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It’s so interesting that you post this now, Connie, because I’ve spent the last couple of weeks gradually cleaning a couple years’ worth of tarnish off my grandmother’s collection of little sterling silver spoons that she collected from her travels all over the world. (There are scores of them.) In our old house (which was hers before she died), they were on display in the dining room, where they’d been since before my birth, and where they enchanted me as a little girl. I used to make her take them down and tell me about all the places she visited or lived--they’re from all OVER the place. But since we moved into this house, I haven’t found a good place to display them, so they’ve been in a kitchen cupboard.

As I’ve been cleaning them, though, I’ve been remembering so many things about her, and have been marveling again that a woman from a dirt-poor family in Kentucky ended up traveling to and living in places as diverse as Austria and Fiji and Peru, and it’s made me feel so much closer to her. I’m determined to get them hung up somewhere in this house before Christmas. I love them.

Ah the tea service, I dodged that bullet, that went to my cousins, however, I will inherit a Joan Crawford-style mink coat (I’m not a fur wearer..) and a baby grand piano (it’s on the west coast, I’m on the east..). A friend got the WHOLE house of a relative, which I thought was wonderful, until I took a tour and saw the nightmere of decades of wiring/plumbing/fix it yourself stuff that had happened to it..yikes, for Bob Villa types, only!
Some of the best stuff I’ve recieved are pictures that have WHO they are written on them. And letters. I have my some of my grandparents letters, which have such a formal, old fashion way about them. I love those.
I think it’s the little, everyday stuff I love that I have..a brooch, a pair of gloves, a spur from my Grandpa. I love the everyday items, rather than the big, formal things, nobody really ever used (or will use!).

Connie,
I think it’s time for you to head to Antiques Roadshow!

A few years ago I was trying to decide whether or not to spend $3,000.00 on an oriental rug for my dining room.  The salesman decided it for me.  He said, “Madam, you will have it for generations.” I pictured my poor son dragging this heavy rug around with him some day.  So I went to the outlet next door and bought a rug for $250.00.

So far, I haven’t been loaded down with anything that doesn’t belong to me or my immediate family.  I’m sure someday in the distant future I will have my own cupboard worth of things and have absolutly no idea what to do with it.  Until then I’ll just read about everyone else.

I’m on the other side of this coin.  I have no family items from either side.  My mother’s family left then East Germany during the 50s and 60s and had to leave all their possessions behind.  And this was after many, many generations in the same place.  I didn’t grow up around my father’s family and all of my grandparents’ belongings went to the grandchildren that lived nearby.

This sounds a little whiny; I guess it’s kind of a sticking point for me!  Fortunately, we have a few things from my husband’s grandmother to pass on to our children - including a silver chafing dish.  (Which I don’t polish as often as I should!) And my mother plans to load up my kids with her belongings.  So hopefully, they’ll have the opposite complaint.

I like heirlooms, it’s cozy to look at antique rugs and to imagine the different generations of feed that have trod across the same carpet on which I am standing. Or to drink out of cups or sit and chairs. All the time those people never realized what would follow them only knowing that by passing it on they would maintain a link slightly less tangible from the actual DNA they passed on.

Since I’m living the boho live of a grad student at the moment, I haven’t been trusted with many of these objects. Um can I say Ikea! LOL.

In my family we don’t have many heirlooms but I appreciate the things that we have such as antique quilts that some civil war aunts in Philadlphia hand made. And jewlery that my great grandmother got from her mother right before she was orphaned in the 1906 San Fran Earthquake. And lots of antique furniture like chairs that Woodrow Wilson gave my family.

And yes all these things are used (except the quits which just look pretty on the walls).

I get handmade blankets and have so many, I need a supersize linen closet to house them.  Every little old lady on either side of the family sends/wills them to me.  And I love them, even the ugly swan one Aunt Fadosa made when she was losing her sight. 

My prize blanket, however, was made by my great Babushka.  I cover up with it when I’m in the reading chair. 

From my husband’s side, I get rugs of every style and material (wool, silk, etc).  God bless them because they’re all insanely gorgeous!

I love my few treasures, and I use them all: the mahogany library table that belonged to a great-aunt is my desk, I store linens in the trunk that contained all one of my maternal great-grandmothers brought with her when she married my great-grandfather, and yesterday I filled the cut glass punchbowl that belonged to another great-aunt with Christmas balls and used the two matching goblets (all that survived from the original twenty-four) as candleholders to create a Christmas centerpiece for my dining table. And the pictures are the most precius; they are always on display. My favorite is of my mother as a baby in a long dress and voluminous petticoat in the arms of her grandmother.

Thanks for this topic, it’s pulling me out of lurk mode.

I am the personal representative of a small estate left by a friend of the family.  It is draining.  Carol was the only child of two only children and never married or had children.  She had friends who loved her but no family.  There are some bequests; those are easy but, what to do with the family treasures; sad.  I was in a truck and found her baby things: baby ring, book, prayer book from grandmother, etc..  No one among her friends wants this stuff.  I guess I put them into the estate sale and let the ether have them.  It makes me sad.  There are so many things that had meaning to her that are now trash.

My big thing is china.  I have my husband’s great-grandmother’s china and I have his grandmother’s china.  So when you die, I come to your house and take your china.  I’ve already warned the other Squawkers to tell their kids to lock the doors after they go.

I have an enormous moving box filled with black, dented silver that belonged to my grandmother and her family. I once actually used and displayed most of it (some is engraved from my great-grandparents silver wedding anniversary in 1887 or 88...my daughters have used the knife to cut their wedding cakes) but at this point we’ve downsized houses and I’ve downsized chores.

I’ve told my kids to take stuff now while I’m still alive but somehow I still have all this STUFF and theirs, too, until houses are finished and apartments are bigger.

But my house is loaded with old china in a glass display case in the dining room which I love every day, some from my family and some from my husband’s. I have wonderful old photographs so we can see where Jessie got her eyes and Abby her dimple and Sarah her curls and Christopher his smile.

I really am going to get into the basement someday and weed stuff, so the kids aren’t cursing me after I’m dead! I do love old things, but not quite so many of them!

About the only things I have that I consider “heirlooms” are some of my mom’s old books.  Some are from her childhood, some are her college textbooks (poetry and Shakespeare - she was an English major). 

We don’t have much from generations past - my maternal grandmother came from Lithuania as a little girl and they brought very little with them - my sister does have a cross.

My father grew up in a poor Irish Chicago neighborhood, and they didn’t have much of value.  The most important thing he can pass on is the stories - wonderful stories.  I keep telling him he needs to write a book, he won’t do that.  I have to get him in a storytelling mood with a tape recorder one of these days.

I love old stuff. I’ve been told I have an obsession with it (though, I like to call it a passion ). Right now, because I’ve just graduated college and am living in a modest apartment, I don’t have much in the way of heirlooms. I’m probably too young to be really thinking about having them, mostly because everyone else to whom the items were willed still have them! Which is perfectly fine with me, as I’ve no place to put any of it.

I do have a few thing, one being my great grandmother’s china set. It’s a beautiful set that my mother’s had for years. She finally admitted she had no space for it. She’s the keeper of most of her family’s heirlooms. (so I guess that means I will end up with a lot of it when the time comes...I should look into getting a house with an extra room just to hold all of it! Come to think of it...she has a huge silver set....CURSES!!!!)

Anyway, she mentioned donating it to charity and I nearly had a coronary right there. The thought of giving away something that’s been in our family for years just wasn’t going to fly with me. So, in my tiny apartment my boyfriend and I have a twelve place setting china set. Yeah, he moaned and groaned about having to unpack and wash all of those! HAHA

The other thing isn’t really an heirloom per say...well maybe. It’s my grandmother’s 25th wedding anniversary ring. My aunt (who is lurking around here somewhere...) gave it to me a couple years ago. I adore it and it rarely leaves my finger!

What I’m really eyeing is my dad’s antique book collection. He has many books that have been in his family for god knows how long. Some I know to date back to the late 19th century. Mmm books :D Looks like I better add a library to that house I’ll eventually have.

As my mother got older, she loved to go to antique shows.  The one thing she found that she truly loved were swans.  Duncan Miller swans.  That I actually remember this should give you a clue!  Mother, sadly, has been gone for 10 years, but before she left us, she divided up her beloved swan collection between all of us kids....there were 5 of us!  She even made sure there were little ones for each of her grandchildren.  Somehow I don’t think my boys are going to cherish them the same way my mother did.  Did I mention they come in all kinds of colors too??  Most of mine are packed away, but I’ll get them out one day and display them.

I have a several things that belonged to my mother and grandmother, but being the youngest of 5, it’s kind of the remnants of what was left.  I cherish them just the same.  The picture my mother remembered walking to town to buy when she was just a little girl and the picture that she and my father won at some company function when she was pregnant with my older brother.  The same picture that my sister-in-law says she gets the chills from just by looking at the gloomy scene.  I don’t have much from my Ex’s side.....he seemed to want to take that stuff with him when we divorced.  Let’s hope he remembers the boys when the time comes. 

Sorry this was so long, I got carried away.  Great topic Connie.  Just glad I dodged the silver tea set!!

--dorothy

my confirmation word is ‘death48’....I hope that isn’t some omen!!

I too have the “Oh, no! Don’t open THAT box” in the closet. I do have things handed down that I adore, but the “box” contains the miniture, weird shaped, salt & pepper shaker collection from my grandmother. I feel guilty so I keep it but to display would mean to clean and that requires a tooth brush for all the little crevices.
I thought it was neat as a child, now I consider it a necessary family responsibility!

When I was a kid, it was my job to polish the silver service my mother kept displayed in our blue-collar home.  We never used it.  I hope to God she leaves it to someone else, along with the shelves full of plastic containers and pots and pans she can’t let go of.

I am, however, awaiting a little treasure that was my grandmother’s, a little tin chicken, one of four she placed under her tree at Christmas, along with a small tin WWI Doughboy.  No clue why they were there, but I get a quirky nostalgic feeling thinking about them.

I’ve got the “china” set from Scott’s grandmother—actually, it’s depression glass which she collected from the soap boxes (I can explain if you’ve never heard of this). It is very cool, eight pieces most of it and twelves pieces for some, and both of my kids want it, so that’s going to be difficult.

I’m the keeper of my mom’s decorative china tea cups and saucers. You know, those fine china cups? They’re not my style at all, but she wanted my daughters to have them and until they finish school and settled down somewhere, the cups are in my cupboard, and I sort of like that.

Of course, when my daughters do settle down, then I’ll be the referee of the Great China Fight, where they decide which ones are theirs ...

The Great China Fight… too funny! But, um, would you mind explaining the soap box part?

My mother has tons of old family pictures on the wall of the dining room back home, and I love all the stories behind them. I enjoy a lot of the old, yet not really heirloom, things. My mom has a doll from her childhood and we have an old butter churn that I loved to play with when I was little (what more can you expect from an Iowa farm family ). My mom also collects various antiques, especially furniture, so I’m sure those will eventually become heirlooms in their own right.

My favorite part of anything passed down is that you know it holds great stories, even though you may never learn what they are.

nothing like family heirlooms to give the family a couple of decent feuds to nurture and see grow as the years go on!! if nothing else they gives one something to talk about in christmas..

in my family my father and his brothers are beginning to talk about my grandfathers’ estate. hopfully my granpa will hold out some years more, but..

and the problem is noone wants anythiing!! except my father. not for any sentimental reason, just because “it might come in handy” or because it is old (as in more than 10 years..) or because noone else wants it. (in this he is his father’s child for sure..)

so in 40-50 years time me and my two brothers will inherit stuff enough to furnish and fill two three goodly sized houses. and since we have our fathers’ genes, well, i see us reluctant to throw anything…

but i will under no circumstance adopt his collection of computer magazines (PCGames). there i put the foot down…

Hey Christina, if there is no specific memory tied to any cup and saucer for the girls, gift wrap them and then let the girls take turns choosing packages until they are divided.  They get what they get that way.

I love family heirlooms that have a memory associated with them . . . but I’m not such a fan of inherited stuff that one never saw before.  That’s the stuff that if you can’t or don’t want to use it, should move on to another family member or to a collector of the past.  My sister has a her hutch covered with dishes, too fragile now to use, that neither of us ever saw until the dishes came in a box from my Great Aunt’s estate and we were told it was a family set.  Well, how do we really know that?  I still can’t talk her into parting with the stuff.  I’ve even offered to turn the dishes into a mosaic table top for her . . .

Use it, document it, and don’t burden the next generation if it means nothing to them. 

Sorry, I’m in a big declutter mode right now. 

Lynn

My dad gets a really delighted expression when he talks about how “all this crap (here he inevitably waves his hand around his house) will be your problem when I finally take the long dirt nap.”

Yes, he really does call it the long dirt nap.

The things I’ve inherited that I use? My great grandmother’s cooking stuff--ladles, stirring spoons, potatoe mashers etc. They’ve all always been regualrly used by whoever inherited them so if you were to come into my kitchen you would never recognize them as being antiques. The only clue is that almost all the paint that was on the wooden handles has disappeared over the years exposing the beautiful bird’s eye maple underneath.

Just this past year I got my grandmother’s china (my mom just barely managed to keep it from my cousin’s greedy hands for me).  The only other heirloom worthy item I have is a 125+ year old quilt the same grandmother gave me about 25 years ago.

My mom has a custom made stove that’s been in her family for 5 generations that every one of us 10 kids wants, as well as a rocking chair that was carried across the plains by the pioneers.  She finally decided that the only fair way to decide who gets the stove and the rocker is to let us kids draw numbers.

I too have my grandmother’s depression glass and its too cool looking to ever get rid of! I don’t use it but I love it ...

Connie, I hear ya! I have a cast iron skillet/dutch oven (basically a skillet with a lid and wood insulator handle) that came off the ranch chuck wagon of my great grandma. Love that thing! Use it camping, in the kitchen, etc. and folks don’t believe me when I tell them the story of it being over 100 years old! Thats the cool stuff we get!

I should add that when I said “Use it” I included those of you how love to look at what you’ve inherited.  That’s a use too.  I’m just thinking about the stuff that isn’t enjoyed.

Lynn

I’m feeling a little left out here. I don’t have any silver, or china, or rugs that were past down.  My grandma had 10 children and 40 grands, and since I was living in different parts of the country for the past 20 years, I missed out. 

The one item that was promised to me, that I hope to go and pick up soon, sits in an attic of an old farm house in the north.  It was the original black trunk that carried my grandmother’s belongings when she came to this country via Ellis Island in 1921 from Teramo, Italy.

When you guys write about all those trunks in your novels, I envision them looking similar to my grandma’s.  If it’s still in decent shape, I’ll give it to one of my children one day.

We have a complicated inheritance. When my husband’s grandfather died and his grandmother moved into a retirement home, she wanted to see some of the things that were precious to her stay in the family. The only problem is that most of the family didn’t want it, and her much loved cherry diningroom set and all her crystal were among those unloved things. She was really distraught at the thought of these things being sold to strangers, so my husband and I talked it over and took it into our home.

Totally not our style, and I never once dreamed I would own crystal anything (nevermind enough stemware to seat 17 people for Christmas dinner and still have extras).

And, typical of grandma, she added a few things to the boxes destined for our house, so I now also own a full set of silverware, silver serving platters, silver chafing dishes, silver cream and sugar bowl, an ashtray commemorating the moon landing, and a beautiful silver gravy boat that, to my surprise, makes my heart sing every time I put it on the table.

When my husband and I first decided to accept these items, we said we would keep them while she lived and sell them once she passes on, to replace them with the modern glass-top table we had there originally. Now that we’ve lived with them for 4 years, I’m finding it harder and harder to think about getting rid of them. Every time I look at them, I think about her. And it has become a christmas tradition to fill the house with sparkling silver and crystal so that she’ll look around and feel like she is still at home despite having moved cities and homes and lost her husband.

It’s funny how sentimental we get over material things in this day and age of plenty.

I am the keeper of four generations of “stuff”

When we sold my great-grandparents home, it took 76 pick-up truckloads to empty the house. Everything was cataloged and boxed. It took a whole year to accomplish that part of the task.

Antiques Roadshow is my favorite TV show. I’d love to have them come here and see all this stuff, but I’d never sell it. My Mother said there was a reason they kept it, and now I understand. I have given lots of things to the kids as they matured or married and expressed an interest in certain objects. I have a memory like a steel trap, and if one of the kids says they like something......they get it when they grow up. My nephew loved a set of articulated silver and abalone fish. His bride was UN-impressed when I gave them to him, but he was pleased that I remembered.

Don’t know who will wind up with all this stuff when I croak. I just hope they appreciate it.

Ann

What things have you been doomed to take care of for the rest of your life until you can pawn it off on some unsuspecting relative with your last breath?

I was having a nice, peaceful day, scrubbing away at my bathrooms. Thinking to myself that there wasn’t a single unwanted heirloom looming around my house…and then it hit me…I remembered The Thing that I am Doomed, Doomed I tell you, to take care of for the Rest of My Life. Forever. I should have lost the Thing on purpose when I moved. Burned it, buried it, and denied that the Thing ever existed. But no…I made a Sacred Vow to my DH’s Grandfather that I would keep It and pass it on…It’s only a copy of the original…but still… it haunts my nightmares …worse than a monster under the bed. Worse than an IRS audit. Yes this Copy of The Thing is even worse than having to wear a pair of jeans that make you butt look three sizes bigger than it really is.  The Thing lives in my filing cabinet and it is titled The Last Will and Testament of…of …I can’t say it…I’m I citizen of the USA…We don’t Call people names like that over here. You know, stuff like Sir and Lord, and Worse, much Worse…I want this Thing to go away. I really do. IT is Just like those jeans that I was describing. The Thing just doesn’t Fit me right. And it never will. SO Let the cousins twelve times removed have It. Oh that’s right, They do have it, even though the piece of paper says that it doesn’t belong to them. Not really. Fascinating. My DH’s Grandfather made me take a Sacred Vow to keep this unwanted heirloom and the story behind it safe.  And I have kept it. I’ve kept it safely tucked away in my filing cabinet. Until the day comes when I can pawn It off on my Poor Son so that he can deal with IT…Or not.  .

My favourite family heirloom would be our rotating Christmas tree holder, which the father of my great-grandmother bought when she was still a child. Inside the holder is also a music box which plays three all-time popular German Christmas songs. When I was little, we stood around the tree on Christmas Eve while the holder tinkled its melodies—and this we used as the accompaniment for our Christmas songs. Now, what kind of sounds do music boxes usually emit? Oh yes, really high tones. Now imagine singing along to a music box. Oh yes, musical chaos is bound to ensue!

I am in the same shoes as Carolyn.  When my parents came here from Italy in the ‘60s they couldn’t afford to ship all their furnishings, china, silver, etc. here, so they left it all behind to various relatives.  What they did bring over, aside from their clothes was...get this....the wool for the mattress stuffing that my mother brought to the marriage.  In one sentence she would lament about leaving the gold trimmed goblets behind while complaining about never having a use for the wool here!

‘Ma, what am I going to do with all this wool?!!  It’s not like I own a spinning wheel or loom!’

J Perry, I love your blanket story and can I borrow your Aunt Fambosa’s name?

Nope, nothing has been pawned off to me. . . I guess the closest thing I have to compare it to is whey I go through my jewelry box and stuff I never wear I give to my sis. . . she always does.  Well, sometimes this starts with Mom, she’ll go through hers, and give me something and sometimes it then goes to sis after a while. LOL But sis always wears it.  Needless to say, sis is the one with the most jewelry in the house. . .

Lois

Like Ann, I am the gatekeeper of family heirlooms.  I also have the dubious distinction of being the Family Grim Reaper (a/k/a Executrix).  I imagine it’s because I’ve always paid attention and listened to the family stories and know who everyone is in the pictures, and where what given object came from.  My older relatives kept me enthralled for ages with great stories and I was the only child among the children and grandchildren that gave a damn.  And I’m just plain sentimental.

So I’ve got perfume bottles that belonged to my paternal grandmother, earrings and books from my maternal grandmother, all of my late mother’s stuff, most of my late father’s stuff, most of my great-aunt’s stuff and now my in-law’s stuff.  I have my first pair of earrings, which became my daughter’s first pair of earrings.  My bedroom set is my parent’s old bedroom set which is made from beautiful mahogany.  It has a vanity table that I adore and use each day.  That vanity is my prized possession and is the only thing I have begged my daughter to keep after I leave this planet.  She can make arrangements with eBay for everything else if she wants.

I’ve got the china and silver which my husband polished and we used on our Thanksgiving table.  And my husband’s parents had enough glass and stemware for the whole of England, which means I can invite them all over and have something for them to drink from.  My husband has a train set from when he was two and is threatening to lay the track all over the house.  And pictures!  I’ve got pictures going back generations.  Lots of them have names written on the back (thank you!) and lots don’t (who the hell is this?).

My aunt just told me that she’s leaving me her house (!) because she knows for certain that my cousin would sell it in a heartbeat and junk everything inside.  Her daughter never lived in that house and barely even visits.  My aunt has always been like a mother to me and grandmother to my daughter.  My daughter and I were at her house two weeks ago and Gillian asked where my aunt had put some little ceramic fruits with faces that my aunt made in ceramics glass and always had in her kitchen.  Last week at Thanksgiving, my aunt gave Gillian the fruits as a gift.  Ah, another generation continues the legacy…………

I don’t have many of these heirlooms passed down, family estrangements (my Mom from hers) have made it difficult. However, I do have a set of silverware with iviry handles that belonged to my Great-Grandmother. When my Nana passed she gave my Mother a black pearl necklace to her for me, I wore it when I married my Dh and when I had my first child. I also have pictures, lots of pictures I inherited when my Mother passed away 4 years ago, unfortunately those from her childhood have no names on them!
And oh my gosh, Sandra! I thought I was the only one who has one of those rotating Christmas tree holders with the old music box. I love to listen to the tinkling it makes. My Dh even loves it. My Father is still alive (and remarried, son’t get me started!) and so is my Grandmother, who starts every family get-together with the words “when I die, I want so and so to have this”. She drives me crazy and I’ve told her for as long as I can remember that the only thing I want is her to live forever. I’ve no idea which of my children should inherit which item, but the one thing I wish I had from my Mother? More time, and to hear her say the Lords prayer in Gaelic one more time.

I don’t have very many heirlooms but I cherish the ones I have. Most of them I’ve begged from relatives.

I have some tatting and other lacework that one of my great, great aunts brought over in her bride’s chest from Sweden (there’s a story there that I hope to publish someday). I also have a pair of my grandmother’s kid gloves. When I was a very tiny girl I’d sit and hold her hand in church and I’d rub my fingers over her gloves and they just felt so warm and smooth to me. I love that memory. I have her highboy dresser that my grandfather gave her as a wedding present when they married in 1910, as well.

So, when I’m just a memory, my two daughters will get to fight over those little possessions as well as my spinning wheel, my 1923 Baldwin piano and their dad’s collection of “antique” (to them) baseball cards! LOL!

Loved the post, Connie! Sometimes it’s nice to take a stroll down memory lane.

I almost forgot that my DH’s mom has given me the hand painted china set that was his paternal grandmother’s.  This was promised to me years ago.  His sister tried to lay claim to it and I told her I was fine with that so long as she used it every time we came over!  Of course, I was only kidding!

Since most of my relatives lived in Berlin or other cities in Germany that were heavily bombed during World War II, not very much came down to us from our ancestors. We have a few things from my mother’s side of the family, but I can think only of his parents and photos from my father’s side. Two of his brothers were MIA and we’ve never found out what happened to them though my grandmother and father tried for a long, long time. Since the Wall came down, I’ve wanted to find out if anything new has been discovered in Russia. All three brothers served on the Eastern front. At first my mother supported me but as her Alzheimer’s progressed so did her disinterest in everything. Since she’s been gone, I keep thinking of really going for it but never find the right time. One problems that’s hampering me is that I have been unable to find any note of the exact birth dates. With the fairly common last name that we have, I think that is an important if not vital piece of information.

We do have a few silver things of which I, as the eldest in the family, am now the “guardian”. Since my mother told me outright that I was to have her 12-setting silver, I gave that to the first in the next generation that got married. I think her giving me that huge set was a result of her Alzheimer’s. After all, I never cook; there will never be a meal for 12 people at my table. I gave it the nephew who loves to cook. The other things I’ll negotiate with my siblings.

I regard them as links to the past. And unfortunately, not everyone will receive such a lavish set. A friend of mine urged me to sell it when I became too ill to work. However, I regard this as a trust that my mother as the last of her generation, gave me. Even this set was not inherited. She had begun to buy the silver when she began to work and was pretty certain she would marry my father. But it managed to come through the war unscathed. I’m not even sure how, come to think of it.

There are a few other little things from her mother’s household that they were able to rescue when they watched the apartment building being bombed. And along the way my mother also received some unique gifts. One is a rare porcelain-lined silver coffee-pot with sugar container and creamer. I guess the first to marry in my brother’s family will get that. For now, since we have such few tangible memories, I like to put them in places where I can see them and remember the people they belonged to.

At first I said to myself, I don’t have anything like that!  Then I remembered the quilt my grandmother made from her black sheep.  It’d been recovered so many times I had forgotten the story until I recovered it yet again.  Beneath the many layers of brown cotton quilting and button knots, I found it.  Straight combed wool, black wool, is the batting. Now the quilt sports a lovely blue and red fabric and is still in use, nearly 100 years later. Grandma never told me the name of the black sheep, but that’s OK.

Tables are also a thing for me.  3 marble topped tables from my grandfather’s house are cluttered with daily detritus.

The china dolls sit in a closet.  I broke too many fingers off of them as a girl and I’m afraid to touch them anymore, especially after they were appraised at $$$.  But Grandma always said she was never allowed to play with them and she never had a daughter.  So those dolls got love every holiday.

Such memories...all good ones.