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Mother's Quilts

Sometime last night while half-asleep I thought I heard the furnace kick on We hadn't needed it yet this year Since the weather has been so warm My restless mind began dwelling on Old times still remembered so well I thought of our Mother making quilts And the stories that each one held but A big, poor family in Appalachia Doing without was nothing new Daddy worked hard in the coal mines Mother pinched and scraped and made do Most Kentucky winters were vicious We had a time just trying to keep warm The cold wind whistled through our old house We'd shiver and wait out each storm but Huddling around the old cook stove Or the fireplace crackling from the coals Dreading to climb into the frosty, cold beds Snuggling to warm our weary souls Mother had a real knack for sewing Making curtains, slipcovers and clothes So many times she'd be working On the quilts from the scraps she chose but Every now and again, she would make a quilt Out of stuff from the Company Store Mostly, though, she used the pieces From old clothes we couldn't wear anymore I remember one quilt in particular The funniest thing that I'd ever seen It had scraps of dresses we girls had worn And parts of the boys' old jeans but The whole front of a vest of Daddy's Was on there, with buttons included And pockets and zippers from the britches We kind of thought our Mother was deluded Mother had a bit of a whimsical side And she made us all laugh on occasion But when she finished that big old quilt Getting under it called for persuasion but The quilt found a home on the boys' bed And they bragged how it kept out the cold We came to appreciate that funny old quilt 'Cause Mother's love was in every fold In winter, clothes dried inside the house Hung on ropes strung from room to room But the quilts freeze dried on the lines outside With Daddy's vest brightening winter's gloom but Kathleen McCoy EldridgeŠ October 21, 2006 All Rights Reserved
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As Long As I Live
Midi Picking by Harry Todd
Sequenced by Harry Todd
Used with Permission