Time Travel Tuesdays~

Uncle Fern. That's who I loved to visit when I was small. I also loved her husband, Aunt Smitty! It took me a lot of years to get the two straightened out, name-wise. Fern Hamblin Smith was born June 6, 1910, the 3rd oldest of my mother's 12 siblings. She and her husband Wilson Lyle Smith (Smitty) lived in Bloomfield, NM on a bluff overlooking the valley. When I was small I thought her house was on top of the world. Her children were mostly grown so when we visited on our summer trips she would shower me with attention. She had a little cast-iron stove she would let me play with, Dinah Shore paper dolls, and an original Mr. Potato Head set. This required you to provide your own potato and you pushed the face parts into it because they were on long, sharp toothpick-y plastic spears. So unsafe yet SO fun! On one visit she had no potatoes so I made Mrs. Applehead instead. I thought that was marvelous!
She had such a laugh and bright , twinkling eyes. She also had a twang-y New Mexican accent and my Dad loved to tease her about it. He would say, "Fern, how are those farty far harses doing down in the pasture?" She'd laugh and say "Oh Jarge! You quit a-teasin me!"

 This is the front of the Smith's old cabin in the La Plata mountains of southwestern Colorado. So many fun times were had there and Fern was always in the middle of it. She could whip up a meal at the wood burning stove in a flash. She was always up for a hike, or a game of cards by kerosene lamplight! That's Uncle Fern on the right, me in the middle, and my cousin Dodie (Fern's daughter) on the left. Notice the old fishing creel? This was obviously in my "learning to go down the stairs" phase.

I found these photos of Fern while scanning Mom's pictures.

I love them!

 I believe Mom told me this in downtown Farmington, NM. Love the old lettering in the store window.

Don't you love Fern's finger-waved hair? I also noticed her eye-liner and the way her eyebrows are shaped. These photos are circa. late 1920's to early 1930's. It was such a fun era for style.

 These are my mother's brothers and sisters in the late 1970's. There were 10 of them left at that time.

  They are Fern, Faye, Margaret, Klea, Blanche, Orland, Sylvia, Herman.
Front- Shirley & Helen (my Mom).

This is just how I remember Uncle Fern. She is on the far left holding the cup. She was always dressed stylishly and had big, big sunglasses. Doesn't she look a bit rascally? I miss her so much!