No Plans for a Baker's Dozen...

“You can't use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have.”

― Maya Angelou

Written in November 2016 by  Cathern Harrison 

    

It is that time of the year when Christmas takes over. The containers come out from the storage area and first we get  outside  decorated then it starts in the house.  Being a crafty person over the years I’ve made several Christmas ornaments as well as other odds and ends for the holidays.

However the ones I cherish and hope the owners do too took me 41 years to complete. Why? Well for one reason the first one was put away and not taken out to complete 18 years later.  It was given to our eldest son when he turned 25 :D

It was a needlepoint Christmas stocking a kit I’d found and ordered from either a Woman’s Day or Family Circle magazine. Decided to finish it because he was not living at home and  our youngest son who was still at home wouldn’t be slighted not having one I had created for him too. We also missed our eldest so it was a very emotional gift for me to create and give him.

 

That was in March and our youngest son’s was ready for Christmas that year. But what a task it was I used the same pattern as his brother’s however the graph was not working so I had to fiddle with it. The same happened with the next one, the girl’s version of what I had created for the boys.  Made up a kit and give it to our daughter-in-law as a birthday gift so she could make the stocking herself. That didn’t happen so I took it back and did it which turned out to be wise decision when the same problem cropped up as the pattern didn’t fit the graph or was that the needlework fabric? Got the stocking done though so knew several years later when we had a second daughter-in-law and she too was given the girl’s version of her husband’s stocking what to watch out for.

Before that happened grandchildren started to come along and I switched to cross stitching and youthful patterns.  At first teddy bears was a theme. It fit into what was happening in my life at the time, My sister and I had starting collecting teddies after our mother had passed away. I’d put a teddy bear in the coffin with her when I found out she was claustrophobic. How had I not knew that about my mother before she died?  Thus the cuddly little bears filled all parts of my life especially when I needed them three and some years after my mother passed away and on the very edge of a break down, (a story for another day).

 Meantime not sure what came next another grandchild or my stocking. Our second grandchild was a boy, a brother to the first so his stocking was created from the same pattern.  Whenever it was I started my stocking it too sat for a long time to be finished because it was not an easy pattern to create and then when I did get the cross stitching done felt guilty that I’d have one and my hubby, our Santa, wouldn’t - mine was put aside until I got his stitched then the final part, outlining the design, was done on mine and our stockings were both sewn and ready to hang last year.

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Before ours were done I have made four more cross-stitch stockings, from three different patterns. Our eldest granddaughter, sister to the two boys has a different design to her brothers. Their cousins a boy and two girls in that order, have two different designs; one for our youngest grandson and a different one for his sisters.

 

 Oh yes before I finished our stockings completely thanks to a friend showing me how she had finished her first grandchild’s stocking, I decided I wanted to do that to our  grandchildren’s stockings . 

 In October when we went to visit brought home the three eldest grandchildren’s stockings picked them apart cleaned the aide cloth (and design), The first one made 18 earlier had a stain on it that eventually came out, thought for a while I’d be stitching something over it as a disguise:D then they were sewn back together, now with the design surrounded with trim and lust material which gives the design a framed look, it makes the design stand out. And off they went back to Nova Scotia with their Christmas gifts for our gang down there.  Next on the agenda were the stockings for the three grandchildren back here.

   

   

Their parents now have bigger stockings to fill and  so do we for each other :D    Mind you our stockings are never big enough we use our old stocking too and there is still stuff spilling out :D It is great fun though to do and I actually enjoy opening my stocking stuffers more than the gifts under the tree.

                                       

Being creative is often a learning process and learning on the job so to speak, if you are teaching yourself. Such was the case with needlepoint and cross-stitching. It has happened often when I have seen something I want to create such as with the first stocking I made – saw it in a magazine and had to have it.

My mother was very creative but as far as I am aware she never did needlework or cross-stitch, or what I would call ‘fancy’ work. . She sewed out of necessity, crocheted, knitted for family, bazaars and gifts. She also, as I tend to, tried her hand at many things. To me she created items to be used or enjoyed daily not to hang on walls or stored away for months. At least, that is the lasting creativity impression I hold of Mom.

Have a feeling the challenge I had with the second through fourth needlepoint stockings was due to the wrong thread count of the canvas I was stitching the pattern onto – I soon learnt to pay attention to the count of Aide cloth for cross-stitching when a high number of stitches per inch was difficult to do. How was petty point ever accomplished or however many angels painted on the head of a pin?

 Obviously I still had not learned to note the stitch count when I fell in love with my stocking pattern which was put aside not only because other stockings were needed for grandchildren but because it was not an easy design to render. However now I know not only to check the stitch count but also to be aware of  ¼ and ½ stitches in the design yes they add something to the finished product but for me are frustrating to do so stay away from them if possible. 

Bless one of my dear sisters, as after I finished all the stockings last year went on and on about how I was never going to do another cross-stitch item 0 she gave me a printed on material kit to create. It is beautiful and I did start it but the challenge was too much right then so it was put aside and eventually will come out again to be finished… My niece, my sister’s daughter knew how I felt about cross-stitching at the time and tried to convince her mother that the kit was not a good idea, guess time will tell who will be right as I do enjoy a good challenge at the right time :D

Yes I used the same pattern for the first two cross-stitch stockings but the first had been a kit, thread included, the thread became a challenge when what was in the kit didn’t match any of the thread numbers I could find for the second stocking. A very kind woman in the shop where I got my threads helped me sort that problem out. It also taught me to be very organized when stitching and storing thread. My girlfriend that has created stockings for her three grandchildren using my patterns always tells me how organized I am, trust me I do it to stay sane :D  Being organized helped when I did my Santa’s stocking and the kit didn’t have enough thread (others that had tried to create the same stocking had the same problem I found out on-line), having threads stored by number order and colours allowed me to quickly find the same colour or something close enough so I didn’t have to go out and buy more.

Another thing I learned came with the 5^th grandchild’s stocking she was born in the fall and her stocking was well on the way when she was born then finished for Christmas. However I had stitched the given name as the one I had been told she was to be only to learn afterward it wasn’t – she has a completely different, shall we say ‘foreign’, version of my name, which is not my name and what I had stitched on her stocking. It didn’t bother anyone but me but it bothered me enough that eventually I stitched a stripe of aide with the proper name and sewed it over my name, because that is not her name and I didn’t want her to wonder why it was on her stocking.

Something by chance I learned came about because if you have not noticed sure you will now, there is no photo of one of the four needlepoint stockings – one of the couples split up a few years ago.  What did this teach me?  When we have family photos taken make sure to have some with just us, our sons and grandchildren just in case there is another split (they broke up shortly after we had family photos taken). Just hope the women in our son’s lives now understand why I do that and that they never have to experience as it was not pleasant to say the least.

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 Added Nov. 29 2016

Apple head Santa and Mrs Claus (crafted by Cathern:o)

Yesterday after I posted this went to help at a food bank. One of the items I marked the best before date on was a can of smoked oysters - it instantly brought to mind my father-in-law. Why? Because when my in-laws were with us or we with them Christmas morning to open gifts I would also fill the stockings I had made for them, (before we had any children),  so they wouldn't feel left out.  Cannot remember what else I put in their stockings but canned smoked oysters in my father-in-law's. After his wife passed away I continued to fill a stocking for him. 

1979 Our first Christmas in this house - my in-laws has stockings much like ours

Adult Curiosity

Curiosity is the wick in the candle of learning.

William Arthur Ward

Written in 2007 revised in 2016

            Cathern Harrison

     

Only a few pages into a book I was stunned by a word, the name of something… that prompted me to look it up.

 Finding the meaning of a word or a recipe new to me, such as Roly Poly Pudding, Burnt Leather Cake, or a grog shop is not new for me, I’m curious and have many what I call, adult questions to find answers for  - an easy task now with a 24/7 library available to me, a computer and the internet.

 However, this new WORD was perplexing, not only because I have never heard it but more so because it was a racial slur, I felt.

And to be used in a book written about the experiences of an elementary teacher was puzzling … Especially as her writing seems ‘clean” and plain. Thus this word jumped out and hit me square in my curiosity spot.  I had to re-read it to make sure I had seen it correctly.

The book was  “Children of My Heart”. It is the English translation of a book by Gabrielle Roy, “Ces Enfants de ma Vie”, written in 1977.   It was translated into English by Alan Brown in 1979…

And from http://www.cbc.ca/books/2014/10/children-of-my-heart.html

“Children of My Heart was a contender in Canada Reads 2007, when it was championed by Denise Bombardier. It also won the Governor General's Literary Award for fiction in 1957”

 That is likely why I was reading it and because I had seen the series on television or is it the other way around?  It doesn’t matter, this is about the journey my curiosity took me on and continues as I revise this.

Gabrielle Roy has written several French books that have been translated into English. Some of her other books are, The Tin Flute, Enchanted Summer, and Windflower.  The dust cover of "Children of my Heart”, said this is the latest of her books

“Children of My Heart” is filled with Gabrielle’s memories of the mid 30’s when she taught young children out on the Canadian Prairies.

 After I found out what the word was it sent me looking for other racial depicted items that have disappeared since I grew up such as Little Black Sambo and Golliwogs.

http://people.ischool.illinois.edu/~heinric3/514LBS/LittleBlackSamboText.html

http://www.golliwogg.co.uk/    

 

The photo of the Golliwags was taken in England in 2014 when we were on a coach tour.  I was surprised to see the shop window full of the once popular dolls as they had gone out of favor years ago because a Golliwog was considered to not be “politically correct” . However, they were making a come back .

And how about the counting rhyming I grew up with  -  following is the common modern version

Eeny, meeny, miny, moe,

Catch a tiger by the toe.

If he hollers, let him go,

Eeny, meeny, miny, moe.

Which is not how I learned it back in the late 1940’s – it was not a tiger we caught by the toe.  Did you know that the counting part is only a small portion of a Rudyard Kippling song?

“It was also used by Rudyard Kipling in his "A Counting-Out Song", from Land and Sea Tales for Scouts and Guides, published in 1935. This may have helped popularize this version in the United Kingdom where it seems to have replaced all earlier versions until the late twentieth century.”

And are you a bird feeder? Do you feed Nyjer seed to finches? Until a few years ago, it was spelt differently and some folks pronounced it that way as well.

Now that I had more information I  realized where Gabrielle was coming from when she used the word in question. It is still around, down south if not elsewhere but people that use it to this day, are considered racist.

Most of us know the slang word Gabrielle used as Brazil Nuts…

However, in the 1930’s that was the way it was.  A creating writing instructor once told me using  ‘mentally challenged’ to describe a boy was not authentic for the time frame my story was in- I knew that but could not write what it would have been back then so scraped the story which had only begun - it stays on in my mind though.  

March  2007 

 This morning I had my dog, Teddy, out for a walk, the first in a very long time. We enjoyed the spring like weather stroll around our neighborhood.  He marked his territory while I looked at houses for changes or ideas to try. One house that has a pathway running alongside it to the next street has a nice 6 foot wooden fence between the house and the path’s ugly Frost fence.  The wood fence stood out like a sore thumb because there was a dark stain, paint I assume across several of the boards.  It is very evident that something was thrown at the fence. The reason I mention this is because the other day I was thinking about how Graffiti Junkies seem to stay away from private property.   So why was this place hit? Is it because a black family lives there?  I walked on disgusted with how some human beings treat others and  the world around me didn’t seem so bright and fresh all of a sudden

Maybe racism isn’t as dead as we would like to think…

Nov 2016

I was right in that, as the incidents of racism go on and on not only against black people but many other races, religions and anything that one feels they are superior to and many of the offenders call themselves Christians really?

No, racism has not settled down and now after the months of nonsense heard during the presidential campaign the fuel that feeds it, drives it on like a forest fire out of control. AND the now president -elect that fanned the flames throughout the campaign during an interview after he won, (Lord help us), looked at the camera and said, “Stop it!”  And expects all the crap he stirred up to settle down.

What a mean-spirited world we live in at times.

The Bold Bull Fighter

 There's no fear when you are having fun

Will Thomas

*This story has an addition to it due to finding a thread back to where this took place after it was posted Just yesterday. See bottom

There's no fear when you're having fun. Will Thomas
Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/keywords/no_fear.html

There's no fear when you're having fun. Will Thomas
Read more at: https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/keywords/no_fear.html

 Cathern Harrison       Written 2011 revised 2016  

Names have been changed to protect the innocent ;o)

The three eldest children were playing out in the backyard, while the baby slept snug in her crib upstairs. Henry was at work in the barn across the road and Amelia was enjoying a cup of tea with a friend in the living room. They talked about their children, the latest gossip and their husband's jobs. Both men were farm hands on different farms in the area. Amelia was telling her friend Marg about a young cantankerous bull Mr. Beard the farm owner, had bought to 'service' his dairy herd.

The only person that was not afraid of that young bull was Henry, who had told Amelia some nasty stories about the beast. He hoped his family would stay clear of the young feisty creature that was often pastured in front of their home. The women got up to peek out the window to see if the bull was out to pasture that afternoon. "Oh, No!" Amelia shouted, "I've got to go and find help!" and rushed out, with her friend trailing after her.

Amelia needed help because although the bull was lying down chewing his cud, sitting on his tummy playing with her dolly,  doll paraphernalia spread out around her on her comfortable warm seat, was the youngest of Amelia's three children thought to be in the backyard.

So much for Henry's scary stories ;o)

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TRUTH: (or getting rid of the embellishment ;o) And More about life in  Dewittville.

 Photos are a mixture of back then and 2003 .

That girlie, girl was me, Cathern.

I was about three or four years old at the time but have no memory of it. Only what I have been told and despite the concern for my safety someone grabbed a camera to take a couple of shots of the scary situation – the black and white pictures have long since been lost.

The incident took place in the late 40's in Dewittville near Ormstown Quebec, on the dairy farm where Dad worked at the time. The baby was a toddler, and our older siblings were likely at school. There was no back yard that I recall… The bull was not as cantankerous as I made him sound but its true everyone but my father was afraid of him… Cattle back then had horns so could be very dangerous if provoked.

Dad had something about him that animals were attracted to and that bull became putty in his hands. When Dad went into the barn he'd bellow for Dad to come to him… like a love sick animal.

The pasture at the front of our house had an electric fence, how I got by it is another puzzle? It was on that farm in the barn where I was perplexed about how the cows found their way to the right stalls when they were brought in from the pasture. Dad explained to me in a very simply way. "You know where you live don't you?"

The windows looking out on the front yard and pasture.     Pasture behind the young girls and the outbuildings, barn to the right. My sister (the toddler) and making mud pies.

In the fall of 2003  (just before I turned 60),  my husband and I went for me,  on a sentimental trip back to Dewittville.  Noticed that water pump my sister and I are sitting in front of was still there WOW!  (seen in one of the photos above as well)

The shed behind my brother and a friend is the place I remember bushels of tomatoes  that were to be  

canned by my parents (for other people) It was a way of making some money to help with the expenses of raising a family of six when money was tight following World War II My mother hated it though.
To the right of that same photo a distance away there was some sort of shed/barn where my father raised rabbits on the top floor. To a young child they seemed to be everywhere :D. The purpose was for food for our table.  Dad soon learned he had better kill, skin and cut up the rabbit before bringing to my mother or she would have nothing to do with it. It looked too human for her. We often had rabbit though the years but now it seems to have gone out of favor, likely due to animal rights, housing developments and lack of being allowed to keep rabbits as livestock.


There was and still is a stone wall/fence across the road and  the photo of two on my sisters and  my eldest sister's friend at in front of

The out building behind my sister and I  was still there too but the barn is gone. It had to be burned down and the cattle destroyed when bovine tuberculosis was found to be present in the herd.

My father found a new job for the safety of his family as far away from milking cows as he hated doing that. 

 And our family began a new life  that we are still attached to today or the town, schools and all that goes with it. That town is Ste Anne de Bellevue, Quebec and since the late ‘40’s has been in my life so have many stories to share about that 65 years :D

  

Dewittville on Facebook

https://www.facebook.com/Dewittville-Quebec-207207479296114/

Canadian Food Inspection Agency:  Bovine Tuberculosis - Fact Sheet

http://www.inspection.gc.ca/animals/terrestrial-animals/diseases/reportable/tuberculosis/fact-sheet/eng/1330208938232/1330209051950

Ste Anne de Bellevue, Quebec

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue,_Quebec

* After I posted this story went back to the Dewittville Facebook page and asked if some of the photos posted were possibly the dairy farm main house. Was going to ask a friend who lived out that way if the owners of the home, Gleness, were her friends - before I could get to her she posted a like so I pretty well know that I had the right place. This morning there was a message from the once owner, (sold in the fall), that yes the house we lived in is across from Gleness.  And that is how I found a thread that goes back at least 68 years :D
Was also told that the father of the man, Marcil Soumier, who lives in the red brick  house now  worked for the dairy farm owner Mr Rowett, ( pretty sure he also worked with my father that many years ago).  Hoping now I can find out more about the first house and area I remember.  And with that is mind think I have a Merging Roots (another of my blogs about just that ), story to write :D