My Beautiful Aunt

Aunt Linda is my mother's only sibling—and she's always rated the title of "My Favorite Aunt" in my book!

Aunt Linda is the oldest of my Pappa and Nannie's two children. From the stories I've heard of her youth, and from personally knowing her these 41 years, I'd venture to guess she was quite the spitfire growing up! She and my mother were raised on a tobacco farm in rural North Carolina. Aunt Linda raised her five children, and often included me in the count, claiming to have six kids, and calling me "Pete"! Being an only child, my cousins were the closest things I had to my own siblings as a child. I remember her always being my champion, always standing up for me whenever the need arose. She always lived in the north east, while I grew up in Texas. That meant that she always had snow in the winter, while I often ran around outside barefoot and in shorts at Christmas—Aunt Linda would send me "snow" wrapped in a paper towel inside of foil and plastic wrap in order that I might not feel so left out. Of course, by the time I received it, the only thing inside the plastic wrap and foil was a soggy paper towel. Certainly, her thoughtfulness went a LONG way!

I have fond memories of the knowledge that Aunt Linda's favorite color is yellow—the only color she can "see" as she's color-blind, of her love for flowers, and racing down I-77 and eluding Trooper Vance (or not). Aunt Linda was a very hard worker and truly loves her family, although often her family made life for her more than challenging. During one of these times, my family had the honor of having her live with us for several months. She helped my mom with her plant business, spending many hours out in the greenhouse. Dad renamed the pecan tree in the back yard "Aunt Linda's Pee-can" tree in honor of her many "pit stops" made there, as she'd waited too long to make it into the house! After she returned to NC, my dad would send her the "pee-cans" that had fallen from her tree for Christmas each year. I believe that the love shared between my dad and my aunt was as much like that of brother and sister as possible. You see, Dad was also the youngest of two siblings to Mammaw and Pop, both children boys. So as he never had a sister, neither did my aunt have a brother, and through my parents union, they each had new siblings!

About four years ago Aunt Linda suffered a brain aneurism. Fortnuately, she survived this traumatic event, but has remained in a nursing home since leaving the hospital. Prior to her illness, I had started a quilt-block-of-the-month quilt that is primarily yellow, with some purple and navy and other blues in it. (Interestingly, purple and navy are two colors that Aunt Linda "sees" as the same, and one year she gave a gift that included a top of one and bottoms of the other.) About three years ago I finally got the top of the quilt set, but kept going back and forth over whether or not I would add additional borders. The uncertainty of Aunt Linda's condition made it difficult to wrap my mind around working on it. So this year I determined to finish her quilt and give it to her on my trip to see her in July. I didn't get very far on the quilt by the time I left for NC, so I took it and my portable machine with me and spent many hours in the hotel room machine quilting it. The straight stiches look ok, if you can get past the fact that I did a horrible job sandwiching the top, batting, and back together, but the free-motion quilting looks absolutely terrible! Not only are my lines jagged, but the tension on the just-serviced machine were so loose, I'll be surprised if it doesn't fall apart the first time the nursing home washes it! However, I "needed" to give it to her this trip, so I did.

In the photo above we placed the quilt over Aunt Linda's lap and asked her to smile—to which she told me (several times!), "NO!" So, alas, no smile in this photo, but I'm just happy she's still got her spunk! That is a good thing! She will always be my favorite aunt!