Our History and What It Teaches Us

I should be working on my Woodlawn report since I have the computer controls right now, but when I read the following on how the Plimoth Plantation folks are figuring out reproducing birds on their 17th Century embroidered jacket, it gave me a piece of the puzzle that is samplers.
http://thistle-threads.com.mytempweb.com/blog/index.php/2009/03/bird-butts-a-long-tail/

I don't "get" samplers. Folks here love them, though, and over the years in Chilly Hollow I have seen a lot of the reproduction and also the modern samplers. But the reproduction pieces, ones either modeled on old samplers or that exactly reproduce one stitched in the 18th-19th Century, don't appeal to me much. Many of them are pretty big so stitching them is a sustained task. What accounts for the charm? What am I missing?

Reading the above, I think they are time machines. They put us in the shoes of our stitching ancestors and teach us how much we have in common with them, as well as exactly what makes the stitching we do today different from the stitching done in 1814.

By the way, the example above is Mary Cottam's 1814 sampler, charted and sold by Scarlett Letter.
http://www.scarlet-letter.com/rsdescr/19thengl/cottam.htm

Jane/Chilly Hollow
Main blog at http://blog.360.yahoo.com/chillyhollow

Bears in the Air

Bear canvases seem to be in the air in the Blog-o-sphere. Kathy is stitching a bear on her Tapestry Tent Entourage stocking. Click on the title of her March 14 posting to see the whole thing.
http://kmack-backtothefuture.blogspot.com/

And Jane is happily taking a class from Tony Minieri to stitch her Brenda Stofft Frontier Bear Santa. Isn't it turning out beautifully?
http://janew1102.typepad.com/my_weblog/2009/03/frontier-bear-progress.html

http://janew1102.typepad.com/my_weblog/2009/03/im-busy-stitching.html

By the way, the Stitching Sisters have a bunch of finished items to admire. There's a purse finished by Marlene's that's gorgeous, a Barbara Elmore room with a lovely chimney, mantel and mirror decorated for Christmas, a gorgeous pillow from Shelly Tribbey that will remind you of Audrey Hepburn, and the first stitched All That Glitters Xmas ornament from the Needle House monthly club.
http://nystitchingsisters.blogspot.com/

Kelly's dragonfly pillow is back from the finsher's. It's spring in pillow form.
http://kellysorts.blogspot.com/2009/03/dragonfly-is-back-from-finishing.html

Ruth Schmuff's finisher has come up with a way to add feet to Ruth's Halloween standups.
http://www.tistheseason.org/blog/2009/03/how-cute-are-these.html

I tell you, seeing all these wonderful designs is really inspiring. It's better than Spring (although I can't wait for Spring to arrive). Progress on Holi is slow--I did more tent stitched background last night. But I'll have something fun for you to look at soon. I bought a mixed bag of sequins at the crafts emporium yesterday at lunchtime. I think Holi will have a sequin or two on her floral halo.

Jane/Chilly Hollow
Main blog at http://blog.360.yahoo.com/chillyhollow