Here are a few more things I want to remember and document.  First, this silver belonged to my Mom.  I never remember her using it.  I have offered it to Leslie, my sister-in-law.  She can pass it on to her girls.

It looks like some of these silver pieces came from a shop in Grossgartach, where Grandma and Grandpa grew up.  Maybe Mom & Dad bought it when they traveled through Europe in 1956.

Mom’s initials for Grace Smuin, and Grace Laemmlen, and Dad’s AL for Art Laemmlen.

Here’s another treasure from the kids.  When they were in Jr High at Lakeridge, they each had biology from Mr. Richard Glassford, one of the finest teachers in the school.  During those years, I because the Bug Lady of the neighborhood, offering nets, killing jars and mounting board to anyone who wanted to borrow them.  Our yard was an insect paradise, filled with flowers and plants that made collecting easy.  During those years, I was the Young Women President in the ward.  At girls camp, we collected bugs.  Everyone under my care had help with their collections.  It was a fun few years.

I saved all of our kids’ collections.  They were stacked on a shelf in the cellar room in the basement.  I used to keep the mothballs fresh, but that ended long ago, and bugs ate the bugs.  The collections were pretty destroyed when I opened the boxes this week.

I want to highlight the huge moth in this Lepidoptera box.  It is a Black Witch Moth.  A neighbor found it struggling on the sidewalk under a lamppost one evening.  She knew I was a collector and she gave me this tired moth.

I asked the folks at the BYU Bean Museum to help me identify it.  Here’s what I learned:

The Black Witch Month is a giant, dark-colored, nocturnal insect known for its bat-like shape and impressive five-to-seven-inch wingspan. 

We did a lot of sorting in John’s office this week while the kids were gone.  I emptied lots of files and we boxed more books to donate.

Here is a blast from my past.  I used to be in charge of a ward newsletter back in the days before could could design on computers.  It was a cut and paste (literally) world.  We used what they called “Clip Art.”  I had files and folders full of clip art, and images and borders and fillers.  This is how we decorated things like newsletters or handouts for classes.

John is sorting through piles of old computer disks–floppies, hard disks, CDs, and DVDs.  We used to back up our computer work onto these disks.  There was no such thing as Cloud Storage or external drives.  We had to keep copies on disks.  And we kept those disks just in case our computers crashed (which happened, from time to time).

Floppy disks (above) were replaced by 3.5″ hard disks (below).

The first computer I worked on when I worked as an editor for the Church Magazines (1987-1990) was a WANG.  Here are some of my early saved files.

We had enough mailers and manila envelopes to last beyond the Millennium.  And boxes of cards and Christmas cards.  Who mails things anymore??

And who uses stationery??

Or typing paper??

Or airmail paper??

These shelves hold my Grandpa Smuin’s 5-Foot Library of Harvard Classics.  I’m not quite ready to part with them.  John is.

Here are more books to donate.  When I was in high school, I poured over catalogues from the Time-Life Library.  I wanted to learn stuff.  I saved my money and ordered the series on sewing and one on Ancient Civilizations.  I always intended to read them.

I also had bound copies of the International Magazines from the years I was an editor there.  That was before Church Magazines were digitized.

Here’s how we’re leaving the office, until we move into the office at the new house.  The cupboards and file cabinets and drawers are empty.  It was a big job.