Carrico Sisters

Pictures of my mom, Catherine Lyons Carrico Hill McIlvoy (that’s a name and a half!), and two of her sisters.  My mom is on the left in each picture.  In the first one, my mom is with her older sister, Margaret Ann Carrico Tingle.  The second picture is my mom with her baby sister, Mary Alice Carrico (she never married).

Notice the difference in the two photos – with Ann, mom is standing straight and serious.  With Mary Alice they both look mischievous and giggly!

Of course, none of them were married when these pictures were taken –  which I believe would have been about 1947 or 48.  My mom looks to be about sixteen, Mary Alice about fourteen (notice her socks!) and Ann about 19 or 20.  Ann was the more serious of the three, stayed in the house, rarely went outside.  Mom and Mary Alice were wild tomboys when they were young.  They raced their mules, climbed to the top of sycamore trees and swung on grape vines.  What one didn’t think of, the other one did.

I can hear both of my aunts saying, “Oh, Catherine!”  Aunt Ann in her worrisome, I can’t believe you just said that, tone of voice.  And Mary Alice in her ‘that was not the way it happened at all’ tone!

One time they heard their dad complaining that birds were getting into the shed and eating his feed.  Mom and Mary Alice had a solution to that problem.  They waited until there were several birds in the shed, closed the window and took a string to the birds’ necks.  Needless to say their dad was quite upset when he found out about it.  They didn’t take things into their hands again – until their next adventure.

Unfortunately my mom is the only one of the three left.  Aunt Ann died four years ago.  Aunt Mary Alice died in October.  We visited her about a a week before.  Stories were going back and forth – neither one quite agreeing with the other.  It was a great day to see the two of them together once more and being like the little girls they once were.