Gakked from Donna: Stitching question and conversation starter

"Dawne Peterson" wrote in message
el...
My mother did several forms of needlework, and particulary excelled at
petit point on silk gauze. She also loved to knit those very lacy baby
sets. She had no interest in or patience with teaching me anything she
did, so there was no love of needlework shared there. I have talked
previously about my horrible home economics teacher. I was younger by 2
years than the rest of my class, and admittedly had chubby little hands,
and she spent two years ripping up everything I did in front of the class
along with a dripping commentary on how inept I was. My mother, rather
than help me improve, said she was "mortified" by how bad I was, since she
did such lovely work. So again, no great love of needlework there.

After Home Ec I strenuously avoided anything involving a needle until I
married at age 18. Faced with furnishing a home, this hippie girl sewed
up all kinds of things, including a sofa (!!), and embroidered various
objects including weekend shirts for my non-hippie DH. I taught myself
out of books (I love you, Erica Wilson!).

So, what motivated me was the desire to create things I loved, rather than
buy the very ordinary stuff in the stores, the need to save money, and the
desire to differentiate myself from needlework as I had seen it done by
Mum and the aforementioned Awful Home Ec teacher (I have never made a huge
Victorian floral, my mother's favourite theme, or sewn anything out of
huck towelling or cross stitched a gingham apron (the pinnacle of
achievment for the good girls in home ec.) . I guess that involves a
little bit of "I'll show them!!", but my Mum bless her never got the
subtext, and continued to the last offering to show my a better way to
knit (she once ripped out an off shoulder pullover I left at her house,
and when I retrieved it, it had become a "more appropriate for your age"
cable knit cardy. I was 40 something at the time)

Dawne

Loved reading this and someone has to ask, so why not me. How do you sew
up a sofa?????

"Lucille" wrote .

Loved reading this and someone has to ask, so why not me. How do you
sew up a sofa?????

Okay well remember this was the 70s and I was a hippie. The sofa was a huge
(very huge) u-shaped tube, probably over 3 feet in diameter, and the length
of your standard 3 seater sofa along the back of the U. This was the sofa
back and arms. The seat was a very large cushion which filled the interior
of the U, and was attached to it by the decorative (okay, tastes differ) use
of nylong strapping. The whole thing was made of a red-orange fake suede
and stuffed within an inch of its life, so it was very firm. You ended up
sitting a couple of feet off the floor, but hey, I was a teenager so jumping
up from that height was no trouble.
It lasted for many years, and eventually did service as my son's bed after
moving from the crib, the low height and soft surround being absolutely
perfect for that.
Alas, I left it with ex-DH when I left him. I believe it did one long
distance move with him to act as DS's bed for visits--another advantage was
it was comparatively easy to move around.
To accomplish this, I managed to sew a napped fabric, use those big curved
upholstery needles, and several other tasks which if I had paid attention in
Home Ec I would have known were "advanced techniques" and so beyond my
capabilities. The courage of youth??You can accomplish great things when
you don't know what you aren't supposed to be able to do!!

Dawne

"Dawne Peterson" wrote in message
el...

"Lucille" wrote .

Loved reading this and someone has to ask, so why not me. How do you
sew up a sofa?????

Okay well remember this was the 70s and I was a hippie. The sofa was a
huge (very huge) u-shaped tube, probably over 3 feet in diameter, and the
length of your standard 3 seater sofa along the back of the U. This was
the sofa back and arms. The seat was a very large cushion which filled
the interior of the U, and was attached to it by the decorative (okay,
tastes differ) use of nylong strapping. The whole thing was made of a
red-orange fake suede and stuffed within an inch of its life, so it was
very firm. You ended up sitting a couple of feet off the floor, but hey,
I was a teenager so jumping up from that height was no trouble.
It lasted for many years, and eventually did service as my son's bed after
moving from the crib, the low height and soft surround being absolutely
perfect for that.
Alas, I left it with ex-DH when I left him. I believe it did one long
distance move with him to act as DS's bed for visits--another advantage
was it was comparatively easy to move around.
To accomplish this, I managed to sew a napped fabric, use those big curved
upholstery needles, and several other tasks which if I had paid attention
in Home Ec I would have known were "advanced techniques" and so beyond my
capabilities. The courage of youth??You can accomplish great things when
you don't know what you aren't supposed to be able to do!!

Dawne


You sound just like my mother. Many moons ago my really expensive,
beautiful, brown silk sectional couch developed a hole in the very corner
little L that wrapped between the back of the couch and the very low arm.
There was no way new fabric would match to fix just the one love seat sized
pillow and really no way I could afford to have the whole thing
reupholstered so my mother said I'm going to fix it.

Innocent me said what the hell do you know about upholtery. Her answer,
which I now know was perfect, was what does a professional use to do it,
said she. He uses two hands and a needle. What can we lose. She
proceeded to cut a piece out of the back which was against the wall and cut
a patch big enough to cover the entire little square that had the hole.
She fixed it with one seam, that on the dark chocolate brown didn't stand
out too much and was easily covered with a throw pillow. She then sewed a
piece of muslin over the hole in the back and stood back to admire her work.

I used the couch like that for a very long time and no one ever knew it was
repaired.

Amazing what a lot of ingenuity and an even bigger amount of nerve can
accomplish.

On Aug 21, 9:49*am, " wrote:
I started this thread not from a magazine article, but from the EGA
National's yahoo!group.

Sorry - misread.

Hope you don't mind me lifting it for a topic here - I think it's very
interesting!

linda

I just didn't want any looking for an article in Needlearts and not
find it...

Donna in Virginia

Just in case anyone is interested, the EGA is rolling out a student
membership. I was searching for the details, but can't seem to locate
them. Sent an e-mail and will post my answer.

Donna in Virginia

Ah. They are calling it a youth membership. Will be open to children
under 17 or 17 and under?

Cost - $15.

They have not finished finalizing the details of this plan yet. Which
is why I didn't find anything on the website.

Donna in Virginia

On 8/21/09 12:28 PM, "Lucille" wrote:


"Susan Hartman" wrote in message
...
Lucille wrote:

I came from a family of people who knew how to knit, sew, crochet and
even a great aunt who was an haute couturier high fashion designer in the
20's.


If you haven't seen it yet, try to get "House of Eliott" on DVD. I think
you'd enjoy it! (I'm pretty sure Netflix has it, if you're a member.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_House_of_Eliott

sue


--
Susan Hartman/Dirty Linen
The Magazine of Folk and World Music
www.dirtylinen.com


I'm going to look for that. It sounds like something I would like.

It's a great series - you might even be able to find it on a local PBS
station - it was up here some years ago.

My mother used to talk about her very eccentric aunt and told me that she
designed the first tuxedo for women, which was then knocked off by another
designer and worn by Marlene Dietrich in a movie. From the lack of men in
her pictures and the closeness to another lady, arms entwined, etc., we
often speculated on whether or not she might have been gay.

Given the fact that my grandmother despised all men except her son and
son-in-law and their very strict orthodox upbringing in their native Russia,
nothing would surprise me. She threw her husband out and bought a push cart
and sold fruit in the street to raise her kids. The two sisters came to the
U.S. all alone when they were in their early 20's to escape the pogroms in
Russia.

L

Very interesting family history. On my maternal grandmother's side
(similar situation - coming from Russia in IIRC just post WWI (pogrom
affect) - she had an aunt known as "Tante Rosie" who was very glamorous and
taught my grandmother to always keep some money of her own. Evidently Tante
Rosie always had her own funds, etc - and was a "fancy lady" - which I took
to mean that my grandmother and her sisters thought she was a high-priced
prostitute. Go figure.

Hope you can find House of Elliott - it's quite worth the watching for both
the story and the costumes.

Ellice

On 8/20/09 3:53 PM, " wrote:
*snip*

How old when you when you started stitching? I think a majority of us

I remember learning to hem, do basic hand sewing when I was about 6. I then
started doing embroidery at around age 8, more or less. Started with DM
giving me some stamped emoroidery to do while she was working on a
tablecloth. I wanted to "help" - so I suspect she wisely got me my own
piece to work on, while she did hers. My DA did great NP, and had done
petit point covers for her dining room chairs - it was kind of inspiring - I
remember her working on these for a couple of years when I was about 10-11.
Similarly I remember my other DA doing NP, as well as my cousin but I wasn't
really interested then. Kept it up until about age 20, put it away for some
time and picked back up about 15 years later. I did however a fair amount of
embroidery - shirts, jeans, jackets, monograms on hankies. Picking back up
stitching really came from my then MIL (the truly difficult now exMIL) doing
XS, and I thought it would be fun. My DM's best friend had also taken it up
- so well, it seemed like a good thing to do, that we could all sort of
share. But that was just a jumping into point WRT XS.

Garment sewing, been doing steadily since about age 8 when we moved to FL,
and my mom started. Her aunt sewed tons of cloths for my mom's cousins, and
got my DM started, and I wanted to do it too! Sewed steadily, regularly
until about the early 90's. Stopped for a few years, and then picked back
up with quilting in the late 90's, then back to garments, etc..

My Paternal DGM and mom were fabulous knitters and crocheters - I didn't
really get it, though I could muddle my way through crocheting - say around
age 16. But when I decided to learn to knit as an adult about 7 years ago
turned out that I had muscle memory and have to knit European style. Who
knew.

How to reach young people? Fun, quick INEXPENSIVE small stuff. At
Wal-Mart, Target (*THAT* would probably get attention), maybe some
boutique-y places. (Urban Threads or Pimp Stitch should look into
this.) It should include EVERYTHING - needle, fiber, hoop,
instructions. Those crewel kits from the 70s were perfect examples
(sans hoop).

Good point about the crewel kits. I've done/will be doing some workshops
with kits for kids of cool bracelets that are dyed Aida with some XS & a
couple of other stitches, and some NP kits. Doing an NP class as a
mother/daughter activity for the synagogue sisterhood - seems to be a fun
way to get them involved. I think not only small, inexpensive, but also
things that are kind of fun or cute - like little boxes, or the friendship
bracelets, etc.

BTW - I don't think Lizzie Kate talks to the younger crowd that much -
too soccer mom and predictable. While I know a lot of people like her
stuff, I think it's boring and predictable.

Trite and cutesy. While some of it is cute, I find it so much of the same -
but OTOH, I've done my handful of L-K pieces, too.

Sorry so long - but it's an interesting topic!

linda

It is an interesting topic, that so many of us picked up early. My mother
was quite fond of telling me that I'm really a very traditional woman -
because I do things like stitching and cooking. It led to many arguments of
her not understanding the rest of my life not falling into the "traditional"
path - that you could love the traditional female arts, but that didn't mean
I wanted the rest of the more traditional lifestyle. Not a right or wrong
thing - just made for some lengthy and frustrating discussions.

Ellice

ellice wrote:

My mother
was quite fond of telling me that I'm really a very traditional woman -
because I do things like stitching and cooking. It led to many arguments of
her not understanding the rest of my life not falling into the "traditional"
path - that you could love the traditional female arts, but that didn't mean
I wanted the rest of the more traditional lifestyle. Not a right or wrong
thing - just made for some lengthy and frustrating discussions.

Ellice



This was part of my ex's problem: because I cook and stitch he *assumed*
that I would be very traditional in other ways, and couldn't
understand the dichotomy of my being a card-carrying feminist who cooks
and knits. I cook because I like to eat, just like a bunch of my single
male friends; doesn't make THEM "traditional wives"!


--
Karen C - California
Editor/Proofreader www.IntlProofingConsortium.com

Finished 8/13/09 - Death by Chocolate - what a way to go!

WIP: Nativity from "Countdown to Christmas" book, Oriental Kimono
(Janlynn),
MLI The Teacher (gift to the library), Bethany Angel (Marbek)
Retrieved from UFO pile: Marbek's Snow Angel, MLI Farmers Market

www.CFSfacts.org -- where we give you the facts and dispel the myths
Myths, with research cites: http://www.aacfs.org/images/pdfs/myths.pdf
Newest research blog: http://cfs-facts.blogspot.com/

On Aug.20, Ellice wrote:
I think a majority of us tell of some experience in our youth that made us familiar with it
when we were older. Do we do a terrible job in the needlework industry
attracting teens and twenty-somethings?

And then on Aug 21, 2:45*pm, she wrote:

It is an interesting topic, that so many of us picked up early.

After reading all these responses, could it be as simple as that, when
we reach our teens, we need to "rebel" and broaden our horizons, as
teens are wont to do,or, are just so busy that something has to be put
aside? Not to mention the fickleness of those years. By the time
designers figure out what they like (if that's even possible!) and get
something designed and published, the fad has changed.

I'd hazard a guess that most of us did much less needlework during our
teen years and then picked it up again once we were in "settling down"
mode. I did a fair amount of stamped embroidery when I was young
(probably started around 6 or 8 yo) but don't really remember doing
much during my teen years. I was in college when I started knitting,
crocheting and crewel. I didn't discover counted stitching until a few
years later and married, when I saw something I wanted for our
bedroom.

Maybe it's just the nature of the beast... Maybe we just teach the
little ones when we have *some* control over them, so the basics are
there when they mature. The crux of that, though, is getting more
adults involved so they can then expose the youngsters.

Joan

On 8/23/09 7:25 PM, in article
, "NDJoan"
wrote:

On Aug.20, Ellice wrote:
I think a majority of us tell of some experience in our youth that made us
familiar with it
when we were older. Do we do a terrible job in the needlework industry
attracting teens and twenty-somethings?

And then on Aug 21, 2:45*pm, she wrote:

It is an interesting topic, that so many of us picked up early.

After reading all these responses, could it be as simple as that, when
we reach our teens, we need to "rebel" and broaden our horizons, as
teens are wont to do,or, are just so busy that something has to be put
aside? Not to mention the fickleness of those years. By the time
designers figure out what they like (if that's even possible!) and get
something designed and published, the fad has changed.

I'd hazard a guess that most of us did much less needlework during our
teen years and then picked it up again once we were in "settling down"
mode. I did a fair amount of stamped embroidery when I was young
(probably started around 6 or 8 yo) but don't really remember doing
much during my teen years. I was in college when I started knitting,
crocheting and crewel. I didn't discover counted stitching until a few
years later and married, when I saw something I wanted for our
bedroom.

Maybe it's just the nature of the beast... Maybe we just teach the
little ones when we have *some* control over them, so the basics are
there when they mature. The crux of that, though, is getting more
adults involved so they can then expose the youngsters.

Joan

I stitched/knitted/crocheted A LOT through high school and college, but did
much less when I got out of school and had to earn a living. And learn to
live with the now DH

In fact several of those uncompleted projects still live in my hoard. One is
a scrap blanket I must of started in HS with all sorts of yarns knitted in
stockinette and a huge granny square piece (also blanket sized now) of
pieces of crewel yarn leftovers. I really should finish both pieces.....


Cheryl