Keepsakes

Daniel and I did some re-arranging a couple of weeks ago and he moved the L-shaped workstation that Daddy (Ernie) built out of his room and back into the game room.  He needs all kind of space for his two monitors, fancy keyboard, mouse, speakers and, of course, the iPhone.  I like looking from the kitchen and seeing my son sitting in front of something built with my dad's hands.  Daniel never met "Granddaddy Ernie", but he loves that desk. 

As a result of the change, I ended up with Daniel's little corner hutch computer workstation.  I had been working off of a little 18" x 36" folding table and Daniel needed it to put in his room to be the base of the matching desktop that Daddy built to match the workstation.  It was built to sit on top of a couple of two drawer filing cabinets, but the little folding table works perfectly as the base of the desktop.

I sit in front of my computer and look around from time to time and love what I see here. My little hutch holds a stack of journals to the left of the keyboard;  a white clay wizard that Anna made in elementary school art class stands guard over them.  The wizard has a crystal ball in front of him which was a Christmas gift to me from Daniel.

I went through Mama's jewelry box recently and pulled out a couple of things that now are randomly scattered across my desk: Mark's college ID from Western State, a brass name plate engraved with an Indy car and inscribed with the words "Built by Clyde Adams Los Angelas", and two silver plated ornaments meant to dress up a pair of Mama's pumps in the 50's.

Hovering in front of my wireless mouse is a stuffed cheetah from Nell's tapping class at the Unity of New Hope retreat last year.  This one is a hard one to explain...ya kind of had to be there. One of two little shelves holds another elementary school art project, a big green frog with blue bulging eyes, mouth wide open with a long pink tongue lapping out.  An arrow head, next to a pink ribbon pin sit beneath a framed picture of a cat that says "Precious things are few - guess that's why there's just one you"...I'm sure that was a gift from my sister. My pink patchwork scarf quilted for me by my dear friend, the pieces signed in honor of lost loved ones and survivors of breast cancer, drapes around my keepsakes.

A Waterford crystal jewelry box -- a gift from my lifelong friend Kari, a ring box full of lavendar that my "mother's rings" arrived in and a metal sculpture of two people sitting on a porch swing adorn another shelf.  Up top is a picture of Daniel dressed as "Hamilton", the rat from Charlotte's Web, taken in kindergarten.  He has Spot, his live pet rat sitting in his lap.  Spot was the hit of the day for the "dress as your favorite storybook character" hallway parade at Bee Cave Elementary.  Front and center on the top shelf is a picture of the Adams family on The Big Rock taken in the mid '80's.

To the left of me is a painting by Phil of an adobe house in a stand of aspens with a Native American spirit watching over.  On my right side, is my huge painting of Crested Butte that Daddy painted, a view of the mountain at either sunset or sunrise...very pink and purple and light.