Sewing, Stitching, and Quilting at The Pioneer Museum

For my stitching and vintage loving friends out there I thought I would post a few pictures of quilts and embroidery items that we saw during our tour of the Kenmare Pioneer Museum.

 

There were many vintage quilts displayed throughout the museum.  Here are a few.



A beautiful Signature Quilt.

Another Signature quilt.  Folks could pay 25 cents to have their name embroidered on a block.  Proceeds were given to the Red Cross.

Crazy Quilt (and some books I didn't look at!  I wonder what they are.)

Dresden quilt.  Every flower was the same which tells me that only these fabrics were used.  Maybe they were feed sacks, or a little girl's dresses.

This beautiful quilt is a Log Cabin quilt (I think).  So pretty!

This quilt was probably my favorite and I wish I knew what the pattern is called. 

Here are some pretty French knots.  Wow, I'll bet this took a few hours!

And here are some examples of beautiful handy work.

 

 

 

Colorful doilies.  I especially like the one with the grape bunches and leaves.

 

 

Some adorable embroidered quilt squares.

 

 

And here are some fun notions.

 

 

And some fun, fashionable patterns!

 

 

 

And I'll leave you today with a whole wall of patterns to drool over.  Aren't they wonderful!?

 

That's all for today, until another time, have a happy, vintage, stitching day!

 



Dyed Yarn Placemat

Back in July of 2012, darling daughter and I dyed some white Sugar-n-Cream brand yarn.  It was such a fun project and we were very excited about how the cute little balls of pastel colored yarn turned out.

 

 

Since then, the little balls of yarn have been living inside this large, glass, pickle jar just waiting to be used for something....but what?

 

Well, the other day I saw a colorful place mat in a store and it dawned on me...I can make my OWN colorful place mat for spring decorating with our little balls of yarn!

 

So I grabbed my Grandma's old crochet hook and set to work.

 

 

Well, the finished project is pretty crooked on one side (I'm not very good at crochet), but I think the colors are kind of pretty.

If you would like to see the blog post about the yarn dying that we did, click HERE, and

as always, have a happy day!

Home Arts Magazines

This past weekend's flea turned out to be a fun one!  This is one of my finds, a stack of Home Arts Magazines (Needle Arts).

I apologize for the photo quality.  My scanner is on the frizz again!  This is the second printer-scanner-copier I've owned that goes bonkers when I try to scan!  I'm ready to buy a plain old scanner.

This is probably my favorite one of the three I bought over the weekend. It's from January of 1940!

 

These magazines are full of beautiful embroidered tablecloths, pillow cases, and crochet patterns.  One thing that surprised me about these Home Arts magazines is that they are not JUST about needlepoint, crocheting and other needle arts.  There are small tid-bits about beauty and full articles on making ones home a cheerful place to be.  Especially the kitchen.  Putting three meals on the table everyday could be hard, busy work, why not have a cheerful kitchen in which to work?  

The article below is titled, "Your Kitchen...Make it Compact, Convenient, Colorful"

 

 

And what a cute little kitchen this one is!

 

 

The article goes on to say...

"Even if you can't start from scratch and install that perfect kitchen you want, do something now about the one you have."

"You may assemble canister sets, coffee-makers, cutlery, mixing bowls, and dish towels in fun colors, or black and white, to give zest to your color scheme."

 

Ummm, was this article written for me?  This is exactly what I did three summers ago.  I hated the "vineyard" look of our kitchen decor, we had had for ages.  So I took it all down and replaced it the dusty olive oil bottles and fake grapes with wonderful vintage bowls, tins and goodies I'd collected through the years, including vintage linens.  I love my cozy "vintage" kitchen now!  It's my favorite part of the house!

 

And then there is this fun page...

 

 

"Hello, and Happy New Year again!  Do take down your receivers, everybody, and let's chat, for there are parties afoot, and plans to be making;  and I wonder if you wouldn't like, this year, to help me solve some special party problems."

 

Apparently January and February were the "party" months of the year.  I suppose it makes sense with the cold weather keeping everyone from enjoying the outdoors.

 

 

Finally, the back inside cover is illustrated with 7 or 8 dress patterns.  A gal could choose a pattern, write to the Home Arts Company and buy the patterns.  The patterns were 15 cents back in 1940.  I found this one to be my favorite. 

 

 

What a fun little glance back into time this was for me.  I imagine the woman who received this magazine (she lived on a farm) studied it and read it cover to cover...there are so many interesting articles! 

 

That's all for tonight!  Until another time, have a happy vintage day!

 

 

 

 





A Fun Weekend with Cookies and Yarn

This past weekend was fun.  And I just realized, it's Monday evening and I haven't left the house since Thursday evening!!  Should I try for a whole week?  It's happened before and could very well happen again.

This weekend Autumn had her cousins over for a sleepover so we baked white sugar cookies aka: cutout cookies, aka: frosting holders. 
It went well and the girls had a blast decorating. 

They went a little crazy with the frosting, but they turned out beautiful, and delicious!



All I could think of is The Princess (Prince) and the Pea.



What a little snuggle bug.

Of course, while the girls were having fun playing and decorating cookies, I had a bit of time to crochet and listen to some old radio programs on the computer.  I tried listening to The Jack Benny Show but just couldn't get into it, so I listened to a George and Gracie and a couple Fibber McGee and Molly.  I only crochet about once or twice a year.  My sister-in-law crochets on a weekly (maybe even daily) basis.  She's always got a beautiful project going.  So between her and Pinterest, I was bound to pick up a crochet hook again sooner or later.  I got quite a few new Granny Squares done in a style I had never tried before.  It's called a solid block.  Here is the picture from Pinterest that gave me the inspiration to try the solid block.

So I was looking and looking at these thinking how pretty they are and I realized most of those colors are in my yarn box!  So I hopped online, learned how to make a solid square granny and went to work.

My Grandma Eva taught me how to crochet when I was about 13.  She is very good at it as many women of her time are.  And she made yarn doilies right up until the time she had to go into the rest home.  She was actually working on an afghan for Autumn which was about half completed.  Autumn won't let me finish it, she wants it just the way Grandma left it. 
When my Grandma Eva was younger she could make the prettiest doilies and afghans.  She made Christmas tree angels and potholders. She got many of her patterns from Workbasket magazine.  She also tried to teach me how to knit, but I liked crochet better.  She crochet every person in our family an afghan.  Mine was the rainbow colors ROYGBIV (I was like 10 years old and that's what I wanted).  She told me later that she always thought mine was the prettiest and most fun to do because of all the beautiful colors.  Sadly, she doesn't remember making any of them.  But I will never forget that she did.

So here is my first square done.  Not perfect by any means, but good enough for me as I am not picky.  Well, the funny thing about crochet is...once you start, it's addictive (it's like pinterest).  So I sat and crochet until almost midnight!

 The yarn I am using is all Caron Simply Soft.  The brighter skeins I bought right after Autumn was born and I made her a bright, rainbow afghan.  Then the softer colors I bought just last summer and made my little baby cousin an afghan with those.  So I am running low on some colors and am hoping they are still available at Walmart. 

The lighter colors.  The only two brighter colors I've been using are the hotter pink and lime green.  The green above is just a little to drab.

The other night I had a dream I was in a store (much like the one below) that had a whole wall of colorful yarn (yarn on the brain).  I don't think I purchased any.  I just stood there looking at the way the colors melted into the next, yellow into chartreuse, green into turquoise and so on.  It was a good dream and proof that I dream in color.  Here are some cute yarn stores I found while browsing the web.

Here is the yarn wall at Silver Threads and Golden Needles, a yarn shop located in the historic downtown district of Franklin, North Carolina.  I can just imagine myself walking down the sidewalks, a cup of coffee in hand, seeing this shop and fainting right on the spot. J/K  I could see myself dropping a few twenties in there though. 

Okay, how clever is the name!?  Purl Jam.  Love it!  (Loved the band by the way)  And this little house is the perfect setting for a lovely little yarn store.  Now, if I just knew how to knit and purl.  This little yarn shop is located in Califon, New Jersey.   

We had our own little yarn shop here in Minot called the Yarn Stash, but as I drove by last Wednesday night, I noticed their sign was gone.  Sad.  They still have their website online, so that's promising.  I kept saying I was going to go in there, but you know how it goes.

I will leave you with the address to a blog my Sis-in-law and I LOVE called Attic 24
 http://attic24.typepad.com/weblog/  She always has the most colorful projects and ideas going on in her head.  I just love the way she has decorated her house to be so bright and cheerful.  Take a look and enjoy!

Here is a crochet flower pillow from Attic 24.  Her work is flawless.  And her projects are just so darn bright and cheerful they make me smile every time I visit her blog!

Whew!  I didn't realized I had so much to say about yarn!  I will post more pictures when I get a few more squares done. 
Until then, have a very happy day.