Winch Family - Myra Lee Winch - page 0 - 2 years.

I thought about starting with "I was born", but someone famous uses that line in their autobiography, so I changed my mind. 

This picture to the right is of my parents and under that top mom is wearing is me. I would think that this was sometime in the early summer of 1954.

I was supposed to be born on or about October 3rd. That would have made my dad's mother extremely happy, but my mother was relieved that I was born on October 16. My Mom did not care for my father's mother, but she hid it well.

So, I was 2 weeks late. Mom said that when she came into the OB Delivery floor, she didn't look like she was ready to deliver. My Dad was relegated to the waiting room with other expectant fathers. Except for newborn males or male doctors, the OB unit was no man's land.

I think I gave my mom a sleepless night. I was born and delivered at 0500 by Dr. Devereaux. He took care of me until I married Brian.

When I was born my left eye wouldn't open. Mom said that Dr. Devereaux took my Dad to the nursery window and explained that I would open my eye, and that the closed eye was due to how I had been laying in Mom before I was born. By the time I was 3 months old both of my eyes were wide open.

Mom and I didn't go home until I was 5 days old. My Mom's dad couldn't even come in and see either of us in the hospital. Supposedly Grandpa and Grandma were visiting Grandma's relatives above Sacramento when I was born. They had stayed in Fresno until Mom told them to go ahead and go. And of course that was when I was born.

Grandpa tried to come to see Mom and me while we were in the hospital, but he was refused entrance. His only child, just had his only grandchild and he didn't get to see or hold me until I was at home.

You can kind of see my head as Mom and Dad look at me adoringly. Am thinking that my Grandpa took this picture. I have other pictures of my Grandparents holding me, and finally the Grandmother's  holding and looking down at me.

Mom and Dad named me after them. They didn't want either side of the family to feel slighted if I had been named after the other side. Myra is feminine for Myron. My mother's middle name was Lee. So there you have it: Myra Lee became my name.

To the right is me at 3 months. My mother probably made me smile! By 3 months of age I was fine! Am sitting here looking at this picture and I think I looked like a boy! I am sure no one cut my hair, but that's what I look like to me. No ribbons or curls! But I look happy! Supposedly Mom was making faces at me so they would have a picture of me smiling at 3 months. 

What these 2 pictures don't show is the playhouse that my Dad made for me. It was painted white and had cut out windows. He put window flower boxes at the windows. You could fold it up and store it. We had that playhouse for a long time......

My parents owned the home I came home to for 29 years. The address of this house is 4610 N. Vagedes, in Fresno California. 

One of my favorite pictures is the picture of me having a bath in the kitchen sink. I had forgotten until we visited the place in 2012, that the tile was a baby blue with light yellow trim. The cupboards were metal. Apparently, when they were building the house they left the wood and metal window frames out in the rainy weather. Because of that they were warped, and had to be reordered ordered. The other opportunity was the builder would bring beer to the worksite for the builders to drink during constructing our house!

Mom and Dad moved into the house in January 1951 and there was mud everywhere. [They lived in Mom's apartment after they married on 16 December 1950. Dad said that he gave Mom's Dad a birthday present by marrying his daughter! Grandpa's birthday was on 16 December.] Anyway, one time I was waving my arms and I got a burn on my wrist from the faucet - I can't find the burn area on either wrist any more, but I used to be able to. I think Mom never got over that incident.

I think this picture in the baby carrier was taken at my Dad's Mother's home. [My Dad and his brother Grover bought the home for "Granny" and Aunt Lola to live in so they didn't have to pay rent].  I think that after Grover died - I have several pages dedicated to Grover here in this blog - that Dad paid it off the mortgage with the life insurance money. The property was in my Dad's name. The house had one bedroom but had housed all of  Granny's children, Dad, Grover and their 3 sisters, Deborah, Doris, and Lola. [At some point in the late 1960's or 70's, Aunt Lola bought the property from Dad.]

Granny was able to live there for the rest of her life. The deal was that Dad had paid off the house, but she paid the electric bill. Unfortunately Granny loved to go to "The Moose" club and play bingo. Then she would take the "Barney's Bus" to Lake Tahoe and blow her Social Security check playing bingo. She would come home and her electricity was turned off. She would ask my Dad to get it turned back on, but he said "no". Then Granny would hit up my Aunt Deborah or Cousin Richard and they would pay the utility bill....... 

This picture is of my grandparents and me. There names were Hildegarde Olga Teuber Starr Triplett (am leaving out 2 more husbands), and Mom's Dad, Shirley Green Triplett. This was probably taken in late spring or early summer. I still miss them very much! 

This is a picture of my 1st birthday. This was taken in the backyard of our Vagedes house.

This is me feeding Mike our Pekinese. I think I am in the back yard. Mom had Mike before she and Dad got married. I really don't remember Mike as I was so young.

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