The Work of Her Hands

While on vacation, I had a few days to stop in Franklin with my kids and sister to visit my grandma. Her town and her house seem to be identical to the memories I have of many childhood visits. I wanted to see some of the items that Julia, my great grandmother, had spent her spare moments and evenings working on. Grandma pulled out pillowcases, baby bonnets, table linens, and quilts, embroidery, crochet, and needlepoint, and I wondered how many countless hours had been spent on such detail. According to Grandma, Julia was never empty-handed, but always had a project she was working on.

My favorite item was a lively patchwork quilt, made of the leftover scraps of worn out dresses and aprons. While Julia would probably have preferred to display the immaculate white quilt, flourished with large red roses and perfect, tiny hand stitches I loved the chaos of the patchwork colors, balanced and restrained by the perfectly symmetrical pieces. It felt full of life. I wish I knew the source of each piece of fabric.


We also found a patchwork quilt, pieced by Bertha, my grandpa's mother.