Author Archives: Ellen

Tuesdays With Moisi ~ 7

Our Pop’s story continued…

This is our Pop’s story dictated verbally by him a few years ago. I’ll be sharing excerpts every Tuesday. When I add to his story or explain a photo I will Italicize my words. Our Pop’s words will not be italicized. Our mom does not come into Pop’s story until “Tuesdays With Moisi ~ 9” even thought I’ve posted photos of her before #9. I have very few photos from our parents’ life in Russia and Persia. At the end of my Tuesday posts I’ll add links to all the other posts.

My paternal grandfather is in the gold and black shirt with his red bear waning and filling in with grey. My dear paternal grandmother is next to our Pop. Pop’s sister and her husband are on the right. This photo was taken at our home in La Mirada in the USA in the 1970’s. Red Beard, Timofey, my paternal grandfather died July 23, 1979, the year our first son was born, he was 91. Martha, my maternal grandmother died inJuly of 1986, she was 98! Our pop’s sister shown here is the last remaining member of the family alive.

About two or three hours later we came to the town of Sherevan just before sunset. Some of the townspeople came out with bread for us.  We were so thankful for their generosity. We were directed to a motel for the night.  But shortly thereafter, border guards came to the motel and took us all to the local police station in order to start the process of deporting us back to Russia.  We did not know this at the time. But then at that moment, a truck happened to arrive at the station. The driver saw us and asked, “Whose family are you?” My mom answered, “Bagdanov.”  He said, “Do you know that they are planning to send you back? But don’t worry, I’ll take care of it.” He then went to the town mayor and asked, “Do you know whose family you’re sending back?  It’s Red beard’s family.” (My father had a rather prominent red beard.) The mayor immediately released us back to the motel, gave us a large room and brought us food. Later on that night my father came with a loaded truck (he was in the delivery business).  The next day he delivered his load and came back for us. We then headed for the town of Meshed where my father was living while he was waiting for us.

If you want to read the rest of the story you can search my Tuesdays With Moisi posts.

First Thanksgiving at the Bungalow

Thankfully one of the local groceries had a nice turkey for me to buy. We enjoyed turkey, stuffing, gravy, yams and rolls. It was a beige meal but one we all enjoy.

We all ended up in plaid except for Addy.

Our oldest with job, family and roots in Western Washington.

Second born and our neighbors in Colville. Neighbors by eight miles. Roots and future established in North Eastern Washington.

Our youngest with their shallow roots in Western Washington wondering where life and jobs will take them.

The plaid, courtesy of Wal-Mart and Costco! We had a whirlwind wonderful family time together. All these shots taken in our back yard acreage.

Soon I’ll share photos from the inside of our Country Bungalow. We have many more walls to cover with our art pieces. Before too long Dear will be painting every square inch of our interior. Happy new week to all of you!

Weekend Roundup “P”

1. Starts with “P.”
2. A Favorite.
3. “P”retty

1. Starts with “P”:

A Precious Pair at our Piano!

2. A Favorite:

Our people in plaid.

3. “P”retty:

I have so many pretty plates that I packed and unpacked and found a place for in our new place.

Parting shot…

Grand “Parents” having a photo shoot with our grand before our pumpkin dessert. And I forgot to mention we have a pond that perplexes us with it’s proper upkeep.

Linking up with Tom The Backroads Traveller for Weekend Roundup.

Happy weekend to all of you.

Falling Leaves plus…

We gathered for our 2nd Annual Family Hunting trip. The guys spent a couple days hunting and then we filled in the days with Fallish things to enjoy. They are able to hunt a few miles from where we live. We now have a cold room which is a good place to hang the deer while they are prepped for the phase two job of butchering and packing the meat. This year Josh and Dan each got a buck their first day out. Josh opted to take his deer to a local meat processing company. Dan and Jamie packaged their deer on their own.

Before the Western Washington kids headed home we all enjoyed a Thanksgiving meal together. The family shots from our Thanksgiving are coming soon.

Early Thanksgiving…

…but it’s never too early or too late for Thanksgiving.

My first Thanksgiving tablescape at our Country Bungalow. I’ve settled on that name for our new abode. Basking in the time we’ve had these past four days with all of our kids and our little grand. Thankful to God for his provision and protection over each one while driving, hunting, working and playing! Since we were all together and won’t be together on traditional U.S. Thanksgiving day we decided to enjoy a Thanksgiving meal early. I’ll share people photos soon!

Give thanks to the Lord for he is good, his love endures forever. 1 Chronicles 16:34

Tuesdays With Moisi ~ 6

My Pop’s story continued…

This is our Pop’s story dictated verbally by him a few years ago. I’ll be sharing excerpts every Tuesday. When I add to his story or explain a photo I will Italicize my words. Our Pop’s words will not be italicized. Our mom does not come into Pop’s story until “Tuesdays With Moisi ~ 9” even though I’ve posted photos of her before #9. I have very few photos from our parents’ life in Russia and Persia. At the end of my Tuesday posts I’ll add links to all the other posts.

 

Not too long after this, the father-in-law of my brother John showed up on our doorstep.  His name was Sofely Sisoyev. He told us to be ready by the end of October because he would be our guide in our escape to Iran.  He then left for Azerbaijan to collect his family and bring them back to Iran. Again by God’s grace, my brothers were given another roofing job and so we were able to buy provisions for the journey.  Then Mr. Sisoyev returned with his family as promised. We all left the evening of November 6, 1933. We walked all night, reached the Iranian border and crossed it. We hid during the day. On the second night we were unfortunately accosted by a gang of Kurdish thugs.  They robbed us of all we had and raped my brother John’s wife. (She was impregnated as a result, but died months later in giving birth.) And so we were left with nothing but the clothes on our backs – no food and no water. During the following day, we hid. Even though we were not walking or active during the day we were still hungry.  On the third night of our journey we became very tired and very hungry. We approached a Kurdish village, knocked on doors and begged for food. One family had mercy and gave us bread and raisins. We were able to pay them for it because we had some money hidden in a belt underneath my nephew Alex’s diaper. It had escaped the attention of the Kurdish gang that had robbed us.  By this time we were quite a distance from the border. Uncle Sofely told us to take a certain road that would take us to where we needed to go. He then separated from our family and his. The reason for this was self protection. He did not carry any ID – either Russian or Iranian. If we were for some reason apprehended, he would be identified as the guide and would be arrested.  He reconnected with his family later.

So our group continued on – all fifteen of us.  There were seven adults and eight children. Around twelve noon on the 9th of November, a man on horseback overtook us, looked us over and rode on.  We walked on for another hour or so. All of a sudden, there he was to our right, about 250 feet away, underneath a tree. He motioned us to come to him.  As we drew closer we could see a rug on the ground loaded with bread, grapes, raisins and lady fingers. We all started to cry and literally knelt before him in gratitude.  He motioned us to sit down and eat. Before we began eating we prayed. After we ate we rested for a short while. When we were ready to resume our journey, we were given specific directions as to how we were to reach our destination.  We again knelt before him in gratitude and started on our way.

If you missed any of the story you can find parts 1-5 in older posts.

Welcome

The welcome sign is something I purchased that found it’s place on our detached garage/shop. The rest of these photos are scenes we see driving into Colville or Kettle Falls. Welcome to my country life. We are slowly but surely settling in and soon I’ll be able to share indoor photos since we are finally finding the time to hang our art work. On Sunday evening we were together with our family and our DIL’s family for the grandbaby gender reveal. As soon as our kids announce the gender of our new grandbaby on social media, I’ll share that news on my blog.

We have some good family times planned for this week so I’ll be scarce again.

Weekend Roundup “O”

1. Starts with “O.”
2. A Favorite.
3. “O”pen.

1. Starts with “O.”

The first weekend in October my husband and I traveled down to my home town of Montebello for my 50th high school reunion. Montebello High School is the proud home of the Oilers. “Long ago she rose and stood, Montebello Dear Old High”

2. A Favorite.

Here are our mascots, Ollie the Oiler and Olive the Oiler.

3. “O”pen.

On Saturday last, the gates were opened up to the alumni to take a tour of the grounds. Things have changed including this gate. The whole school is now fenced in so that if need be they can have a total lock down of the school. Fifty years ago there were no fences around the school.

It was good to travel back in time and to enjoy the present, too, with many of my fellow Oilers in October who are now 50 years older.

Make new friends, but keep the old; those are silver, these are gold. ~ Joseph Parry

The Weekend Roundup is hosted by Tom The Backroads Traveler.

Crowned

Addy received some princess dress up items from her Auntie Laura and I was with her when the items were opened for the first time. She chose this crown for me to put on my head and since that first wearing of the crown she’s deemed it Baba’s crown. We put our crowns on and then I am directed by her to take her to the bathroom mirror to have a look. She has two others that she will wear. Soon her throne will be disturbed with the addition of a brother or sister. We will find out on Sunday evening if we are adding another granddaughter or a grandson to our family. The whole family will be together since Josh, Laura, Katie and Andrew are driving over the mountains for our 2nd annual family hunting time and Jamie’s family are invited over for the reveal, also.

I’m still considering a name for our new space…maybe our country bungalow although we don’t have a broad porch but some of the other requirements are met to call it a bungalow.

17 more cardboard boxes left to empty and 2 large bins with photo albums. We finally caved and ordered the parts to put together our three bookcases since we still have not found the original hardware that we put in a logical spot that has turned out to be not so very logical at all. In the future when we finally come across those parts we will have a good laugh.

Here I am with another crown with those bookcases in the background. This time around those bookcases will be in the office here at the bungalow so they will be filled from top to bottom with books and no tchotchkes.

Happy Friday y’all.