Getting Stitched on the Farm

Purple and Orange

I picked this bunch of lilacs the other day. I set them down on my grandmother's old "pantry" that I painted a great shade of flaming orange. I walked by a few minutes later and just said "wow!" What a great combination - LILAC AND ORANGE! It makes me happy and cheerful on Day #3 of rain, rain, rain. But for sure, the rain will make my garden grow and for that I am thankful.

I ended up with Gram's pantry because I was the only grandchild with an honest to goodness farmhouse. I know it is from 1920 because that is the year my grandmother married my grandfather. I bake some (not nearly as much as my gram) but mostly I use the pantry to store pans, muffin tins, notecards, rubber stamps, the checkbook - whatever doesn't fit somewhere else. It has an honest to goodness flour holder with a built in sifter in it which is super helpful and fun to crank. Every time I twist that crank, I think of my German grandmother Frieda baking Christmas cookies, stollen, and apple cake. I learned a lot from her and feel so fortunate to have had her be a big part of my life. It makes me sad to think that Julia, like most children her age, lives so far from her extended family. Julia has only my mom Nancy left now and we don't get to see her as often as we should. There's a lot to be said for the old-fashioned way of having multiple generations sharing the same house taking care of each other - a way of life that, in America, has practically vanished.