Archaeological Church Dig

Our pastor has been keeping himself busy at the church by cleaning out cabinets and organizing what he finds. A few days ago, he sent me an e-mail saying he had found some sewing stuff in the office and did I want to come look at it? (I am the current president of the Mennonite Women/sewing group so that falls under my job description.) I popped over to the church yesterday morning to see what he had unearthed. Margaret, no doubt you will recognize some of this stuff. If you—or anyone else from church—knows more about these items, let me know. For now, they are stored in the sewing room.

There were two winder-type thingies that I thought might be for reeling binding. This one has “Mennonite Central Committee” and an address on it:

Our pastor says he remembers, as a child, tearing up sheets and winding them into balls to be used as bandages. Maybe that was this object’s purpose?

The ubiquitous button tin, although this one originally held bandages and not cookies:

And quilt block templates:

I found these most intriguing as they appeared to be made from some very heavy, very coarse-grit sandpaper. Did that come from the sawmill that used to be in this area? The sandpaper would have helped keep the template from sliding around on the fabric. Nowadays, we use mostly rotary cutters, rulers, and mats to cut quilt blocks. This is old-school quilting, for sure.

Also in the box of items were two bags, one containing packages of bias tape—and some 1/4” elastic—and one containing short lengths of ribbon. Arlene Johnson, there was a book with your name on it with some designs I suspect may have been used for appliqué. If you would like it back, let me know, although after this long, you may not be missing it, LOL.

The pastor tells me there is another box with Mennonite Women records dating back to the 1950s in it. I will get that out one of these days and sort through it.

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It’s been raining steadily since last evening and that is a welcome sound on the metal roof. I can’t work outside today, so I am going to cook down a couple of chickens for stock and attack some paperwork. My supervisor from my medical transcription job e-mailed me yesterday with an update. Apparently, one of the doctors is leaving the clinic and another one is retiring at the end of the month. The two of them made up about 40% of the work in the queue. She wanted me to know that the clinic probably wouldn’t have enough work to bring me back on board, so it appears I am retired once more. I don’t need the work, but I enjoyed it and will miss it.

I guess it’s time to make long-term plans again so that the universe can screw them up for me. That has certainly been the theme for 2020 thus far. Do I sound bitter? I’m not, really—just getting weary of the constant upheaval. I’m not lacking for tasks to keep me busy around here, but I do better with some benchmarks to aim for.

Our governor, Steve Bullock, announced phased re-openings for Montana beginning this weekend. I have no plans to rush back out into public even though I’d really like to see my kids. I can wait a few more weeks—or even a month or two—for a road trip. This is such a difficult balancing act. Montana is so dependent upon tourism that for the state to stay closed for a season would be devastating, but I hope we are not invaded by people fleeing other areas.