw back 2, one flipped off before we got him in the boat. Jerry ended up with 6 keepers, 3 throwbacks and two really nice Bass, that he caght on his own hand-tied jig.

I told you all, I know how to fish!!!! I just haven't done it in the past 20 years. After this Sunday, I will be taking on challengers. Watch out Krysta, the REAL, "Reel Girl" is back in town and she is HOT!!!!

Easter weekend "Camping Trip"

We are planning a camping and fishing trip this week-end. Everyone (Jerry, Cotton, Jacob) is excited about it. I am usually not all that excited about pitching a tent, sleeping on the ground, no a/c, no t.v. or any of the rest of those cool little two letter words, however, I am starting to get excited. Jerry bought me a rod and reel because I said, I need to get a fishing license so I can fish with Jacob and Lucy while he and Cotton go out on the jon boat. Well, that is all I needed to say! Now, I have my own rod and reel and he is making plans for future fishing adventures with just me and him and his little boat out on the lake for hours. As Lucy would say, "WOO HOO!" I used to really like to fish. Who knows, maybe after this week-end, I will start really liking it again. I know, I can give the rest of the "Reel" Girls a run for their money. I may not have been for a while but it's all coming back to me and I learned from the best and original "Reel" Girl, Jerry's Mom. You know, when we went with her, the ground didn't seem quite so uncomfortable and she was so unpredictable, that you never missed the t.v. She was always so cool, that you never missed the a/c.
I am hoping to create some memories with my own grandkids this week-end. And show
Krysta (and Cotton) that Mom might be old but she ain't lost it!