Maria von Trapp

One of my all time favorite movies is The Sound of Music.  The movie ends with the audience watching the von Trapp family climbing over the mountains into Switzerland.  I always wanted to know what happened to the family after that famous ending scene and here is what I found out.


First of all, I have to mention some of the real life facts which did not appear in the movie version of their life.  The real von Trapp children are named differently.  They are Rupert, Agathe, Maria, Werner, Hedwig, Johanna, and Martina.  Maria and Georg von Trapp also had three children of their own named Rosmarie, Eleoanor, and Johannes.  The von Trapp family lost most of their money during the Depression and were forced to lay off their servants and take on boarders.  Eventually, they started singing publicly and toured Europe as the Trapp Family Singers.

The von Trapp family did indeed leave Austria because they did not approve of Germany annexing their homeland.  But they did not climb over the mountains, carrying their luggage with them.  They boarded a train and went to Italy.  They continued touring with their musical act and eventually moved to America.  They purchased a farm in Vermont and ran a singing camp.  Georg died of lung cancer in 1947.  The family decided to build a ski lodge on their Vermont property and it still exists there today.  Maria von Trapp ran the lodge for many years with the help of her son Johannes.  She died in 1987.

Lion Country Safari

Sorry that I did not get a chance to blog last weekend.  I was roughin' it at a campground site in the rain.  It was not an ideal time to get out my laptop computer.  Despite the soaking wet bedding and consequent lack of sleep, I had a really great time camping.  We went to Lion Country Safari which is located in South Florida.  It is a unique zoo that allows you to drive your car through a 4 mile stretch of the zoo. The kids loved driving next to the giraffes, ostriches, camels, chimps, and of course, lions.  Right next to this zoo, there is a campground for people who are brave enough to spend the night a short distance away from the lions.  Is was a surreal experience to be lying in my tent (trying to squeeze in a second or two of sleep) and hear all the lions roaring nearby.  The highlight of the trip was on our last drive through the zoo.  An enormous ostrich walked right next to our car and pecked on the driver's side window.  It was a trip that my family will never forget.

Happy Easter

The Easter Bunny has arrived at the Silverglate house.  All the kids are hyper with the influx of candy.  This year, the Easter Bunny apparently decided to cut back on the amount of candy in the baskets.  It did not go unnoticed by my youngest.  He is holding a little grudge now.  But even though I have one Easter "Scrooge" in the house, I thought it might be interesting to talk about the origins of some of Easter's secular traditions.


Eggs have always been plentiful during the holiday.  Catholics were not allowed to eat eggs during the 40 days of Lent, so they naturally celebrated Easter with as many eggs as possible.  The Greek Orthodox would often dye their eggs red in order to symbolize the blood of Jesus.

The Easter Bunny has been around a long time.  Due to the rabbit's ability to get pregnant a second time even while being pregnant with a first litter, it has come to represent fertility.  The rabbit has always been present in Spring Festivals.  But the official Easter Bunny that can now be thanked for the fact that my kids' faces are smeared with chocolate, is first seen in Germany in the 1500s.  There, a magical hare named Oschter Haws, would leave good children a nest of colored eggs.  By the 1700s, the Easter Bunny had moved to America.  Pennsylvania Dutch children would make nests out of their capes and bonnets hoping that if they were well behaved enough, the Easter Bunny would fill them.