Heritage Hints From Mama – Getting in Touch With Your Living Ancestors
Getting In Touch With Your Living Ancestors-
Hello from the Deep South, home of magnolias, sweet tea and sweltering hot summers! I am Christy’s Mama and have been invited to share a little wisdom gleamed from my years of experience. Some of it may come in handy and others may just be a little bit of rambling thoughts from my cobwebbed brain. You can take either with a grain of salt. If you have any comments or suggestions along the way, they will be welcomed. Remember, I am getting old so coddle me a bit. Well, here goes!
Today I want to talk about our living ancestors. Do you have a grandparent, older aunt, or uncle living? If so, call today and set up a time for a visit. It doesn’t have to be in person if they live a little far off from you. A phone call will do nicely. I’m sure you will be pleasantly surprised by the outcome and I’m sure your relative will be more than willing to talk with you. They are some of your family’s most precious resources- connect with them!
Is there a favorite food you enjoyed as a child that was prepared by someone in your family? Have you ever wondered about how family traditions started? Or have you ever thought about tracing your family tree? Your older relatives are the easiest way to solve these mysteries and sadly, once these relatives pass on, their knowledge goes with them.
Take a week or so, to think about growing up and some of the memories that come to mind. Make a list of questions you would like answered. You will probably be surprised at the things you think of. Christy hears of so many people that enjoyed a certain food when they were small and long for just one more taste of it. Most of the time it is an everyday food that was prepared from memory and just can’t quite be duplicated. All it would have taken was a few minutes to watch it being prepared and taking a few notes. But when that relative passed on, the recipe was lost forever. Don’t let this happen to you.
If you have ever thought of taking up genealogy as a hobby, your relatives are your best and easiest by far resource for getting a great start. Ask about grandparents, parents, aunts, uncles, cousins, etc. Take detailed notes and list any names, locations, birth dates, marriages, deaths, etc. Let your relative talk about whatever crosses their mind. You will learn much more than names and dates. You will learn about the where and why that made your family what it was.
If you are able to, take older relatives back to where they lived and went to school, church, etc. It is amazing the stories that they will recall. I have done this with my mother who is 80 years young and even though I had asked questions a thousand times with no answers, it was amazing some of the things she remembered when taken back to the places where she had carried on her day to day life.
Also ask your older relatives if they have any old family pictures. Sometimes a picture is worth a thousand words. By sure and list who the people are in the picture. Believe me, I am speaking from experience. You will probably forget Aunt Sophie’s sister’s name and where they were when the picture was taken. Nowadays, it just takes a quick trip and a little cash to get a picture copied. The old pictures don’t mean a thing if you don’t know who is in them. Old pictures are some of my most prized possessions and I’m sure they will become some of yours too!
To get you started, take a minute and think about what you would have liked to know from relatives who have passed on. Then, you may just realize the importance of taking advantage of the resources you have before they are gone. We are all busy and even though we have good intentions, it seems like we have a hard time getting around to some of the important aspects of our lives. Please make an appointment to take care of a little family business before it is too late. This is just a little advice from me to you.
I’d love to hear some of the wisdom or family history you have uncovered just by taking the time to talk with your living relatives. Please feel free to chat with me in the comments section below. I’ll read them all and look forward to answering!
I’ll be talking with you from time to time but until then, remember Mama loves you and I’ll see you soon!
~Mama
“There are only two lasting bequests we can give our children – one is roots, and the other, wings.”
~Hodding S. Carter
I am late in putting in my 2 cents worth. First of all , I have a question for you,
Would you share Mom duty with me concerning Christy?? I do love her so very much. You are a young Momma and Grandmother if your Mother is 80. I am not young but I sure am young at heart and mind. You gave some good advice and I hope the youngsters out there take heed. I wish I had written down all the stories my Grandmother told me about the family as I was growing up. I have done research on my Mother’s side of the family who are McCarter’s and they came from Scotland and settled near Gatlinburg. My Great Grandmother is buried on Federal land. My Grandmother was such a wonderful cook and doubt see ever saw a recipe. She made the best peach butter and Corn Relish that I still long for but I like others have said , those are now just memories.
You are so fortunate to have Christy and her lovely family in your circle. You did a great job of being her Mommie.
Send us more notes. Love and Blessing to you.
Well Ms Betty you have made my day. I try to stay young but I wll be 58 tomorrow. I am fortunate that my mom and dad are still living. Christy and I and all the kids are going to my dad’s this afternoon. His memory is not great now but he still knows all of us. I keep some of the grandchildren almost every day so I am looking forward to school starting back. It will give me some down time. Write the stories of your life. They will bring so much back to you. You will enjoy the writing and remembering! I will be glad to share Christy with you. She enjoys hearing from you and told me so.
Take care and have a great day. Janice
I enjoyed your mother’s message and was a lot of food for thought. I am a grandmother of 15 and great-grandmother of 8…one Christmas our family garthered around the table after brunch and gifts and had my dad sit at the head of the table and each family member had brought some questions with them to ask him.A granddaughter had just gotten a new video camera for Christmas and recorded it.My dad passed away 2 years ago and this video is a treasured memory and will be nice for the younger members of the family years from now.I enjoy Southern Plate and all that you share with us.
That is a great idea! My dad’s memory is not so good but I have talked with him in previous years and have those memories. Thanks for enjoying Southern Plate. Janice
We have a family reunion coimg up and it is at my great aunts house. I eas thinking of not going bit after reading really want to now. For my daughter how often do you get to meet a great great aunt. Thank you for helping me decied to go. We are all the way up in Michigan and I just love southern plate you feel like my family at times.
You will definitely not regret going to your reunion but would regret not going. Take lots of pictures with the younger generation with the older relatives. Always have the younger ones with the older ones in the same picture. It helps the younger ones connect with their elders. Enjoy! and let us know how it goes. Janice
Thank you so much for posting this. I have been working on my family history for a while now. Please everyone talk to your elders. It is the best way to find out everything and write all the names that they tell you down. I have been searching census for my relatives. From 1790 till 1920. We also have been visiting cemeteries and taking pictures of the headstones to go along with names. I wish I had real pictures of my family. I have located several generations and now having trouble locating some of my husband’s family. It has been so exciting finding where everyone came from and where they lived. I do remember the food that my grandmothers made when I was little. my mamaw always had a pan of biscuits on the stove and she made a great pinepapple pudding. My great-grandmother made the best fresh apple cake and the prize was to find the broken egg shell. Some how a pieces of an egg shell was always in the cake. Cherish the memories that brought us to where we are now.
A friend who has helped me research our family suggested that we always pose with the tombstone so that we know which side of the family the deceased family member belongs to. My husband is in his family tombstones and I am in mine. Then if young relatives come across the picture they will have an idea of which side the relatve belongs to. I hope I have made sense, I am working fast before the baby wakes up. Take care! Janice
Hi Christy’s mama. I too am working on the same thing with my mother who is 92 years young. She has lost some of her memory and I am trying to write as much down as I can. I know what you mean about recipes. My mother-n-law passed away in 2005 just shy of turning 98 years young and she used to make tea cakes for my husband. I watched over and over but did not write it down. But you know those folks baked things. It was a lot of this, a little that, a pinch of this and it turned out great. I have tried over and over with no luck yet on duplicating hers. When, and if I do, I am going to write it down for my children. I am also starting a recipe file of the things my mother used to cook that was from either her memory or from a cook book. What better gift that can be passed down to other generations. Looking forward reading yours and keep up the good work.
I am a new reader but lover already of SouthernPlate.com, and this post (like most of the ones I’ve read here so far!) got me shaking my head yes, lol!
I agree that it is important to collect family history, any way that you can. Whether it’s hearing stories from your relatives, reading old letters or even the backs of old photographs, watching home movies if you’re lucky enough to have had a family member who recorded history in that way, or even searching through an old recipe box or two like my mom had, (you won’t believe some of the things you find in recipe boxes, besides the beloved recipes themselves! I found a love letter from my mom to my dad before they were married but after he went off to war (WWII), war ration books, soap coupons, vaccination records, favorite poems/quotes….my mom’s recipe boxes were obviously her go-to for lots of things besides solving the question of what to make for dinner that night!) there is priceless value in learning about your people and loving that they were there before you.
My mom and dad were both great cooks. My family is Italian on both sides but from different parts of that country. So the cooking traditions when I was growing up varied. And ~ lucky for me ~ both my mom and dad were vocal about what they cooked and how. So I learned a lot along the way. We had the same traditional foods served on specific days and holidays, and most of the time, I had to beg for my mom or dad to actually write a recipe down for me to save! But man, I’m glad I begged, lol! One of the last recipes handed down to me from my dad is for Pasta Fagiole, which was his specialty. He would make great pots of it and invite the whole neighborhood practically to come and eat. Accompanied by fresh, crusty Italian loaves with lots of good, melty butter, fresh fruit and sherbet for dessert, it was always a magical meal and now, a magical memory of sweet times long past.
A few weeks or so before my dad passed, he came over to my house and we had Pasta Fagiole Class….he spent the morning and afternoon teaching me how to do it right. And I wrote down what he said, what he recommended and what he didn’t, and that page in my own cooking book is now most prized, without a doubt.
I am so enjoying reading everyone’s recollections. Thank you all for your heart thoughts and for touching mine!
I am so glad to hear that you had that last memory of your dad. Family stories are connected to the food we eat a lot of the time. I know that every family gathering was connected to food when I grew up. I have family pictures of all ten of my grandmother’s children when we had a reunion at a state park when I was about 6 years old. It seems that I can remember going to it but I’m not sure. We had a lot of family meals and gathering when I was young. Thanks for reading Southern Plate and welcome to our family! Mama
My children had a class assignment to have grandparents fill out a questionnaire about their lives. I’ve saved it b/c it is in their handwriting. Both kids are in their late 30’s now. The information helped me when I started researching both of their families.
Before I was into computers and genealogy, I wrote my grandmother and grandmother in law asking about their parents, brothers, sisters, grandparents or other relatives, when and where they were born, when they died and where they are buried. I saved those letters. It was like a gold mine when I started the research. I tell people to do this now while their relatives are alive b/c when they are gone you will wish you had asked. Also you will have this information written in their handwriting.