Fanciful Utility
Christmas for Your Old-Fashioned Girls
So many have already taken advantage of our new digital-download doll pattern! It’s very exciting to see pictures posted on social media of the various unique little cloth girls everyone is making; I’ll do up an inspiration post soon!
DISCLAIMER: this post contains links. They’re either to items we publish, or to items we admire but do not sell. The outside links are non-affiliate; I share them only because I like them, with no kick-backs or considerations of any kind.
Make a Making Kit
Any doll lover or little history girl will love her own doll and wardrobe. If she’s a “maker” herself, consider gifting the finished doll, her own copy of the pattern, and a box of sewing supplies and fabric cuts.
If she’s starting from fresh, use your copy of Fanciful Utility to make her up a little sewing case, stocked with needles, a thimble, little scissors, and tiny, delightful notions to round out her supplies.
Fat-quarters of good white cotton, cotton prints, fine silks, and wool will give her plenty of drygoods options.
Stash it all in a wooden box for historic uses (I’m currently in love with re-papered cigar boxes, personally), or a nice little lidded tote for at-home use, and old-fashioned girls of all ages (but particularly those sewists ages 12-or-so and up) will be delighted to unwrap their goodies.
Doll-Scale Fun
Now, I’ll admit we fall into the Possibly Nutty categories, due to the four-story, 7.5′ tall, 150 pound dollhouse anchored to the wall studs in our Little Girls’ room. But I do adore doll-scale items, and adding a few fun things for your history-driven friends and relations can be a lot of fun. You might consider some of these fun projects for a china, cloth, or play-scale doll fan:
One of the sweetest Victorian-styled feather trees I’ve ever seen!
Historical “china” plates made with paper and glaze!
Little mini-books for a doll to read on the train!
For History Girl Readers
For those old-fashioned girls who also love to read, consider introducing some of the historic heroines that have been making readers happy for decades. (You can find copies of these books through most booksellers; I’m just a fan, so there are no affiliate links here. But I probably ought to do that affiliate thing some day!)
Back to Book Friends: for instance, have you met:
Caddie Woodlawn
Carol Ririe-Brink’s young heroine is hardly sedate, always compassionate, and had wonderful adventures in rural Wisconsin during the mid-19th century. Caddie and her brothers work and play with vigor, and the book does not shy away from a child’s perspective on tense inter-ethnic relations during the 1860s.
I’ve loved Caddie since I was a little girl. The best part about her? She’s not entirely fictional. Modeled after Ririe-Brink’s own grandmother’s actual life events, and the stories her grandmother told of her own childhood, the three-book series (Caddie Woodlawn and Magical Melons are by Ririe-Brink alone, with an additional volume, Caddie Woodlawn’s Family containing 14 shorter stories about, surprise, surprise, the family) has a realism and nifty material culture details that provide great inspiration for building a Caddie Set for your cloth doll.
Rose Campbell
Eight Cousins and Rose in Bloom follow a wonderfully pert family, as written by the ever-new Louisa May Alcott. The books follow Rose from age 13 into adulthood, and I love the details of her life, home, and family shared all the way through. It’s a great introduction to the concept of extended girlhood; at 13, Rose is still considered a little girl, and she retains her girlish life for several more years–a refreshing change from today’s push to early adulthood! The sometimes mad-cap adventures of Rose and the whole Campbell clan are delightful!
Emily Byrd Starr
Emily of New Moon, Emily Climbs, and Emily’s Quest are three of my favorites from LM Montgomery. Her orphan status and writing abilities are the only similarities to the more well-known Anne Shirley; Emily is her own creature, sent to live with relatives at New Moon Farm on PEI after the death of her father. Any reader will find sympathetic characters in the trilogy, along with a bit of Gothic horror shivers, and some romances both tragic and lovely.
Emily is not a mid-19th century character, but her rural and city adventures set a few decades later still recall a great deal of the earlier era. There is a film adaptation, but the books are still the best way to meet and enjoy Emily!
Laura Ingalls Wilder
We can’t skip this beloved friend! Laura is many a girl’s first introduction to historical fiction, and she remains one of my all-time favorites. Yes, the timeline is skewed from reality. Yes, there’s a whole brother left out of the series. Yes, it was probably ghost-written by Laura’s daughter Rose to help her mother out in financial difficulty. A few unhelpful bits of reality do nothing to tarnish the joy and adventure in the entire series, and make Laura a must-read for any young person. My favorite books are the ones with the Garth Williams illustrations.
Whatever your plans for projects, here’s to the last few days before Christmas, and all the flurry of Making it brings!
I’m a FanU Fan, Too!
Ever since Fanciful Utility debuted three years ago, I’ve been making up items from its pages to give away at Sewing Academy workshops, where they’ve been received with delight. But, as with cobbler’s children going barefoot, my own sewing supplies were kept in a series of battered plastic ziploc baggies!
Finally, at the Montana Sewing Academy Retreat in spring 2015, I determined to end that sad habit, and make something for MyOwnSelf!
My Little Case… Click to embiggen!
I decided to make my case to finish out at about 2″ wide and deep, and 4″ long. I knew I wanted a tool box and pin-cushion, a scissor sheath and a bit of wool for a needle-keep. And inside Fanciful Utility, I found all the bits and pieces to make my project both consistent with historical examples, and My Very Own.
My challenge to myself: use more than one fabric. I have a… thing… about visual coherence. I really, really need for colors to have compatible tones and shade. It’s hard for me to mix patterns, particularly across fabric print collections. Scrap quilting is Not My Thing. I’m in awe of people who can put together items that have loads of different prints!
I also have a history of challenging myself to do odd things. Like the time at university when I made myself do the city newspaper crossword every day for a week, to see if I avoided crosswords because I was bad at them (in which case, it was a character flaw, and I just needed to learn to do them well), or whether I was good at them, but just didn’t like them (in which case I gave myself permission to never do another one in my life.) (I’ve never done another one in my life.)
So, this case has not one, not two… but SIX different cotton prints! There are two on the exterior: the main blue print, with a narrow piping of a red coral-branch-type print where I flipped the blue print around so it would be “right side up” when the case was closed.
Another branching print forms the base of the interior. A tiny red floral is the inside of the toolbox, with a striped print used on the box dividing wall and removable pincushion (which is filled with wool roving).
I used a brown-based print for the scissor sheath, and a bit of white wool felt for the needle-keep.
The asymetrical featherstitch on the needle-keep was put on first, then the blue buttonhole stitch to finish the edge; a blue thread hinge anchors it to the interior. The scissor sheath has a full lining, and was felled securely to the interior, then I worked a backstitch in little mounds around the edge to tie it visually to the blue used elsewhere in the case.
The toolbox is large enough to hold my thimble, wax, a seam ripper (modern), and about six slender spools of Gutterman’s cotton, or truly loads of thread winders when I get those lacquered and in there.
The case closes with three little hooks and three little blue thread eyes on the outside. It stays shut very well!
I made the case entirely by hand (as is historically appropriate), in short and random moments of down-time during a multi-day sewing retreat, in which I was everyone’s minion. It was a great retreat, and my own sense of accomplishment as I loaded my tools and supplies into this compact little case at the end of the weekend was such a great feeling! The whole process of making the case and each component was a relaxing, enjoyable thing. I love these kinds of projects, don’t you?
Making your own case? You’ll want your copy of Fanciful Utility, of course! Here’s a previous post about getting your case set up, too!
Don’t forget to pop over to author Anna Worden Bauersmith’s blog today–look at the great resources she’s making available!
Happy Third Birthday to Fanciful Utility!
So, three years ago, author Anna Worden Bauersmith and I “birthed” a project that we affectionately nicknamed FanU… or, Fanciful Utility, a fantastic technique and project book that teaches you how to make a huge variety of Victorian sewing cases, sewing rolls, and needlebooks.
This lovely book is packed with illustrations and pictures to help you “de-code” originals and engravings from historic magazines, and replicate them for use today.
So far, we’ve sent out copies of FanU to nearly every state in the US, as well as to places like England, Belgium, France, Austria, Singapore, Australia, and New Zealand. FanU’s fans live everywhere!
To celebrate, Anna has a whole week of great posts and neat ready-to-use items (made by her own hands, and listed for sale in her Etsy shop!)… you’re going to want to click through, and sign up for updates, so you don’t miss a thing.
For instance, later this week Anna will be discussing the most popular period sewing tools, and she has some amazing free printables coming out! Eliza Leslie’s sewing introduction notes in a booklet form, and two mini-booklets that fold down to a miniscule size and are ideal for your own reference or to tuck into a gift case.
She’ll even have some printable needle packet designs–print, load with needles, and pass them out to convert all your friends to the benefits of period sewing!
Fanciful Utility: a New, Free Template!
We’re excited to hear the feedback from those of you who already have your copy of Fanciful Utility, and to say thanks, we’re happy to share a new, free template you can use with the techniques in your book to create something special for holiday gift-giving!
Whether you choose to embellish the project with tiny beads, as suggested in the original 1859 text, or employ your own favorite decorative techniques, as Liz did with the version shown here, you’ll have an elegant little something to enjoy or share. For the free project sheet, please click through or right-click and save:
Beaded Needlebook Project Sheet
Here’s a needlebook Liz made from the project sheet templates. It’s scarlet shot silk with a cream chintz lining and cream wool felt shaped needlepages edged with wheat-colored blanket stitch. The exterior embroidery features wheat-colored feather-stitching, satin-stitched vining, and cream beading-stitch petals. It is suitable for both modern and historic use, and Liz thinks it’s kind of snazzy.
We’d love to see one done with tiny glass beads, as in the original! If you use this template (remember, they’re for personal use, not making things to sell!), pop us an email with a few shots so we can share them!
Fanciful Utility: The Newest Book from Anna Worden Bauersmith!
Are you a fan of historic sewing and particularly, historic sewing accessories?
Would you like to be able to make gorgeous, functional, accurate pieces for yourself? For gifts? As educational tools? As something just generally nifty to own?
Then you’ll want to order your own copy of Anna Worden Bauersmith’s