Fascinators (Women's Hats)

The Royal Wedding showed off its finest.  Some links for your enjoyment are included at the bottom of the post relating from fashion to the sanctity of marriage.

But first, let's talk about the hats almost all wedding celebrants were wearing yesterday.  I learned from a television commentator a new term for those hats that sit on the side of the head: "fascinators".

The hat style, as SIL Charlotte remarked, it not new.  In fact, fascinators were quite in style in the 18th and 19th centuries.  Here is Marie Antoinette in what could be called a fascinator on her head:

Hats are not required to sit atop the head, but can be an adornment to an elaborate hairdo.  Marie shows her up-do to advantage with the fascinator adding at least 10-12 inches to her height!

From yesterday's ceremony, note the hat that Posh Girl wore yesterday with a sleek pony tail:

Kate Middleton has generally favored Philip Treacy as her favorite hat stylist.  Now that she is Catherine, Royal Highness, the Duchess of Cambridge, Mr. Treacy will likely continue to be a designer icon world-wide.

Remember Catherine in this Philip Treacy hat?

So an old made new style is coming back for hats.  The Fascinator!  Let's all run out and buy a few.

Satanica on Etsy has these lovely fascinators for sale at a reasonable price; swing over to this page to see more and/or to purchase on Etsy (everything hand made).

As promised, web links, courtesy of Living the Grand Life:

• The Commitment
• Wedding and War
• Stunning in Lace and Satin
• We See an Ideal, Not a Fairy Tale

Wooden Crochet Hooks

These lovely hand fashioned crochet hooks were made by William Schmidt of Turn of the Century.

Having recently taken up crochet, and reading that wooden crochet hooks were easier to hold and made pulling yarns less taxing on finger joints, I found this one in walnut and ergonomically fashioned.  The shop is on Etsy and owned by DCWoodcraft.

 DCWoodcraft's Etsy shop made purchasing quick, and DC efficiently sent it out the next day.  The postal service cooperated by sending it quickly.

This hook feels smooth, organic and comfortable while working with it.  My SIL says she really likes hers, too.  SIL has one made in cherry wood in size "J", although any millimeter sized hook can be purchased.

Here is the crocheted baby blanket in progress with the ergonomic hook attached:

Pleased with the wood hook, I might get rid of most of those stashed plastic crochet hooks.

Alpaca and Llama Wool Yarns

Consider this free advertisement for Knitters Review, because that weekly magazine is a wealth of information. It has "timely, in-depth, and insightful reviews for knitting and fiber enthusiasts", and is chock full of goodies, all relating to products dealing with fiber.

This week, buffalo fiber is showcased on their webpage:

What do you knit for someone truly special? If you can, you save your pennies and splurge on a glorious yarn, taking your time to knit an equally glorious gift from it. You try to find a yarn that, even in its natural state, whispers sweet nothings into the ears of its wearer.

I love working with different animal fibers. New blogger friend, Brenda at Split Rock Ranch, raises, trains, shears, and sells llama furs, and she even dyes and spins their fiber. One smart cookie, that Brenda. Here is what she sold me yesterday:


You can find her Etsy Store at this website: Split Rock Llama and Alpaca on Etsy.

This yarn is merino wool, handpainted and handspun in colors of fuchsia, burgundy, black and gray. I will combine it with a purple merino wool to create another baby sweater.

I asked Brenda at Split Rock Ranch about the properties of alpaca wool, and she replied with this:

Llama and alpaca are hollow fibers so they trap air and act as an insulator, very much like down. They are best spun fine(r) and knitted in smaller projects like scarves, hats, etc. unless they are spun laceweight. Because they don’t have “memory” like sheep’s wool, they can tend to get stretched out of shape if your garment is too bulky and heavy.

An open-work shawl done in llama wool would be gorgeous. Tip to make that skein stretch a bit farther - use big needles! That leaves a bit of space between stitches so the garment doesn’t get too hot.

Llama fiber will be a new experience (in my limited repertoire, at least) to use in knitting winter garments, so come on cold weather... those knitting needles are anxious for a workout with animal fibers.

Poinsettias for Sale

One of the many blogs I visit (virtually) is A Cozy Life. In her posting a few days ago, I came across this gorgeous 5" x 7" watercolor, an original. It is so lovely that I decided to bring out my watercolors and also paint some seasonal poinsettias for our home decorations.

This is Irina Akimova's rendition of a poinsetta. You can buy it from her Etsy shop for only $6. She says it is an original and signed; a bargain of a price!

Other handmade poinsettia items can be found at the Etsy Poinsettia Place. Take a virtual visit and see the lovely items for sale at reasonable prices.

If you need help in caring for a living poinsettia plant, go here for a link.

Easy Lace Scarf; Independent Wool Dyers

The easy lace scarf pictured here was knitted using only four stitches: the knit stitch, the purl stitch, the yarn over stitch, and by knitting two stitches together.

Here is the pattern for the lacy scarf:

Cast on 38 stitches (size 6 or 7 needles)
Row 1 Knit
Row 2 Purl
Row 3 K1, [K2 tog] 3 times, [YO, K1] 6 times, [K2 tog] 6 times, [YO, K1] 6 times, [K2 tog] 3 times, K1
Row 4 Knit

In a previous post on this blog, this scarf was also mentioned, and now it is completed.

If you need to refresh your knowledge on the "yarn over" technique, this video will show you how.

The yarn used for this project was 50% wool and 50% silk, hand dyed by the Hand Maiden, a Vancouver dyer. It is functionally warm, and soft with the silk woven into the wool fibers. An excellent link can be found at this site; all kinds of useful information is given there about the dying of fibers.

At the Etsy shop, over 8,000 items of hand dyed wool can be found at this website: Independent Wool Dyers.

I have purchased several items from Etsy independent dyers and sellers and have been very pleased with their products. Try them out, and buy handmade!

Watercolored Altered Art* Vintage Girl

Thought I would give a quick blog shot of the finished "altered art" for Baby Ella Ann, due in about two weeks. This gift was referenced in yesterday's Blog posting. Shhhhh.... her mom and dad don't know about it yet.

Similar ones (with applicable baby's name) will be for sale at my Etsy Shop.

* Altered Art - Album/Book/Tag/Anything - Collaging, embellishing, enamelling, stamping or doing anything else to a book or other household item to reflect a creative idea, theme or narrative (from ChewingPaper).

Watercolor Paints & Pencils- Picture for Baby's Room

A new baby niece will be making her entrance in a few weeks. One of the presents we bought her was from an Etsy Store (all things handmade) called RockaByeBabyRetro. It is a darling Onesie made into a dress. There is a pink bow at the neck and applique on the front, with a full skirt. Carousels and animals are the dress theme in pinks and reds.

Another small gift will be a hand water colored 5" x 7" little girl in an old fashioned dress. It will be drawn, painted and personalized for little "Ella Ann." The original stamp block can be purchased from stampington.

Here is a similar picture of the girl before sketching, sizing and colorization process:I plan on using all my watercolor skills on this little beauty, and will matt and frame it in a girly, pink flowered frame.

Congratulations, Kim and Jeremy, on adding this new life to the world!

Triptychs - Paintings

"Triptych", the word itself, means three items consecutively joined. It could be thoughts, prayers, icons, or paintings that are used or grouped together that follow the same theme.

Here is further information about painted Triptychs:

...painting consisting of three panels, usually hinged together with the central panel being twice the width of the wings, which may fold inwards. The triptych developed from the diptych and was used both as a portable altar and, on a larger scale, as an altarpiece.

Above: Anonymous painter. Triptych with Virgin and Child Flanked by archangels, scenes from the life of Christ, apostles and Saint George and Saint Mercurius. Ethiopia (Gojjam?), late 17th century. Tempera on panel. 14 78 x 4 5/16 inches left; 15 1/8 x 9 inches center; 15 1/16 x 4 7/16 inches right. 36.7 museum purchased, the W. Alton Jones Foundation Acquisition Fund, 1996, from the Nancy and Robert Nooter Collection. (taken from Tadias)

But triptych art does not always have the middle panel larger, nor must it always fold. Triptych art can be found for sale many places, and is especially easy to purchase over the internet on either Etsy or eBay.

Last year, I completed a triptych in oil paints which is displayed in our home, and is currently for sale at my Etsy shop. I shamelessly promote this site since I have several things for sale here.

Each panel is 10" x 20", and if put side-by-side, the triptych measures 30" x 20".

Here are pictures of my triptych oil paintings, entitled "Three Peas in a Pod":

Get 'em while they're hot!

The Good Earth: Review

Etsy is the place to go on the internet for “ALL THINGS HANDMADE” with over 100,00 sellers world wide. One of the Etsy forums is sponsoring a blogger posting for recently read books, and my submission for August, 2008 is a review of Pearl Buck's The Good Earth, which follows.

The style in which Pearl Buck's renowned THE GOOD EARTH is written (a combination of biblical prose and a sort of Chinese narrative) has been said to "increase the dignity of its characters". It is a bit different to read, and the reader must fill in the "gaps" with necessary words and images in order to complete sentences. But after just a few pages, mental interpretation becomes easily patterned.

With references from Kirjasto, the story takes place in the 1920's in the time of intense famine in China. (Remember that from 1800-1850 about 45,000,000 people died of starvation in China.)

The main character, Wang Lung, is followed from his early life as a peasant living with his father, and then buying a servant wife from a prosperous town family, living a bare-bones life including intense hunger, and then on to his eventual position as a prosperous landowner.

O-lan, the servant wife, also figures prominently in the story. She was sold into slavery at the age of five or six by her father in order to feed his family. She then grows up in the wealthy house of Hwang as a kitchen slave, working 12-15 hours almost every day. O-lan is sold to Wang Lung while in her teens. Thus begins her adult life as a willing slave to her husband.

O-lan is a plain woman, often described by Wang Lung as having "big feet" (because they were not bound). Only the wealthy could bind the feet of a female child to increase her marriage potential to a suitable husband, and O-lan was destined to be a slave with unbound feet. And slave she was, with a unswerving devotion to her husband and her children and to the land Wang Lung acquired at her extraordinary expense.

The narrative starts out with relative prosperity in that they have enough to eat and O-lan bears two sons. Hardship follows, a drought comes over the land and O-lan gives birth to a girl. And although they need money for survival, O-lan decides not to sell the first daughter.

More from Kirjasto,

Revolution breaks out, houses are plundered, and Wang Lung gets in his possession a silver treasure. The family returns to their home region. Wang Lung buys land and soon owns also the house of now impoverished Hwang. The only problem is their retarded child, a girl, who don't speak. O-lan gives birth to twins, a boy and a girl. The elder boys go to school. Wang Lung buys another wife, Lotus. O-lan is not well after the birth of the twins, and she dies after the wedding of her sons. In his old days, Wang Lung gives his love to a young slave girl, who also takes care of the retarded girl. His youngest son moves from the house to become a soldier and because he also loves the young slave girl. Old Wang Lung witnesses for his sorrow that his children do not share his unyielding devotion to the land.

In 1932, Buck won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction for this book, and in 1938 won the Nobel Prize for Literature.

One biographer states ...

In 1949, outraged that existing adoption services considered Asian and mixed-race children unadoptable, Pearl established Welcome House, the first international, inter-racial adoption agency; in the nearly five decades of its work, Welcome House has assisted in the placement of over five thousand children...

.The Good Earth kept me spell-bound. The rich history of China is graphically crafted with Buck's choice of words. The story was captivating, and parallels to modern day life can be conjured up from every page of this narrative.

Mrs. Buck went on to establish the Pearl Buck Foundation in 1964. She died in 1973 at the age of eighty. Her fascinating life and biography is well worth reading in its own right.

Sewing Decorative Vintage Pillow Cases (Fairies Part II)

A previous post on the drawing, coloring, and embroidering of a whimsical fairy dealt with that aspect of pillow decoration. The colored and embroidered fairy is at rest with a bumble bee on a lily pad leaf and has been made into its final application on a small pillow case.

These little pillows would make darling baby gifts, and would also look charming on a rocker as a back pillow, or as just another girly decoration on a bed or sofa; I plan to make a few more and display them on my Etsy store in the near future.

The following is a brief tutorial on how the pillow case was made with vintage fabrics that display hand embroidery, cut work and drawn-work. Pictures are shown to accompany the tutorial.

1) Decide on the picture you would like to transfer for embroidery purposes. Make sure the lines are as simple as your embroidery skills allow. (In this case, a fairy was used, but some child might like a brightly colored green frog on his pillow with contrasting bright colors.) Complete the tinting and embroidering of the chosen image.

2) Gather materials of small travel pillow (available at discount stores for under $4), vintage fabrics such as old table cloths, napkins, handkerchiefs, etc., threads and sewing equipment; lace seam binding or ribbons (optional), measuring tape and scissors;

3) The finished pillow (below) showcases two different fabrics laid on top of one another. In this case, a regular sized peach colored pillow case with a drawn-work interior was used for the under fabric; the outer edging of the existing case was turned inward and sewn down to further emphasize the previous vintage drawn-work. For the over fabric (white), a large tablecloth was cut into appropriate sizes to show off as much as possible of the lovely vintage needlework;

4) Cut both the under fabric and the over fabric the size to fit the purchased travel pillow, with a little less than one inch seam allowance added. Usual dimensions on these travel pillows are 15” x 20”, so cut the existing fabrics to allow for generous seam allowances, i.e., 31.5" x 41.5". (French seams create a more polished effect in its final appearance, so extra material for each seam was taken into account before cutting.) Hint: the under fabric should be of a contrasting color to enhance the cut-work shown on the vintage top fabric (in this case, a vintage peach pillow case was used for the under fabric);

5) You will likely need to piece together various parts of the vintage cloths in order to take the best advantage of the prior threadwork. I used lace seam binding to join two pieces of a tablecloth together to emphasize more of the cut work. Hint: ensure that the back of the pillow also incorporates as much as possible of the embroidery displayed on the vintage cloth.

6) Join the seams (french seaming, if possible) and complete the pillow case with simple straight stitching. An excellent tutorial on how to make french seams can be found here.

The finished pillow case with purchased travel pillow inside: (front view of the pillow case above, and back view at upper right)

More information about vintage fabrics can be garnered here. A reliable seller for vintage fabrics can be found here.