The Seamstresses in My House-Part 11

SUNDAY MEMORIES

Judy Wills

I’m going to jump ahead in years here.  While on one of our trips to England, I purchased some of Fred’s family’s tartan.  Since I had learned that daughters retain their father’s tartan and clan, I purchased that particular tartan.  It is a beautiful tartan, and unique in that both Fred’s Mother and Father were from the same Scot clan – the Gunn clan.  Here is a picture of that tartan.

I had purchased quite a bit of the fabric – in a soft, light-weight wool, and debated for several years just what to do or make for the girls out of that fabric.  I thought about making a skirt for each girl, but thought that might not be a lasting choice.  Then I thought of a “vest” – but just never got around to making it, either.  And so, I finally made up my mind to make a stole for each daughter.  A stole is a type of shawl.  So I set to making them as Christmas presents a few years ago.  

I made each one with a relatively short “fringe” all around the stole.  That probably took more time than anything else, as it needed to be done by hand, pulling the threads on both the short ends, and the length of the stole.  

Here are some pictures of the girls in their stole pinned with the Gunn clan pin:

Karen:

Karen stated:   I looked it up, and apparently normal people should wear it over their right shoulder; only important people, like daughters of clan chiefs, are supposed to wear it over the left shoulder. Who knew.

Janet:

There is a “Scottish” store in Colonial Williamsburg that we like to visit whenever we are in Virginia – The Scotland House.  I found some fabric in my family’s tartan one time and purchased enough to make a lined vest from it for my Aunt Jessie.  Unfortunately, I have no pictures of that vest, nor of Jessie in it.  Here is a picture of my tartan – very similar to the Gunn clan, but with a different color stripe in it.  My clan is Colquhoun – it’s where we “Americans” get the word/name Calhoun.  I’ve never made anything for myself from that tartan, and I’m not eligible to make something for myself from the Gunn clan.  And that’s strange, because I’ve always liked plaids.

Also at the Scotland House, we found and purchased a new tartan tie for Fred, and also one in the “Ancient” or “weathered” version of the tartan.  Interesting.

Credit to Google Search and Houston Traditional Kiltmakers website

You can see the difference between regular and weathered.

~~~~~~~~~~To Be Continued~~~~~~~~~~

Judy is living in Central Florida with her retired U.S. Air Force husband of 50+ years. Born in Dallas, Texas, she grew up in the Southwestern United States.She met her husband at their church, where he was attending the university in her town. After college and seminary, he entered the Air Force, and their adventures began.They lived in eight of our United States, and spent six years in Europe, where their oldest daughter was born. She was a stay-at-home mom for many years .

  Judy has always been involved with music, both playing the piano and singing. Always interested in exercise, she was an aerobic dancing instructor, as well as a piano teacher for many years, and continues to faithfully exercise at home.

After moving to Central Florida, she served as a church secretary for nearly nine years.Her main hobby at this point in time is scanning pictures and 35mm slides into the computer. She also enjoys scrapbooking.She and her husband have two married daughters and four grandchildren, including grandtwins as well as a great-grandson and a great-granddaughter. She and her husband enjoy the Disney parks as often as possible.

Tags: #amblogging, Christian bloggers, Family, Roots, Sewing, Tartans