Skip to main content

Featured

What I Learned by Researching Mary Jane Sheridan

  In January, I committed to in-depth research on the under-documented women in my family tree. I had hopes of researching one woman every 1-2 months. My first foray into this type of research, however, took over three months!  There were a lot of things I learned doing this research and writing Mary Jane's story. Here are some of them. Things that went right Discovering and using a wide range of resources —I enjoyed finding and using a terrific range of resources discovered while I created a locality guide for Erie County, New York, and added to my Ontario, Canada, locality guide. I have begun to gather many Cleveland and Cuyahoga County, Ohio, resources and have started a locality guide for that as well, including maps, websites, record sets, etc. Fleshing out several periods in Mary Jane's life —I feel good about the details I was able to bring to her story by researching various social history aspects of her times, such as life in the Hydraulics neighborhood of Buffa...

The Thumb's Christmas

 

Our daughter, Anne, was a prolific artist when she was young. Our refrigerator door was full of her drawings, paintings, and school artwork. She liked to create little books, too, as she was also a natural storyteller.

One Christmas when she was about eight years old, Anne wrote and illustrated a Christmas story for her little brother, James. If memory serves, she drew her inspiration from a book she had recently gotten from the library by illustrator Ed Emberley. He wrote and illustrated The Great Thumbprint Drawing Book. In it, Emberley showed how to make a variety of animals and people using a thumbprint as a starting point. The creations are simple and charming. It's amazing what you can do with a blog of ink and a few black lines. It's art that's accessible to anyone.

Anne's story is called "The Thumb's Christmas," and is based on our family. There is a thumb with glasses (Anne), a thumb with little hair (toddler James), a thumb with a mustache (Jim), and one with a half-circle of curlicue hair (me). There is even a thumbprint Santa, bear, and Christmas tree, along with a little story.

I get a kick out of reading it every year. Not only is it creative, but it was a gift from the heart from our daughter to our son. I'll always treasure it. And hope you will like it too.



It's Christmas at the Thumbs!



 

They went for a walk in the snowy woods.


 

They wrote Christmas lists...


 

They set out eggnog and cookies for Santa.


 

Where are Mom and Pop going?


 

Shh!


 

What a nice surprise!
The End.

 

Until next time... 

Follow my blog with Bloglovin 

© Nancy Gilbride Casey, 2024. All rights reserved.

P.S.  When Anne was a little older, she wrote a story called "Spider's Christmas," which I've featured here in the past. It's always fun to read again. Share it with a little one in your life this Christmas.



Comments

  1. Replies
    1. Isn't it delightful? She really got the expressions right!

      Delete
  2. Such a precious book! Fun and fanciful.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I'll be sure to tell our daughter you liked it! Happy Holidays!

      Delete
  3. What a wonderfully creative imagination she had. So cute! My youngest used to make Christmas gifts like this for us as well! The best gifts to treasure always! Thanks for sharing. :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. She really did...still does. I love these handmade gifts the most of all. Gets me where I live!

      Delete

Post a Comment