Joel came home from school a few weeks ago with a big family tree/biography/speech project. It's way too involved and complex for a third-grader, but we're trying our best to help him with it. We invited Great Grandpa and Grandma Moffat over for dinner so Grandpa could tell Joel some stories about the Moffat family history. They've done a bunch of research and have quite a bit of information about the Moffats. He told us about how his grandfather came to the U.S. from Scotland, then moved up to Canada, where he died in a mine explosion. His grandmother started a candy store but couldn't afford to take care of the three boys on her own and had to put them in an orphanage. One boy ran away to the Navy, and the other two ran away from the orphanage and found their mother, who was remarried by then to a "worthless" man, according to the orphanage personal records. She left her husband, took the boys, and ran away to Port Angeles, Washington, where they stayed and where Great-Grandpa's dad became a U.S. citizen.
Grandpa brought copies of photos and maps and a copy of the newspaper article about the mine explosion for Joel to use in his project. We all gathered in the family room to listen, even the littler two sat and colored as they listened. While I wasn't thrilled about this project when Joel brought it home and am still annoyed with the fact that it's really a parent project, I'm thankful for the wonderful opportunity it gave us to learn about Grandpa's family history and to hear his stories first-hand. A lot of it was new to Greg, as well. It will be a treasured memory for us.
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