Wardrobe for Cindy

When Cindy was a little girl, she wanted a wardrobe where she could keep her Barbie and other doll clothes. We couldn’t afford to get the real thing, so I made her one out of a box. My husband was a school teacher and teachers were paid very little those days. Come to think of it, they’re still not paid enough. Teachers have to put up with a lot from unruly students, and if they take action, they may be sued by the parents or the kids . . . or even fired. They must be so careful in their interaction with their students, that it makes me wonder why anyone would want to be a teacher anymore. People say teachers have a long vacation every summer as if that were a bad thing. The thing is teachers can’t afford to not work in the summer, so they all have to get out and hustle to find summer jobs. My husband worked many different jobs during the summers. Sometimes he taught driver’s education and would bring the students by our house where I’d give them all popsicles. I guess that was our vacation. The students would examine my fish ponds, my frog and our dogs and then be on their way . . . sort of like a home zoo. They wanted to examine our girls, but the girls were off limits. Those weren’t bad times as we didn’t know anything else. All of our friends were in the same boat. But I made some great meals, and the best one was my secret recipe for baked spam. We all loved it, so I suppose we had it quite frequently. Maybe that’s why my cholesterol was off the charts in those days. Now I never eat it unless Harry, my grandson, comes to town because I taught him how to love spam. But that happens only about twice a year which is sad because I could eat it every day!

But getting back to the wardrobe, I found a box and covered it with some chenille that had little white balls on the edges - probably from an old bedspread - and I covered the inside of the box with red cloth. I put some wire inside across the top so that clothes could be hung on it. When Christmas came, Cindy loved the wardrobe and had it for many years. I thought it was gorgeous! I have a picture of Teri that Christmas holding a ukulele which was one of her own gifts. I liked it as it brought back memories of my college days and singing with the girls in my dorm. I’ll have to ask Teri if I ever gave her a chance to use it.