My Mother's Hands

Have you every really sat and looked at an older person's hands?  I mean really looked at them and thought about what those hands have done and helped do during that person's life?  A number of years ago, I sat looking at my Mom's hands and realized they looked like the hands of my great-grandmother, her grandmother.  As a child, our Great-Grandma Miller would come for Sunday dinner or for Sunday car rides.  During those times in the car, I remember looking at her hands, touching the brown age stops and asking her about them.  I don't recall what she told me, but I do remember what her hands looked like.  So when I looked at my own mother's hands and saw the hands of my great-grandmother.....I told her how much her hands reminded me of Great Grandma Miller.  

During my recent visit to Ohio to see my Mom, I began thinking about my Mom's hands and all they have accomplished over the years.  As the oldest child in her own family, I am sure those hands helped with her four brothers.  At the age of seventeen, her baby sister Ellen was born.  My mom helped raise Ellen, so her hands became part of Ellen's life as well.  Her hands were there to teach a little sister things she needed to learn; to hold and love her as well.  My Mom's hands held the hand of a shy young man who was so flustered the first time he asked her out, he invited her to the Father and Son banquet when he meant the Junior and Senior banquet.  Her hands worked as this young man went off to war to help support the war effort.  And held his hands again when he came home on a two week leave and ask her to marry him before he went back.  Many years have past and still these hands hold the hand of that man.  These hands have borne and raised six children; five daughters and a son.  They have driven tractors, birthed piglets, cared for chickens, gardened, cooked, sewed clothing and quilts, along with so many other things in her lifetime.  Now, there isn't a lot these hands can do without help, yet there is still one thing they do and do well.  With her hands, my mother blesses her family; she can still pray and hold your hand.  And that is the greatest thing these hands have ever or will ever do. 

posted by Sarah

Quilts for Place of Hope

In the fall of 1997, while reading the local newspaper, I came across a short article about a local church that was in the process of buying some land with the sole purpose of providing homes for foster children.  At the time, I thought, "Wouldn't it be great to have a quilt closet for the foster children to get a quilt from when they are placed in foster care."  About a year later, while sitting in a restaurant with a group of people for a surprise birthday party, I struck up a conversation with the couple sitting across from us.  In the course of the conversation, she told me that she was the acting director of Place of Hope.  I told her about my idea of having a quilt closet for the foster children and she got really excited.  She had just gotten a newsletter from an organization doing foster care and there had been an article about their quilt closet.  I shared with her that I made quilts and how I'd made one for the foster daughter that had lived with us for a year.  From this chance meeting, I developed a relationship with Place of Hope providing quilts for their quilt closet.  Over the years, I have asked friends, family, and parents of my students to help make quilts.  While teaching at Jupiter Christian School, I always made it an event the day we gave the quilts the students had helped make to Place of Hope.  One of my greatest advocates, was my own Mom.  She would sew quilt tops in Ohio and send them to me in Florida to finish and donate. 

Place of Hope is a ministry in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida that houses foster children.  Each house has a set of house parents and six children.  These are beautiful homes, designer homes, dream homes, homes that these hurt and broken children would never have a chance to live in.  Place of Hope provides tutoring, emotional and spiritual counseling; whatever the children need to begin their healing journey.  Many of the children who live at Place of Hope are available for adoption so they provide this service as well.   If you like to know more about the services Place of Hope provides, check out their website:  www.placeofhope.com

My mom has continued, over the years, to sew quilt blocks which have gone into quilts that have been donated to Place of Hope.  Two months ago, due to multiple mini strokes, my Mom quit sewing; she can no longer remember how to do it.  Yet her legacy will be remembered in the quilts she has provided for the children who live at Place of Hope.  Here are pictures of 19 quilts that she sewed the blocks for.  The quilts were finished by her daughters, and the Alliance Women's Group at the Ft. Pierce Christian and Missionary Alliance Church, Ft. Pierce, FL.

posted by:  Sarah