"Well She Was Just Seventeen.....

You know what I mean
And the way she looked
Was way beyond compare"
I Saw Her Standing There
(The Beatles - Lennon/McCartney)


Our little Kathryn Irene Fleming is seventeen today. I wonder what Daddy Preston was thinking in this picture?
It is easy to remember Kathryn's birth year - it was the summer of '93 - the summer of the big flood.

Kathryn was named for both her grandmothers - Helen's middle name, Kathryn, and mine, Irene. Both names are Greek in origin and together mean "Pure Peace".

I wonder how much pure peace there has been in the Fleming household since she was born?

In this picture taken at our house in WDM when she was about a year old, she was bouncing on her Daddy's back.

I always liked this professional photograph of her. There was something so angelic about it. And she looks so cute and happy.

Left to right: Shalea, Deise, Alyssa, Ellisa, Kathryn, Great-Grandma Ruth and Shelly.

For her 8th birthday, we had a tea party at "Country Blooms" a farm north of Fontanelle. At that time the owner had a gift shoppe and tea room in her re-purposed barn. She also had a greenhouse and sold plants. She had extensive flower beds to enjoy near the beautifully landscaped, four-square, farm house. (Country Blooms is now a landscaping business and the barn is now used as a guest and hunting lodge.)

The huge rock everyone is standing in front of is a few miles on north of Country Blooms. I had first heard about it a couple years earlier and gone to see it before it was completely dug out of the ground and moved. What a farmer thought was a nice sized rock for his front yard was actually one of the largest rocks in southern Iowa left by glaciers thousands of years ago. The rock was in his cornfield and he was tired of farming around it. By the time it was dug out, it looked as though he was building a pond.

This will be Kathryn's last year of high school. Before we know it, we'll be celebrating her graduation. I hope she savors her seventeenth year. Happy birthday, sweetie!