New kids have arrived at my school (CSVM), and they are all scrubbing their stones to flatten their stones to flatten their plane soles and sharpen their blades to flatten their first pieces of spruce to make linings. Reminded me of that cumulative song, I know an old lady who swallowed a fly. So here, I present you the violinmaker’s version:

I know an old lady who flattened her straightedge,
but I don’t know how she flattened her straightedge.
She flattened her straightedge to flatten her marble,
she flattened her marble to flatten her whetstone
she flattened her whetstone to flatten her plane sole
she flattened her plane sole to flatten her jointer
she flattened the jointer to flatten her plate edge
but gave it a hollow against her straightedge,
And then she glued.

Note: I confess I took various liberties in accuracy to make the song work better: We do not flatten our straightedges – the way to keep a straightedge flat is… never ever drop it ever. And although we don’t flatten our marbles, we do wiggle our straightedges all over them to find high spots! Oh, and we do not flatten our stones on the marble, though it’s fine to do it that way.