Number 12, spoon - stainless slotted spoon
Nothing much to report. Maybe a family story would suffice.
My mom grew up as one of nine girls on a homestead in New Mexico. She was born in 1905 so saw many changes in the world. When they were growing up, my grandmother washed clothes outside in big tubs sitting over wood fires to heat the water. She used a washboard and elbow grease to wash, then hung the clothes on a line to dry.
One day my grandfather came along and told her, "I can't believe the amount of washing you have, you should just paint their bottoms blue and turn them out to play."
Well, one of my aunts heard and took that to heart. She and three of the sisters including my mom went into the shed, found some blue paint and painted themselves from the waist down! Not knowing of course that the paint was lead based in those days. They were all sick and my grandmother didn't have anything but gasoline or kerosene (I'm not sure which) to clean the paint off. They almost died.
Careful what you say in front of kids!!
7 comments:
Whoa! How a story can be heartwarming and alarming at the same time, I can't figure out! Did something about the slotted spoon trigger the story? In any case, I'm glad I dropped in!!!
Your grandfather sounds like an interesting man. The lead based paint sounds scary, though. It is amazing how far we've come with paints and such. Just imagine the old masters using such toxic paints.
The slotted spoon caught my attention too.
Susan, I was just trying to find something to write about. My mom liked to draw and I have posted about that before and thought about the "blue paint" story. Those girls did so much growing up as ranch hands.
Bag Blog, He must have been very interesting. He met my grandmother on a cattle drive and sent for her to come to New Mexico from Missouri. He was the State Land Commissioner in New Mexico and died before my time. :-(
that was a big blue oops!
Jennifer Rose, yep! Amazing that I am here. Ha.
Yikes! That's a terrible story. I do not remember hearing it before but I imagine I have. Wow.
Yes, Joanna. You probably did hear it. Pretty scary what kids will try.
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