A Simple Life

Grandmother was a career woman. She didn’t hold high position in a corporation, but she did operate and care for her own 4+ acres near Hawk Run Creek which was a tributary to the great Moshannon Creek. While Grandfather was working the local bituminous coal mines, Grandmother was busy being industrial and entrepreneurial. She would buy and sell the chickens, pigs and the cows, while growing all the produce, fruits and vegetables which she would preserve, successfully storing it all in her fruit cellar, to meet the future needs of her family.

That was only half of Grandmother’s enterprise. The other half consisted of a storeroom of used notions, a sewing machine, and her hands. With those simple things, Grandmother would sew, knit, and crochet. She would make beautiful rugs, knotted together using scraps of color until she had a mosaic of material, so to speak, that we as children took for granted when we walked into her home in our muddy boots. And it wasn’t just her fabric creations that were so useful, she knew how to make soap and other necessities for her family from the most simple, pure ingredients. It wasn’t fancy. But it was good and useful. You might say that it was better than anything we use today. She could also make simple things with wood, a hammer, and a couple of nails.

This is the spirit behind Moshannon Select LLC, Olive Branch Soapworks, and Lost Run Woodworks. We are pleased to share a little of what we experienced in our family with yours.

Grandmother standing in front of her bungalow which was set less than ½ mile from Moshannon Creek.