Flossie Morris' sewing room has everything a seamstress dreams of: tables to lay out work, enough drawers for keeping everything organized, a mini refrigerator for snacks and soda, and a TV/VCR for watching M.A.S.H., as she sews. But she isn’t making fancy dresses or quilts, she’s making panties for little girls.
Morris spends several hours a day in her sewing room making what she has termed Granny’s Panties. What started as a way to keep busy after retiring from teaching has turned into a huge project.
I’ve always sewed, Morris said. When I was younger, I had a sewing business in Jacksonville.
Flossie constructs panties for girls from old t-shirts or fabric. "The fabric needs to have a one way stretch to it," reports Flossie. She makes 10 different girl sizes 2-14. These panties are then given out to girls through charitable organizations throughout central Illinois such as the H.E.L.P Center and Inner City Mission in Springfield.
Residents of the Inner City Mission receive one pair of Granny Panties a week and they get three when they move into the center, said Morris. That adds up to thousands of pairs of panties. The mission gets 100 pairs at a time. Ten of each size, reports Morris pointing to the stacks of panties laid out on the table.
Morris is looking for sewers to help construct the panties as well as t-shirts to use as material. She can get about three pairs of panties out of one t-shirt. "My hope is that some church ladies group will jump in and help out," said Morris. "Its not difficult to do and only takes about 15 minutes to make a pair. The only cost to construct the panties is the thread and elastic for the top and leg holes." Currently Morris is only making girls panties.
Granny’s Panties is only one way that Flossie has given her time and love to this community. She and her husband Paul were foster parents for 18 children. At one point they had nine children in their house: a combination of their own children and foster children.
They also hosted W.I.U. foreign students for holidays. "They didn’t have anywhere else to go," said Flossie of the foreign students. "This became home for some of them. The students could always count on a hot meal when they came to visit."
For several years the Morrises owned Granny’s a Christian Bookstore in Rushville. "Flossie always had a way of reading a customer when they walked in the door", said Paul. "She would talk to them and always knew what to give them to make them feel better. No one left the store empty handed."
In addition to this, Flossie taught grade school for several years and was also a high school special education teacher.
"I don’t know how she did it all and raised a family," said Paul.
Flossie continues to touch and change lives this time through her sewing. She doesn’t show signs of stopping any time soon.
(This article was written and the picture taken by Shelly Akins, The Rushville Times)