A Book Review & More Acorns

A week or two ago I wandered into our local Half-Price Books while running errands and ran across this little gem. For those that have never visited, this bookstore has used and overstock books.   You can easily leave with a whole bag of hardback books for less than $20.  I love to pop in and see what's there. Sometimes you get lucky and sometimes not.

This time I happened onto a gem!  This book was published in the UK in 1998 so it's not new but it sure looks like it's barely been read.  It has chapters with reproduction samplers, schoolroom samplers, celebration samplers, flora and fauna samplers, and a celebration of childhood samplers.  All with color charts!

 

There are several things in this book that caught my eye.  I especially liked the chapter on Schoolroom Samplers.  The cover sampler is from this chapter!

 

This multiplication table was one of the first things that attracted my attention.  I've collected several different versions of the table and at some point I want to do at least one...maybe more.  The book tells us that this particular sampler is similar to one found at The Edinburgh Museum of Childhood and it is thought to have roots in Scotland.

The Mary Elizabeth Nicholson sampler is one of the reproduction samplers in the book.  There are actually four different samplers in each chapter and a section at the end of the chapter showing different ideas for using the motifs in them.  I like this one for the top alphabet and the Berlin style motifs at the bottom.  The funky border is said to possibly be Welsh in origin.

This sampler was the one that cinched it for me!  My parent's will be celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary this year and I've been on the hunt for an anniversary sampler to stitch for them.  This one looks like it will finish right at 8 x 10" so it shouldn't take forever to stitch.  I like that the writing is simple and the border makes it special.  Now to find the time to gather up the stuff and actually stitch it.  I've got acorns to finish first!

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Yep, I'm still working on my homework and making acorns and little leaves. I actually "should" have been done already according to the class schedule.  I'm about half way there now.  Oops!

I'm really enjoying this one and in a way I'm going to be sad when I'm done. I really do need to focus on this one only and get it finished. Ideally, I'd like to get this one done in the next couple weeks. I've got a bunch of things I want to do soon so maybe I'll use that as my motivator.

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I hope everyone has a great weekend.  I'm going to kick mine off with a night out with the Tiara Club girls.  Hopefully I'll get some more acorns made tonight...that is if I don't socialize too much!  I know, imagine that.  LOL!  Thanks for stopping by.

Until next time,

The Inspired Stitcher