Sweet story.....Our yellow shirt is the "Ever Ready Bunny" Shows up in someone's Christmas stocking every year. What's yours???
PW


>The baggy yellow shirt had long sleeves, four extra-large pockets trimmed
>in black thread and snaps up the front. It was faded from years of wear,
>but still in decent shape. I found it in 1963 when I was home from college
>on Christmas break, rummaging through bags of clothes Mom intended to give
>away. "You're not taking that old thing, are you?" Mom said when she saw
>me packing the yellow shirt. "I wore that when I was pregnant with your
>brother in 1954!"
>"It's just the thing to wear over my clothes during art class,
>Mom. Thanks!" I slipped it into my suitcase before she could object. The
>yellow shirt became a part of my college wardrobe. I loved it After
>graduation, I wore the shirt the day I moved into my new apartment and on
>Saturday mornings when I cleaned.
>The next year, I married. When I became pregnant, I wore the yellow shirt
>during big-belly days. I missed Mom and the rest of my family, since we
>were in Colorado and they were in Illinois. But that shirt helped. I
>smiled, remembering that Mother had worn it when she was pregnant, 15 years
>earlier. That Christmas, mindful of the warm feelings the shirt had given
>me, I patched one elbow, wrapped it in holiday paper and sent it to Mom.
>When Mom wrote to thank me for her "real" gifts, she said the yellow shirt
>was lovely. She never mentioned it again.
>The next year, my husband, daughter and I stopped at Mom and Dad's to pick
>up some furniture. Days later, when we uncrated the kitchen table, I
>noticed something yellow taped to its bottom. The shirt!
>And so the pattern was set.
>On our next visit home, I secretly placed the shirt under Mom and Dad's
>mattress. I don't know how long it took for her to find it, but almost two
>years passed before I discovered it under the base of our living-room floor
>lamp. The yellow shirt was just what I needed now while refinishing
>furniture. The walnut stains added character.
>In 1975 my husband and I divorced. With my three children, prepared to
>move back to Illinois. As I packed, a deep depression overtook me. I
>wondered if I could make it on my own. I wondered if I would find a job.
>I paged through the Bible, looking for comfort. In Ephesians, I read, "So
>use every piece of God's armor to resist the enemy whenever he attacks, and
>when it is all over, you will be standing up."
>I tried to picture myself wearing God's armor, but all I saw was the
>stained yellow shirt. Slowly, it dawned on me Wasn't my mother's love a
>piece of God's armor? My courage was renewed.
>Unpacking in our new home, I knew I had to get the shirt back to
>Mother. The next time I visited her, I tucked it in her bottom dresser
>drawer.
>Meanwhile, I found a good job at a radio station. A year later I
>discovered the yellow shirt hidden in a rag bag in my cleaning closet.
>Something new had been added. Embroidered in bright green across the
>breast pocket were the words "I BELONG TO PAT."
>Not to be outdone, I got out my own embroidery materials and added an
>apostrophe and seven more letters. Now the shirt proudly proclaimed, "I
>BELONG TO PAT'S MOTHER." But I didn't stop there. I zigzagged all the
>frayed seams, then had a friend mail the shirt in a fancy box to Mom from
>Arlington, VA. We enclosed an official looking letter from "The Institute
>for the Destitute," announcing that she was the recipient of an award for
>good deeds. I would have given anything to see Mom's face when she opened
>the box. But, of course, she never mentioned it.
>Two years later, in 1978, I remarried. The day of our wedding, Harold and
>I put our car in a friend's garage to avoid practical jokers. After the
>wedding, while my husband drove us to our honeymoon suite, I reached for a
>pillow in the car to rest my head. It felt lumpy. I unzipped the case and
>found, wrapped in
>wedding paper, the yellow shirt. Inside a pocket was a note: "Read John
>14:27-29. I love you both, Mother."
>That night I paged through the Bible in a hotel room and found the verses:
>"I am leaving you with a gift: peace of mind and heart. And the peace I
>give isn't fragile like the peace the world gives. So don't be troubled or
>afraid. Remember what I told you: I am going away, but I will come back to
>you again. If you really love me, you will be very happy for me, for now I
>can go to the Father, who is greater than I am. I have told you these
>things before they happen so that when they do, you will believe in me."
>The shirt was Mother's final gift. She had known for three months that she
>had terminal Lou Gehrig's disease. Mother died the following year at age
>57.
>I was tempted to send the yellow shirt with her to her grave. But I'm glad
>I didn't, because it is a vivid reminder of the love-filled game she and I
>played for 16 years. Besides, my older daughter is in college now,
>majoring in art. And every art student needs a baggy yellow shirt with big
>pockets.

Great Story and great idea.. will have to think of an item to start this tradition with .