Lesley Doran of Hamilton has used hundreds of cross stitches to record not only part of her own life story, but also a piece of New Zealand rural history.

From 1967 to 1970 Lesley worked for Terry and Catherine McGougan in their Waimana IGA store and now she has featured the wide variety of goods the store sold in a large cross stitch artwork she has gifted to her former employers.

“Over the last couple of years while recovering from several operations, doing needlework has helped fill my days,” says Lesley, who featured in the March issue of Coast & Country News when she correctly identified the ‘History Item’ from the Opotiki Museum as an early cash register.

“I recall having to work the heavy keys on the till (in the McGougan IGA store) and the amount would show up on the ticket at the top of the machine. It was all pounds, shillings and pence until decimal currency came in.

“Sometimes the money draw would get stuck and refuse to open, but a good thump in the right place usually got a result.

“It was a heavy, cumbersome appliance which took pride of place on the wooden shop counter.

“Every day it got a clean over to keep it bright and shiny. It was all part of the job to handle cash in those days, not like today’s world of supermarket checkouts and credit cards. Those were the days,” she says.

Her first job obviously made a marked impression on Lesley who took inspiration for her cross stitch project from an old IGA magazine and re-created a ‘shopping list’ of items, including Waimana Red Band Cheese. “The cheese features in the second row of the cross stitch. It was made at the Waimana Cheese Factory and was world-renown as an excellent cheese.”

The cross stitch also includes matches, light bulbs, boots, bikes, ladders, sweets, ice cream, milk, a rolling pin, flour, brooms, petrol and more as examples of the wide variety of goods the IGA general store stocked.

“I well remember all the grocery items we used to stock, including those we weighed up and put price tickets on.

“The coins at the bottom of the frame are a reminder of when New Zealand changed to decimal currency on July 10, 1968. I found the changeover quite easy to handle.”

Lesley says she was never surprised at the jobs she was asked to do at the McGougan store. “I was asked to serve customers, get orders ready for delivery, pump petrol and sweep and wash the floors.

“I remember being sent home early from work on April 10, 1968 as the Wahine storm was coming and Waimana was an area which flooded badly.”