"What Grandma Taught"

While pouring though magazines this morning, I found many little articles I want to share with you. Among them was this charming poem in a Needlecraft Magazine from September, 1925 by Josephine L. Ingham. I hope you all enjoy it as I did.

What Grandma Taught

When I was quite a little girl, and sat at grandma's knee,

She taught me how to sew a seam and turn a hem, you see;

To piece the gayest patchwork and work buttonholes, so fine,

And all the little tucks I made must be right on a line.

And Grandma used to tell me that I might go and play

When I had neatly finished that pattern of crochet!

*

And, too, the knitting-needles I was taught to swiftly ply,

To fashion socks for father, and sometimes I would cry

When I tried so hard to "turn the heel" and couldn't do it right,

And Grandma said "My goodness, child, that surely is a sight!"

And when holes showed in those stockings, either in the heel or toe,

I must learn to darn them neatly, over, under, to and fro,

*

All these "arts and crafts" were taught me, as I sat by grandma's knee,

Happy when my stint was over and I once again was free,

But these two things I decided in that time so long ago

"When I became a woman I shall neither knit nor sew!

And if my heavenly father little ones to me should give,

They'll never have to take a stitch as long as they shall live.

*

Time has sped and my dear grandma long since has passed away,

But the good old things she taught me have been my help and stay,

Once when fortune frowned upon me, ill-luck hovered o'er my head,

The homely art of mending helped to earn my daily bread.

And the hours have been less lonely, many days have been less gray,

Just because my grandma taught me how to do "that old crochet!"