• heirloom counterpane dresser scarf

    Pillow inspired by 1890 bureau scarf

    Recreating the pattern of a knit counterpane bureau scarf from the collection of the Huron County Museum and Historic Gaol is a fascinating trip through vintage knitting patterns and traditions. Counterpanes – white bed coverlets or bedspreads – were quite popular in the mid-1800s and into the 1900s and were traditionally made from white or cream-coloured cotton yarn that was so readily available at that time. The…

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  • Knitting History Forum

    If you are fascinated by knitting and crochet history, the Knitting History Forum is a great resource to check out. The Knitting History Forum is an international society for the history of knitting and crochet. Their members advance and promote the history of knitting through research, exchange of ideas and information and by historical reconstruction. Membership is open to anyone…

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  • Knitting the Huron Wristers video tutorials

    Hi there! I’ve been working on a video series on how to knit the Huron Wristers. The videos are meant to help beginners or knitters with a little experience who would like to knit their own pair of history inspired wristers but maybe need some help with knitting in the round and colourwork. My knitting skill level is experienced beginner,…

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  • Herb Wheeler's Carpentry Shop

    The Huron Wristers: a story of connections part 2

    Continued from The Huron Wristers: a story of connections part 1 Was there a family tie to either Estonia or the British Isles? The answer would help to identify the glove pattern perhaps. When an instagram post by Best Dishes, a Goderich business owned by Sarah Anderson, appeared in my feed one day identifying the wristers pattern as based on…

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  • Rare Stitches: Knitting Inspired by Illuminated Manuscripts

    I recently missed this very fascinating virtual knitting event hosted by McGill Library, Rare Stitches: Knitting Inspired by Illuminated Manuscripts. I would have loved to have attended, but I can enjoy watching and rewatching the video… and so can those stitchers out there into history and needlework. In the workshop, historian and knitter Kristen Howard shared her work to bring…

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  • The Huron Wristers: a story of connections part 1

    The story of the creation of the Huron Wristers is a story of connections: the connection of past to present, of generation to generation. Back in 1972 Pearl Wheeler donated a pair of knitted gloves that once belonged to her husband Herbert to the Huron County Museum and Historic Gaol. The museum’s record notes that at the time the gloves…

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  • Exploring historic textiles in our local museums

    I enjoy reading about and researching historic textiles. For me, these vintage textiles provide a invaluable, tangible link to our past.  And as I work at reproducing old knitting patterns and recreating vintage knitted items, I find that the local museums hold a wealth of reference material in their textile collections, providing wonderful period pieces to help with pattern identification…

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  • Huron Wristers and the Colours of Huron

    The Blyth History Stitcher is at it again… naturally dyed palette created by FACTS and beautiful wool from Steele Wool Farm, this is definitely a creative fibre collaboration; it’s time for an update on the Huron Wristers. The Huron Wristers Kits are now in production, with the coloured yarn being weighed and divided. The worsted weight wool is from Steele Wool Farm, a Blyth-area…

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  • Dress of Many Patterns – lace pattern #1

    I thought it was time to write an update on the Dress of Many Patterns and share my own lace sampler swatch in progress. The first row of the eight-row repeat staggers the diagonal of eyelets formed; the pattern is worked in multiples of five stitches and an eight-row repeat. The stitch count remains the same – five stitches per…

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