Sylvia shrugged. “We’ll have our celebration tonight. You and Matthew can leave for your mother’s place first thing in the morning.”
“Sounds good to me,” offered Matt.
Sarah was not satisfied. “That still leaves you alone on Christmas Day.”
“Sylvia can spend Christmas at my home,” said Agnes. “With me and the girls and the grandkids. There’s always room for one more.”
“No, there isn’t,” said Sylvia, remembering their phone conversation earlier that day. “So you and your family should spend Christmas with me.”
Agnes brightened. “Here at Elm Creek Manor?”
“We could spend it in the barn if you prefer but the manor will be warmer.” Sylvia smiled. “Why not here? We have a tree, all the fixings for a Christmas dinner, and plenty of room for the children to run around.”
Agnes looked inquiringly at her daughter, who said, “It’s fine with me, Mom, and I know Laura will agree. She was worried about the kids trashing your house, so this will be a load off her mind.”
“The children are more than welcome to trash my house instead,” declared Sylvia.
Agnes beamed, and for a moment, Sylvia glimpsed in her lined face the girl her brother had loved. “In that case, we’d be delighted to accept your invitation.”
On Christmas morning, Sylvia, Sarah, and Matt rose early for church and returned home to a breakfast of Agnes’s apple strudel. The famous Bergstrom recipe was as delicious as Sylvia remembered. The cinnamon spiced apples and flaky crust immediately took Sylvia back to those Christmas mornings of childhood, when the people she loved gathered around the table and reminisced about Christmases past and absent loved ones. Gerda Bergstrom could not have done any better.
They exchanged gifts, and after Sylvia reassured them that she would be perfectly content, Sarah and Matt loaded their suitcases into the red pickup and drove off to Uniontown to spend a few days with Sarah’s mother. Sarah called later that afternoon to tell Sylvia that her mother had loved the Hunter’s Star quilt. Carol had given Sarah and Matt jeans, identical blue-and-white striped sweaters, and knit Penn State hats. “Can you believe it?” said Sarah in a low voice so she would not be overheard. “Matching outfits, like we were five-year-old twins or something.” But she sounded pleased.
Not long after Sarah and Matt departed, Agnes and her brood showed up, and the children promptly filled the manor with enough noise and play and laughter for twice their number. Santa had apparently gone on a Christmas Eve shopping spree, too—in a red pickup rather than a sleigh—because there were toys for each child beneath the tree. After some consideration, Sylvia decided against reviving the tradition of hiding the ruby-and-gold glass star.
It was a wonderful, blessed day.
When her guests departed, Sylvia tidied the kitchen and settled down in the sitting room with a cup of tea, her heart content. She put on her glasses and read Elizabeth’s letter once more, then sighed, folded it, and tucked it away for safekeeping. Somewhere out in California, Elizabeth’s children and grandchildren might be gathered around their own Christmas tree, thinking of Elizabeth fondly just as Sylvia was. Or perhaps Elizabeth was present among them, watching over her family from a favorite spot near the fireplace, the Chimneys and Cornerstones quilt on her lap. Wherever she was, she was also with Sylvia in Elm Creek Manor, for as the Christmas Quilt had shown Sylvia that day, those she loved lived on in their handiwork and in the hearts of those who remembered them.
Tomorrow, Sylvia decided, she would string popcorn and cranberries into garlands and decorate a tree near the creek.
The wildlife of Elm Creek Manor had gone too long without a Christmas feast of their own. She would search through Claudia’s old papers and see if she could find the letter Elizabeth had promised to send, and perhaps with it, an address, a promising lead to the descendants she might have left behind.
But that was for tomorrow. Tonight, in the last few hours of Christmas Day, Sylvia intended to work on the Christmas Quilt, to complete a task too long neglected. In her home full of memories, she felt the presence of all those whom she loved, blessing her and wishing her well. At last she understood the true lesson of the Christmas Quilt, that a family was an act of creation, the piecing together of disparate fragments into one cloth—often harmonious, occasionally clashing and discordant, but sometimes unexpectedly beautiful and strong. Without contrast there was no pattern, as Great-Aunt Lucinda had taught her long ago, and each piece, whether finest silk or faded cotton, would endure if sewn fast to the others with strong seams—bonds of love and loyalty, tradition and faith.
Table of Contents
Colophon
ALSO BYJENNIFERCHIAVERINI
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Epigraph
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Elm Creek Quilts [08] The Christmas Quilt Page 20