Country Girls Do and Make Do

When you are a country girl, at a very early age you learn how to do.

You learn the proper way to weed the garden: pick the offender out of the ground as close to the ground as possible, not from the leaves or the top of the stem. If you don’t get the root out, it will just grow back and you will have to engage in the backbreaking task all over again.

You learn to sew, quilt, crochet, or knit—depending on which your mother or grandmother were skilled in. My Grandma Jenkins quilted. My mother sewed. Several aunts and great aunts crocheted. A second cousin knitted. Necessary tasks in earlier days, but not so any more.

Mom taught me to sew.  My mom and I made most of my clothes for years--until the cost of store bought clothes became less than the cost of patterns, fabrics and notions. The instantaneous reward of going to the store and buying a ready-made dress beat out the hours required to pick out fabric, lay out and cut the pieces, and sew them together. Regardless, the skill has never left me and I don’t have to pay the dry cleaners to alter clothes, hem pants, sew on buttons, or fix busted zippers. It still astounds me how many women do not have those basic skills. Witness the number of times, I have sewn on buttons or fixed hems in the ladies room at work for co-workers.

I never did learn to quilt or crochet like my grandmother and aunts, but I did learn to knit. No, it wasn’t Gail who taught me, although she taught many others. I do remember watching Gail when I was young and recall that that she learned to knit with her eyes closed to be certain she still could if she went blind. Some of those that she taught and those that they taught  have begun a Prayer Shawl Ministry at church in her memory.  Prayer shawls lay in a basket in the sanctuary near the altar. They are free to anyone who needs one or knows someone who needs comfort, prayer, a blessing, or just a warm hug. They have been sent all over the US and even overseas

In my mid-twenties, I learned to knit essentially from a book and a kit, under the guiding eye of Trudy Reed. She watched over me and kept me on the right track. Her real name was Gertrude, but early in her life her aunt christened her Trudy. She often said how grateful she was that her aunt didn’t like the name “Gertie.”  I did knit sporadically after that, but had to give it up for good after Dylan was born. I was struck with pregnancy onset carpal tunnel syndrome. I struggled with it for years until surgery in the fall of 2003. Once I healed, the first thing I did was pick up my knitting needles again. I’ve never looked back.

Country girls also learn to make do. If you don’t have the time or the money to go out and buy what you need, then you get creative and you make do. You learn how to make a simple corsage or boutonniere and to arrange flowers from your garden instead of paying an expensive florist. You learn to cook and adapt recipes to recreate that amazing dish you had at a fancy restaurant.  When your child needs a Halloween costume, you get a hot glue gun and get crazy with it!  

Recently I bought a new comforter set for the spare bedroom. The lamp in the room was looking dingy, outdated, and out of place.

Before

Since I use the spare bedroom for my yarn stash and knitting supplies, I decided to match the shade to both the comforter set and the yarn theme. So, I rummaged through my stash and found several yarns that echoed colors in the bed set. I wrapped the yarn around the shade very closely so that it covered completely, randomly changing yarns.

Close Up of Yarn Wrapping

When that was done, I took a yarn cord that I made last year for a Halloween costume*, and used it as piping at the top and bottom of the shade. Finally, I found a few buttons for whimsy and glued them on. Ta-Dah! A matching lamp shade!

After

*If you don’t know how to make a twisted yarn cord, it’s really easy. It is also a very useful skill to have if you ever get selected for Survivor. Gee, that sounds like a subject for another posting!