Tonight we attended a family gathering in honor of my brother-in-law Stuart.

On June 29th of June he hit the big 5-0 milestone.

Happy Birthday Stuart!

We gathered at my Mama’s house and enjoyed pizza, spaghetti, and, of course, salad.We sang the Happy Birthday song, enjoyed cake and ice cream, and the company of family.  This will be a moment worth reminiscing.

Speaking of reminiscing

…recently my Mama has decorated a bedroom in her house.  She loves chalk paint and has taken a collection of bedroom furniture that was handed down to her from my great-grandmother and transformed it.  During the birthday festivities she looked at me and exclaimed “you haven’t seen my new bedroom!”   Until tonight I had only seen pictures, but now I’ve experienced the new room first hand.

As she showed me around the newly decorated room there were

stories to be told…

When they visited their grandmother, Mama and her siblings used the finials on this bed post to serve as pretend telephones.  Reminiscing about life as a little girl, she described having to reach up to take the finial from the post.

  The portrait on the wall is of my great-grandmother when she was sixteen years old.The bed is decorated with throw pillows, one of which is a portion of the feather pillow that belonged to my great-grandmother.  My extremely talented brother-in-law took the pillow and divided it into smaller pillows for my Mama and each of her siblings to treasure.  Mama has kept hers in the case that is in front on the right.

She spent time telling me about

The Mementos

on the dresser

A little glass shoe that was a gift given to my great-grandmother by my maternal grandfather on the day he joined the military.  It was well taken care of and eventually passed down to Mama.  A box of Coty Airspun loose powder and a bottle of Evening in Paris cologne have a place on my great-grandmother’s dresser as they did when my Mama was a little girl.

And it has an interesting scent.

She has placed a temporary mirror on the beautifully refinished dresser until she completes painting the original dresser mirror.  Her plan is to place it above the singer sewing machine table, that is reminiscent of her grandmother’s.

The tour of the newly decorated bedroom was delightful…

…and the tour guide, even more so