Treasures From The Basement: Part 1

In April, my dad's basement flooded due to a monsoon-like storm (if you can have monsoons in the midwest; otherwise, I guess it was just a ridiculous amount of rain accompanied by lots of thunder and lightning, although the thunder and lightning part is irrelevant, except that's probably why it rained so much, so...relevant). 

This happened while we were worried about the lake house flooding from the same storm system and my husband and I had gone there to sandbag the house. The Corps of Engineers and Mother Nature somehow kept the water from rising as high as it did a year and a half ago (when the lake house DID flood), but unknown to us was the water making its way through the basement of the other house. 

My dad was in a rehab facility post-knee replacement surgery at the time, and we didn't discover that the basement had had water in it for another two weeks, so you can only imagine how much fun THAT was. All the cardboard boxes of stuff that were stored on the basement floor, some junk, some treasure, none of which were enhanced by the addition of rain water, were pretty much ruined. Mold growing. Smelly. Ugh.

Cleaning it out has been a chore. Or has it? Here are a few of the jewels I found down there:

Bona fide stereo with record still on it.

My 3rd grade math workbook ca. 1968

My brother's 6th grade ruler. I know this because
of the room number; he and I had the same teacher
and same classroom for 6th grade, which was
located in the basement - hence, the "B"

In 5th grade, we made maracas out of an old lightbulb
we brought from home. Instead of a normal household bulb,
my dad brought home a used bulb from Municipal Auditorium
in downtown Kansas City for me to use for the project. After applying
papier mache to the bulb and allowing it to thoroughly dry,
we cracked the bulb against our desk. The shattered glass inside
then made the shake shake shake sound of the maraca.
My guess is that craft wouldn't fly in schools today....

From 6th grade. See? Same classroom my brother had.

My Brownie bracelet. I lasted all of about four months
in Brownies.

My 6th grade notebook. The stick-on
hands and feet were furry.

I used to keep these on my dresser when I was
in elementary school. I discovered the little
dog is actually a salt shaker. Or pepper shaker.
How did I not know that? Where's the other shaker?
Is that why someone gave it to me? I'll
never know the answer!

One of my favorite finds: my brother must have
ordered this from Tiger Beat magazine.
Pretty groovy, huh?

You might be able to see why the cleaning out of the basement is taking me awhile.

There WILL be a sequel....