It’s Mother’s Day weekend! The fifth chapter of my book Vintage Notions shares inspirational essays about mothers and children, so I thought I would do a throwback to a Mother’s Day blog post. The post is all about shared memories of mothers from my childhood, with comments added from a post several years ago. First though, I am sharing the newest episode of Vintage Made Modern with you: Hats and Scarves.
This photo says it all for my early days of sewing with my mom, Donna. “A deer in headlights?” I am not sure I was excited about my new machine as my mom would have hoped!
My mother shared her love of sewing by created many matching outfits for us, thought this gingham spring style would be fun to share.
In my early teen years, my mom invited several of my friends from Girl Scouts to join for me for a sewing class. We made a wrap shirt, my first garment sewing project. As a former Home Economics teacher I think my mom thought teaching her Girl Scouts would be a breeze, I remember otherwise. My daughter is now the age I was at that point and I admire my mom for the patience she had with me and my friends.
Here are some of the great Mom Memory posts you shared with us from the Mother’s Day Gift Basket Giveaway in 2014…
“My mom is still alive so we are still making memories. But one of my favorite things about my mom is she always encouraged my creativity. She let me sew and paint and make things whenever I wanted. I learned so much of my creativity from her and now my daughters enjoy the same creativity.”
“My mother has always had a sense of style. She could take an average looking flower arrangement, move a few flowers around and turn it into fabulous. I observed this quality about her for years and thought that I could never have the eye that she has. Where did this come from, how do you get it. It isn’t something that you can purchase so is it something you are born with? Something that you grow into?”
“The summer after my first grade year my mother decided to teach me to sew. She picked out the material and fabric. It was a swimsuit cover-up and she had picked out terrycloth. Who gives their 7 year old terrycloth to learn how to sew on a sewing machine? My mother! I remember looking at it, looking at her and asking, “Mommy what do I do if I have to rip out a seam?” Having grown up underneath the sewing machine watching this happen, I did know about it. She looked at me and said, “I don’t want you to rush through this. I want you to check and re-check before you put anything under the needle.” We had so much fun making that cover-up together. It was the start of my love of machine sewing. She had already started me on hand sewing at the age of 4 when she had handed me a floss threaded needle and a small embroidery hoop with a stamped cross stitch kitten head on it. I remember such pride when I finished it. Now 52 years later I can’t sit down without embroidery, knitting, or tatting in my hands.”
We had over 2000 entries for the Mother’s Day Gift Basket Giveaway! To read more of the amazing “mom” memories from those who participated, click here.
To watch more in our Vintage Made Modern Youtube series visit the playlist here, oryou can choose an episode below.
