My Mom, God love her, made a lot of my clothes when I was young.  She stopped sewing once we were in high school but always had her sewing machine nearby in the corner of the dining room.  It was a green Singer machine.  I can still smell the grease she kept nearby in case the bobbin got stuck.   Which, by the way, it always did and was followed immediately by a stream of swearing and a huge knot to untangle.

As I think about my Mom and what I remember most, one of the first things that comes to mind is this crafty side of her.  It might have been a sign of the times.  You know, a classic tv stay-at-home mom in the 60’s.   Spending a good part of the day unfolding and smoothing down the almost transparent paper Simplicity and McCalls patterns before pinning and cutting the fabric.  Cooking up a yummy dinner and then knitting to wrap the night up before bed.  But I also think it was a clear indication of her personality and its influence on us.

When I was about 7 or so my Mom started making 3 arm hole dresses.  Yes.  You read that right.  A dress with 3 arm holes.  It was basically a long piece of fabric that you put on arms first from the front, then wrapped around your back for one final arm hole.  I can remember the coarse flowery fabric she used and how she tricked them out with lace.  I must have had 10 of these dresses.  They were easy and cool in the summer.  A “summer shift” if you will.  She was so damn proud of those 3 arm holes.  Neat as a pin.  One for every day of the week.

Once the knitting phase began, she naturally started knitting me dresses.  I remember clearly the lime green knitted (or maybe this one was crocheted) dress she made for me and my friend, Pam.  We wore them to sing in an elementary school talent show.  I am sure I have a picture of that somewhere but I’m betting you can picture it.  We wore white turtlenecks and tights underneath.  Then the lime green over dress.  We were very proud……  We didn’t win the talent show but must have gotten something for being most creatively dressed.

She didn’t stop with me and my friends either.  Oh no.  My brother was not to be left out.  She made him pants without buttons or zippers.  Easy on easy off.  He looked like an Oompa Loompa toddling around in those pants.

One of her best creations though were her unisex slippers, a/k/a “mops”.  Mops were made from towels and when we were really little, washcloths.  They were sewn into a diamond shape and had elastic at the top.  Basically a washcloth over your foot and held on with a rubber band.  The real purpose though was for us to wear them around the house, covertly cleaning the floors as we ran around.  Pretty clever actually.

Once I had children, the sewing/knitting obsession switched to them.  My daughter was born with very graceful hands.  She frequently held them up as if showing them off to people – making graceful movements.  So what did my Mom do?  She knitted a onesie that had hands on it.  This didn’t turn out quite the way she had planned.  The hands were a bit hard to make out.  They actually looked more like claws with fingers bent at strange angles.  But it was the thought that counted and that onesie remains one of my favorite articles of baby clothes.   Mostly because the hands were a bit crazy – just like my Mom.  The good kind of crazy, that is.

All of these crafts sum up one of the best parts of my Mom.  Her fun, crazy, silly side.  The side that could care less what anyone thought of what she made for us to wear.  They were original to her and, most importantly, they were for us.  Of course, at the time we hated it.  I moaned a lot, as did my brother but now I see that it was her way of making sure that we were originals.  No standard JC Penny outfits for us.  She was imprinting herself on us to the world.  And now I am so glad that she did.   I have no doubt that having her outfit us and our children has not only kept us laughing with these memories but has made us appreciate the small things that make us real.  That make us original.  Mom definitely set us out on our own individual paths dressed to kill — one 3 arm hole dress at a time.