In early March Gary came over for dinner one weekday night and had dinner then he watched us kids while Mom and Dad went to the movies and saw “The Ten Commandments” with Charlton Heston.  Mom always loved biblical stories, after all she was a preacher’s daughter.   On Sunday we drove out to the old country as Dad starting calling it, and visited Grandma and Grandpa Mixson and then Betty and Billy and had a chat with Sybil and Willie who also were visiting the Yawns.  Another Sunday, after a log afternoon nap, we went to Crestview Mission to hear Grandpa Junior preach.  Mom said, “The kids really enjoyed hearing their grandpa preach!” Grandpa was a very animated Southern Baptist Preacher and looked the part, slightly overweight, hair slicked back with Brylcreem, pants belted up high on his waist, white shirt and tie and a reddish complexion which got even redder as he preached, pounding the pulpit with his fist and waving the bible in the air, spittle sometimes coming out of his mouth as he preached the gospel and then getting all quiet and moping his brow with a handkerchief that he pull out of his shirt pocket.  Yes, was we enjoyed it for the most part but that bit at the end about burning in hell got a little scary. Mom would sometimes say to us kids if we were acting up, “You heard Grandpa, you will burn in Hell if you’re not good.”

The third Saturday in March we had big birthday party for my brother David. Most all the kids in the neighborhood came, Hank, Becky, Sally Weaver, Little Al, Rebecka Nash, Tommy, Barby Lou, Mary Grace Hewelitte, Janice, Karen & Timmy, Sharon Fay, Sammy & Rick, Robin & Debbie Alexander. After the party the Yawns stayed after everyone else left and Mom and Betty prepared dinner, while Dad and Billy watched a football game on TV.  When it came time for dinner Dad put the extension into the middle of the table so it could seat all the adults and kids.  Billy said the blessing and we ate dinner.  After cleaning up, the adults played Canasta and the kids played games until bedtime which was later than normal.  Janice and Karen had fallen asleep so they stayed the night while Betty and Billy drove back their home in Flemington.

Sleep over at our House
Karen, Janice, Brenda, Mom holding Timmy, David, Betty, Billy and Larry in back, Dad took picture

 

The week before Easter we dyed Easter eggs.  Mom would get a couple dozen eggs and a dye kit which had small tablets for each color which would be put in a cup of hot water mixed with vinegar. Mom and us kids sat around the kitchen table and took wire holder which held the egg while you dipped in the cup.  There were red, green, blue, yellow, purple, and orange. The kit also came with a wax crayon that you could draw designs with on the egg which then would not color.  I liked to take an egg and using the wire holder only dip it partially in a color then, turning it, dip the uncolored part in another color.

For Easter Mom and Agnus from next door took her kids, us and the Weaver kids to the easter egg hunt at the shopping center and then to another one at Harris Field.  Brenda found an egg with a $5.00 gift certificate at Fremac’s downtown which she proudly gave to daddy to get a new pair of pants. A few days later daddy went to Freemac’s and bought a new pair of shoes.  On Easter morning all got Easter baskets that had brightly colored plastic straw in them and we hunted for eggs that we dyed which Dad had hid all around the living room.  In the following years if the weather was good Dad would hid the eggs in our backyard.  I remember one year finding a rotten egg that was hidden from the previous year and wasn’t found.

 

Updated: 03-22-2024

April.