In the Quilters' Book Club this month, we're reading Aunt Jane of Kentucky by Eliza Calvert Hall, written in 1898. It comes highly recommended by author Sandra Dallas. A community of volunteers converted the book to digital format. If you have a Kindle or a Kindle app, you can get it from Amazon.com here. If you want to read it directly from your computer, you can do so here, courtesy of Project Gutenberg. It's a public domain book so is available free in either format. (I am reading it on my computer and my iPad with no Kindle app, and that is working fine for me.)
This book consists of nine short stories. The fourth short story is called "Sweet Day of Rest" and is only 22 pages long. It describes a Sunday morning of a woman named Millie:
"You know,' says she,'there's some days when everything goes wrong with a woman, and last Sunday was one o' them days. I got up early,' says she, 'and dressed the children and fed my chickens and strained the milk and washed up the milk things and got breakfast and washed the dishes and cleaned up the house and gethered the vegetables for dinner and washed the children's hands and faces and put their Sunday clothes on 'em, and jest as I was startin' to git myself ready for church,' says she, 'I happened to think that I hadn't skimmed the milk for the next day's churnin'. So I went down to the spring-house and did the skimmin', and jest as I picked up the cream-jar to put it up on that shelf Sam built for me, my foot slipped,' says she, 'and down I come and skinned my elbow on the rock step, and broke the jar all to smash and spilled the cream all over creation, and there I was—four pounds o' butter and a fifty-cent jar gone, and my spring-house in such a mess that I ain't through cleanin' it yet, and my right arm as stiff as a poker ever since.'"
And that was just the start of her "Day of Rest!"
If you could take a complete day of rest, what would you do? Inquiring minds want to know! Please reply in the comments sections below for a chance to win a copy of Jennifer Chiaverini's just-released book, An Elm Creek Quilts Companion, courtesy of Plume Books. If you are reading this via email, you must click on the title of my blog post to be able to comment and read the comments of others.
You might also enjoy reading my previous blog post here. And if you'd like to make the Night and Day quilt block pictured above to go with this short story, here's a link to the free pattern.
Gorgeous fabric and your blocks are always just perfect.
ReplyDeleteI would sleep in and wake whenever. Have breaky in bed. Read a book. Have a nap. Dinner. Bath, book & wine. Then bed...
ReplyDeleteLazy day
I am afraid my day of rest would be a lot like that of Millie. I would keep finding things to do until the day was over ... then I would wonder where the day went so quickly.
ReplyDeleteI would put my feet up. Watch holiday movies on Hallmark channel, do random handwork, call out for dinner. Sounds wonderful!
ReplyDeleteI would wake when I felt rested, splurge on another cup of tea, ignore the world and people therein and cut out and start those two new patterns that are whispering my name - ignoring the taunts of my already guilt trips UFO's.
ReplyDeleteI would wake up, have coffee, stitch, stitch while listening to music, stitch at the beach listenign to the ocean, eat and stitch.
ReplyDeleteI would gather the stuff needed to do some hand sewing, gather some food, and then drive down to the ocean. Park next to the beach and sit watching and listening to the waves crashing on the shore, the seagulls overhead and on the beach, and work on my sewing until evening arrived and then watch the sunset over the water. Living near the ocean, i get to do just this regularly, just not for the whole day.
ReplyDeleteI have been known to read the day away. Then again, I am retired! I wish I had an ocean nearby. I love this block and will try drawing it up in EQ as I can't find it searching in Barbara Brackman unless it is under a different name?
ReplyDeleteMary Anne
It's available free on-line at Quilters Cache: http://www.quilterscache.com/N/NightandDayBlock.html
Deletethank you. I didn't think to look there!
DeleteMy perfect day of "rest" would be me, my sewing machine, a stack of movies and a box of chocolates...oh, and someone else cooking dinner and bringing me fresh cups of tea! lol Of course, I'd miss the exercise I get filling my own water and tea as my sewing room is on the third floor and my kitchen is on the first! pbstrand@msn.com
ReplyDeleteWhen I do take a day of rest, I read. I call it my 'laz' day.
ReplyDeleteI'm doing my day of rest. I read the first two stories. They are hard to read, but interesting. I would like to be listening to them. It is so great to listen to someone read or tell the story.
ReplyDeleteMy perfect day of rest would include worship, time with family, and time in God's creation.
ReplyDeleteI love that block. A day of rest, to me, means family time, maybe some reading time, or a DVD. Still doing stuff, but, quietly, not rushing. More of something I 'want' to do, not something I 'have' to do.
ReplyDelete