A NUMBER IN BUTTONS!

As it is my 200th blip birthday today, I hope you will indulge me, as I am using TWO of the blips in the HeartFreek July Photo Challenge, namely A NUMBER and BUTTONS.

The number, of course, is self explanatory (have I really not missed doing a blip a day for 200 days?) and the buttons belonged to Mr. HCB's mother who kept them in a large metal toffee tin - didn't all Grandmas have a button box in the olden days?

Mr. HCB's Mother was a seamstress for a local tailor and in fact, was still sewing well into her 80s. She had a basket full of material remnants, cut off when she had taken up a dress or a pair of trousers, bits of elastic, mostly taken from old knickers that had been consigned to the bin and of course, her button box. This was full of assorted buttons, large, small, shiny, material, some with two holes, some with four and all cut off old dresses, skirts, shirts, cardigans or coats before they too were either put in the bin or given to the Rag and Bone man who called regularly at the house. All this "treasure" sat next to her treadle sewing machine - an old Singer!

Our two sons loved sorting these buttons into pairs, or threes or fours and obviously, this helped them when they were beginning to count and learn colours. Their grandmother also taught them to sew and they spent many happy hours sewing buttons on to scraps of material, and whilst sorting out the buttons for this blip, Mr. HCB and I had a lovely time reminiscing about this and about his Mum generally. Sadly, she died almost 17 years ago, just after her great granddaughter, Charlotte, was born, but her memory lives on.

On this special day, I would like to thank all those who have helped me to get here - for your comments and friendship, for your encouragement and all the fun and laughter we have shared over the last 200 days. It has been a "blipping" wonderful journey and I hope all you lovely blippers have enjoyed sharing it with me.

I leave you with that wonderful verse from NUMBERS 6:24 :

The Lord bless you
and keep you;
the Lord make his face shine on you
and be gracious to you;
the Lord turn his face towards you
and give you peace.

I pray you will all be truly blessed today - and if you need an extra blessing, and some of my blip friends do, then I pray a double blessing especially for you - you know who you are!