What a sweet story of how Bella Pamella got its start:
One afternoon at a function in the church basement I noticed someone had meticulously arranged a display of aprons. One apron had a little sign on it describing its former owner. A great-grandmother, her children, grand-children and great-grand-children numbered something like 70.
And the author of the sign figured that this apron was worn for every meal ever served those 70 descendants in her kitchen.
The thought occurred to me that if you asked those people to describe their matriarch the description would surely include that apron.
It was her uniform. And since it covered her from shoulders to knee they might have little idea what else she had on. That woman’s identity was defined by that apron. And a realization came crashing down on my head: I wanted that.
Increasingly, I’m aware of a longing to be connected with my home and mothering. I wanted my kids and my future grand-kids and great-grandkids to think of me, not as I come running in the door from work at 6pm, but as I function in my kitchen, serving up some homemade comfort in my “uniform”, my identity, my apron.
When I set about to find the quintessential apron I was amazed to see that with all we consumers have at our fingertips, nowhere could I find a good old-fashioned apron. Pretty much every apron out there was the basic “butcher” style. No frills. One piece of fabric. Twill tape ties.
Being a sewer, I was undaunted. I figured I’d make one. But that turned out to be much more difficult than I realized. Somehow what seemed to be a perfectly simple and utilitarian article was not so easily captured. So, I began to research. And sew. And sew and sew.
Then, the more I sewed, the more I realized I wasn’t just trying to make the perfect apron. I was setting out to recreate a familiar comfort of a time past. I also realized if I felt that way, maybe others did too.
And BellaPamella was born.
Apron stories, indeed: My story: A few summers ago, my brother and his children visited me. While the boys went out somewhere, my niece (seven or eight years old at the time, I think) stayed home with me, and together we prepared to bake some chocolate chip cookies. To get going, I set her up in one of my aprons. I didn’t think much about it at the time, but… Fast forward to the next summer, my niece went down to visit my Aunt Mary Anne. They were going to do some baking too. My Aunt later told me that before they got started, my niece asked, “Aunt Mary Anne, can we wear aprons? I wore an apron at Aunt Pam’s.” Peeples, this is the stuff that memories are made of!
Our new friends in laminate land — executives from Wilsonart — from left, Alison DeMartino, Natalia Smith, Andrea Flint and Tammy Weadock. Gwen Petter and Beth Randolph were key contacts, too, although this missed this photo op last Friday, when the package o’ aprons arrived.
How to enter to win an Adult+Child apron set from Bella Pamella:
- To win, you must be a subscriber to our newsletter —> Sign up here; if you are already a subscriber, you don’t need to sign up again (Yes, this is “what’s in it for the blog” — you can opt out at any time after the contest ends, or continue on for the stories and because our goal is to schedule a giveaway every two weeks.)
- To enter, use the Comment field on this post below and tell us: Which Bella Pamella apron design and fabric would you choose? Click here to scope them out. Or” How about, give us an apron story. Or, a happy whatever — we’re easy, the goal is joy.
- One entry per person. U.S. lower 48 states only.
- Entries close on Friday, Feb. 19, around 5 p.m. Eastern — that is, we will close the Comments field at that time.
- Prize: There will be one winner. The winner will receive one Adult apron and one Child or Sister apron in the design and fabric their choice, delivered by Bella Pamella.
- Publisher Pam (not apron designer Pam) will choose the winners via the Random Number Generator at random.org. We will email each person. [Tip: Be sure you enter your email address correctly in the email field of the Comment form.] The winner will have five business days to respond. If we do not hear from them, we will choose the next person who commented. Lather, rinse, repeat. We will post the winner’s first name as soon as all is confirmed.
- Terms of use apply.
Many thanks to Pam! Bella aprons!
And, congrats to our recent giveaway winners, Jordan, who won the Tiki Diablo tiki mug, and Lisa, winner of the Ikea PS2014 light.
Link Love:
Disclosure: We were not paid to host this giveaway —
we do giveaways to delight readers and to grow our newsletter list.
You can read more about how we make money here.
The post Giveaway: Enter to win a pair of Bella Pamella vintage style aprons — Adult + Child appeared first on Retro Renovation.
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