The Interesting Impact of A Journal Entry

Grandma Blanche Bingham on the left

It has been a blessing to me that my mother spent a lot of time collecting family history items. My sister Nancy has been given most of them, but I have a few things.

This morning I came upon several pages of what is from a notebook from my Grandmother Blanche Bingham, perhaps a crude journal. They are hand written and in places it is difficult to read.

They leave me with a tender feeling about my grandmother. She discusses the positive things about the spouses of her children. She gives their maiden names. She tells how many children each had.

She is brief about her marriages but says some things about them, such as her first husband left her and how many years later she married.

I remember my grandmother as an old woman. She died when I was a teenager. My memories of her are good. I remember the apartment she lived in, in Tacoma Washington. We lived in Idaho.

The final part of the first section of these pages is what I want to publish today. "I am alone and try to keep myself busy sewing and house work. I love my church work and lady friends and enjoy my children. My health is not good but I try to keep happy. I like to go to the temples and do temple work for the dead. I hope I can finish out my generations and do more temple work. I know that heavenly fathers spirit is sure with you in the temples and it such a restful happy feeling. My prayers have been answered many times. I have sick children and grandchildren. I have been alone and no phone. I have prayed to Heavenly Father for help and the children would be healthy and resting and they would be alright the next day."

Grandmother has been gone many years now. I wish I could have given her fewer alone times. I know my aunts and uncles living in Washington State tried, but it seems she still was lonely.

I thought I knew my grandma - but thanks to a handwritten entry I know her better now.