October 5, 2015

Because we knew several that had birthdays the last of September and the first week of October, Andrea decided to make Rueben sandwiches and invite them and friends to help celebrate. Mary Lou Havard’s birthday was the 2nd and Marcia (Warner) Jones’ birthday was September 30th. The other birthday was for the young man that has been around here for quite some time, Thomas “Spiderman” Linton whose birthday was the 28th. Guests included Bess Andrews, Ima Weisinger, JoNell Placker, Kathreen Chuke, Joyce Carlton, Dee Adams, Marcia’s son and daughter-in-law, Bob and Shelly Jones from Houston and Mark Havernick. Mark’s wife, Ann, had a birthday on the day of our little party but she was in Dallas so Mark decided to celebrate with us and sent Ann a picture of his plate and told her “Happy Birthday”. For dessert Andrea made homemade pecan and buttermilk pies. We also served a Snowball cake that Patricia Stubblefield made and delivered to us with her husband, Kenneth. There were lots of laughter and stories told at the table that day. In the conversation, I learned there were three DHS cheerleaders from the class of ’44 sitting at the table; Bess, Mary Lou and Marcia who was also Football Sweetheart that year.

It was great to see Russell and Tricia Roberts when they were in town to attend the funeral of Dave Winfrey. The Roberts lived here for five years in the late 80’s while he was athletic director and she worked in the library. Both of their children graduated from DHS; Tina in 1990 and Chris in 1993. Tina graduated from Baylor and Chris attended school in Wichita Falls a short time before transferring to Baylor. Tina got a business degree and worked in the business world for a while and later taught school. She now loves being a stay-at-home mom to 15-year-old Trinity and 11-year-old Tucker. Everyone in her family has a name with “T”, Tad, Tina, Trinity and Tucker. After Baylor, Chris immediately began coaching with his dad in Wharton and New Caney before moving into the Humble ISD and is now the head coach at Meridian which incidentally, is where he attended kindergarten. His wife, Kathryn (from Mexia) is the assistant principal and their children are 13-year-old Maddie and 9-year-old Grant. In 2010 Russell retired and he and Tricia moved to Round Mountain, population 181, not even a stop sign. They truly enjoy living in the country on their 8 acres of rocks, watching the wildlife and drinking coffee on their deck. Tricia works one day a week in the library at their church’s school. Russell fully retired this year after serving as head coach at Faith Academy in Marble Falls, at first it was 6 man football and later 11-man and eventually he stepped down to coaching Jr. High. Tricia’s parents, Patsy and Sam Johnson lived in Diboll about 5 years but eventually moved back to the Marble Falls area. Patsy passed away about 5 years ago but Sam will be 94 on the 11th of October and still lives alone, drives and cooks for himself.

Geneva Ard called to let everyone know that the $100 gift card given away by the Diboll Pilot Club was won by Dennis Gilmore of Jasper. He is the brother of another Pilot club member, Barbara Nash. Proceeds from this go toward the special projects that the club does. Geneva also shared she spent the weekend in College Station being “Nana” to her two grandsons 3-year-old Case and 5-1/2 year old T.J. Their parents, Allison and Dennis Gilmore attended the Texas A&M game.

Two SFA lifetime alumni, attended their first SFA football game this past week end in Houston at the NRG Stadium. Kevin and Andrea Swor along with their SFA freshman daughter Cheyenne and her friend, Samantha Wallace enjoyed good seats on the 50 yard line. The girls were able to find their former high school classmate, Brandon McCall, in the huge and very impressive SFA band. Brandon was playing the piccolo and being watched by his parents, David and Brenda McCall, who were also in the crowd. I just have to interject that my mother, Anna Lee Burden Powell, was the 13th student to enroll at Stephen F. Austin in 1923 before there was football or even buildings.

Jimmie Woodard shared with me about her recent cruise to Alaska on the Norwegian ship Pearl. She traveled with Kenny & Gay Standridge from Huntington who were celebrating their 25th wedding anniversary. They invited Kenny’s brother and wife, David and Vivian and Sandy Anthony who invited Jimmie. The group flew from Houston to Seattle and spent two days sightseeing before boarding their ship. Their first port was Ketchikan, then the historic island of Sitka, Juneau, and the last port was Victoria, BC where they took a tour to Buchart Gardens, the Empress Hotel and a night view of Parliament. This was Jimmie’s second Alaskan cruise and it was as awesome as the first. They enjoyed the icebergs, glaciers, saw black and brown bears, whales, eagles, totem poles and took a train ride to a salmon bake and watched the spawning salmon. Back in Seattle they spent two more days touring that included a second trip to Pike’s Market, space needle, floating bridge and houses and observing locks and dams. It only rained a short time on one day during the 12 day trip.

James Davis from Lufkin was impressed that Andrea was able to get his 20-year-old Spin Cast feeder working again. He told her when he returned from being in the service he enjoyed being a referee for 24 years and remembered Coach Joe Wyatt when he was Diboll’s Athletic Director.

It’s time to plant bluebonnet seeds in early October. They are annual plants meaning they go from seeds to flowers to seed in one year. They germinate in the fall, grow throughout the winter and usually bloom (if someone doesn’t mow them down for weeds) the end of March to mid-May. We do have bluebonnet seeds for sale here at Pouland’s.

Congratulations to Melvin and Kay Linton, Sr. on the 53rd wedding anniversary, October 5th. John and Gloria Ogden will celebrate their 54th anniversary on October 7th with a short trip to a classic car show in Alabama.

If you read your Diboll Free Press today, Thursday October 8th, before 5PM, you’ll have time to attend the ribbon cutting of a new business in Diboll, Tropical Toucan Shaved Ice. The colorful trailer will be set up at the site of the old Diboll Free Press building at the intersection of Hwy 59, Thompson and Hendrick streets. The owners are Steve and Dortha Jackson of Diboll and the cute trailer is packed with dozens of flavors and new items coming almost every day. Steve plans to move the Tropical Toucan to the Angelina County airport this Saturday for the air show.
Come see us…’round the table.