As a child, I had very chubby cheeks.
My craft/life/stuff blog is bollewangenhaptoet and I made my debut in issue 5 of mixtape with the Second-Hand Book Review. There is, of course, only so much room in the 'zine for book reviews so I am delighted to be able to contribute a few more from my collection to the blog here.
Moving from Australia to the US earlier this year has, of course, provided me with a whole new array of second-hand craft books to choose from. I found these two at the Mercer Island Thrift Shop:
What a patriotic find! This lovely book - Woman's Day Book of American Needlework by Rose Wilder Lane (Simon & Schuster, 1963) - is full of historic examples including embroidery, quilting & appliqué, knitting, crochet, candlewicking, weaving, rugmaking and hooking. Um, hooking? Ok, some of these designs may have come over with the Mayflower but we're not talking about anything of the Mayflower Madam variety - this is latch-hooking to make rugs. The book is filled with large colour photos of various historical items that almost take your breath away with their style, simplicity and simultaneous intricacy. There are a few instrcutions and diagrams but not quite enough.And that is why I was absolutely delighted at the same time to find this box set:
The Book of Patterns and Instructions for American Needlework! I'm assuming that these two volumes were donated by someone at the same time but I was so delighted to find them still both there. Fifty-one pattern sheets with charts and full-size quilting diagrams and so forth, all cross-referenced to the book above.
These beauties are still available on-line - have a look at ebay or AbeBooks.
