Gingham Gallery
My mother was Martha Stewart before Martha Stewart even knew who she was! As I had said in one of my earlier blogs, my mother would sew a lot of our clothes, make curtains and crafts and bake and cook like no other. Her grilled cheese sandwiches were nothing but bread and cheese toasted in the oven, but somehow you would be hard pressed to find any better. I think it was all of the love that she put into everything that she did. One time my mother set out to bake pound cakes as a fundraiser to help save an old church here in Haralson County. She was featured in Country Woman Magazine with an article about her trying to save this church one pound cake at a time.
But before all of that, she had a craft shop in our old house called Gingham Gallery. She sold handmade items. Anything from decorative candle skirts, stuffed animals, country crafts to children’s clothes to Christmas decorations and ornaments. I remember people asking my mom, “How in the world will people find your craft shop out in the middle of nowhere?” And I remember my mother just doing her thing. I remember going with her to make copies of flyers that she would go around distributing to local businesses and even the Georgia Welcome Center as we were located only 3 miles from there. My mother would say, we are just 3 miles off of I-20. Anybody can find us!
She had so many crafts, every room was overflowing. She also let other people put crafts in her shop to sell. I remember she had a Christmas Open House one year and everything was decorated so beautifully and lit up so bright and it was looking and smelling like Christmas. I especially loved all of the Christmas snacks we had that day too. My sister and I helped and excitement was in the air with the people coming in. I don’t remember how many people came or how much money she made, I just remember that being a special memory for me; spending time with my mother. I spent a lot of time with my mother growing up. I even found the old wooden sign about the Christmas Open House.
When we had moved to the country I was in fourth grade, I had a difficult time making new friends. As I’ve said before, my mother made a lot of my clothes and some kids laughed at me and made fun of my “homemade” clothes. That was a hard time. So I ended up spending a lot of time with my mother, beside my mother making crafts and learning to sew. I learned at a very young age how to cross stitch and have made many things since. I had sat beside her while she made so many crafts, clothes and curtains. I remember getting up and ready for school and I would hear the sewing machine humming in the basement. I knew my mother was hard at work early in the morning.
If she saw something that she liked, she would figure out how to make it herself. Back in the 1980’s the big, ruffled curtains were in style. They were also very high priced. So… my mom sets out to learn how to make them and start selling them. She had a client one time that lived in a very affluent part of a city a few miles over. They had my mother custom make curtains for their kitchen. When we would go to town (that’s what we would call it when we went to a bigger city to buy groceries), my mother would ride by the lake and this house and say “See! Those are the curtains I made for this nice, big house on the lake.” She was so proud. I was proud of her too.
In later years, my mother turned the craft shop into a type of historical house. She had many of the furnishings from my great grandparents and had the house arranged as if they had just lived there last week. She would give tours to local school children and church groups when they would visit the farm. The school children would pet the animals; sheep, goats, horses, etc. and pick out pumpkins to take home when it was pumpkin season. She also had converted our carport into a Christmas room as she had quite an extensive Christmas collection. It was Christmas all year round at our house. So the kids would get to visit there too. When the church groups would come out, my mother catered dinner and my dad would sing Christmas songs, then they would go and tour the old farmhouse. By that time they had named the farm Goose Chasers Farm. That’s a whole other story!
My mother always had big dreams and goals. In fact, I found a sheet of paper with all of her “dreams and goals” written down. She loved her family and the history of our old farmhouse and land so much. I wished she could be here to see what all Blake and I are doing now. But I know she’s here with me. Watching me and loving what we are doing.
Now, proudly and appropriately, the Gingham Gallery sign hangs in our living room.
