Piece of Furniture Finds its Forever Home

A piece of furniture that used to hold oil cans in my dad's garage now sets inside my house.

It's filled with books, items from my childhood, and other things I packed away in tubs when I needed to make room for a husband and step-daughter.

My crafty friend Valerie Shellhammer helped me refurbish this jewel.

at home in the house

When my brother-in-law Jeff saw it earlier this summer, he said, "It was a pie safe." He pointed to the screens on the top doors. "Flies wouldn't get in the pies that way," he added.

So that's what I'm calling it. The pie-safe bookcase.

Here's its story.

Dad said, "Are you sure you want that thing? It's really oily." 

I did. I had magazine pictures from years ago of what I wanted to turn it into. 

Dad didn't know that as a little girl, I had an entire plan of how to turn that yucky garage into a studio apartment. That bookcase was a key component of the design.

Yes, I have quite the imagination. Maybe when I'm 90 like he is, and if the garage is still standing, I'll renovate that garage into cottage I dreamed it could be.

Anyway, he let me have this cabinet, and that's when I learned there were doors for it. The top had that chicken wire, but the bottom doors were solid. Dad cleared out his stuff and packed it up for the trip from South Dakota to Kansas.

My brother-in-law Rick used my brother Elliott's pick-up to haul it down here. He brought a couple more items from the farm too.

The bookcase, a two-piece outfit, sat in my shed except for the times I took it out to scrape it.

I remember my friend and colleague Tim Hiebert bringing me, a relatively new home owner, a weed eater he'd picked up from a garage sale. That was somewhere in the mid to late '90s on Labor Day weekend.

Why do I remember that? Because he startled me when he walked into the backyard while I was scraping it. Tim said it looked like I had my work cut out for me.

And I remember the weekend because I thought I could get the thing completely scraped and done in a few days.

Work it was. Lots of elbow grease. 

What I found underneath was shocking. 

Red. Red paint.

Grandma Elizabeth, who no doubt had this in her house, must have painted it red. (Read "Namesake" by clicking here to know more about her.) Oil also seemed to seep from one corner. 

I decided I'd better measure the thing. It was too tall for my house­—if I was going to use both parts. I have low seven-foot ceilings, and this thing was nearly 10 feet tall.

My dream project went back in the shed to be infested with wasp hives and bird poop. Not much different than its life on the farm in the garage.

That was around 15 years ago.

After I got married in 2006, we moved the bookcase from the shed to our newly built garage, so the bookcase got cleaned up a bit for that. It stored lots of stuff on its open shelves with the doors setting on top collecting spiders. I still had dreams of it being inside the house some day though.

One summer my husband Chris bought me a hand sander, so I could use electric power to continue to clean up the thing. It worked. I went through a lot of sandpaper, but it worked.

A couple more years passed.

Brittany moved on to college and then out on her own. Her teenage room got redesigned back into a guest room. Here was my chance to get that thing in the house.

Valerie and I checked out vintage stores in Wichita for ideas. She snapped pictures. I bought paint. We had good intentions. But life happened.

And so it remained.

In the garage storing golf balls, flower vases, sander equipment, old yearbooks—not what I had envisioned for the thing years ago.

One day, Valerie said, "Let's get your bookcase done.

So on November 6, 2014, our first cold day of the fall season, we painted it with white chalk paint in the garage.

My husband had to cut off about two-and-half inches from the bottom, so it would fit in the house when finished.

Val finished up the doors at home.

Months pass.

Then finally in May, the entire thing was done. We put some sort of glaze on it. Smooth surface now.

Val found new hinges, but we saved the original clasps.

Oh, if those clasps could tell me the hands that have touched it throughout the years.

Finally, my dream piece had its new home inside the house.

I had fun arranging the items in it on my first full day of summer vacation. It took me all afternoon, but I wanted to make it look inviting to the point that if you came to my house, you'd love snooping around in the thing.

You'd figure out a lot about me through the book titles, the cups filled with bookmarks, the newspaper clippings and pictures arranged in boxes by year or topic. If my memory ever starts to fade, this will be my go-to place.

Sentimental me sure enjoys going in there, pulling out a box, reading through old notes.

After 26 years of teaching, I have a lot of notes from students—and I believe I have kept every one.

My Cousin Cynthia gave me Aunt Mary Ruth's notes from the state quilt she made me when she finished the embroidery squares that Mom had started. Precious to see her handwriting and planning.

Letters from my sister-in-law Doris when I first attended college. I've always loved her fancy cursive writing. And letters from Mom too. Kept in the envelopes with the dates stamped on them.

Notes from college pals. Homemade cards from my eight nieces and nephews who are now all adults. The vocabulary list of a made-up language my niece Jessica and I tried to invent one summer.

Notes from Steve Elliott and his mom about how thankful they were for the connections we made while I student taught at Halstead the fall of 1988. I would not have stayed with teaching if it wasn't for Steve, but that's a story for another post.

Material things. Yes. But things from events, students, and people that matter. This bookcase keeps them safe. Just like it did Grandma's pies.


Have you ever taken on a project that spanned two decades to complete? Have any items from an earlier time that you wished could be at your fingertips? Any family heirlooms in your home?

What I Never Knew About My Parents' Wedding

At the start of it all, Mom knew Dad was a night owl when she married him. For weeks leading up to their wedding in 1944, Dad would visit her at 10 o’clock at night. Mom lived miles away in Doland, South Dakota. She worked at the Northwestern Public Service office and had graduated from high school the spring before in 1943. 

Mom, 18-years-old, on her
wedding day when Dad, 19, came to pick her up

My dad’s dad, Grandpa Pete, had died a month earlier (I’ll explain more in future post) on March 18, so at the age of 19, my dad became the man of the farm near Hitchcock with plenty of work to do. Grandma Elizabeth, Dad’s mom whom he lived with on the farm and whom I wrote about here, didn’t like the late night visits, so she encouraged them to get married.

Stella & Waldo's wedding portrait

The ceremony took place on a Sunday morning after the main church service on April 16, 1944 at Ebenezer church. It was the custom for the woman to go with the man, so that's why the ceremony wasn't at Emmanuel, Mom's church. Dad drove to Doland during the Sunday school hour to pick up Mom, her mother, and one of her sisters. They had no car.

Back in the day, men and women sat on opposite sides of the sanctuary in the Mennonite Brethren Church, but for this occasion, the bride and groom sat up on stage in front of the minister, Reverend DJ Mendel (Smoky Joe's dad), with their backs to the congregation. It was just a regular church service until the end when a short marriage ceremony was performed.

Dad said he has no idea what the sermon was about that day. The entire service was in German and rather than say “I do,” they said, “yah” to commit. And there was no kiss-the-bride announcement either. Dad doesn’t remember where their attendants, Aunt Bina and his cousin Miller Glanzer, were during the ceremony.

He does recall; however, tears rolling down his cheeks when my mom's other sister, Aunt Grace, and neighbor lady Ruth Decker sang "Blessed be the Tie that Binds." Click here to hear the lyrics and various renditions of the old hymn.

Dad & Mom with their wedding cake on the south side of the house

So the ceremony was simple and short without a lot of hoopla. In fact, his sister Mary Ruth and mother just made sure all the important parties were in church that day.

Grandma Elizabeth invited the minister and his wife Katrina and other close family members to the house then for a celebration dinner of noodle soup. Dad remembers my cousin Judy running around and estimates she was around 3-years-old. Cousin Cynthia was there too, but younger. Maybe my cousins can fill in some blanks here by commenting on the blog as to what they remember.

Mom's family makes a visit.
Aunt Bina, Aunt Grace with Cousin Judy in front, Grandma Katie, and Mom

What about the opening of gifts? Dad doesn't remember that part. Seems Grandma Katie, my mom’s mom, gave Mom a wardrobe for a wedding gift, but it was too tall for the room, so they had to take it back to Doland. Dad doesn’t know about any replacement gift. He doesn’t remember how the item was transported either or when the exchange was even attempted.

There was no honeymoon. Dad said the next day Mom was on her hands and knees scrubbing the floor in the front room upstairs. Sounds like Mom. Work before play. Always. I am a lot like her.

Sure wish I’d have talked with Mom more about this sort of thing when she was alive because she had a photographic memory. But I’m glad that on his 71st wedding anniversary, Dad still remembers a few precious details of the day he married the only woman he'd ever kissed.




Any interesting wedding details in your families? How about the circumstances of your parents' wedding?

 

Namesake

Cliff hangers. I ended last week's post, Seven Silly Tidbits, with an unanswered question. Which deceased relative would I choose to spend time with if I could?

My answer?

Grandma Elizabeth.

Grandma Elizabeth sitting where the kitchen sink now resides in the family farmhouse.

She was dad's mom who died long before I was born. She was the writing type. Kept five-year diaries that no-doubt influenced my Aunt Mary Ruth, the niece she raised like a daughter. My middle name, Beth, connects me to her, the woman whose house I grew up in.

My dad, Aunt Mary Ruth, and Grandma Elizabeth standing on the west side of the house. The window behind my dad used to be the front door. This is the only picture I have seen with that in tact. Now it's the bathroom.

One of Grandma Elizabeth's silly sayings has endured. Many times, people broke down with flat tires or cars would just stall. So whenever the family turned the corner near the farm, she'd say, "Now if we had to, we could walk." I find myself saying that whenever I return from going out of town.

Her life was not void of tragedy. Grandma Elizabeth miscarried twins years before my dad was born. The stillborn girls were buried on the family farm. No marker served as their grave. I think that's sad, but Dad said that's how things were done back then. 

My dad Waldo doesn't look too happy about this family picture.

Grandma Elizabeth also had rapid weight gains and losses. She battled depression to the point where she received shock treatments—twice—at the state hospital in Yankton, South Dakota. My dad, who watched the first treatment, said it lifted her entire body off the table. He did not watch that again.

Afterwards, Grandma Elizabeth spent a couple days in the hospital. My mom stayed with her. She embroidered tea towels to pass the time as Grandma slept. Because of this family history, I am cognizant of my own thought life and find any study of the human mind to be fascinating.

Grandma with Grandpa drove this car during a parade in Hitchcock.

Grandma's furniture is still around. My mom used her China closet and matching server until the house was remodeled in the '70s for the first wedding in our family. Read more about that in my post entitled Curlers, A Bra and an Airplane Ride.  


Mom would often stick pictures behind the wooden inlet in the China Closet. When Mom got her new China closet when I was around seven, this old one was a three-level Barbie doll townhouse. For more about how those dolls kept me company on long road trips in my blog post, Seven Kids and Me.

I now have that China closet. It holds my best Longaberger dishes.

Grandma Elizabeth's China closet

writing on the back of it: Feb. 27  ~  1941      $31.95      Gamble

Why the handwriting on the back? Seems that was the thing to do. Write the price and the purchase year. The matching server resides in our garage. Needed more room in my house for the piano.

Another piece I have of Grandma's is what we call the game chest. It stored the table games. I use it now as an armoire. It is solid wood and houses our bedroom TV on top. When Dad, my sister Brenda, and I were moving this heavy piece downstairs, Grandma's writing on the back revealed something. What we saw made it even more special. 

the game chest

 

Grandma wrote ~ Our Father gave this dresser to me in 1929 ~ which he made himself ~ Mrs. Pete ~which I appreciate

It took us awhile to decipher Grandma's spelling. I thought she wrote apricot, but it was appreciate. My Great Grandpa, Michael Hofer #2, made the game chest. He was a blacksmith and a carpenter of sorts.

Precious. Just precious. Just like time with Grandma Elizabeth would be.

Some day, I hope those five-year diaries of Grandma's will be mine. And maybe someday, one of my greats will cherish mine. 


Do you have a relative you've never met that you wish you could spend time with? What traits have you inherited from them?

Writer's note: this is a continuation of last week's post, Seven Silly Tidbits, written in response to a challenge from my online friend, Shelli Littleton. She tagged me to post random facts about myself.