It is raining today, so looking through some of my books, I found something I would like to share with you. Shoes? What did our acadian ancestors wear? What did they wear in the summer and in the winter? Well I read different articles. I learned that many of our ancestors were barefoot in the summer, some wore mocassins in the summer and in the winter they wore a higher boot type mocassin. I also read that the early Acadians used to wear their moccasins, in the summer and for dress up, and when they worked fixing their dykes, and on their boats they wore wooden shoes, (des sabots), These wooden shoes were made from the willow tree. Here is an exert from History and Acadian Traditions by Anselme Chiasson.
To prepare cut and sew shoes from hide was an art.The animal hide was stretched out on the floor,hair underneath,this was stretched as much as they could and nailed all around to dry out.Once dried the skin was scraped on both sides with a knife to remove the fat and hair. Then the hide was tanned by hand.In order to cut a shoe one had to place the foot on a piece of skin, the skin was then cut all around,2 inches from the foot,just enough so that the raised piece would make the height of the shoe. On the toe and the front of the foot a tongue was placed which was sewed all around the skin,while pleating it, it made a nice foot like the mocassins of today.The heel required a vertical seam and another horizontal seam. These hide shoes were comfortable indoors and outdoors.In the winter they made their mocassins a lot higher.They never used laces, but a pleat was made behind the calf and attached to the top with a string. Can you imagine the work in this, especially if you had a big family.
Have a great day
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Today I will tell you fishy stories (smile). I am certain everyone has some of those.
First of all, I have four brothers, two older than me and two younger ones. My oldest brother used to go fishing at a brook called Champ A Zeke, I remember that brook, I used to go there also as a young girl. One day my oldest brother decided to go fishing with some friends, and my younger brother who is but one year younger than me, decided he wanted to tag along. So off they went to fish, now in those days my brother did not have an up to date fishing pole, so he would throw in his line, wait a sec then pull it out again, to toss it further in the brook.This paticular toss, my young brother moved behind my older brother ,and when my older brother pulled the line back to throw it further , the hook caught my young brother in the ear lobe. No one could remove it, so they all returned to my parent's home with my young brother hooked to a fishing line.Then my parents took him to see the doctor and had the hook removed. Later at school , the teacher gave the students home work to do an essay on what they wanted to. So my brother made his essay and titled it " The biggest fish my brother ever caught".
Now another little story: My late husband used to go fishing in a river which was near a camp. The owner of the camp was a retired trackmaster, and the only way at the time to get to the camp was by Trolley, the trackmaster would pace his crossing according to the train schedule, since they had to cross a thistle,and I remember crossing it, the trees below were so small it seemed. Anyway this special trip, my husband and his friends decided to take their sons along. Now my son had never fished before and he was around ten years old.So they were fishing in the river but my son wasn't catching anything, so one of my husband's friend went behind a bush and took my son's hook out of the water and attached a fish to it. Well now my son had a bite, was he ever excited, so he pulled and he caught the big trout that he thought he really caught.We never told him for a long time what had happened because he was a very proud boy when he got home from his fishing trip.
have a great day
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Today was a beautiful day, so I went to a park in the city, it is called Centennial Park, it has a little island in the center of a pond. I went on the side of the park where there were lots of trees and picnic tables. I wanted to take a photo among the fall colors. But I think I shall return in a week or so when the fall colors are at their peak. I had a photo of me taken, with a few trees behind me. There were lots of ducks nearby. You could tell they were being fed, since they were not going anywhere, but soon the people will have to stop feeding them so they can fly south.
Now the reason I wanted a photo of me among the fall colors is because I want to have calendars made for Christmas to give as a gift to my family. I have been doing this for many years now. One year I had a calendar made of my grandchildren. Another year I had one made of my mother when she was 18months old.So this may be a idea you might like to try for the holidays? I have friends on line who live in Scotland, and I met them online around 7 years ago. One year I toured the city and took photos of where I lived, and sent them a 12 page calendar, they really enjoyed seeing Canada through my eyes.
Now as for genealogy, I finally finished adding my cemetery of Grande Digue New Brunswick in my website at http://www.acadian-roots.com There are many names listed, and also the names taken from a war memorial monument in the same cemetery.Now that that project is finished, I have to think about what to add next on my site. I know that there are many people coming into my site, and reading about my acadian words, and our recipes, and I am hoping many will come in and share some of their memories about their ancestors on our family memories forum.. I also would like to mention that Lucie LeBlanc Consentino has her own blog, I know she looks at mine and I drop in to read hers, I enjoy her blogs since she is a newbie at blogging and she is doing a super job, her blog is at http://acadian-ancestral-home.blogspot.com/ so I shall end on this note , keep reading our blogs, and a comment now and then would be nice, for both Lucie and I . Have a great day
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Looking through a book on Bouctouche I had loaned from the library, I came across the photo on the left of this little gothic church. For the ones of you who know Bouctouche, you should recognize the area, it is towards the Bouctouche Bay or Fond De La Baie in french, on the left you can see the old Bouctouche Convent which today is converted into a museum. Notice the road wasnt paved.

Now the church you see in the photo, was built around the late 1890s, notice the gothic design, I find it was very pretty. It was situated on the former property of Jacques Cormier who married Osite Pothier in 1770. They called this area Pointe a Jacquot (Jacquot Point).I don't know who Jacques passed the land to before the building of the church, I have not searched for that info yet. The church burned in 1921.So they decided to build a new church in the village of Bouctouche, the foundation for the new church was built in 1926. So for the ones who have ancestors born, married or died before 1921 this would be the church where their services were held.

I have a few ancestors who were in the Bouctouche area, so this gives me a sense of knowing a bit more of the past.My late husband's Cormier line came from Bouctouche, his line descends from Jacques Cormier and Osite Pothier.My grandmother's line descends from Amand Cormier brother of Jacques.

Hope you enjoyed today's blog. Have a great day

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First of all I want to share this joke I received with you.
Birth control thru the eyes of a child A six-year-old boy told his father he wanted to marry the little girl across the street. The father, being modern and well-schooled in handling children, hid his smile behind his hand. "That's a serious step," he said. "Have you thought it out completely?" "Yes," his young son answered. "We can spend one week in my room and the next in hers. It's right across the street, so I can run home if I get scared of the dark." "How about transportation?", the father asked. "I have my wagon, and we both have our tricycles," the little boy answered. The boy had an answer to every question the father raised. Finally, in exasperation, his dad asked, "What about babies? When you're married, you're liable to have babies, you know." "We've thought about that, too," the little boy replied. &nb sp; "We're not going to have babies. Every time she lays an egg, I'm going to step on it!"

smile.
Well I am still working on my Grand Digue Cemetery in my website, I am nearly all finished adding the names that were in the cemetery. I am hoping that through all my work that it will benefit someone. Yesterday I met someone I went to school with during my first 8th grades, and we were saying , it is good to share memories, and preserve them, he is collection old photos and going to donate them to the genealogy center, I think that is a great idea. Years from now, someone will know what our times were like , what their ancestors looked like. He created a book, with lots of photos of his family and stories and he gave them to all his siblings. I thought that was so nice and to some I am certain the book is very precious.
Last month I went to my grandson's birthday party and I created a storybook for him on his dog Fluffy because Fluffy is old and they nearly lost her, so I created the story as if I were Fluffy tell ing the story. And I had already given my grandaughter a book I made about my mother's adventures when she was little. My mother told me another little story so I made the page up and brought it along to the party. I gave it to my grandaughter and there were lots of her friends there, but she took the page, and ran upstairs with it to put it in her book. That made me feel so good. My daughter in law told me that she is really taking care of the book that her memere made for her.
Have a great day
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Hello, today I would like to share an old story with you that I found in the Moniteur Acadian, which is an old french newspaper. First of all I found a little tidbit about my ancestor Narcisse Chase, and it mentioned that the article was in the moniteur, it gave the page and the year.
So while I was at the Centre D'etude meeting Lucie, I browzed through the microfilm, to the date that I had. Well I found it, it was all in french so I am going to translate it for you the best that I can. The date was August 8 1879. (That was a long long time ago). Headline read
Terrible Tornado (Cyclone in french) in Bouctouche. (New Brunswick Canada).
Wednesday around 6 o'clock at night a thick cloud appeared in the south and headed towards the north. A storm was announced but the clouds continued their way and it seemed to pass us except for a rain that lasted only a few hours.Yesterday morning a dispatcher from Bouctouche put all our town in awe.The announcement was that the storm that passed here at six pm had struck there as a tornado.It struck the church, rectory and 80 homes, sweeping the normal harvest at sea, destroying part of the large bridge and killed four people. It was a disaster like nothing we have ever had on our shores. Our correspondents headed for the disaster area and returned with his report.
At Rivere des Hache Joseph LeBlanc =barn destroyed.Aime F Robichaud =barn destroyed.
Ls B Allain= Barn and House lifted and damaged. Anselme Leblanc =barn destroyed, David PH Cormier=house and barn completely destroyed and an abandoned house lifted.
Ls Denis Cormier =barn destroyed and one side of roof destroyed (this abandoned house belonged to MM Bourque. The 7 or 8 buildings of McAuley destroyed.Powell's tannery =crushed.
The new Bouctouche school built last year with desks costing more the $1200. destroyed.
Trees were uprooted. Roofs of the mill blown away.A brand new barn being built, destroyed.
Alexis Roy,his house, two barns and other buildings destroyed along with his equipment.
Jean-Baptiste Marin Girouard=house demolished. Narcisse Chase house totally swept away, All around him is a scene of debris some wood as deep as six feet in the earth.
Ls Meunier =barn destroyed. Simeon Allain =barn lifted and put back , kitchen swept away, house nearly crumbled.Anselme Allain =nice house newly finished last year, his old one and 2 barns completely destroyed.His trees uprooted. Philip Cormier=new house garage and barn destroyed. Meleme Cormier=barn destroyed ,kitchen damaged and part of his house destroyed.
Clement Cormier =barn destroyed. Francois Bastarache-barn and house levelled.
David Hubert Cormier= house and 2 barns completely destroyed.Olivier LeBlanc =barn destroyed.The ones who perished were the wife of Etienne Duplessis who was bedridden was found dead in the rubbles of her home, An indian lady Jeanne wife of Thadee Nicolas crushed by the chimeny Bricks, A child of Alexis Roy age 2 died. The injured were Alexis Roy in grave condition, Mrs Jean Baptiste M Girouard fractured skull, Narcisse Chase carried with the debris of his house received serious concussions along with his wife and two of his daughters.
Anselme Allain sick in bed was rescued from his home with cuts and bruises.A grandaughter of Philippe Cormier burned her foot on the stove.Two daughters of Thomas Ward broken legs.An indian widow of Marin Nicelas fractured skull,broked wrist, several fingers in serious condition,two young indians fractured arms,a child of Nita Girouard died.

Wasn't that terrible? So years ago there were tornadoes, hurricanes and bad storms. For the ones of you who's families mentioned above are your ancestors, save this article. Mention who your ancestors were, I have Narcisse Chase in my line he was my fathers great grandfather, he was married to Marie Martin.....
Have a great day.
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Well yesterday I went to the centre d'etude Acadienne to say goodbye to Lucie LeBlanc Consentino. When I arrived ,there were quite a few doing research. Lucie was looking at some records. We chatted a bit and decided to go to Fort Beausejour and to the Beaubassin site. Lucie told me each time she comes to New Brunswick she does her Fort Beausejour pilgrimage.

Arriving at Fort Beausejour, we looked over towards the water, the water was a rusty brown. It was very windy. Looking down from the Fort I thought to myself ,this is what the acadians at the fort probably saw as they looked out from the fort. Just to walk where our ancestors walked so many years ago is something I think very special.

Later we left Fort Beausejour and made our way to Fort Lawrence, formerly the village of Beaubassin. As you know Beaubassin was the first major settlement outside of Port Royal. That is where one of my ancestors Thomas a Robert Cormier settled, he became one of the most prosperous men in Beaubassin.

There is a monument erected in memory of the acadians who lived in Beaubassin, but the names are of the last acadians who were there, Thomas Cormier was not listed on the monument so he must not have been there at the time.

Beaubassin would be an ideal place to create a sort of replica of Beaubassin, something like the village acadien . People in old acadian costumes, some houses, church ,etc. It could be possible in the near future, as I am sure many of you would agree.

I hope you enjoyed today's blog.

Have a great day.

Last night we went to dinner at a lovely restarant called the CREEK, it was the first time I had gone. My friend and I arrived around 5.30 pm, the dinner was at 6 pm. We sat in the front near the bar, and waited for our party to arrive. The first ones to arrive were Francis LeBlanc and his wife Norma, so we chatted a bit, it was the first time I had met Norma, but I had met Francis at the CEA. I remember the first time I met him, he was working furiously on his laptop, and some researchers were asking him questions on the LeBlancs, so I at the time could not find what I was looking for, and I asked his help, he is a very nice person and a nice sense of humor. Norma also was very nice to chat with.
Next to arrive were Lucie LeBlanc Consentino and a friend of hers who came down with her named Marcel, now Marcel is a very nice man also, he was interesting to listen to, he also came down to do genealogy. And as for Lucie I don't have to tell any of you how nice she is, because you all know it. She was fun to be with. But that was not the only people at our dinner, because Lucie invited Stephen White and he accepted, and it was very nice having him with us.
Of course you must all know that the biggest part of our conversation was in some form of genealogy (smile). My friend asked each one of them how they got started in genealogy, and everyone had their own story it was very interesting to listen to.
As I listened to each of them tell their story, I could see the love for genealogy each one of them had. They are all totally addicted to it.
I even told them the story about the old film I saw at the CEA and about seeing a cow at a window of this old tar papered house, which turned out to me my parents house and their cow.
And how Ronnie Gilles made me a copy ,which in turn I copied and gave to all my siblings for a christmas present.
This was a very very nice night, I hope you like the photos above, of Lucie and I , and Stephen White and I.
Have a great day.
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Have you ever seen the TV sitcom the Beverly Hillbillies? Or have
you ever heard the song "come along and listen bout a man name Jed ? Have you seen Granny Clamplett?
Well it is said that we all have a lookalike somewhere. And I believe Granny Clampett has a
lookalike. The lady in the photo above is my great great grandmother Domthilde Williams dit Bristol.I find she does look a lot like Granny Clampett, what do you think? She was born around 1849 (according to the census) daughter of Lucien Bristol and Anne Landry, She married Ferdinand Bergeron D'Ambroise in Cap Pele on February 14 1871
(valentine day). They lived in different places , in Marshalltown NS, in Mattawonkey Maine, and finally settled near Saint Paul NB.
My mother told me that Domithilde lived next door to my mother, and she had lots of flowers around her house, plus her apple orchard, yes she is the one who planted the apple orchard that I told you about earlier. Mom told me that she used to have gooseberries near her farmhouse.
And every time she made preserves she would give some to my grandmother. There was a certain kind of berry that used to only make a small batch of jelly, and she would give a bottle to my grandmother to use as a treat when someone was sick in the family. It was her special remedy. I have in my possession some of Domithilde's old china, they are not in perfect condition, there are cracks here and there but to me they are worth a lot, since the china was used by her way back in the early 1900s. She died in 1929.
I had been trying to find Ferdinand's death, for a long time, would you believe since 1976? Well not too long ago, I finally found it, through the NB Provincial Archives, he died in 1933, my mother told me that after Domithilde died, he had dementia and used to travel among the neighbors with all his possessions, dishes etc. He died in the Shediac Hospice, but I do not know where he is buried, wish I did. Before he died they amputated both legs, wonder if he had diebetes? Hope you liked today's blog. Now I need to concentrate on tonight's dinner with Lucie and others.
Have a great day. Keep the comments coming, it gives me incentive to keep on going .
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I have been a busy lady lately, but that doesn't mean I have forgotten you reader. I have finally met Lucie LeBlanc Consentino.
Yesterday I awoke early and wondered what should I wear? Should I dress up? Or just be me, so I just went as my old self, jeans and a t shirt. Arriving at the center, I saw Mister White talking to a lady (I knew it was Lucie although I had never met her before).
So I went over and Mr White told her who I was. Then others were talking with her and I waited a while before we chatted. What a nice lady she is. I returned to the center today and Lucie arrived shortly after I did. She even took the time from her busy schedule to help me with my website. I had not added certain codes, and she found them.
So tomorrow we are all having dinner together at a restaurant, I told Lucie, I am getting my hair done and intend on taking photos . She said "sure".
While we were at the genealogy center (CEA) another lady was sitting there doing research, I had seen this lady there before , but took no notice of who she was. I found out yesterday that she was Zella Robichaud who has a website online, and I had received permission from her to add one of her census to my website. She too is a nice lady.
I spoke to Mister White, and gave him all the hello's I was asked to pass along to him. I always enjoy talking to Steve, yesterday we talked about when I first began my research, he remembered that it was my son who got me started and he told me I had come a long way, which is true, from 1976 when I first began to now, I sure learned a lot, and found a lot . I said to Steve (Mister White). I love what I do, I love genealogy and never get tired of it. There are always other avenues to look into with genealogy.......
Remember I told you I had transcribed the Grand Digue Cemetery? It is quite a large cemetery, well yesterday I was told that the old cemetery is being transcribed all the ones before 1900. I spoke to a Mister Leger who is in the project, he told me they would be putting the list on a CD. I sure hope I can get a copy of it when they are finished.
I have been given permission to add the Cocagne Cemetery on my website today, so that may be in the near future, if I do, I shall let you know.
A little footnote: I would love to hear from you to let me know if my blogs are interesting enough , if you like them, or if you have something to add on the subjects. Click reply or comments and let's chat.
Have a great day.

I was going to blog yesterday, but instead I decided to take a trip to Cap Pele. I wanted to find certain tombstones in the cemetery. Arriving at the church, the cemetery was not there, so I looked across the street and there it was. What a huge cemetery. I began walking through it, and there were lots of old stones. I found two Williams stones, one was Isaie and one was Madeleine. There were lots of Leger's, LeBlanc,Landrys. I looked for Bristol, never found one.
So then I decided to go to Barachois, found the cemetery, and I walked through it. Looking for Dupuis, never found one .
Next I decided to go back towards Cap Pele and try and find an old church and cemetery in Saint Andre, but I guess there was none.
I did find lots of mosquitos tho, here we are at the end of September and boy talk about mosquitos.
Now I want to try and get back up that way and check out the Shemogue Cemetery. Not sure when I will do that.
So as you can see I am keeping busy with my cemeteries, my website at
www.acadian-roots.com , my blog, my research.

Lucie arrives tonight, will be meeting her tomorrow.
Have a great day.

What could I talk about today? I was going to add my great grandmother's photo today, but I have decided to do it another time , so instead I picked up a book I have here on Saint Marie de Kent in New Brunswick written by Emery LeBlanc. I find it very interesting and I really wanted to see what it would say about a LeBlanc family ,since I am looking for an elusive lady.
Inside the book I came to a story I want to share with you, it is a humorous story.I shall translate it for you since it is all written in french.
Felix LeBlanc father of Jacques Leblanc always worked barefeet when he was out clearing his land. Boots were quite expensive during those days so he would use them as little as possible to make them last as long as he could. So when the weather was nice , he would go barefeet.So each day Felix would go work on his land barefoot. His wife would go with him.One day Felix twisted his foot, the pain was unbearable , he had a hard time to walk. His wife told him, Felix if you are not better tomorrow go to see the doctor in Bouctouche.Next day Felix could hardly walk, so he washed his sore foot as best he could ,he could not rub it since he was in so much pain nor could he scrub it.
Arriving in Bouctouche he showed his foot to Doctor Landry;
I think your problem is your foot is too dirty, said the doctor, I have never seen a foot so dirty.
Listen Doctor replied Felix, I work out clearing my land, and for your information my foot isn't that dirty, I have seen dirtier feet than that and the people walk just the same.
Doctor Landry continued, I am sure there is not another foot as dirty as this foot of yours.
Felix replied Do you want to bet five dollars?
Sure I will bet you five dollars said Doctor Landry.
Felix shows him his other unwashed foot and takes the five dollars .

have a great day.

Well today I woke up to a cool morning, and I decided to go to Grand Digue and do more on the cemetery. I left here around 7.45 am. I took the scenic route ,through Cocagne , then to Grand Digue. I drove in the cemetery road, it is just a dirt road, and I stopped my car near the row of stones I had to begin at. The row was from the monument to the back that you see on my webapge at http://www.acadian-roots.com in the cemetery Grand Digue on the sidebar .
I thought that I would have to return quite a few times to finish the cemetery. Well it was cool at when I first started, but the sun came out and it became quite warm. I worked steadily at copying the names on the stones, there were some made out of wood , and the writing was all eroded away. Working my way from one side to the other then from the other side on the next row to where I began, it was going very well. Later on I looked towards the back and I noticed I had but five more rows to do, So I decided that I would finish the cemetery. Arriving at the last stone, I thought to myself, I am finally finished. But looking at the cemetery I noticed that there are about 25 or so stones on a little hill nearby, but I think they are the latest ones that died .
So I shall return at a later time and complete that section, but the biggest part of the cemetery is finished. I shall add it to my webpage in hopes that it may help someone in their research.
Have a great day.

The nights are getting cooler , this morning we had a white frost. So many things I want to do before the snow flies. One project I want to finish is the Grand Digue Cemetery transcriptions. I live about a half hour drive away from the cemetery, and I have gone twice already. I now have 10 rows done. I am not half done yet.
Walking along the rows of tombstones, I see some sad things, one of the tombstones really touched me, all it said was the family of so and so died in a fire and the year. Another one there were two girls possibly best friends died in an accident. I wonder how some of our ancestors died? Did they die tragically?
A couple that I know very well, had three sons, one went to school with my son.
The one that went to school with my son,got married had a baby girl, and they lived in a trailer, it caught fire due to hot grease on the stove, they all perished, then one year later another one of their sons went to this swimming hole, and one of his friends got in trouble in the currents, he dove in to try and save his friend and he drowned. That family was devastated. I felt so bad for them, although when God calls us , we have to go.They were so young.
A song I hear a lot on the radio is very touching the name of it is If Tomorrow Never Comes.... Listen to the words to it, sure makes a lot of sense. We should maybe treat each day as it were our last and tell our love ones we love them .
Now on a happier note, soon I will be meeting Lucie, I am anxious to meet her, at first we will meet at the Centre d'Etude Acadienne, that is the ideal place to do so , since we both love genealogy. Then we have other plans, and I am hoping we take lots of photos. I shall be seeing Stephen White, I see him most of the times I go do research, he is a very interesting person. He takes time to talk with me or whoever approaches him, he has a tremendous memory. He is working on his second set of Dictionaire Genealogique des Familles Acadiennes , I would encourage all you genealogist and researchers out there to order your set as soon as the order forms are available, I know I plan on getting the set. I have his first 2 volumes and I won't be without them.
Have a great day.

Today I would like to chat about old photos that your parents may have. By looking at photos they can tell you stories about your relatives.

The lady on the left is my great grandmother's sister her name is Marie Williams dit Bristol.She was the daughter of Lucien Bristol and Anne Landry.

Notice her clothes, the long dress, or skirt and blouse, that was the acadian way of dressing back then. I find it very interesting .Now notice the tree, it looks like an apple tree to me. I wonder if this could be a tree planted by my great grandmother Domithilde? Perhaps it was.

My mother told me that her grandmother Domithilde Williams lived next door to Mom's family and she planted an apple orchard all by herself near Saint Paul. But Domithilde never lived to see the orchard bear fruit, she died in 1929.

I decided to go for a drive one day , my mother had told me where they once lived, and would you believe the apple orchard is still there? It is an abandoned apple orchard. But I have seen the orchard that was planted by my great grandmother .What a sight to see.

Do you have old photos? See if there are stories behind that photo, where was it taken? How old were they? Make some kind of scrapbook with the stories to go with the photos.... Another great project for you to do.

Have a great day.

What a lovely day, the sun is shining after a night of rain. It is a sight to behold, since we have had a lot of rain lately and cool nights. Looking out my window I notice the trees changing colors already, the maples are turning red and some other trees are a yellow and orange.
I love to go driving when the fall colors are here. Especially on an old dirt road that all you see along the side of the road are trees of different colors.That is when my digital camera comes in handy. My late husband and I once took a trip on the train from Moncton to Halifax in the fall and the scenery was breathtaking.
If we could look through our ancestors eyes, and see what they saw, I wonder what we would see? Would we see their children playing ? Would we see their garden growing? I am sure we would see a lot of tragedies during their times. My mother told me that when she was young , the neighbors helped each other, they helped build homes, barns, dig wells and much more. It would be nice if that were happening in our generation, but since times have changed that is not always possible is it?
Sometimes I look in old newspapers for articles written about my ancestors, little tidbits, and when I do find something it is very exciting. It gives me more information about them than I already had. I went to a funeral parlor one day and inquired about an obit of my grandfather, they found it, and I copied it, it said he died of Lupus, I did not know that , my mother told me he died of kidney disease, but when I looked up Lupus it is a disease of your organs. Now my nephew has the disease. So it is possible that he has it because of my grandfather having it.
Now I would just like to add a little more to this blog, I would be interested in your comments by answering here instead of sending me your comments by email. Someone else may enjoy your comments also. So please click the comment at the bottom of this page and let me know you are reading these and let me know if you like my blogs or have a comment to add..
Have a great day.

Today I went for a long drive with some friends. We decided to take some back roads, not knowing exactly where we would end . We saw cows grazing in the fields, saw some Jersey cows and some Holsteins.
I noticed old abandoned farms, and I wondered who would have lived there long ago. If those houses could talk , what a tale they would have to tell. Some of the houses in those back roads were large. So I figured they must have had big families back then.
And churches, we saw beautiful churches, one was a baptist church and it had four steeple on it. What a beautiful building.
Finally we came to this lovely brook that you see in the picture above. I took a few photos of the brook and my friend took the one of me at the brook. From the other angle I saw a little rapid running down. It was so peaceful, you could only hear the sound of the water gently flowing and the little birds chirping in the trees above. What a lovely day it was.
Now a little bit about genealogy and what would be a great idea for some of you. If you are just beginning your genealogy, and you have love ones in nursing homes, and who can remember a little about their youths, two good things could come from a visit from you to an aunt or uncle, or cousin, or grandmother etc one you could make them very happy to have a visit from you , and two you could bring a little notebook with you, start having them tell you stories about their past, ask them " Aunt Jane what was Grampy like? Was he tall? Did he smoke a pipe? Did Grandma tell you stories about when she was little? Can you tell me about them? Were any of your family born in the USA or CANADA? Questions like these can bring you much infomation to pass down to your children, through a book , a diary, CD or however you want to.
I remember when I worked in a nursing home, and there was this little old lady , who seemed so sad, and I noticed she had no visitors at all, and I mean none, so on my break I would drop in to see her, her name was Mrs Osanski and I would just go sit and talk with her, one day I asked her to sing me a song, she sang me a song of her motherland, and from then on I would just enter her room and she would smile and begin singing her same little song....Now had she been my aunt or relation, I would have jotted that song in a book and saved it and tell my children this was a song she always sang for me. I remember one song my grandmother used to sing. One day I went to her home, as I was climbing the stairs, I could smell brownies cooking and I could hear her sing the song "why do treat me as if I were only a friend" So each time I hear that song, I remember my grandmother.
Have a great day.

Thank you for the approval of my poem , this means that you are reading my blogs, and that encourages me to keep on blogging.
So today I shall talk about old acadian words, that I remember saying and I still do at times. Now Chiac is a form of acadian slang, it is very unique ,it is not perfect french, some of the language is part french , part english. Perhaps it was that way because in New Brunswick, the french and english got along very well, and in order for the french to talk with the english they had to learn a few words.
For example, " J'ai prit le canal et mon car a un flat tyre.J'assaie de haussez le car pour arranger mon tyre.. ( translation) I took the ditch, and my car has a flat tire, I am trying to raise the car to fix my tire.
"Mon pere va m'le bailler quand j'mon va. "My father is gonna give it to me when I get home." Some words we used to say were, Chicanner (scold), mon jeu " my god" guenille "rags" assayer "tried". These sound better when they are being said. It is a shame that lots of these words and saying are being cast aside for the modern french. I speak to some well educated people, who has the paris french for instance and my chiac stands out. To others I may seem odd, but to me that was the way I was brought up.
Where I live we have a golden age club, and every saturday they have a dance and a band, well when I began going there I was hipnotized to the music, it was mostly all acadian music, and there is one paticular song, I forget the name but some of the words were j'ai passer le speed limit , je connait pas ca la metric. " and the entire song was all Chiac.
To end this I want to share with you , since we are talking about language that
when my grandaughter was barely talking, maybe 2 or three? I took her to the pharmacy behind our home, It was a cold day, and I had her bundled up very nice and toasty warm. Walking through the snow towards the pharmacy, I began singing to her :Baby it's cold outside" Then she took over and started
"Baby brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr side......... haha........have a great day.

IF I COULD TALK
If I could talk , would you listen
If I could talk would you care
If I could tell you about my past
Could you imagine being there.
What if I told you I helped your kin
What if I told you his name was Tim
He had a brother who lived not far
In those days there were no cars.
I was on the wagon that special day
We left his home to make his hay
On our way we met his brother
He said come Tim it is our Mother
She is not well, she will not heal
And right now we need a Wheel
We only need it for a bit
Doctor Melanson is in the ditch.
Tim said no problem we are on our way
You can use my wheel anyday
The doctor made it there in time
Because of me Tim's mother's fine.
When you see a wheel like me
Ask yourself what did it see
Did it help my uncle Dan
Did it get stuck in the sand
If it could talk would you listen
If it could talk would you care.

composed by Aline Cormier

five minutes ago. (smile)

Memories, what are they? Well to me, they are things that are very important. They are what stories are made of. Long ago , when there were no radios nor televisions nor computers did our ancestors tell stories to their kids?
Well my mother told me that her aunt was a great storyteller, where did she get those stories? Maybe she added some of her memories into her stories. Whatever it was, my mother told me that my father used to go there along with others to listen to my great aunt. This leads me to memories again, my mother told me about her aunt.So these were my mother's memories.
My mother told me how she met my father, and how she was very young, and my father was nine years older. She told me that when they decided to marry, the priest would not marry her because of her age, she was barely 14. Can you imagine? So Mom told me how she would meet my father on a bridge nearby and make plans. They would take a train to Moncton and get married by a justice of the peace, so that day arrived and they did take a trip to Moncton and got married in a baptist church. They were married no matter what. But their marriage lasted a few days only when there was a knock on the door. It was the parish priest, he told my mother to go home, and told my father to go home too.
But my parents were determined to remain married, so the priest wrote to the Bishop asking permission to marry them Catholic, and the Bishop agreed and they were married in the Catholic Church. Mom says she has Two marriage certificat, and Dad would say, she is the only woman I married twice.
Now once my mother is gone, these memories had she not shared with me would be gone with her. My dad has passed away, he could not tell me..
Wouldn't it be nice if we had memories like these passed down by our ancestors? There is nothing I would like better to be able to travel back in time, and see how they lived, see their happy times, I am certain they must have had some good times.I wonder what their favorite foods were? Did they like music?
So to me I honestly believe that sharing your memories with someone is the way to go. If you have no one to share them with, make some kind of diary or book.One day someone will enjoy reading about us.And we will not just be a name and a date, we will have had been living persons who loved, cried, were hurt, laughed and had dreams...... Share your memories you have nothing to lose and a lot to gain in the end.
Have a great day.

I have decided to do two blogs in the same day. The reason is because I wanted to tell you that Lucie LeBlanc Consentino has taken the plunge, she has begun her own blog, I have just read it and it is very interesting and I am certain she is going to keep us wanting to go back again and again. Her url is http://acadian-ancestral-home.blogspot.com So why don't you bookmark her url, and when you read mine , read hers also.
If you read Lucie's blog you must know that we will be meeting in Moncton in a few weeks. I am looking forward to our meeting, and we both will be going to the Centre D'Etude Acadienne to do research that week.
Today I finished transcribing the St.Lawrence O'Toole Cemetery in Irishtown New Brunswick, The parish was founded in 1820 and the latest church has been there since 1870. It was an Irish parish, but now it is for any Catholics, I have transcribed all the acadian names in the cemetery, and I have begun adding them to my website.

On a another note, today I phoned my grandchildren to see how they like their new teacher and how they made out the first day of school. My grandson said Memere it was ok, but my teacher taught me for two months last year, she is not new. Then my grandaughter said to me "Memere I was so nervous the night before that I had one dream and she said I am ok, and my teacher is a boy teacher.
I said I am happy you both had a good day. Then my grandaughter said something to me that really touched my heart..... "Memere I love you"......
Goodnight until next time.........

To begin today's blog I would like to make a change to my url for my acadian-roots website. Please go to www.acadian-roots.com . I hope you do enjoy my site I am trying to add new things. So please check back often.
Today we are having rain, so that will delay me from completing my cemetery transcriptions.
I have started a project in our yahoo acadian group (which you can access though the sidebar on my website if you are reading this through my website). I am asking all the ladies to do their maternal lines to see if any of us branch down to the same ladies. If we had enough with the same lady ancestor and if we had our DNA done, I wonder what the results would show?
I know of a gentleman who is gathering LeBlanc lines interested in having their DNA done through him, which would cost around $110.00, he is very interested in the descendents of Andre LeBlanc son of Daniel, but I believe if you are a descendent of another son of Daniel LeBlanc you would still qualify to have your DNA done through him.
I wonder how many of you out there would be interested in having your DNA done if you could have it done at a low cost..This would have to be an Acadian line. I was chatting with someone one day and they told me that if would be nice to be able to trace back the females. meaning maternal line.
As you know many acadian records were lost or burned along the way, so we are going via censuses a lot of the time. There are lots of possibles and probables in our researching. Now let's say that around 50 of us descend from Jeanne Aucoin as an example, and we all had our DNA done? Wonder what the results would show. I think DNA is a great tool and something we should explore .What do you think?

Well since I last posted I have been a busy lady. I now have a very gorgeous website set up in my new Domain. But I will tell you for me it wasn't an easy task,since I was not very good in html , but I am learning slow but sure.
They say we all have a gardian angel, well I think I have more than one because at the moment there is this angel named Lucie LeBlanc Consentino who must have a lot of patience. She is the one who set up my site for me, she moved my entire site over from my old site to my new home. She gave me ideas regarding my site, she guided me towards softer music, she showed me how to set up a sidebar, well she did the work , I just have to do the fill ins. So Lucie if you are reading this, I thank you from the bottom of my heart , you surely are an angel...(smile).
Now regarding genealogy, I have this cemetery transcribing bug at the moment, it really gets addictive you know. I have transcribed the Saint Paul Cemetery in Kent County New Brunswick, ( I had been wanting to do that cemetery for years but never got around to it and for awhile I lived about a ten minute drive away from the cemetery) Now I live further away and I finally decided now is the time.
I now have another little cemetery in mind to do, and today if the weather permits I am on my way. This Cemetery only began around 1938, and we cannot access the parish records for 1938 up till now, so I believe doing this project would be a great help for others looking for their ancestors.
In closing today I would like to invite you all to view my new website of which I am so proud of . The url is http://www.acadian-roots.com/index.html

enjoy and have a great day.