Wanted - a new spade and fork

Tweet

The photo is of my mother, taken on her birthday in 1985. She was born in 1910 and lived to be 104. She was a very keen gardener and was never happier than when out in her garden. We always said, if you couldn’t find her in the house, she would be on the end of a hose somewhere in the garden. And you could also find her by listening for her whistle. If she was gardening, then she was whistling. Like many women of her day, she worked very hard all her life. When we lived on the farm, water was precious. All the laundry was done by hand which was almost an all-day chore. When the laundry was finished, Mum would bucket the water out to her precious plants. But my main purpose in sharing the photo was to show how her tools of her trade – the fork and spade - have been worn down to next to nothing. The spade was once the length of the one on the left. Mum always wore an apron. As well as protecting her clothes, she would often bring in eggs or fruit by picking up the corners of her apron and using it as a hold-all.