21 Aircraft Avenue, Layton Utah, 1982-1987

Aunt Carol, and the current homeowner

When I was in Utah a couple of weeks ago, we went to see the old house where Wayne and I had lived in Layton.  Wayne's grandparents, Earl and Olive Nunn Wixom lived right across the street from us, in a very similar house.

Our little house was 685 sq. ft. upstairs, plus a full unfinished basement, plus a garage that was attached, but there was no doorway in between.

While we were taking pictures of the front of the house, the homeowner came out and talked to us, and was so nice to invite us in for a tour.

The current homeowners have changed it quite a bit.  They have added pop out bay windows in both of the front rooms.  They have changed the garage to a family room which is accessible from the house.

They ripped out the upstairs bathroom and changed my little boys' room into a big bathroom, and added an addition onto the back of the house.

We bought this house in 1982 for $35,000.  It had been built in 1942, and was 40 years old at the time.  We put in a new bathroom, new roof, new furnace, new flooring, new electricity, and didn't make a penny when we sold the house for $35,000 in 1987.  The current owner said she bought it for $41,000 in 1991.

Bountiful Apartment 1981-1982

While I was Utah recently, I went to see the apartment where Wayne and I lived from fall 1981-spring 1982.  Adam was born while we lived here.

We graduated from BYU in April 1981, and moved to an apartment in Layton, Utah for 6 months.  After that, I got a job at Brooks Fabric Store in Bountiful, and the owners owned this apartment right behind the fabric store, and we moved into it.

This is the back of Brooks Fabric Store, which we could see out our side window.  I only worked at the fabric store for a few months until Adam was born.

Last week, I went inside Brooks Fabrics, and I couldn't believe that they hadn't changed a thing (except the fabric for sale) in the whole 31 years since I worked there.  The ugly old linoleum tile floor and the same old wooden fabric racks, same wooden shelves around the walls, it was amazing.  So I guess updating a business isn't necessary, as long as your same old customers keep coming back.  It must be an institution by now, and no one cares what it looks like as long as it keeps stocking the fabric they want.

Zac left on his mission today

 Zac is my fifth son to leave on a mission.  We got to take him to the airport, and miraculously, an LDS Delta airline worker pulled some strings and got us some security passes, and we actually got to go through security with him and wait at the gate for a little while.  We haven't waited with any of our missionary sons since Adam's mission, because he left in August 2001, just before 9-11 changed airport protocol.

Zac left about 5:45 pm on a plane to Atlanta, and from there he is flying all night to Sao Paulo, Brazil.  He will be in the Mission Training Center there for 6 weeks (?), then he will travel to his mission in Florianopolis, Brazil for the rest of the two years.

We are so proud of him, and wish him the best as he learns to speak Portuguese.

Poison Ivy, Tree Down

Living on this much land sure brings its own troubles.

I found poison ivy in our front flower bed.

A big tree fell down onto our lawn, and we have been trying to cut it up with a chainsaw little by little.  We are going to have to pull it with a rope and the tractor to be able to reach more of the branches.

Wayne had to weedwhack all around the perimeter of the fence, but only got it partly done.

My neighbor's workman killed a water moccasin at our pond.

Tree frogs are adhered to our porch railings.

I never thought about any of these things before we moved here.

Wixom keepsakes, part 3

Wayne's parents, Lu and Wickie, lived in Maine for many years while Lu was a park ranger there at Acadia National Park.  Earl and Olive Wixom, and young daughter Carol, came to stay with them every summer (Earl was a high school art teacher, so he had summers off.  It was too hot to make chocolates in those days without airconditioning, so Olive had the summer off too.)

This is a picture of Earl Wixom at the top of the Morgan Tower on Mount Desert Isle (Acadia National Park).  J.P. Morgan originally owned the whole island, and had given some land on Sand Beach to his daughter.  She and her  husband, Mr. Satterlee, built a house, a gardener's cottage, and this stone tower on their property.

Wayne's family liked to visit this tower while they were living in the old Satterlee place.  Later the Park Service tore the tower down.

Here are some great 1950's pitchers which belonged to Olive Wixom.

Aunt Carol has this old rocking chair.  It was brought into an uphostery business where Grandpa Earl Wixom was working, but after it was reupholstered the customer never came back to pick it up.  The business owner sold it to employee Earl for $15.  Carol remembers rocking so hard in it just to make it tip over when she was little.

Sister Monson passed away

My mother called from Salt Lake City and said the flags were at half mast, Sister Monson died today.  I feel sad for President Monson and his family.

More Wixom keepsakes

 I was at Wayne's Aunt Carol's house in Layton, Utah, last week, and Carol showed us a lot of  heirlooms from her parents, Earl and Olive Nunn Wixom (Wayne's grandparents.)

This trunk belonged to Olive, and was what she packed her clothing in when she was young.  Carol painted it gold later.

Grandpa Earl Wixom built this dictionary stand, and this big dictionary was always on top of it.  The clock belonged to Olive's sister Ruth.

Mary Ann Markham Nunn

This is Mary Ann Markham Nunn, Olive Nunn Wixom's mother.

When I knew Olive, she was about this age, and resembled her mother a lot, I thought.

Mary Ann Markham was an orphan, her parents both died of a contagious disease so everything they owned was destroyed.  Mary Ann really didn't know very much about her parents so her genealogy is very difficult to do, we have so little information.

After she married, she and her husband and family moved from Nebraska to Idaho in a covered wagon, and then her first husband (Olive's father) died. Mary Ann outlived her husband for many years, and remarried, and lived in Idaho until her death.

Wixom keepsakes and treasures

I was in Layton, Utah, last week and was able to take photos of the heirlooms which had belonged to Olive Nunn Wixom and Earl Partridge Wixom (my husband's grandparents).  We lived across the street from them in Layton from 1982-1987, so I remember many of these possessions very well.  They are now in Wayne's aunt's house.

Olive Nunn Wixom had a handdipped chocolate business for many years, and these were the scales she used to weigh the chocolates for the customers.

Aunt Carol said the scales originally belonged to Frank Adams, who opened the earliest supermarket in Utah.  Olive worked as a checker in his supermarket, and later he gave her space in the store for her to have a glass fronted candy case where she sold her handdipped chocolates.  Frank Adams sold the scales to Olive, and the scales sat on top of the candy case.  She used them the rest of her life, as she moved her chocolate business to various places.  For a long time she ran it from her own basement, and later from her daughter-in-law LaRue's basement.

These scales were originally white, but Earl Wixom painted them gold.

The name of her business was "Frontier Lady Chocolates", and here is one of her boxes.   In front of the box, you can see the paper insert which tells which shape is which flavor.

Olive also worked in the Bluebird Cafe in Logan, Utah, and here is one of their paper bags.

The metal sculpture on the wooden base has a strange story.  One day Olive and Earl were away from home, and when they got home they discovered that Olive had left the iron on.  The iron had completely melted into this lump of metal.  The great blessing was that their house did not catch fire.

Earl took the lump and mounted it on the wooden base, and wrote the story on the bottom.

I can remember Grandma Wixom showing me this and telling me about it when I was a newlywed.  Her advice was to unplug your iron everytime after you use it.  I have followed her advice the rest of my life.

Earl Partridge Wixom

Sorry this picture is crooked but I didn't have time to take it out of the frame and scan it.  Earl Partridge Wixom was in the military in World War I.  He is my husband's grandfather.

Ongoing blog problems

I have been having such bad luck with this blog over the past many months.  First, we moved, but we didn't get internet in our new house for awhile so we had to keep going back to our old house to use the computer.

Then, when we got the internet, it wasn't a very good connection.

Then we thought our router broke, so we bought a new one.

Then we found out it was our modem, and got a new one of those.

Now my laptop broke, with lots of my January-May 2013 photos on it, so I am going to have to take it to Geek Squad and see if they can rescue my photos.

I swear I am going to blog better again.  Just wait and see if I do.

Olive Nunn Wixom at age 17

This is Wayne's grandmother, Olive Nunn Wixom.  I think she is so beautiful in these pictures.  We lived across the street from Wayne's grandparents, Earl and Olive Wixom, when we were young with three little boys.  She was the most wonderful woman, and helped me SO MUCH.

My best recipe

I was asked for my very best recipe.  I thought about it, and realized if I were to tell the complete truth, I would have to give the recipe which I use more than any other.

I am ashamed to admit it, but here it is.

This is a totally tacky, low class recipe, but I use it all the time! This is the way I get my sugar fix without having to keep a bunch of sugary desserts around the house.



Butter Cream Frosting for Emergency Sugar Craving



1. Decide that I MUST have something sweet.

2. Put a teaspoon or two of softened butter in a bowl.

3. Add a teaspoon of milk.

4. Start adding powdered sugar a little at a time, stirring with a fork.

5. If it gets too dry or stiff, add a little more milk or butter.

6. When it gets to the right consistency, spread it on a graham cracker.