Long-lost treasure!

So as I mentioned, mom and David brought down one of my old dressers. Well, of course, all of the drawers were filled to the brim—assorted stuff having accumulated over the multiple years it has sat in the basement waiting for me to have a home of my own to store it in. (It really didn’t matter to mom when I told her that, even though we have a big house, it’s already full to the brim. 🙂 ) So, due to space issues, we ended up giving the dresser away to a coworker—figuring who better than a 4-year-old girl to enjoy a Barbie-pink dresser?

my old pink dresser

But that meant I had to empty out the drawers. And find space to put all that stuff. But oh, did I have a grand time looking at everything, like…

  • A “memory book” detailing “The Blizzard of 1982” — each of us in the class had to write what we did over the three-day surprise snow break and then it was mimeographed (yes, mimeographed—not copied!) for everyone and made into a book. A book with construction paper covers and tied with yarn, but a book nonetheless!
  • An “autograph book” from the last days of school, circa 5th grade (I can tell because my teacher signed it). Heck, I think I had everyone at the school sign it, down to secretaries and janitors, I think! Hilarious. One funny thing? One of the kids in my class signed it…and I swear, his handwriting never changed through our senior year. Two neat things? I obviously carried on getting autographs after school, because both my Grandma Smith and Grandpa Len signed it. :'(
  • A periodic table of the elements from my chemistry class in high school… Why would I keep that? It has a story, of course! Which I remember like it was yesterday. The day our teacher was handing out copies of the periodic table to the class, it was my birthday (technically, it was Friday the 29th, but since we wouldn’t be in school on my birthday, my friends had put in the announcement for Friday). So, because it was my birthday, the teacher gave me his only color copy. I was the envy of the class. (Keep in mind, this was before the prevalence of internet research and color copies. What the teacher gave you is what you had.)
  • A letter from my dad, circa 1994. I haven’t reread this one yet!
  • Two cartons of my pysanky attempts, along with two kistas, an unopened box of dyes from Aunt Marge (I was always waiting until I had my own house/space to make all the dyes…I guess I have that now, don’t I?), and an egg-drying rack.
  • Four photo albums of Tom #1 era pictures. As you can imagine, that had some good and bad memories attached…but they were still fun to look at.
  • Three sticker books! (Don’t tell me you don’t know or remember sticker books…they were ALL the rage.) I still hate to part with these, but why on earth would I keep them?! I should just pass them on to Virginia who would surely love them. After I scan the pages into my computer, of course. 🙂
  • Two books of Sniglets. Yes, you remember Sniglets, too. You can admit it.
  • A brand new soup bowl/plate set that was a gift from my boss back in Traverse City 10 years ago (I’m rounding down).
  • But the best was the photo album Grandma Smith made for me probably 20 years ago…which I thought I had lost. After her funeral this summer, I looked high and low for it and couldn’t find it. I was devastated, because I could remember it clear as day—just not where it was. It was NOWHERE in this house, which meant it hadn’t been at the last house… So when I opened the drawer and found that… Well, it was a good day.

The sad thing? I still don’t know where I’m going to put all this stuff!

One Reply to “Long-lost treasure!”

  1. Oh, how I would have loved to been there while you rummaged through your treasures! How cool is that? It is always such an “ah ha” moment when you find something that has been lost. I found mom’s locket that way; thought it was gone forever and finally came across it while redoing the basement! I cried. It was so great to find it.

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