I think they'd be happy

So the other day I was bending down to pick up a rug and my back cracked. I just doubled over on the floor, legs paralyzed in that excruciating pain that comes from the back.  Luckily I was in the bathroom, where I could crawl (using my arms....thank you pilates) to the basket on the shelves where we keep the medicine.  Some of you may recall that this happened to me once before so I knew that I had some kind tube of miracle cream that would ease the pain.  Sure enough, I found an entire basket full of tubes of miracle creams - all with medicinal (aka: not helpful) names and none with descriptions of what they are for.  Not knowing which one relieves back pain, I chose the tube that looked most familiar to me and hoped that I wasn't rubbing athlete's foot cream on my back.  Then spent the rest of what should have been a very productive and enjoyable Sunday shuffling from chair to chair with my book, trying to be comfortable.

And thinking a lot about my grandmas. You know, feeling old leads to thoughts of grandmas.

I had these two really amazing grandmas.   Both of them had a knack for taking nothing and making  something - usually, something beautiful.  I love that.  Maybe all grandmas are that way, maybe not.  Mine were.  Let me give some examples.

Grandma Moersch took her daughters' childhood dresses and made quilts.  For my 9th birthday she made me some down pillows using the mattress ticking and feathers from her parents' old mattress.  She used to also take a cow and make a lot of milk.

Grandma Serpe used to collect the empty flour sacks from her son-in-law's bakery to make sheets. My dad tells me they were the most uncomfortable things ever, but I still think it's totally cool. She also used to take half her back yard and make enough food to, when need be, feed a family of 7 for a year.

Skip forward to today...still shuffling, but mobile enough to make it to the orto to harvest these

Tomatoes for sugo batch 4.

And then, looking for things I can do standing up, I started cutting these squares for my next patchwork blanket.

Thanks for showing me the way, Grandmas.