Let’s Talk About: Tilting Houses

In April 2024, I was blessed to spend two weeks in Holland on a Viking riverboat cruise. Besides learning that Gouda cheese is “wunnerful,” I eagerly soaked up lots of Dutch history. Since many family historians find that they have a family line going back to the Netherlands (proper name of that little country), I thought I’d share some of the Dutch history bits that I learned.


After noting the houseboats and the bicycles, look closely at the houses. This was called “the laughing row” because the buildings tilt to one side! And why? Because they are centuries old and because the ground is soft. Not all structures tilt, to be sure, but the ones that did surely did catch my eye. 


Which is straight, the trees or the house??????

I quite longed to go inside one of these “leaning houses” and see how they cope. Do the floors slant? 

While I surely did admire all the ancient old buildings, churches and government buildings, to me they all did need sand-blast-cleaning (inside and out). Centuries of grime shadowed their splendor. 

Let’s Talk About: Dutch Bicycles

In April 2024, I was blessed to spend two weeks in Holland on a Viking riverboat cruise. Besides learning that Gouda cheese is “wunnerful,” I eagerly soaked up lots of Dutch history. Since many family historians find that they have a family line going back to the Netherlands (proper name of that little country), I thought I’d share some of the Dutch history bits that I learned.

Yes, bicycles are EVERYWHERE. We were told that there are about 18,000,000 people in Holland and at least 25,000,000 bikes. Our guide quipped, “I have three!” Bikes have the right-of-way, not pedestrians. We were constantly told to watch out where we were walking!! 

Some bikes are super fancied-up (note the “oog-gga” horn) and some are modified to carry small children or old folks. We were also told, with a big smile, that if you were angry with your wife or boyfriend, you’d push their bike into the canal! That must be true, he said, for every year they haul out hundreds of bikes from the canals. 

We were also taught that there are NO school buses in Holland. The children ride their bikes to school…… up to an hour each way!!!  And it rains over 200 days per year!! No sissies there for sure. And with all that bike riding, the only chubby folks I saw were the tourists. 

Would you or I be up to riding a bike every day, everywhere?????

Let’s Talk About: Dutch Cheese!

 In April 2024, I was blessed to spend two weeks in Holland on a Viking riverboat cruise. Besides learning that Gouda cheese is “wunnerful,” I eagerly soaked up lots of Dutch history. Since many family historians find that they have a family line going back to the Netherlands (proper name of that little country), I thought I’d share some of the Dutch history bits that I learned.

The Dutch are known for their cheese, or kaas, as they say. In some towns, the cheese trade dates back to the 1300s. Today, this country is the largest cheese exporter in the world. We toured a cheese factory…… tour started with meeting the cows all happily munching in their stalls. Holland’s low, flat rich soil, kissed by a salty sea wind, produces grass most healthy for cows….. which produce much milk. Legally, cheese farmers/factories can only have a certain number of cows to graze the land allotted to them. After seeing the adults, we got to meet a 10-day old calf….. her pink muzzle was so darn cute. (Females are kept for milk production; males are sent to become hamburger.) 

Here I am with a 20# wheel of Gouda. I learned that there is young Gouda (less than six months), perfect for sandwiches, and mature Gouda, best for eating as cubes to dip in mustard. Wrapped in paraffin wax for export, cheeses do not spoil but they do become harder and saltier. Edam is a close favorite cheese, best eaten as a snack with apples or pears. In days gone by, cheese makers delivered their product to the town square on market day either by horse cart or canal boat. Known as kaasdragers, they carried up to 300 pounds of cheese to the buyers’ stalls. Buyers would purchase a slice of a wheel….. that’s why you see deli cheeses cut in wedges in stores today.Have you had your cheese today? REAL cheese, not those plastic-wrapped slices. 🙂 

In days gone by, cheese makers delivered their product to the town square on market day either by horse cart or canal boat. Known as kaasdragers, they carried up to 300 pounds of cheese to the buyers’ stalls. Buyers would purchase a slice of a wheel….. that’s why you see deli cheeses cut in wedges in stores today.

Have you had your cheese today? REAL cheese, not those plastic-wrapped slices. 🙂 

Let’s Talk About Windmills!

Yes, I clicked “publish” too soon few weeks back….. now this post is in order. So sorry.


In April 2024, I was blessed to spend two weeks in Holland on a Viking riverboat cruise. Besides learning that Gouda cheese is “wunnerful,” I eagerly soaked up lots of Dutch history. Since many family historians find that they have a family line going back to the Netherlands (proper name of that little country), I thought I’d share some of the Dutch history bits that I learned.


I learned that over half of this little flat country, right on the North Atlantic, would be underwater if the windmills (and modern pumping stations) didn’t keep pumping. I was told that with rising ocean levels and glacial melting increasing the rivers’ flow through Holland, it’s a constant battle of man against nature.

I heard this wag more than once:  “God made the world but the Dutch made Holland.” The industrious Dutch constructed dykes and dams and pumped the water out (into the ocean) and the resulting polders provided rich farmland for a growing vegetables (and tulips!) for a growing population. 

The original windmills had a keeper-miller who lived in the base of the tower with his family. He needed to be a good judge of weather. It was his job to keep the blades turning, and the water pumping, but not endanger the structure. The top of the structure rotated as needed by hand to get the blades in best wind-catching position. 

I visited a restored windmill and was amazed at the strength and work it took to move those big wooden blades into position, often several times in a 24-hour period. 

Windmills were not invented until the 1700s and didn’t come into widespread use until into the 1800s……… before this time, when much of Holland was flat, mushy land, the cities were confined to higher points where they could be found. Before windmills, the early inhabitants built dykes to keep the water from their homes. (Amster was the town began on the Amster’s Dyke.) 

Fascinating topic; one could read a big book and not learn all there is to know about Dutch windmills.

Let’s Talk About: Tulips!

In April 2024, I was blessed to spend two weeks in Holland on a Viking riverboat cruise. Besides learning that Gouda cheese is “wunnerful,” I eagerly soaked up lots of Dutch history. Since many family historians find that they have a family line going back to the Netherlands (proper name of that little country), I thought I’d share some of the Dutch history bits that I learned.

I learned that tulips did not originate in Holland but in Turkey (Persia then). The word tulip is the Persian word for “turban.” Some thought tulips looked like turbans.


Tulips were first introduced into Europe and Holland in the 1550s as a gift from the Ottoman Emperor.  The Dutch went crazy for tulips; the waxy flower became so wildly popular that an economy of trading known as “tulip mania” exploded overnight. At the peak of tulip mania, some SINGLE bulbs sold for more than ten times the annual income of a skilled craftsman! 


At first tulips were mono-colored but about 1600 a non-fatal virus caused mutations that resulted in the splotched colored and curly leaves we love today. 

Let’s Talk About: Cloud Thoughts

Approaching Spokane while flying home recently and having my nose glued to the window 🙂  I got to thinking. ONE little puff of a cloud makes a nearly mile-square wide shadow on the ground. If you’re under that cloud-shadow, you think it’s a cloudy day. If you’re not, then it’s a sunny day. Yes, I know the cloud-shadow will move in a few minutes.

Apply this to life. A little puff of a cloud so often shrouds us in a dark shadow. And we’re “there” before we realize what’s happened in too many cases. We need to, we must, realize that the darkness WILL pass, driven away by the warmth and light of the sun moving away the cloud. 

Something to think about on a hot August summer day??

Let’s Talk About: Warm Fuzzy Newspaper Story

 Alvin Gauthier was going about is workday as a postal carrier in Grand Prairie, Texas, when he stumbled upon something unusual in his parcel hamper: a Christmas card sent in 1944.

Gauthier sifted through the hamper and found several other loose letters written in 1942 and 1944, all of which were signed by Marion Lamb. There was also a tattered envelope postmarked 1942, and addressed to “Mr. & Mrs. Harvey Lamb, Jacksonville, Arkansas.” It was stamped “U.S. Army Postal Service.”

As a Marine Corps veteran, Gauthier felt a personal connection to the wartime letters. He know they would probably mean a lot to the writer’s relatives. “I had to find the family,” Gauthier said. 

He searched online and found Marion Lamb’s obituary from 2010. Reaching out to a local news station in Arkansas, they ran the story. Soon Gauthier was in touch with JoAnn Smith, Marion’s sister. “I was shocked,” said Smith, 84, the only one alive of her six siblings. Marion was the eldest and had no children; he had served in the military from 1941-1945. 

To shorten the story (it was a lovely long newspaper article), JoAnn Smith’s nephew had the letters in his possession for decades and in mid-April had mailed a large package of family artifacts to his cousin, Debbie Smith (daughter of JoAnn Smith). The package that landed in Alvin Gauthier’s mail hamper hadn’t been properly sealed and many of the letters had spilled out. “Of course that’s what happened!” said Debbie Smith.

To end this tale, Gauthier made the 5-hour drive from Grand Prairie, Texas, to

Jacksonville, Arkansas, to meet the Smiths and hand deliver the precious letters. It was a very emotional meetings; they all shed tears as they hugged. 

If you wish to read the story in its entirety, just Google the particulars. Don’t we all just love a warm-fuzzy genealogy story????

Let’s Talk About: Oppossums

 Most likely your colonial ancestors were familiar with opossums……….. perhaps they ate them too?  Sometimes in thinking about blog post topics that might interest you, I get to musing about things we know little about but what our ancestors might have been quite familiar with. Such as opossums. 

The word opossum is derived from the Powhatan language and was first recorded between 1607 and 1611 by John Smith. They were described as a “beast in bigness of a pig and in taste alike.”

While there are over 126 species of this marsupial, only the Virginia Opossum is found in the U.S. and Canada, and is commonly referred to as “possum.” 

Opossums are non-aggressive, never carry rabies and when threatened or harmed, they will “play possum” mimicking the appearance and smell of a sick or dead animal. 

Opossums are mainly found in the Eastern U.S. and along the Pacific Coast. They eat insects, rodents, birds, eggs, frogs, plants, fruit and grain. Female opossums can give birth up to twenty babies but depending on the mother’s number of teats, not all will survive.  A possum is a marsupial which means the joeys are born early and must make their way into the mother’s pouch; they are weaned at between 70-125 days when they detach from the mother’s pouch.  

 For a long time, there have been opossum jokes:

What do you call a possum laying in the middle of the road?

Obviously, it is a Himalayan possum.

You did find Himalayan in the middle of the road……………

I was once told that most every American has a good portion of German DNA in their ancestry. I know I do. 

I discovered the German Genealogy Group (GGG) some years ago and have been a member ever since. I am astonished by the MANY FREE searchable records they offer!


Total Database Records (includes all nationalities!): 23,323,444 (FREE to search)

Please take the time to explore our site and its features.

Membership in the German Genealogy Group (which is based on Long Island, New York) is a modest $15 annually and brings to you the monthly Der Ahnenforscher newsletter. This publication includes member stories, timely articles, German recipes and upcoming GGG seminars. 

The April 2024 newsletter directed readers to a really interesting link/website dealing with German Funerary Laws. I printed out the 10-page handout to really study it! Click to www.germanyway.com/history-and-culture/germany/the-german-way-of-death-funerals

Another similar link was titled “What’s With Germany’s Strict Burial Regulations?”Click to https://people.howstuffworks.com/culture-traditions/funerals/germany-burial-regulations.htmIf

If Americans collectively have one-fourth German ancestry, that usually means YOU and certainly ME, and GGG is the group for you. Click to www.germangenealogygroup.com and plan to spend a couple of delightful research hours.