Can't Cut the Apron Strings

This is my mom's old apron for housing clothespins. I've had it for many years, way before she passed away. She reached retirement age and my dad kicked in and did the cooking and chores she'd done her entire life, while raising 7 kids. Eventually she stopped hanging laundry on a clothesline and just ran them through the dryer. I don't recall how I got a hold of this apron...if she mentioned she was going to get rid of it or if I asked her if she no longer wanted it. I am just so happy and blessed to have received it.

Now, it's not the colors or the design that causes me to love this old hunk of fabric. I don't even know where she got it. She did sew clothes for us 4 girls for several years, so perhaps she threw this together too. But I love it because it conjures up memories. The memory of the squared, compact clothesline on a vertical pole in the back yard on which you could hang clothes and then spin it so you didn't have to walk along the line like I do now in my own back yard. You had to start from the inside of that squared setup, though, or you'd be surrounded by wet laundry before you knew it! It was kind of like a square spider web.

With the precious little one-on-one time seven kids could have with their parents, I loved helping my mom hang and then gather the laundry after it dried. It was just me and her and heck, we probably didn't even talk that much, but it was just me and mom, away from the house and everyone else....she was mine, all mine and I never seemed to have enough of that.

None of my 3 sisters have a clothesline like I do now. Mine is a great model that is all rolled up into a small reel and attached to my fence. I pull it straight across the length of my yard, wrap it around a hook and then stretch the rest of it to another hook on a side fence. One entire load fits on it. My friend Bonnie was my first buddy as a mom and she used a line as well. I commented once I liked how clothes don't shrink on a line and they seem to smell better. She taught me how it lengthens the life of clothes as well...she had t-shirts from half a life ago in high school and they looked nearly new.

I posted about this today because I had to repair the pockets on this apron. I've done it once before, years ago, but it was a quick sew and eventually they've loosened. There is now a baby blue scar across the pocket's side because I just won't give up on this apron! (Sorry for you readers that are really good seamstresses to have to look at this!)

I can't let this apron go. It's got my mom all wrapped up in it, so to speak, as well as cherished memories...I swear, I'm taking this to my grave like a little blanket. I can't believe it means so much, but it does, oh how it does.

What do you have in your life....some crummy looking little piece of something that makes most everyone else say "WHY do you KEEP that thing???" I'd love to hear your tale.