We have had some sad days this last week,
as we have lost one dear to us – Larry’s stepfather. He passed away Wednesday, January 25th. He was 89, and had had cancer for about a
year and a half.
Lawrence and Norma were married on
Valentine’s Day in 1991, a few years after they each lost their mates to cancer. My father married them; it was the
third-to-the-last marriage he performed before he passed away. They were married almost 26 years.
Because Daddy was unwell, I sometimes
wound up as a go-between and messenger boy between him and various
parishioners.
It was around the last day of January,
1991, when, during a visit with my father, we talked about this budding romance
between my mother-in-law and Lawrence, one of my father’s oldest friends. I told him they wanted to get married.
Daddy, never one to dawdle when something
obviously needed to be done, asked, “When would be a good time for them?”
I looked at the calendar, and allowed as
how Valentine’s Day was always a good
wedding day.
He laughed. “Sounds good to me!”
So off I went to call Norma back.
“I talked to Daddy,” I told her. “Can you be ready by Valentine’s Day?”
Me oh my, just like in Shushan the Palace,
after that ‘there was no small stir!’
She said, all in a panic, “What do I need
to do?”
“First,” I told her, “you’ll want to put
your shoes on.”
“No, I mean, what will I SAY???!!!!” she exclaimed.
(Her daughter-in-law could be soooo
exasperating.)
She meant,
of course, how would she present this news to Lawrence. He’d asked
her to marry him, and she’d agreed, but he probably hadn’t expected the preacher to set the date, and certainly
not so fast.
“What you say,” I told her helpfully, “is
either ‘I do’ or ‘I will’, depending on the version of wedding vows Daddy reads
from his Little Black Book.”
“But... !!!” ((pause))
Then... “I don’t have anything to wear!!!!!!”
I responded, all cheery, “So you get to go
shopping!”
((another pause)) Then, in a rush, she said, “I need to get
busy!!!”
And that was the beginning of that.
Daddy died in September of 1992. I was making myself a silver/burgundy satin
jacquard suit for Christmas when Larry called to tell me that my father had
passed away from a heart attack as they were returning from a nearby city with
a vehicle my father had purchased. Thankfully,
he had asked Larry to drive home. That
was unusual; he generally preferred to do his own driving.
I finished the suit, but every time I wore
it, I’d look at the pleats in the lower section of the skirt and know exactly
which one I’d been on when the phone had rung.
I still have that suit. It still looks nice — and I could wear it
again, if I’d lose ten pounds.
The day after Christmas, we had a severe
wind storm that took down my brother Loren’s Internet dish. Monday, Larry put up a new dish, but he couldn’t
get the computer to connect. Last night
after church we stopped by, and I tried to get it working, but something in
either the router or the cable between router and dish wasn’t working. This evening after work, Larry attached a new
cable, and managed to connect to the Internet, but only sporadically. I wrote and asked for help from the local
Internet Service Provider – and received a message with DNS and IP and Gateway
and Subnet numbers, along with a short message that was entirely over my head,
with word combinations I’d never heard of before. And I remembered how, when I worked there a
few years ago, it was just that sort of thing that often made customers spittin’
mad. It was as if some of the people
working there tried hard to be
totally incomprehensible.
I’ve sent another message requesting more
information, and adding, “Step-by-step instructions in layman’s terms would
help immensely.” We shall see what
happens.
I’ve worked with computers for quite a few
years now. I’ve read tech support forums
and webpages, and can usually find solutions to computer problems. I like researching things; I like to
read. But it’s always pleasant when the
instructions and advice are in nice, plain English.
When I was in elementary school, I systematically made my way around the
children’s section in our public library, with a goal of reading each and every
book. One day, there I was then,
DONE. Really, truly, ALL DONE. There were no more books to read that I hadn’t
already read! Granted, it was not a huge
library; our town’s population was only about 15,000 back then. Still, there were a lot of books.
I wandered my way into the Young Adults
section... started poking around... and found some things that made the hair on
my innocent, naïve little head stand straight up. (My mother’s hair would’ve turned into a wig
and flown clean off her head, had she known what my eyes fell upon.)
I fled for the card catalogue, read
descriptions with great care, wrote down book numbers on a little scrap of
paper, then went and hunted down those books very cautiously. Whew.
Tuesday, I started going through things in
the upstairs bedrooms. Good thing I
looked in a bag of ‘trash’; it contained one of my leather braided belts, and
several nice hats and scarves. I think
garbage and good stuff were inadvertently mixed together. I washed the bedding, and gave sheets, pillowcases,
and comforter to Joanna, since Victoria didn’t want them.
I filled a box with Caleb’s things: little gold miniature clocks – a train and a
backhoe; a wooden airplane Loren and Janice made for him; a big red Hummer and
a Model A, both of them collectors’ items from my sister and brother-in-law, Lura
Kay and John. Caleb will want these things. But he was in such a froth before he got
married, trying to finish his house, I really don’t think he hit anything but
the top step, middle step, and bottom step as he went upstairs and down, the
last two months before his wedding. So I guess it’s no small wonder if he
left a wooden airplane behind, eh?
In the bottom of the box, I tucked one of
his monkeys – this one, pure white, and swinging on a rope and wooden bar. Caleb had a collection of monkeys, because any
time we went somewhere and left him home, he’d say, “Bring me home a
monkey!” Sooo... we’d swing into some Goodwill
here or there, head for the stuffed-animal bin, and rummage up a monkey. They had to be cute, smell good, and look
like new.
People give away lots of cute,
good-smelling, like-new, stuffed monkeys, you know that?
By the time I headed for bed, I’d only
cleared out about four bags of Stuff and Things. I’d better pick up some speed, if I want this
done before I’m too old to climb the stairs!
My friend Penny suggested that, rather
than toting things up and down the steps, I simply sling stuff out the windows.
“Haha!” I wrote back to her, “That’s
better advice than you think. After all, Laurel and Hardy did it!”
Well... sorta. I guess they didn’t
exactly toss that piano out. They were actually trying to move it out, and it fell, not exactly on purpose.
Wednesday morning, a friend
sent a link to some pretty violin music on youtube. I love violins...
violas... cellos... bass violins...
I used to play violin, did I ever tell you
that?
((pause))
I sounded like Jack Benny when he was
trying his worst.
Early that afternoon, Larry
helped some people from the local drugstore take out the hospital bed and other
items from his mother’s house.
A couple of inches of snow had fallen, and
the wind was blowing at about 30 mph, so it was a bit hard to see, though the
sun tried valiantly to shine.
Norma and Lawrence’s daughter Barbara went
to the funeral home to make arrangements. Too bad funeral-home personnel couldn’t come
to them, in weather like that.
Lawrence knew my family before I was ever
born, and now and then he told stories involving them that I hadn’t heard
before. I’d dash for my computer when our visits were over, and type it
all up. We all loved to hear him tell stories!
Speaking of telling stories... I used to
know a lady who, if anyone ever launched into any story, never mind the subject
matter, she would chime in with her own tale – and no matter what had
happened in the first story, this
lady’s saga was always badder and worser, and she invariably ended with a
melodramatic sigh and the dreary remark (complete with mournful headshake), “It’s
always something.”
Another lady just as invariably responded,
“Isn’t it, though,” and I’d have to escape before I got all cracked up,
seemingly at the poor thing’s misfortunes. I did often feel
sympathetic, but the more eloquent she waxed, the more her believability waned.
I put some bags into the Jeep and headed
to town to pick up the grandchildren. Each
day, I’ve been hauling stuff to the Goodwill, and I’ve found things the
children can use, too, such as winter hats and gloves and scarves. I
wonder how soon Amy will get tired of the kids coming home laden with all this
‘Good Stuff’?
Emma was pleased to get a couple of
Victoria’s nice winter hats – and the matching barrette to one I gave her at
Christmas time – a handmade set of silver, tiger’s eye, and mother of pearl we
got at Four Corners (where Colorado, Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico meet).
In one of my fabric bins, I came upon a
soft piece of faux fur I found in a clearance bin at a fabric store a few years
ago. If I split it lengthwise and sew
the ends together, it will be exactly the right size for a scarf. The
back side is sort of a canvasy-feeling stuff, so it will have to be lined. I have some doeskin satin that matches.
It wouldn’t be as warm as it would if it were lined with fleece or flannel, but
satin is probably the best choice, since the fur is thick, and it wouldn’t drape
nicely if the backing was thick, too.
Years ago, I found a beautiful piece of
fur at a secondhand store somewhere. It was sooo soft and nice, I didn’t
even look at the coat it made up. It was only $7.00, so I snatched
it up and dashed happily home with it, planning to cut it up and make a cute
jointed bear with a pattern I had. I even had a piece of leather for the
foot pads.
I laid the coat on my cutting table,
spread it out, picked up my shears -----
And spotted the tag: ‘Burberry
London’.
I put down the shears. Fast.
I picked that coat up and gave it a good look.
It was gorgeous. It looked
like new. It had a fitted bodice and a
full, flared skirt, a big shawl collar, and it was lined with 100% raw silk.
I looked at the size: it was my size (peewee, aka ‘runt’,
as my brother says).
I put it on... looked in the cheval
mirror... and felt ‘utterly too-too’, as Nellie Olson of the Little House on the Prairie fame used to
say.
Sooo... I never made a teddy bear, but I
wore a Burberry London fur coat for several years!
I once found a soft wool Rothschild
trenchcoat and adorable little hat in a size 2T, when Victoria was almost size
2T, and growing. The price tag was still attached: $74.98.
I don’t much like shopping, but I must
admit, finds like that made those particular days fun.
I offered Victoria a few
of her things, including a nearly-new robe and the aforementioned bedding.
“I got a new robe (newlyweds have no idea
they might need duplicates of anything) and our full bed needs queen sheets now,”
she replied. “We need a bigger bed, so I’m
not really sure what to do. Our new
mattress was quite expensive. Maybe you
could sell the mattress on Craigslist?”
“An axe murderer would show up!” I
exclaimed. “You could take this one, and glue it to your new one.”
“Haha! No, thanks! 😜” she
answered.
And it was such a good idea! Tsk.
Thursday, Larry got home from work at precisely
2:04 p.m., and headed for the bathtub.
School was getting out at 2:30 p.m., and we were supposed to pick up the
grandchildren. It takes exactly 7
minutes to get to the church or school.
Do you suppose there was any possibility of him being ready to leave and
backing out of the driveway in 19 minutes flat??
Answer:
No.
22 minutes, yes. 19 minutes, no.
We were three minutes late, picking up the
children. But they were happy enough to
see both Grandpa and Grandma that
they didn’t seem to mind the wait.
We went to the post office to mail a
package to Dorcas. When they were
visiting last September, she spotted a plaque on my wall that used to be my
mother’s, and Dorcas always thought it was funny:
Although
you’ll find our house a mess,
Come
in, sit down, converse;
It
doesn’t always look like this;
Some days it’s even worse!
Since she stayed with my mother the last
couple of years before Mama died, helping her clean and cook and suchlike, she’s
particularly sentimental about Mama’s things.
We dropped off a bag at the Goodwill and headed
back to the church for family visitation, which would start at 3:00 p.m. Since we finished our new church, we have
visitation there instead of at the funeral home, as the funeral home isn’t big
enough to accommodate all the visitors. By
the time we got back to the church, Amy had returned from a doctor’s
appointment and was waiting in the parking lot, so kiddos jumped out of our
vehicle and scampered over to hers, and Larry and I went on inside.
We didn’t get
home again until 9:30 that evening. Loren
took us to Subway for supper at about 6:30 p.m.
We went back to the church afterwards, and took Norma home later.
It was a long and emotional day. Norma has had a difficult time of it, this
last year, and especially the last week.
Larry and Kenny helped her, the last few days. When they sent Lawrence home from the
hospital, they gave Norma the phone number of a hospice nurse who would be
‘available 24/7’, so they said.
Well, last Sunday morning at about 4:00
a.m., Norma called her, as Lawrence had tried getting out of his hospital bed,
and he wasn’t strong enough to get back in, and Norma needed help with him. The phone awoke the nurse from a dead sleep –
and she did not want to get up. “Could one of your sons help you?” asked the
nurse.
So Norma called Kenny, and he went to
help.
‘24/7 availability’ with that nurse evidently meant, ‘I might
answer my phone and suggest somebody else help you.’
Lawrence had 3 grandchildren, 6
great-grandchildren, 16 step-grandchildren, and 29 step-great-grandchildren. They are sad to lose their grandpa and great-grandpa. The little ones loved snuggling up with him
in his recliner. But they understand
that he is with Jesus now, and we who love the Lord too will see him again
someday. The Apostle Paul wrote, “We sorrow not as others, who have no
hope.”
Life is short – but we have an eternity to
look forward to.
Here’s something
Larry’s nephew’s wife told me: When Lawrence and Norma were married
almost 26 years ago, he asked her, “Is there anything you need me to buy for
you? Anything you want?”
“No, I don’t
need anything,” she told him. “I only ask that you be a grandfather to my
grandchildren and a father to my sons.”
“I can do that,”
he told her ----------- and that’s exactly what he’s done. In fact, I thanked him for that very thing,
just last week, and he squeezed my hand and smiled.
He’s been a
friend since my earliest memories. When I was quite young, Lawrence and
his wife Phyllis would invite me to dinner on Sunday afternoons, as their
little girl Barbara was two years younger than me, and liked me to come play
with her. After dinner, Lawrence would often take us for a ride through the
countryside. Those are happy memories.
He was a
gentleman, respectful, kind, and hardworking. He lived a long and good life, and we’re going to miss him. But we’re
glad he’s no longer suffering. The last year has been hard.
I found 76 photos of Lawrence, many with
grandchildren and great-grandchildren, some with Norma, his daughter, or Larry
and his brother. His granddaughter,
using some of those photos and others she had, put together many framed photos,
an album, and four large boards covered with pictures to display in the front
vestibule of the church. She had pictures from Lawrence’s childhood up to
present, and put them together so nicely.
The funeral was Friday at 2:00 p.m. As Norma was getting into a vehicle to go to
the cemetery, she fell and landed on her knees.
Made us feel so bad... she was probably
weaker than she knew from lack of sleep, and not eating much. She’s okay, but has a few sore spots.
After returning from the cemetery, we had
a luncheon in our Fellowship Hall.
The birds have been busy at the feeders –
downy woodpeckers, goldfinches, housefinches, blue jays, cardinals, nuthatches,
English sparrows, and dark-eyed juncos.
And lookie, lookie, here’s the rare Western Cowboy junco, all decked out
with his little fringy vest on! Reckon he has on chaps and little cowboy
boots with fancy tool work and wee spurs, under that knee-deep snow? And most likely a little shoulder harness
with a 2.7mm Kolibri, too, for good measure!
My sister Lura Kay wrote to say that she’d
never heard of, much less seen, such
a bird as the Cowboy junco.
“The rare Western Cowboy junco only visits
country hicks, so that must be why it never comes to your feeders,” I told her.
“Haha!” she replied. “You’d think a city hick would at least merit a fly-by!”
This Kalanchoe was given to me by my boss
on National Secretaries' Day when I worked at our local Internet Provider
Services in 2005. It was in bloom when
she gave it to me, but it didn't bloom again for seven years. Now it blooms about twice a year.
Kalanchoe is a succulent. There are
about 125 different varieties and species of the plant; they were mostly native
to the Old World – only one came from the Americas, and it was in the Deep
South. Some are from southern and
eastern Africa; some are from Madagascar. In warm climates, they are
perennial, and in the right habitat, they become shrubs. Around here, if
planted outside, they will only be annuals, maybe biennials a little farther
south. So most people grow them as houseplants.
In South Africa, there is a species of
this plant that can cause cardiac arrest to grazing animals in its native
range! But other species of the Kalanchoe have been used to treat
infections, inflammation, and even rheumatism and hypertension.
Scientists continue to work with the plant, as they have found some varieties
that can be used as a sedative, others that help with cardiac issues, some that
show strong anti-tumor promotion, a select group that produces certain types of
antibiotics, and one species that even works as an insecticide.
I just pulled a large plastic bin out of
the laundry room closet ----- and discovered the Texas Lone Star quilt I made
about 20 years ago! I made it with primary-color calicoes that I found in
my mother’s basement when my sister and I were cleaning it. There were
stacks and stacks of pinked-edge squares, and I managed to cut two diamonds
from each square.
You know, I could make a new back for that
thing, get some more batting, load the works onto my quilting frame, and bring
it back to life, couldn’t I?
Saturday, I uploaded photos to my blog; I
had a couple months’-worth of pictures to post.
Here are the beautiful flowers we brought
home from my stepfather-in-law’s funeral yesterday: Flowers
from the church
If after looking at all those pictures you
haven’t gotten your fill of my Snaphappy camera, you have only to look at the
right side margin for all the new photo posts back to the middle of November.
My brother stopped by with a late
(back-ordered) Christmas gift for us. It’s a doormat, featuring
bronze-colored cats on a black background. They each have red bows around
their necks, are seated with their backs to the viewer, and their curling tails
spell out the word ‘Welcome’. Quite cute.
Loren had no sooner departed than one of
the cats threw up on it. ((rolling eyes))
Larry got his W2 form Friday, so Saturday
evening I got busy on our taxes. “Why do they keep making the print at Turbo
Tax smaller??!” I asked my sister.
“The print gets smaller as the hour gets
later,” she informed me. “Didn’t you
ever notice?”
I finally finished the taxes at 11:30 p.m.
Now we merely have to sit back and wait for the refunds to come rolling in, and
then we can buy... oh, ... maybe... how ’bout this nice truck?
Or this charming
tractor?
If you get enough snazzy parts
and pieces, you might be able to make something like this old cyckle! (pronounced as speelt)
Once upon a
time, many years ago when we lived in town, a neighbor kid was being horrid to
a littler one who was only about 2 ½ or so. The bully kept tipping the
little boy over as he tried to ride his tricycle, and the little guy was crying. I was so afraid the little one was going to
hit his head on the concrete!
The little boy’s
mother would stay inside her house and lock the doors so he couldn’t get back
in, so she could watch her soap opera in ‘peace’ – and her child’s sobbing and
wailing didn’t bother her in the slightest, so long as she could still hear her
soaps.
Teddy, who was
about 13 or so, ran to rescue little Timmy and to order the bigger kid, who was
about 9 or 10, to never do such a thing again.
Teddy must’ve looked pretty scary, because the big kid was staring with
huge eyes and nodding and trying to be as agreeable as possible, and when Teddy
told him to tell Timmy he was sorry, he did so with all haste.
And Timmy loved
him forever. With one last sniffle as
Teddy set him down, he trotted over to his tricycle that one of the other
children had righted, patted the seat, and asked Teddy, “Do you wanta ride my
sicko?” (‘tricycle’)
Teddy called his
little sisters’ tricycles ‘sickos’ after that, much to their chagrin.
For supper Saturday
night, I fixed Black Angus burgers on toasted and buttered Ciabatta rolls.
I put Marble Jack cheese on it, with pickle relish, Sweet Baby Ray’s honey
barbecue sauce, onions, lettuce, tomato, and strips of red, orange, yellow, and
green sweet bell peppers.
Only one slight
problem: I had to step on it first, before I could get it in my mouth.
The trouble with cooking is that you go to
all sorts of time and effort to make something scrumptious... fix the table all
pretty and serve the ‘butter in a lordly dish’ (as Jael did Sisera, shortly
before she occasioned his demise with a tent nail through the temple)... and
then everybody hauls off and scarfs it down ((glom glom glom burp)) — and away
they go, leaving the table a mess (unless they’re your own offspring, and you
can collar them into clearing the kitchen).
With quilting, on the other hand, you take
all sorts of time and effort to make something lovely... present it (whether to
yourself or someone else)... and who knows? 150 years from now, it very
well might be hanging in a place of reverence in a museum somewhere! But
even lacking that, at least it’ll be around to be enjoyed for a while.
One good thing about these modern days,
though: if you do like to cook, and if you do like to make
the table and the dishes all pretty, you can now take lovely pictures of it
from all angles, and then post the shots to Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Snapfish,
Smilebox, Picasa, Photo-bucket, PhotoSnack, PhotoBox, Blurb, PixMatrix,
JuiceBox, Pinterest, BytePhoto, TinyPic, ImageShack, 500px, Photo.net, SmugMug,
Slickpic, RitzPix, Dropshots, PixVillage, KoffeePhoto — Now there’s a good’n. KoffeePhoto.
Every time you post a photo, they send you a piping hot mugga joe, right
to your front door via KoffeeDrone. [Don’t
they?]
So, anyway, the pictures will be
around for a while, if the food itself isn’t.
One should always look on the bright side.
Speaking of the
bright side, there was a beautiful sunrise Sunday morning. I took half a
gazillion pictures. (Only half, ’cuz
I was gettin’ ready for church.) See more
here: Sunrise
If I ever start
exploring maps... looking at Street View... pictures... I get lost, and don’t
find my way out of the maze and back again for who-knows-how-long.
My father used
to let me be the Major Map Holder when we went on trips, and if he wasn’t
in too big of a hurry, he’d let me choose the routes,
too. I always chose
the off-the-beaten-track roads – the little wiggly ones – as opposed to the
Interstates. If I didn’t direct him too far out of the
way, he’d take the roads I picked.
The longest trip
we ever took was when we went to Newfoundland.
We had driven our big Buick Electra, and we had my dog Sparkle with
us. At North Sydney, Nova Scotia, we
took a big ship, the John Hamilton IV, across the St. Lawrence Strait to
Channel-Port aux Basques, Newfoundland.
It took 6 ½ hours to cross the Strait.
I’d go down to the level where our car was parked fairly often to care
for my dog.
Once while down
there, a young ship worker asked me to go visit the boiler/engine room with
him.
I was 12. I
looked 18.
I thought, This
ain’t right, and ordered Sparkle, a big, pretty German Shepherd/Collie
mix, “Sit.”
She sat.
Shipworker the
Bearded backed up a step.
I smiled, said “No,
thank you,” and told my dog (who didn’t really need voice commands, but
it was impressive), “Heel.” And off we went.
Scruffbeard didn’t
bother me again.
Here she is,
Sparkle, Best Dog in the World. (She was
not attired thusly on the John Hamilton IV.)
I took these pictures when I was about 15, and entitled them ‘Party Dog’ and ‘Party’s Over’.
Flathead Valley in
Montana is about to get a foot of snow! WeatherBug just informed me of
this news.
I’ve been
through that area three or four times, but only once since we’ve been
married. That was in 1994, when Caleb was
a baby, and we traveled through on our way to various Canadian National Parks. One of these days, I hope we can see it
again.
Do you like cell phones? I hate cell phones. Cell phones are made for
interrupting each other. And for distorting voices. I sound even
more like a hamster on a cell phone than I do in real life. It’s
impossible not to
interrupt, on cell phones, because of that slight time lag. So, it all
comes down to... who can interrupt
the loudest!!! (Yeah, I was just talking on the phone. Or trying to.)
I’m washing clothes. And bedding.
I hauled a bunch of decorator (aka ‘toss’) pillows downstairs, since
they go with the quilt that is presently trying its bestest to get dry in the
dryer. I’m exchanging the
wool/corduroy/velvet quilt for the flannel Log Cabin quilt. And I’m cleaning out cupboards, sporadically. (That’s my NWW – ‘New Word for the Week’.) What that means is, every now and then as I
trot past a cupboard, I yank open the door, scan, and grab stuff I haven’t used
recently and don’t plan to use soon, and pitch it into the bag for the
Goodwill.
I found some leather cleaner/conditioner
in a cupboard in the laundry room, got all enthused, and cleaned both loveseat
and recliner. They’re practically glowing in the dark now.
Time to reread this letter, and hit the
hay.
My boss Lona at
Nebraska Public Power District once asked me why I stayed so cheerful, even
when she dumped so much editing on me (as opposed to the more prestigious
typing of this and that Very Important Document). I was 17... they hired
me (against company policy) when I was 16, thanks to my Business
Administrations teacher, Mr. Jackson (no relation, still a good friend – he
even came to Victoria’s wedding).
I replied, “Well,
... I guess it’s just because I like to find fault with people!”
She thought that
was so funny, she told the Big Guys up on third floor. The next day, I
innocently dashed up the steps (there were elevators; I took
the steps) ---- only to find a couple of the Head Honchos, including the manager
of the WKC (Whole Kit and Caboodle), waiting for me at the 2nd-floor
landing.
“So!” said
Whitey in his big booming voice, “I hear you like to find fault with people!”
I thought, That
Lona! So I grinned at him and said, “Only if they need it!”
He and his crony
laughed, told me to keep up the good work, and headed to the elevator banks,
never dreaming how shy I was, or how sweaty my palms had suddenly become from that
short exchange.
Okay, I’m ready to head for the
feathers... fresh-fluffed feathers, even! Clean sheets... the
not-quite-so-thick-non-Sherpa-backed fleece blanket... and the Log Cabin quilt.
The last time I washed this flannel quilt, I hung it outside all afternoon, and
when it was dry, I folded it up tight, hoping it would still smell like early
summer afternoon when I opened it back up again. Well, it does!
Mmmmmm...
,,,>^..^<,,, Sarah Lynn ,,,>^..^<,,,
