Tuesday, January 21, 2020

Aunt Martha's Workbasket, August 1937


A mixed bag this month - how to make rugs by knotting pieces of rag around and through two strands of heavy cord*, tips on trimming using ric-rac, a very PA Dutch-looking tulip applique quilt, a baby's bonnet in crochet, and three pages of patterns to send away for - cross-stitch tea cloths, wooden garden markers, and an embroidered hanging.  Full PDF can be downloaded from the Antique Pattern Library. 

*The same technique is illustrated/explained much more completely in the Popular Mechanics reprint The Girl Mechanic, if you're really interested.

5 comments:

  1. Just got 2 rag rugs my great-grandmother crocheted from, my aunt. Not the same sunny colors as the braided rag rug that died from overuse, but still lovely.

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  2. My grandmother used to twist two colors of rick-rack together so she had a strip of alternating colors. She'd crochet edges along both sides and use this as an insert on a child's dress or trim on a pillowcase. I tried to removed the trim from old pillowcases, but I always ruined the edges. I don't know how to crochet, but I saved the trim for eons, until I faced the fact that I wasn't going to be able to salvage the stuff. For a congenital hoarder, that didn't come easily.

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  3. Has anyone ever seen an extra large pattern for an embroidered cottage in a garden picture from the UK? My landlady of a long time ago had a completed one, on linen, that her mother or grandmother had done before WWII, all framed, hanging in her living room. It was about 2'x3', just bursting with a flower border that would have done Gertrude Jekyll proud, the cottage being just background. I've been looking for one for years without success. Anyone?

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  4. Can you check out the five issues of "Good Needlework" on Sarah Bradberry's site, knitting-and.com? I have seen several cottage embroideries BUT you will have to copy and enlarge them.

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  5. Shay - Thanks for the site. Fingers crossed, I finally find something.

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