My Elly Loves to Sew

The minute Elly and Liberty walk in the door at Granny & Papa's house, the first thing out of their mouth is "Granny, can we do a craft?" their mom and dad always chastise the girls, "Say hello first, girls..." but I really take it as a compliment, since I"m the one who does crafty things with them all the time. Usually, they come on Friday after school and stay till Sunday after dinner, and that isn't long enough for them, they want to stay "Just one more hour...Please Granny?" So, we have done a lot of crafts! and, of course, Elizabeth and Jakey want to come, too, and play with their cousins. Jonathan is a toddler, and still gets anxious leaving his Mama, so he only stays for a couple hours, till nap time. Does any of this sound familiar? I remember loving to stay at my Nanny's house, too. I tell my kids not to take it personally, I don't have to do laundry, I don't work on the weekends, Leashie (my daughter, still at home) and I will "tag team" them with sewing, beading, painting, Barbies, etc.

Elly is the oldest of this crowd, being 6, (almost 7) and she is usually the one who wants to be the leader. When their "other Papa" (my x-husband, though we are friendly and I love his wife, she has been good to my kids through the years) got sick, my kids decided to throw a fundraiser to help with the $10,000 monthly treatment costs. So, all the little ones came for a weekend and each picked out a fabric, and we made a quick quilt, each one sewed a strip of two fabrics, then I made four-patches while Leashie played Barbies with the ones who weren't sewing. It was great! By the time Sunday came around, we had most of the quilt top done and each one of them were so proud!

By the end of the week, I added the sashing, backing, quilting and binding, and it was wonderful!

James (my son) came to pick it up at work on Friday, and while i was showing it off to him, the whole place was astonished at how well it looked for the babies picking the fabric, piecing, etc. I made the remark "I just hope it brings in at least $40 at the auction." Well, my boss went out to the showroom, grabbed $250 tool off the shelf, handed it to Jame and told him to give the quilt to his dad and auction off the tool. I was so proud of my boss at that moment!

So, now when Papa gets out of his bed, God bless him, he always has that quilt with him. I'm so proud of that.

It was at that time that Elly wanted her own sewing machine, in fact, she wanted mine to take home, tee hee. So that's what she got, her own machine for Christmas.

And she'll always remember her 6th Christmas, when Granny got her a sewing machine.

Have fun with your babies/grandbabies

Lyn