There are several handcrafted-yet-functional items in our house that bring me joy.
When I was four, my dad built us an awesome dollhouse as a Christmas present. I played with it a lot and it's my first memory of contemplating recursion. What if there was a dollhouse in a dollhouse in a dollhouse in a dollhouse...? The house was passed on to D in the fall and is now inhabited by Mickey and Minnie and their assorted friends, including a T-Rex. Rather than putting in the electric blinds D asked us for, Jack added colored lights to it, which was pretty fun during the long dark winter days.
Next, using a word from my great grandmother Hazel's era, is the gaily colored braided rug she made. The rug was in our rec room for my whole childhood and I have a few vague memories of my great grandma herself and her house, full of rugs and collectible spoons. Born on New Year's Eve in 1898 in Kingston, WA she lived to be 96. She is pictured below driving an old car and riding on a motorcycle, outside her house in the Rainier Valley neighborhood of Seattle. She was my dad's mom's mom. UPDATE: My mom tells me I'm all wrong about this rug and it was actually her mom, my grandma Agnes, who made it! She is pictured at the end of this post.
Many times a day we change diapers on the rock solid changing table Jack's grandpa, Kirk, made when Jack, his first grandchild, was born. I think Dd must be about the 5th baby to use it. We contributed the yellow wood stain, when we had time for that kind of thing, pre-D.
Lastly, there is the pair of over-sized pillows in our living room. I remember having pillow races, using one to elevate my leg for months after my teenage knee surgery, sleeping with them during the constant heartburn of pregnancy and learning to nurse D while leaning on one. The ticking and the corduroy covers were made by my grandma, Agnes, I think in the 1970s. The feathers inside are from geese raised by Agnes's grandma, Mary, who also lived in Illinois, as far as I know.
So that means D and Dd are lounging on the feathers of their mom's mom's mom's mom's mom's geese (Cari, Janet, Agnes, Clara, Mary, GOOSE).
We can never know what random little pieces of our lives will linger and spark memories.
When I was four, my dad built us an awesome dollhouse as a Christmas present. I played with it a lot and it's my first memory of contemplating recursion. What if there was a dollhouse in a dollhouse in a dollhouse in a dollhouse...? The house was passed on to D in the fall and is now inhabited by Mickey and Minnie and their assorted friends, including a T-Rex. Rather than putting in the electric blinds D asked us for, Jack added colored lights to it, which was pretty fun during the long dark winter days.
Many times a day we change diapers on the rock solid changing table Jack's grandpa, Kirk, made when Jack, his first grandchild, was born. I think Dd must be about the 5th baby to use it. We contributed the yellow wood stain, when we had time for that kind of thing, pre-D.
Lastly, there is the pair of over-sized pillows in our living room. I remember having pillow races, using one to elevate my leg for months after my teenage knee surgery, sleeping with them during the constant heartburn of pregnancy and learning to nurse D while leaning on one. The ticking and the corduroy covers were made by my grandma, Agnes, I think in the 1970s. The feathers inside are from geese raised by Agnes's grandma, Mary, who also lived in Illinois, as far as I know.
So that means D and Dd are lounging on the feathers of their mom's mom's mom's mom's mom's geese (Cari, Janet, Agnes, Clara, Mary, GOOSE).
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