A Very Special Recipe Holder

This is a VERY special post for me.  On February 18, 2004 an incredible woman passed away after a very long and courageous battle with cancer.  My Mom, Anita, was a wonderful woman who loved her church, her family and cooking.  No don't worry, this isn't going to be depressing so keep reading...I promise!  Before my Mom passed away she gave me a book of handwritten recipes.  I will cherish this book for the rest of my life.  The funny part of her giving me this book is, my Mom truly hoped that I would become an incredible cook and baker like her.  Mom won awards for her cooking and enjoyed entering her food into the local county fair as well.  She found great joy in cooking...I do NOT.  We were very opposite in our hobbies for sure, but to this day I can remember my Mom cooking away and loving changing recipes to suit her taste.  Better yet was when we would go to her favorite restaurant and she would say, "I can taste nutmeg, cinnamon and butter" as she tried to figure out how to make what she was eating when she got home.  I am not a great cook, NOR do I enjoy cooking.  I do like to bake, but nothing complicated like a cake from scratch, which my Mom loved doing.  She loved the challenge of it all, kinda like how I love the challenge of transforming items into something new.  It was a sad day when she left us to go to a better place, but we are left with wonderful memories of her cooking and her RECIPES!  

I'm the keeper of the recipes for the family.  The recipes were a mess because somehow after she passed away the recipes ended up all over the floor when they fell out of their holder.  I knew that one day I would find a great place to put the recipes, but never found just the right thing.  That is until last week :-)  I went to  Goodwill, which I now do once a week, and happened upon an old card holder like they have at the library...or had at the library.  Sorry it's been awhile since I've been at the library looking through the dewey decimal system...LOL  Anyway, the card holder was a whopping $2 and gray.  It had a bit of rust on it and some scratches, but I immediately fell in love with it and knew it had to be mine.  I had no idea what I was doing with this thing until I started driving home.  The idea hit me and I had to smile!!  I decided to put Mom's recipes in the card holder and put it on the kitchen counter. I'm hoping over time I will add more recipes to this holder and then pass them on to my Son some day.  A family legacy so to speak.  I know to some people these are just recipes, but when I opened up the old card holder and saw my Mom's writing and her notes on the recipes, it brought tears to my eyes and memories of her came flooding back.  These little pieces of paper are memories and memories need to be cherished and put in a place of respect and honor.  That's what I hope I'm doing with them now :-)   

So here's the card holder before I did anything to it.  Not exactly pretty, huh?

With a can of spray paint and a bit of tape I was able to transform this little card holder into something pretty that sits on my counter by the fridge.  

I sprayed over the metal handle at the front because it was too rusty.   I'm going to make a label as soon as my Silhouette machine arrives.  I just have to figure out what I want it to say...something more than just RECIPES :-)

This project means a lot to me.  The recipes are easy to get to now and they're in a nice, safe place where they won't end up on the floor again.  People might leave our lives when they pass away, but their memories stay with us forever.  I will always have the memory of Mom making her 'Pake' for the first time.  'Pake' is a cake on top of a pecan pie, which she made in a heart shaped pan no less!  It was way too sweet on the tongue and a bit crazy, but what a fun memory I have of Mom's excitement over making this recipe for the first time.  Priceless!