My grandpa was what you might gently call a pack-rat. There's no doubt that Mike Wolfe from American Pickers would be all over his basement and garage. I loved visiting my dad's father as a child because I could spent hours exploring a basement full of toys and machines from the 1940's and 50's.
One day while my brother and I puttered around in that musty old cellar, we stumbled upon the strangest table I had ever seen. It looked like a small desk, but you could flip over the wooden top and an old sewing machine made an appearance! I did not grow up around people sewing or using sewing machines, so I was completely riveted.
When we ran upstairs to tell grandpa what we had "found", he told us it had belonged to his parents, and he told us their story. They sailed across the ocean from Italy to New York at the turn of the century, and upon arriving to the land of opportunity they opened up a shop in New York as tailors for men.
My paternal great grandparents
As an adult, it haunted me that I had never learned to sew. A few years ago, one of my resolutions was that I WOULD learn to sew and I would pick up the torch, so the speak, where my great-grandparents left off. And so New York to Nashville was born. I know I am carrying on a family tradition every day that I work.