Karter Beardall's Eagle Scout Court of Honor

Sunday February 19, 2012 Karter Beardall recieved his Eagle Scout Award. Congratulations Karter you made it and you finished strong to get this award. we are proud of you and your accomplishments. Kudo's to Barry and Teresa, (Karter's parents) for their assistance, patience and love for you. It was a great court of honor.
In the photo is Barry, Teresa, Kenzie, Kalin, & Karter.

Today Is A Special Day

Today is a special day for it is My first born son's Birthday!!! I t was a cold, bright winter morning in Roy, Utah when Daniel John Beardall decided to make his appearance. It was 55 years ago when I woke Bernie and told him to get ready for a trip into Ogden, Ut to the St. Benedicts Hospital, we were going to have a baby and he had better hurry. We barely made it to the emergency room and he was coming. I was rushed up to OB where Dan made his appearance at 9:30 Am. He was a whopping 8 lb. 9 oz. we were thrilled to have our boy. He had two older sisters waiting patiently at home to welcome him. Genalee and Karen were as happy as we were.
Dan has been a light in our family from that day forward. He has always been our stalwart, one we leaned on, loved, looked up to son. How we do love him.
A BIG HAPPY BIRTHDAY Daniel John Beardall, you are loved this day always and forever.

The Little House

I should probably fill you in on the small house we moved into out on the "straightline". It was really small, a kitchen, living room, bedroom and bath. it also had a small room where coal was stored for the old wood kitchen range.It was a basement home that Hutchings had built and were going to finish it with a floor being built on when one of their sons grew up and got married. Well they decided to rent it to our family in the meantime. The kitchen was small and had the big old wood stove that we cooked on, heated water on and bathed in a washtub in front of the oven. there was a sink where we did everything. Washed the dishes, prepared meals, washed our hands and faces before school, brushed our teeth. etc. It had a small drop leaf table that served for everything too. we ate from it. did school work there, ironed our clothes there. a small cupboard that we used for the dishes and pans.
Then there was the bedroom that had just enough room for a full bed, a set of bunkbeds for Richard and Jim, a chest of drawers, one drawer for each of us (5) and my dad put up a piece of pipe in the corner for us to hang a few clothes on. (mostly his) Then in the living room we had a small couch that I slept on, a bookcase, dad's desk, a cabinet radio, and another small oil stove for heat. In the bathroom it was hardly a real bathroom, it had shelfs for food storage, a place for the old hand crank washer, and a toilet. later my dad jerry rigged a very small shower for us.
I have to tell you I was scared to sleep at night most of the time because I was afraid the Japanese would come back and get us and there was only one way down the stairs and that was the only way out of the house, so many nights I would stay awake and just watch those stairs.
After a few years there the house began to leak water into it in the winter time. It was because the ground could not drain the water away from the house. When we got home from school it was we three's job to clean up all the water in the house and dry the floors. Since there was not heat in the house during the day, we also had to take wood and coal in and make a fire in the old kitchen range. We would use a big scoop shovel to gather the water and shovel it into the toilet, then we would mop up what was left and hope the heat from the stove would dry it out before our mom and dad got home from work. One day when we was shoveling the water we missed and hit the side of that old toilet and the bowl of it broke clean into. We were in real trouble when our dad got home, and sure enough we were! He really let us have it, with the old razer strap and alot of words I won't use here. so now we were also with no toilet and had to use the privy out in the back yard.
Life was not always pleasant back then, we did not know different and thought everyone lived that way. NOT!!! Our ages were Richard 11, Me 9, Jim 7. We grew up fast during those hard years. We did not have much time to fight between us, we were too busy just keeping everything together. Such a blessing to have had good friends and neighbors that accepted us even tho they never knew how bad things were.
Sometimes it seemed like the hardships really molded us into being compassionate and good human beings.

Birthday Update. 76 Years Old!

I had a great 76th Birthday, the only thing that could have made it better would have been to have my children who are far away be able to be here with me. I started the day off by going to Curves with my good friend Joan Hillier, it was a good workout.
Then I came home and got ready, went down to St. George, to the LDS Temple and spent the morning there.
At noon Genalee, Karen and Barry took me to my favorite spot for lunch. We went to the Main Street Cafe and had turkey sandwiches. Mmmmm Good. That afternoon my friend Vicki and I rode up to Zion Park, just visited and caught up on each other's families. A really enjoyable day was had. When I got home Bernell and I went down to Wendy's for dinner and had a salad and a hamburger.
That evening my neighbor Toni came over to visit and while she was here we got a surprise visit by our ganddaughter Courtney who had come down to see her boyfrien in St. George. Then Barry's family all came over for a visit. All in all it was a great birthday. Thanks everyone for the calls, the visits, the hugs, and all the good wishes.

Awe, the fun of long summer days, and school good times.

I pretty well breezed through grade school, then the summer between sixth and seventh grades i went to work picking cherries, apricots, and raspberries. I worked really hard that summer. I also grew about a foot in height, I really slimmed up from all the work. When I went into seventh grade even my friends hardly knew me because of the change. In jr. high school I enjoyed running track and could beat every boy in my grade. That did not do much for popularity with them however. Guess I didn't care much about boys yet anyhow, so I went on and played tennis. I really liked tennis because I had a great teacher, Mrs Barron, she always went the extra mile for her students. I joined Seminary and I really like it.
We had home rooms in seventh grade, my home room teacher was a tiny little old lady, Miss Finley, she was a great teacher too. Some of my other very good teachers were Mrs Huntington in English, Mr. Larsen in math, Mr. Tew in Seminary. I had good friends on the "straightline" and we got together often to study, play games and hang out together. Two of our friends were Paul and Robert Hutchings, that summer Paul got really sick and his kidney's failed, he died just before school started when he was only 14 years old. It was a great loss to all of us on the straightline. Paul was the one that taught me to ride a bicycle, milk their cows, pitch and tromp hay, feed the chickens and was a close and good friend. I remember a time after we had helped haul the hay, (this was when it was hauled loose on a trailer and had to have someone on the trailer to tromp in down so it would stay on) there was Paul, Richard, Jim, Robert, me, Arlene, & Willie, we were all helping get that darn hay in and were really tired. after Mr. Hutchings had gone into the house, all of us kids decided to make tunnels through the hay,so we did, not a good thing to do!!! Mr. Hutchings came out and found what we were doing and yelled at us, then made us restack that darn hay so it would compact for the winter feed. THEN we were really tired and just went home because it was almost dark. (But it was really fun to make the tunnels so we could hide in them.)

My Mother January 4, 2012
I thought since I had told you a little about my dad that I should also tell you about my Mother.
My Dad went by the name of Bill and my Mother went by the name of Jenny, She was a quiet, soft and kind lady. My mom was an excellent seamstress and when she worked, (except during the war) she was a Tailor for Utah Woolen Mills in Salt Lake City. She made all our families clothes including coats, boys suits, dresses and anything else we needed. All were made to perfection. In fact all she did was always done to perfection. During World War 2 while my Dad was gone, Mama moved all of us in with her cousin and their family. We were crowded and it was ok because we always had someone to be close to. Times were hard back then and we lived mostly on S&H Green stamps. These were stamps the government gave each family so they could buy sugar, flour, gas, tires for cars and other things. All of the products we could buy were rationed by the government and they were in scarce supply. when we did not need our stamps for things like car tires, we could trade them to someone who needed tires for their stamps for sugar, coffee, or other things we needed. We made it through the War years by surviving. My Mother was very frugal and could make do with almost anything. Through it all she remained positive, kind, thoughtful of our needs, and those of her parents. We were blessed beyond belief during those hard years. Later she went to work for some of the finest Men's stores in Salt Lake City and in Provo doing alterations on men's suits. (During the War Years mama went to work in an Arms Plant in SLC, amking ammunition for the war effort.)

I have to tell you about the blackouts during the war. In all Western large cities it was manatory for people to block the windows of their homes so no light would shine out at night. In Salt Lake City everyone would block the windows at night. It was common place for air raid sirens to go off and scream all over the Salt Lake Valley if there was any indication that there might be any incoming airplanes that could be enemy planes. Sometimes we would hear them at night, when we did all lights had to be turned off in the house. The City became totally dark. I remember times when this happened that we would block the windows, turn off the lights, and turn on a small radio searching for news. When we did this we would huddle around the radio and hide the small orange light it gave off for fear that it could be seen outside. When these very loud sirens would go off it was very scarry for we young children, (we were 9, 7, I was 5, and 3) I remember hiding and crying from being so scared of them, I had nightmares for years well into my teen years because I was still afraid the Jap fighter planes would come and bomb us. Thanks to my very kind Mother, who always tried to comfort us, I did get passed being so afraid.

My Siblings, One and all.
No blog would be complete without telling you about my sister and two brothers. Sue, as we called her was the oldest of the clan. She was a good sister, liked to take charge of us all and often did. Sue was a quiet child and never made waves with mamma and daddy. It is hard to remember alot about her as she left this life way too soon. Next in line was Richard, he was always full of life and had new things to try, do or make up. He was good at fixing almost anything or building something from almost nothing. Richard was a big tease and I am sure he kept me crying alot of the time. Then I am next in line and after me came my younger brother Jim. I felt really close to him because we got along well and thought alot alike. I am sure there will be many more times that the reader will be introduced to all of us as we weave our way through this lifetime.