Homemade doll clothes. My doll was Christine (I always thought my aunt named my younger cousin after my Christine doll). She had long auburn hair, just like mine, but she had far more elegant apparel than I possessed. That's because her tailor was Grandma Gert. Grandma Gert made Christine a white satin wedding dress so she could pretend she was getting married to her imaginary boyfriend (imaginary because I had no boy dolls except Raggedy Andy and he was taken already). Christine also had a harlot-red satin evening gown...harlot in color only as the design was quite modest as one would expect from Grandma Gert. Grandma Gert didn't seem to be making herself any white or red satin clothing so I don't know how Christine ended up being the fortunate recipient of such elegance. I mean, even I knew that Christine couldn't afford first run fabric: all her clothes were designed and made out of remnants that Grandma Gert some how had access to. But she was by far the best dressed doll in the house, and probably even on the block.

By comparison, Gertrude, my other doll who, due to my love of scissors, sported a choppy mohawk also wore tailor made clothes but hers were far less sophisticated than Christine's were. Perhaps that was due to the difference in tailors (Gertrude's tailor was my mother Margaret), but I suspect it had more to do with the difference in their body styles: Christine was tall, long waisted, with long legs and flat feet. Gertrude was stocky with chubby legs, a baby belly and virtually no neck. Gertrude mostly hung out in a white and blue cotton housedress with matching bloomers...not quite the satin ensembles in Christine's wardrobe.

They would sit on my bed: Christine dressed to the nines in her wedding gown, Gertrude comfy in her bathrobe and bloomers with an old hairpiece of Grandma Gert's stuck into her mohawk to make her seem more lady like. Each much loved in their homemade doll clothes

String beans. When I think about Grandma Gert I think about string beans. A wooden chair, a brown grocery bag and a pot filled with string beans. Snap! Snap! Puuulllll. DroP. Repeat.
What exactly is the difference between a green bean and a string bean, besides green beans coming in tin cans and string beans coming in piles from the produce section. I buy string beans now because they remind me of Grandma Gert. Sometimes they will rot in the vegetable drawer of the icebox and I will end up throwing them out without having performed the ritual Snap! Snap! Puullll. DroP. Repeat. It isn't that I don't like to eat them; I love string beans. Mostly I just forget that I bought them because I didn't purchase them with a plan in mind for including them in a meal; only because they remind me of Grandma Gert.