Our Fun Family

My cousin Suzanne got me thinking about my family heritage sometime last year.  As we began re-connecting and acquainting ourselves and our families, a common bond was certainly our shared legacy and family history.  She has done some wonderful and extensive work on Ancestry.com, tracing our Cornish family back to the earliest days of America at Plymouth.  With the passing of my grandmother last week, and a visit to family grave sites in Muskogee, Oklahoma, my curiosity was re-stoked as I got busy updating the maternal side of my family tree.  The data available online is quite extraordinary really.  To date, I have traced the Parker family line all the way back into the 1200’s, when King Richard II deeded property to a monk named Robert LaParker.  There are still plenty of leads to follow up on, and items to analyze, but the initial findings are amazing.  Interestingly enough, finding the details of the family from abroad, even dating back several centuries proved far more reliable th

Because the trip to Tulsa was such a long drive with the girls in the truck, it was important to us to have a few days to spend in Tulsa.  The last thing I wanted to do was pack up the girls for a 8-9 hour drive up there, go to Mema's funeral and then just turn around and head home.  The extra day or so before and after the funeral gave us a chance to drive around, see some of the old haunts and also take in a beautiful spring day in the parks of Tulsa.  Tulsa really is a pretty city, and I have great memories from growing up in Tulsa, particularly parks like Woodward and La Fortune.  Woodward Park is a beautiful park full of seasonal gardens.  This park is almost always packed with people getting their wedding, engagement, senior or prom portraits done.  Its a little bit early in the spring there, but we did get some nice pictures of the dogwoods, azaleas and tulips in bloom.  This park is definitely a city treasure, a crown jewel for the Parks and Recreation department.  La F

You don’t reach the age of 87 without passing a few milestones along the way.   God chooses all women to bear the title “daughter”, and of those, many women bear the title of “sister”.   Mema took pride in the way she doted over her siblings.   The women in this family have an inner strength that supports a very strong backbone.   If you haven’t heard the opinion of a Chapman woman, then chances are you are both blind and deaf, or at the very least, several counties away. It was a special day, September 10 th , 1941, on the banks of the Truckee River in Reno, Nevada that Mema gained a new title and a new name.   Lahoma Chapman, at the young age of 20, was now Mrs. John Parker.   This little girl had gone from “daughter” to “sister” to “wife”.   To be the bride of John Elder Parker was an honor that my Mema clung to for her entire life.   I fully expect that on Monday afternoon, April 4 th 2011, when Mema entered the gates of Heaven,   St. Peter was merely the maitre d’, and as far