Grandmother Jeppson
Monday July 20th 2015, 10:34 pm
Filed under: Family,Life

I almost sewed today. It was going to have two layers.

I had ordered two identical silk dresses for a grand total of $22 with the idea of cutting the one up to use for parts for the other: the style was eh but the colors were pretty and it had a lot of possibilities.

I knew going in that dye lot could be an issue, but when I held fistfuls of each together against incandescent, fluorescent, and sunlight they always looked good to go. I know, that’s like winning the lottery but it seemed I had.

I could also do this, and this… I cut the one across at the armholes so I could actually see the possibilities in action before ironing and pinning.

And all those times I had checked couldn’t show me what wearing both together did: the dye lots didn’t match after all. So very close, but. Not it.

And that started off a whole new set of tangents: okay, so, the cut one can now become a skirt that will be longer than what it had been because the armholes are now down at the waist. This is good. The other can be shortened to be a tunic over a navy skirt.

And it wasn’t till I typed all this and was about to hit post that it finally hit me just why I’d bought those dresses. Flower prints are generally not the first thing I reach for, but it hadn’t been just the colors and the price after all.

When I was eighteen my paternal grandmother had cancer. Cross-country traveling costs for a large family being what they were then, I had been lucky to see her two years before, not knowing it would be the last. She had always been an avid needleworker, even after rheumatoid arthritis hit, and with my babysitting money I had bought a little kit. I embroidered wool flowers above a little basket motif, set it in the prefab wood frame it came with, and my dad sent it off to his mother with a get-well (I wished!) card from me.

It was pansies. I had always loved purple pansies, and so I was sending her some from my heart the best I could.

Purple. Pansies.

Suddenly I see.


2 Comments so far
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So sweet.

Comment by Jody 07.21.15 @ 1:32 am

Love those colors! And now you’ll have 2 outfits, instead of just one dress. Ta da!

Comment by DebbieR 07.21.15 @ 5:43 am



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