What do Thanksgiving and stitching have in common?

In anticipation of Thanksgiving Day, which is this Thursday in the US, the latest newsletter from Nordic Needle had a wonderful article written by Debi Feyh, Marketing Coordinator, on Thanksgiving. Debi describes a typical Thanksgiving dinner using a "cornucopia of stitches".

This special article was so brilliantly written that I asked Nordic Needle if I could publish it here. Debi responded "yes", so here it is...

Many countries and cultures have a celebration giving thanks for their harvest and good fortunes. Canada has already celebrated their Thanksgiving Day which occurs on the second Monday of October. This Thursday is Thanksgiving Day for Americans. Abraham Lincoln had proclaimed the last Thursday of November to be the official holiday. That was later changed by Franklin D. Roosevelt to the 4th Thursday of the November.

While doing research on Thanksgiving, I found that the original meal was quite different from today's "traditional" dinner. According to Kathleen Curtin, Food Historian at Plimouth Plantation, their menu may have looked like this:
Seafood: Cod, eel, clams and lobster
Wild fowl: Wild turkey, goose, duck, crane, swan, partridge, and eagles
Meat: venison, seal
Grain: wheat flour, Indian corn
Vegetables: pumpkins, peas, beans, onion, lettuce, radishes, carrots
Fruit: plums, grapes

Besides food, people often associate the cornucopia with this holiday. This word dates back to 1508 from Latin, cornu copiae meaning a "horn of plenty". We often see it used as a centerpiece overflowing with fruits, nuts, and vegetables.

Okay, I know you are beginning to wonder what this has to do with stitching....we thought it would be fun to see if we could provide you with a CORNUCOPIA of CANVASWORK reflecting the menu from the first Thanksgiving.....here goes!

Let's start with the cornucopia. We know there were baskets used to gather and serve foods. Most of them were probably woven so these stitches come to mind: basketweave stitch and the woven stitch .

ENTREE
For our meat, I would offer up these possibilities-the Turkey, Herring(bone), and Shell(fish) Stitches.

The turkey on their table was much different from the commercially grown turkey of today. It had a very colorful plumage which Columbus associated with the peacock. He referred to the bird as "tuka" which means peacock in India. Another source said that the name came from the Native American's word for the bird, "firkee". Yet another source said it came from the Hebrew word "Tukki" which means large or big bird. I find that funny because Big Bird's costume from Sesame Street is actually made from white turkey feathers dyed yellow....literally making him a Big Bird! Back to our subject...turkey(work) and herring(bone).

Shell (fish) of various types were part of the celebration. Let's add them (shell stitch) to our "menu".

VEGETABLES
Our cornucopia will have a variety of leafy vegetables and something the colonist called wild rice.

First let's explore our leaf stitches, which are very versatile.

Next we have the wild rice. However, according to the International Wild Rice Association "Wild Rice is (not really a rice, but) an aquatic cereal grain that grows 'wild' in isolated lake and river bed areas located primarily within the continent of North America. This evolutionarily ancient grain has been found in layers of the earth dating back some 12,000 years." Just like the rice recipes we have today, the rice stitch has many variations.

BREADS
The Colonists had corn and wheat flour available to them for their baked goods. We use Indian corn today as decoration primarily because it is a very hard corn, taking a long time for preparation. The Indians at the First Thanksgiving were from the Wampanoag tribe.

The next two stitches are very similar in construction: the wheat stitch and the cornfield stitch.

SWEETS
Pumpkin pie would not have been on the first Thanksgiving menu. However, pumpkin soup was a staple on many tables throughout the year. A pumpkin is a member of the squash family, so does that make it a fruit or a vegetable? It is a fruit, which is defined as being a seed or containing seeds. Therefore, nuts, peas, tomatoes, and even beans are really fruits. Vegetables are plants that don't have seeds. They include leaves, such as cabbage or lettuce; roots, like carrots; bulbs, like onions; and tubers such as potatoes.

Not many sweets would have been present at that first meal. One reason is because sugar and flour were expensive and hard to come by. One possible dessert was a Betty which was a baked pudding where the fruit was layered with bread crumbs. A Cobbler was another probable offering where the fruit is put in a pot and biscuit dough was dropped on top then baked. Both of these desserts were baked probably in a Dutch oven. I was unable to find a "fruit" stitch so we will finish with the Double Dutch (stitch).

I hope you enjoyed our Thanksgiving Day twist. There is so much you can learn about that first Thanksgiving and about Canvaswork, with hundreds of stitches and variations.

Many resources were used to compile the stitches and information in this newsletter including:
The Complete Needlepoint Guide
The Needlepoint Book
Needlepoint Stitches
Suzy's Mini Stitches
Suzy's Portable Stitches
Stitch Sampler
A-Z of Needlepoint

Thank you to Debi and to Nordic Needle for allowing me to reprint this article in its entirety. If you don't get the Nordic Needle newsletter, you might want to sign up for it at their website.

Tom and I will have a quiet Thanksgiving celebration because our children will be with their in-laws this year, and we were in Florida with our own parents just a few weeks ago. We'll have our Thanksgiving dinner at our church. This is something that I started there quite a few years ago when I realized that there are many of us who do not have any family nearby. I "ran" the event for quite a few years, and then several years ago turned the reins over to someone else. However, Tom still makes the gravy.

It is quite an "ordeal" making such a large amount of gravy....more than a gallon. Everyone always carries on about over how delicious it is.

This reminds me of a funny story. Years ago, Becky, a young newlywed, asked Tom for his recipe. As I heard him giving it to her over the phone, I told Tom to ask Becky how many she was having for dinner. (I knew it was only three people, and that Tom's recipe unless pared down would serve a small "army" of Thanksgiving diners.)

As you gather with family and friends, take time to give thanks for all your blessings.

Barbara and Caroline Bevan

Last week I received a lovely note all the way from Australia. Barbara and I first became acquainted years ago through my sampler internet newsletter, With My Needle and Pen.

Barbara wrote, If I had to vote for the woman who has had the most influence in my life I would have to say Ellen. A very dear friend of mine found Ellen's web site many many years ago and notified me about her wonderful newsletter. I haven't looked back since.

My very first reproduction sampler was Ellen's “Caroline Bevan” which now has pride of place on my sampler wall. She has guided me through her newsletter all these years together with all the many ladies who have contributed to the newsletter and helped me with problems locating fabrics, threads, patterns and also been there when I have had difficulties with some of the stitching.

Apart from one very dear friend, Jennifer, living in Perth, Western Australia, who corresponded with me for a few years before we even met, I don't personally know anyone else who is even remotely interested in samplers. Makes for quite a lonely existence when one lives and breathes samplers. My husband is a treasure and listens and shows the correct amount of interest when I am showing off a finished piece but I do miss my friend Jennifer for our bi-annual show and tell now we are on the other side of Australia.

I started my “Caroline Bevan” sampler in September 2000 and finished her in November 2000. She was my first and fastest reproduction sampler ever but I was on holiday for part of the time. We had gone north from Perth in land through some very remote outback country.

I stitched my initials in red in the lower left-hand side of the sampler and I always write up on the back of the frame when I started and finished, any history I know of about the sampler and also who produced the pattern.

an enlargement of one area of the sampler

It was lovely stitching "Caroline" as I sat under a large gum tree in the afternoons. I was worried about keeping her clean because the red dust in the outback is terrible to keep out of clothes and easily stains. However I managed and couldn't wait to get her framed to show off to Jennifer.

I made the silly mistake of leaving the frame face up in the back of my car when I travelled to Perth and another box "jumped" over and damaged one side of the frame. I had a very understanding framer who replaced the damaged side for a token amount since he had a small portion of the frame left over.

When I stitched "Caroline" we lived in the South West of Western Australian where we ran our own farm for ten years, but we have also worked on Aboriginal Missions in the Northern Territory and cattle stations in Far North Queensland in Cape York (were I stitched "Band of Many Colours" designed by Eileen Bennett,"The Sampler House"). Now we are retired we live in the Central Highlands of Tasmania at the end of the Great Lake. Wonderful wildlife here. We regularly have deer, wombats, wallabies, possums and very rarely Tasmanian Devils through our garden and Wedgetail Eagles over head. After travelling all around Australia over the last 30 years we feel we have found paradise. This is a very dry alpine climate and my samplers should last forever here.

Thank you very much, Barbara, for sharing a photo of your wonderful work and also the story. Also thank you for the kind words about me. You have truly touched my heart.

Barbara has really gotten involved with antique samplers. (I think I may have created an "addict".) She has even reproduced some for her personal pleasure. Those of you who receive my sampler newsletter, With My Needle and Pen, will be able to see photos of these samplers in the next issue.

More on A Work'd Pocketbook ...

Judging from comments left both on this blog and on the With My Needle Facebook page, many of you are in awe of Yuka’s beautiful work, particularly the 7000 plus queen stitches on A Work’d Pocketbook.

Zeena, who I affectionately call, “my lady of quotes”, often sends me wonderful verses and quotes for my newsletter, With My Needle and Pen. The other day she sent me this quote from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow which seems so perfect to use now: Perseverance is a great element of success. One really does need to persevere in order to do all the queen stitches necessary on A Work’d Pocketbook…but ah, the happiness of success! What an accomplishment!

I thought you might enjoy seeing photos of the antique pocketbook that inspired my project. The only personalization is the two initials cross stitched on the lining. Who was "M E"? Don't you want to know? I know I do.

Yuka from Japan shares photos of her work!

How exciting it was to receive a lovely note and photos of two projects from Yuka who lives in Nagasaki, Japan!

Yuka wrote, I enjoy stitching, and I love your designs. I was able to finish my favorite two. On these two projects, I learned different ways to finish cases, and I had a lot of fun making them.

The first photos are of Yuka’s Maidens of the Sea. The photos clearly show the beautiful job she did with stitching this case and scissors weight and also with the assembly. Also notice the beautiful piece of whitework on which she has placed her pieces.

I was VERY excited to get Yuka’s photos of her A Work’d Pocketbook!! WOW!! Isn’t it incredible? Her queen stitches are beautifully executed, and look at her finishing!! Exquisite!!

Yuka wrote, I love the color combination on this project. The queen stitches took a long time, but I had great joy when I finished.

The pocketbook has over 7000 queen stitches! (Yes, you read that number correctly---it is not a typo.) Because of all the work involved to make this project, I have nicknamed it Not for the Faint of Heart. I think you can now understand why.

My model for this project was based on a pocketbook I found at an antique show. I was particularly excited because the antique is in such wonderful condition. Even the original ribbon closure is still attached! Often the ribbon is partially or totally missing. My version is an adaptation of the antique--it is the same size and with the same ribbon closure as the original . I changed the thread colors, but I used a bright silk lining similar to what is on my antique. I also added an area on the inside for personalizing the pocketbook.

Yuka also wrote, I love both works. Stitch stores are very limited in Japan, so I purchase your charts and materials from an online store in the United States. I will stitch other designs, and I look forward to your new charts.

Yuka, thank you very much for sharing these photos of your beautiful work!! You can certainly be very proud of your accomplishments!!

Visiting Needle Craft World in Kissimmee

I often visit needlework shops when traveling. On our recent trip to Florida to visit family, I went to Needle Craft World in Kissimmee. It is very near Disney World and attracts customers from all over the world. A map on the wall is marked with pins indicating the locations of the shop's customers--it's an impressive showing.

Needlecraft World has been in business for over 30 years, and Cathy is the third owner. She has been the owner for four years. Cathy is a very enthusiastic person and is constantly encouraging her stitchers to try new things. Her enthusiasm must be contagious to those who visit her shop.

One thing Cathy does is hold contests. When I was there, I saw a tree with some darling scissors fobs that her customers had made. They were so different, not only with the stitching but also with the finishing ideas. Cathy also tries to get the stitchers to make sure that they put their full names and the year on each project; this serves as documentation for future generations.

Although the shop is small, Cathy has packed lots of goodies in it. She can also always order things for you.

Here are a few photos from the shop. The first one is of Cathy with Duncan. In the background you can see some of the variety of charts she carries.These lovely teacups are in the front window of the shop. Of course, they immediately attracted my eye. Cathy says that someday they will be made into teacup pincushions.If you are ever in the Kissimmee/Disney World area, check out Cathy and Needle Craft World at 4151 W Vine Street. You won’t be disappointed. The shop phone number is 407-933-5955. You might even want to call ahead and find out when her monthly stitch-ins are. It would be fun to attend one. (I had just missed one the night before.)

The last photo is of the swans in Lake Eola which is only a block or two from where my father lives. There was an art festival going on there over the weekend so we walked around it. However, we got less than half way around when our daughter phoned to say that she, Greg, and Haiden had arrived. You can probably guess that we hurriedly headed back to see them. (Tom walked so fast that I couldn’t keep up with him!)