Carpenter's Tool Chest.

A Studley Tool Chest* - a work of art!

My great grandfather was a carpenter.  I don't think he ever had a tool chest as grand as this one.  But he did have one.  I saw the remnants of it in my grandparents' main street home's upstairs.  By the time I went exploring up there, it was becoming like an abandoned building, except that the rest of the house was still quite alive.  But upstairs, there were just cast iron head and foot boards, frames, and open springs (as they did such things from the early 1900s or before), the odd small stand, wall pegs that clothes once hung on, and lots and lots of dusty hardwood floors.

In the top, open landing, right at the head of the stairs, there was a small rocking chair, and a closet of sorts - the only one there was in the whole upstairs - and in that closet were boxes of...books.  It was like finding a treasure chest to a little girl like me who had discovered the joy of reading.  I found out later that those books had belonged to my grandfather, who had been an avid reader all his life, although he didn't always have the time to read.  Those books he had bought and especially cherished had been saved in those boxes. He was a man of letters, although in his actual life he led a much more humble existence.

In the middle bedroom, there was an old chest.  There wasn't anything in it when I looked, except that I discovered a tray of sorts that could be removed so that you could access a good portion of the bottom of the chest.  I learned later that that was where my great grandfather's tool boxes, including the one with the carrying handle, were kept.  I'm not sure why there was a chest like this entirely for packing up tools, but now after all of these years, my theory is that this is what William Fitzgerald - father of my grandmother, father-in-law of my intellectual grandfather - had used to ship his livelihood in when he moved from P.E.I., Canada to St. Vincent, Minnesota, ahead of his bride Elizabeth Clow, in 1881.

I have used this little tool all my life, many times. It once was in my Grandma’s care,
then in my Dad’s shed. Now it is with me. Many times it was the only tool for the job.
The handle has a patina from the many hands that have held it down through the decades.

I only have three tools of my great grandfather's that once were in the toolbox and the chest - a drawing knife, a small hand awl, and a combination square/mitre/ruler/level.  All of them show signs of much use over many years, long ago.  The wood handles on each one are polished with the sheen of hand oil, of being gripped and used, over and over.  The drawing knife's blade has been hand-sharpened to a perfect edge many times over, so that it is partially worn down, yet quite usable.  The hand awl's gnarled tip is still sharp, and is the best tool I've ever used to start a hole in wood, drywall, or plaster. I remember seeing an old lovely hand plane amongst my Dad's tools, that was part of my great grandfather's originally, that Dad used when he needed one.  I have an awful feeling it was part of my parents' 1998 auction when they broke up housekeeping.  Oh, how I wish I could go back and buy several things that day! Ah, well, I am thankful for what I do have.
__________

* - O. Studley (1838-1925) was an organ and piano maker, carpenter, and mason who worked for the Smith Organ Co., and later for the Poole Piano Company of Quincy, Massachusetts. Born in 1838 in Lowell, Massachusetts, Studley is best known for creating the so-called Studley Tool Chest, a wall hanging tool chest which cunningly holds some 300 tools in a space that takes up about 40 inches by 20 inches of wall space when closed.

Sewing Machine Magic

I don't remember a time when someone in my home wasn't sewing either by hand or by machine. Needlework was integral to our daily lives - making new clothing or other useful household items, repairing them, or adorning them with embroidery.  Needlework extended towards crochet and knitting, as well as quilting.

Part of using a sewing machine was knowing your machine.  My mother taught me how to clean it, and (very importantly) how to oil the machine. Part of that meant knowing how to take the bobbin/shuttle assembly apart and back together again when thread became entangled in that mechanism.

The bobbin/shuttle assembly was always such a mysterious part of the machine, with several interlocking parts.  There is a special way you must thread it, so it will then be picked up by the top needle and brought through the feed, ready to begin sewing a new seam once again.  I had never seen a visual demonstration on how the assembly in action, actually worked...until now.

Fascinating.

Embroidery

I was taught embroidery by my Grandma. I went on to embroider many dresser scarves, pillow cases, and dish towels. In high school, I embroidered hats, purses, shirts, and jean jackets. As a young mother, I embroidered a crib quilt and dresses for my little girl, Eva.


It's been a long time, but I am once again inspired to do needlework. With my limited dexterity nowadays, I'll be tackling this small project, near and dear to my heart...

Mom was a Packrat

Mom would have had a good chance of
winning the contest mentioned in #4...

My parents built onto the house in the mid-70s, a new kitchen and a downstairs bedroom. Mom used the old kitchen for her sewing room; virtually all the cupboards were filled with fabric.

It came from various sources - recycled old clothes, remnants on-the-cheap, sales.  Mom used some for quilts, as well as tablecloths decorated with a particular (and very beautiful) style of cross-stitch.  A few pieces were made into dresses for her granddaughter.  Much of it was never used; the various solids, florals, checks, and calicos remained snuggling side-by-side, tucked away in the cupboards...in the quiet dark.

Butchering Day

On the chopping block...

I remember the last time my family butchered chickens.  I was three years old.

I had spent the summer wandering around our yard, curious about the woods, but afraid to explore them yet.

The smell:  hot water mixed with chicken blood and feathers in the old copper boiler...

Running around the adults as they dispatched bird after bird, I stayed away, keeping a distance so I could see, but not so close at to get in the way.  I was told "don't get close" - sharp knives, hot water, blood and guts.

My grandmother and mother took them after their heads were cut off and they were hung up to bleed out. Grandma and Mom did the butchering in the yard right outside the kitchen, between the house and woods, just east of the big tree swing.  They worked on a table of planks over some saw horses; the birds were gutted, sliced open and bare hand reaching in, organs pulled out.  Smokey the cat milled around not far away, hoping for some fresh giblets.  Next they were put in the hot water, to help with removing the feathers. Final step was rinsing them inside and out.  In the end, they had went from feathered friend, to Sunday dinner, all in an afternoon...

I didn't know it then, but it was a sort of initiation.  I now knew what fewer people know nowadays: Where my food comes from.  My family didn't do it to save the earth, or eat healthier, but because they needed to, to get by. Our family was able to help themselves by having a garden, some livestock, and skills to process them into healthy delicious food on our table. What a blessing!

Spring Cleaning

When I was growing up, it was common practice for my mother and grandmother to do what was called spring cleaning.  Windows were opened up, curtains and quilts were washed and hung out, rugs were aired and beaten, walls and floors scrubbed.  And kitchen cupboards were emptied, and thoroughly cleaned out and washed down.

As a young wife 35 years ago, even I used to do this domestic ritual.  I liked how it connected me to my mother and grandmother, and how it made me feel like a successful homemaker.  Everything felt so wonderful, so fresh, renewed!

Over the years, I became a very busy single working mother, and spring cleaning was forgotten and abandoned.  Not because I stopped believing in it, but because there was never enough time.  Deep cleaning gave way to spot cleaning on-the-fly.  It seemed to suffice.

In recent weeks, Bill and I have noticed increasing sightings of a small, dark, and thin beetle on our counter tops.  Along with this tiny beetle we have seen nearly as many small 'worms'.  We cleaned the area and thought no more about it.  Until it kept happening.  Over and over.

As often is the case, we were in denial.  It became obvious that this was not isolated but ongoing, that no amount of wishful thinking was going to make them vanish.

We did some research.  We learned they were a type of grain beetle, of which there are many kinds.  The solution sounded suspiciously like...spring cleaning.  I had lucked out over the years;  sadly, time and statistics (and maybe domestic karma) has caught up with me.

So this week, I shall be slowly but surely unloading the corner cabinets top and bottom, doing an inventory on my supplies, throwing out anything that is old, open, and/or infested, and thoroughly cleaning the cabinets.

Grandma and Mom knew what they were doing...

Putting Up and Putting By

In our basement, which was just rough cement walls and floor, was a root cellar left from the days when there wasn't a proper basement under the house when my grandparents built it in 1906. Later in the 1950s came the basement. My parents continued to use the dark cellar for potatoes and carrots, and other root vegetables. But my mother also had many shelves, and they were very full when I was very little. Over the years she did less and less when it was only me and Dad, and my sisters had grown and left. She took her first full-time out-of-the-home job in 1974 to help attain some financial goals her and Dad had before he retired in 1987. She still canned even then, but only as little as possible. She began experimenting with freezing some vegetables. I will never forget the many meals we had during many long, dark winters with food she and Dad grew and then put up. That was the beginning of my 'pickiness' about food; if it wasn't as good as Mom's, it wasn't good enough...

Lessons from Grandma: Making Do

[Image Source:  Handy Farm Tools & How to Make Them]

My Grandma taught those around her the best way anyone can teach another - by how she lived her life. That's not to say she didn't express opinions. I'm just saying she usually was too busy to sit around talking about ideas, and was more about getting things done!

I used to love hanging out with her when I was a little girl, especially in the summers. Most of the time it was her and me and nobody else, which is how I liked it. Grandma would sometimes put me to work gathering acorns from the yard in the fall of the year. I'm still not sure to this day if that was necessary, or just a clever trick on her part to keep me out of her hair. Either way, I was diligent in my job and had filled a large vinegar jar full of acorns by the time I was done. As I cleaned her yard, I'd get close to her little garden out back, and her shed, which I thought were very intriguing, full of old garden and carpenter hand tools, some of them from the last century, belonging to her father.

One summer, Grandma decided she needed a wheelbarrow. Always having lived a thrifty lifestyle by necessity, by then she was living as a widow on a very limited, fixed income. Her solution? Plunder the plunder pile¹, scavenge a wheel, and slap together a homemade wheelbarrow! I was so excited by her project, she even let me help, and I ended up with my own smaller version. I used that thing for a lot of projects around her house and later up at the old homestead where I grew up (and she and Grandpa had built as their original home, as newlyweds...)

¹ - Plunder Pile: A pile of items saved for possible use or re-use at a later time, usually consisting of lumber, fence posts, old windows and doors and other such items. Usually stored outdoors in a pile against or behind a building, sometimes in the form of a tee-pee. Very handy resource to have when making lots of inexpensive, homemade projects.

The Language of Sewing

Hems. Tension. Darts. Inset sleeves. Pleats. Notions¹. A-line. Remnant. Basting (and not as in a Turkey!) Bias. Blind-stitching. Spool.  Tracing. Interfacing. Ripper (of which I have become very familiar with through the years!) Gather. Lining. Seams. Patterns. Pinking Shears.

All these words and terms are old friends of mine.  I have neglected them in the last few years because other things in life became a higher priority, not to mention lack of time.  I realize now that much of it was my own tendency to become easily distracted and enamored by all things new or different.

It's not that I didn't realize the value of knowing how to take up a hem, mend a tear, sew on a button, or even sew an entire garment.  No, it was more about eating up life as fast as I could because with every passing year I felt the hand of the Grim Reaper tapping me a little harder on the shoulder, and I wasn't going down before seeing and doing all I could.

Now that I have come full circle, and am on the homestretch towards that "undiscovered country", I reflect on the skills of my youth.  I cannot fathom producing dresses, blouses, skirts, etc. as I once did, but I do love knowing that I could, if I had to.

Sewing is like a riding a bicycle, and getting back on the wheel, bobbin, foot, and feed would be easy as pie.  Oh dear, I am really mixing my metaphors!

 ¹ - Speaking of notions (i.e., buttons, trim, zippers, etc.), my grandmother and mother were very practical, economical women.  When a garment became irreparable, you didn't simply throw it away.  First, you stripped it of anything useful - old buttons, zippers, hooks and eyes, appliques, even collars, lace or ribbon.  Anything that could be recycled was carefully removed and stored for possible future use.