Great Aunt Claudia- Faux Family Album

This is my entry into the colloborative project I started called Faux Family Album. I asked some of my most favorite artists to participate, and lo and behold there are about 20 of us! I sent each participant a vintage picture of an unknown person from my very large collection, along with the black page from a vintage photo album. I asked each person to use the picture to create an album page and write a story to go along with it. We are nearing the end of the project, and I will be copying each page so each artist will have a complete copy of the project! Below is the "story" of my "Great Aunt Claudia."

When my Great Aunt Claudia was 4-years old her Mother took her to have her picture professionally done. One of the props the photographer used was a basked of flowers that Aunt Claudia wore on her back. She later told me that she always remembered how happy she was that day because of the beauty of the flowers. Her family was not poor, but they certainly could not afford fresh cut flowers in their home. As she was growing up she always dreamt of running a flower shop. She traced the idea back to having her picture taken with the flowers when she was 4.

It did not seem that she would ever have a flower shop though because she went to college and studied Art History. She was going to become a teacher. As part of her courses she was able to go to Paris for a semester abroad. She was going to study the paintings at the Louvre. As fate would have it she met a handsome young man named Paul. (Can you believe they met right near the Mona Lisa?? It’s true!). They had a fairy tale romance and married soon after they met. Paul was very supportive of Aunt Claudia’s dreams and they arranged to open a flower shop in the Latin Quarter. They named the shop Les Charmettes.

The shop gave them so much joy. Aunt Claudia’s favorite thing to do was to go the nearby hospital and bring all kinds of beautiful flowers for the patients and nurses. She was really able to make a difference with her flowers as people just loved the way she arranged them. She always said to me that it was the small things in life that help urge us on to tackle the big problems in life. From a few flowers grew many good deeds..........