Delectable Mountains, Blameless Commerce and More Things

This weekend, I decided, was the one where I would start painting the bedroom. So, between spattering myself with Rose Linen and Honey Bird and Celery Sprig and Popcorn, I've been planning new curtains and hand-piecing quilt sqares for a sampler quilt. The first block is a Delectable Mountains variation:

These sample blocks are being constructed from Moda Fabrics' Sentimental Journey collection for the most part, with a piece here and there from other fabrics.

Jojo enjoys observing from his perch in the Parlor. My innards were tickled by this little scene. Before I got the camera, he and the little ceramic poodle were staring at each other.

Okay, now for a little Blameless Commerce. I am in Dyer need of thinning out my stash, and I would love to have a little pin money. I'll just mention a couple of things each day, to save both of us from overwhelming sorrow, surprise, regret or pain.

First on the chopping block is all the original Rowan yarns for Donegal, plus what I have knit so far of this sweater, which you can frog or continue at your pleasure. First to email me (fortuknit at hotmail.com) takes it for $150.00. Secondly, I have a box of the cute little skeins, 140 or so colors of Jamieson Shetland Spindrift--every color except the naturals in Spindrift, in approximately 20-yard skeins. The lucky buyer can have this for $180. Wouldn't it make a great Christmas present for the fair isle freak?

Commercial over, and now I continue with my 100 Things, a little less orderly that the first seven, but there's a lot to remember!

8. The night of the flood, I and my brothers were in the basement at the John Warner Fine Arts Center at our dance lessons. We were practicing for our upcoming recital. We sang a cute little song that started out "We Are the Wee Rockettes (shuffle, tap, step)" and wore white satin costumes with red sequins.

9. When our trailer was washed away, it floated down the creek and struck a bridge, smashing it to smithereens. Whenever we drove anywhere outside our very small town for the next two years, Mama would cringe with embarrassment when she saw large-sized underwear strewn on bushes and trees.

10. When our furniture and appliances arrived at our new real house, they were all green. Green dining room table, green chairs. Green recliners, green sofa. Green refrigerator and stove. But my room was white with gold trim-- a dresser, a chest of drawers, a set of bunk beds and... a crib. This was my first clue that I might not have my own room.

11. My favorite color was pink, and it is still a favorite. My curtains and bedspreads were pink with 8-inch pink ruffles in 3 tiers at the bottom-- medium pink, darker pink, and darkest pink. I loved them except when they were washed and I had to starch and iron them.

12. When I was eight years old, Mama taught me how to sew. I started by learning to blindstitch hems and sew on buttons, then progressed to using the sewing maching. I made Grandma B a sunbonnet so that she could work in her garden and have shade for her eyes.

13. We spent a lot of time traveling back and forth to Tennessee. It was an eight-hour drive and we would go there for every major holiday, grandparent birthdays, and Decoration Day. In the summertime, I and my brothers would spend a week or two with each set of grandparents, and perhaps another week or so with aunts and uncles. When I was very young, Grandmama and Grandaddy had not yet installed indoor plumbing, and we had to go to the outhouse. At night we had porcelain chamber pots under the bed. I learned from Grandmama that there were some words that you could only whisper, like tee-tee and bottom and later on, brassiere.

14. Grandmama and Grandaddy "kept" cows and pigs and chickens and hunting dogs. I helped Grandmama churn butter and pump water. We washed all the dishes in one little basin of water. Even after they got running water, this never changed. She would get up early in the morning and make biscuits in a bowl that was never washed. She just added more flour and milk and other ingredients, rolled the biscuits out, and put the bowl back under the sink with the sifter in it.

15. Grandmama had a chicken coop and would gather eggs every day and I would help her. Sometimes she took a chicken and wrung its neck, then chopped off its head and hung it on a line outside the back door to let it drain out. She loved cats and Grandaddy didn't, but there was a feral cat she named Smokey, a beautiful gray tabby, that hung around and I spent hours coaxing it to come to me. Grandaddy always had spotted hunting dogs, and inevitably had one named Spot. Grandma B always had German Shepherds, and they were always named Rex.

16. If we were at Grandaddy's and Grandmama's during the right season, we would be put to work shelling peas and snapping beans; shucking corn, cracking walnuts or helping to can jelly or soup or pickles or pickled peaches or pear preserves. No matter where I was in the summertime I always got a horrible case of poison ivy.

17. My third grade teacher was Mrs. Williams, and she had to be my all-time favorite. She brought in a sombrero once and we learned the Mexican Hat Dance. I always chose to sit close to the front of the classroom because I loved her, but she thought I sat there because I couldn't see well, so she called Mama and told her I needed an eye exam. Soon I was sporting a pair of pinkish glasses with the turned-up corners. Ugh.

18. When we first moved to Illinois, I had an extreme southern accent and used the vocabulary of my Grandmama (3rd grade education) and Granddaddy (6th grade education). Of course I was laughed at, so I learned to be very quiet and not ask questions. Perhaps for this reason my teachers thought I wasn't very smart, although my report cards were just fine. They recommended I go to summer school, and so I did. I rode my bike all across town and was miffed at the librarian because she wouldn't let me check out 6th-grade level books to read. (It was the summer after third grade)

19. Mama bought me a wildly flowered dress, very 60's, that was short-sleeved. She told me I could start wearing it when she went into the hospital to have the baby. Carmeda Lynne was born on April 7, 1969 and Grandma B was staying with us. I wore my new dress that day, even though it was freezing cold. Lynne was born a month or so early. We started calling her Car-Car, so Mama made us change it to Lynne.

20. One day I was shocked when I was talking to Mama and somehow in the course of conversation she said to me "well, you have two mamas, you know." What?! Two mothers? When did this happen? She explained to me about Mama Marie, and sometimes I wish she hadn't. I had forgotten all about her. Divorce was still a stigma in the sixties, but I didn't know that. I started bragging to my friends that I had two mamas. They were unimpressed.

Posted by Sheila at December 13, 2004 06:49 AM Posted to | TrackBack