Stitching plans :)

Good afternoon. It's been a quiet weekend here especially after our week of rain from the tropical storm that swept through the Gulf Coast. I think the majority of the coast had forgotten about tropical storms and hurricanes since we have been lucky enough to not have any major storms for the last couple of years.

I know I had forgotten how boring and mentally draining the rain can be, at least with tropical storms/depressions. For some reason, there is rarely any thunder or lightning with those systems.....I don't know why. It makes the storms a bit unnatural.....at least for those of us in the south because we are used to summer storms with thunder and lightning. To not experience it with tropical weather is bizarre.

It was raining just a tiny bit yesterday, but I still managed to get my errands done. I dropped off books at the library (in the book slot instead of waiting for them to open....which would mean checking out books instead of reading what I had at home O-o"), went by the post office to mail off a tiny envelope package to Amanda, and then headed off to Hobby Lobby.

After all these years of having a Hobby Lobby, it still cracks me up that they start putting their fall stuff up in June/July and by July/August, they have their Christmas things up as well. (I won't complain about the fall things because it's my favorite time of year and it makes me think of pleasant weather....even when it's 90+ outside and humid.

While browsing through their fall section, I noticed these adorable turkey buttons. I ended up taking a photo and sending it to my friend Kristina because their little picket signs are hilarious! I think it would be cute to make a cross stitch design with a few fall motifs with the lettering 'Presidential Turkey Pardon' and then put those buttons underneath the lettering.

Makes you wonder if Trump will do the turkey pardon this year. He doesn't seem to care for tradition in the White House so who knows if he'll do it or not?!

Since it's almost July, it got me thinking about my stitching plans for after the end of July when I'll be free of crocheting for the convention my sister and I are attending in New Orleans.

The first item on my agenda is finishing Afternoon in London by Country Cottage Needleworks. (I apologize for the horrible photos.....my cell camera doesn't like overhead lighting....and I've got shadows all over the place!)

I left off with the buildings finished in the pattern. I need to work on the double deckers and other motifs in the pattern and then move on to the lettering. I love working on that pattern....it's very soothing, but it makes me miss living in England.

Another pattern I would love to start and finish this year is the Cinderella Sampler by Willow Hill Samplings. I had bought this pattern on eBay earlier this year...............prior to stumbling across their Etsy shop. The owner of the company got rid of her website and as far as I know doesn't sell hard copy patterns in needlework shops anymore; and moved onto Etsy instead where she sells digital patterns and a few hard copies.

She has a few other fairy tale patterns which I will definitely buy....my second favorite is her Little Mermaid pattern. Loreta at All the Beautiful Things blog had stitched the mermaid pattern a few years ago and I fell in love with it.

This is another pattern I would love to continue to stitch. I have already finished the Neapolitan girl, the strawberry girl, and the green tea girl. I really want to finish stitching the last two girls in the series.

I love Soda Stitch designs. They are super cute, full of vibrant colors, and the backstitching involved adds a lovely dimension to each design as it's completed.

I am hoping I can find some cute frames for the designs. I would love to frame them in either an oval or circular Rococo/Baroque filigree sort of frame. I have seen a few such frames at Hobby Lobby, but they aren't big enough for the designs. I might have to search on the Internet until I can find something :)

The last pattern I'd like to continue stitching on is the Cottage Cakes by Country Cottage Needleworks. I have finished the blueberry cake and the cherry cake....I would love to finish the other cakes in the series :)

In other related stitching news, I've been watching a bunch of Flosstube videos.....mainly Floss Candy, msleftwich, CoffeeStitcher, and A Delcat Stitches. Since I'm trying to crochet amigurumis during my down time from work, I can't watch their videos all the time.....I mostly wait until after dinner before watching a few videos.

I love seeing what everyone is working on. A Delcat Stitches makes me want to buy more Soda Stitch patterns. She has some seriously cute designs that she has stitched.......but I gotta resist the temptation to go out and buy a bunch of patterns since I have some I'd like to finish first :)

In non-stitching news, work is just work.....I don't like my assistant. She's nice, but there's something about her that I don't like and I can't put my finger on why. We started our main project this week and on the second day she started mentioning interns. I tried to calm her down and tell her that we weren't even a week into our project and that if we were going to do it the way we were told to do it, it was going to take time. So we shall see what happens.

I need a break......so I'm actually happy for the end of July when my sister and I go to New Orleans even though it will be hectic like all conventions are, but at least it isn't real work......which has caused me to have a serious burnout....which isn't good because I need to stay in my field for another 8 years to pay off student loans.................the loan gods are cruel.

On that note, I hope everyone has a great week. Remember to Stay Calm and Carry On! (I'll try to keep that in mind as well!)

Until next time ^____^

Sonia Roetter ~ illustrator for Peter Pauper Press

Hi, everyone! I had bought this book a while ago on eBay. I had bought it primarily because one of the authors of the fairy tales was Lafcadio Hearn. Added bonus it was fairy tales and Japanese fairy tales at that.

When I received the book, I fell in love with the illustrations. I even brought the book to work with me so I could share it with a coworker. The illustrations reminded me of origami and I knew my coworker would like that as well since he is always folding an origami creation in his spare time.

Initially when I tried to find out about the illustrator, Sonia Roetter, I hit a dead end. The most I could find out was that she had worked on several books for Peter Pauper Press, the company who published the book I had bought. The Metropolitan Museum of Art had an entry for her Chinese Fairy Tales book in their catalog, but all they had under her name was 'American, 20th century'.

You know me, history nerd, lover of research, I had to find something out on her. One of the greatest resources you can use in my opinion is Ancestry. I know that sounds odd when you aren't working on genealogy, but trust me, it is a lifesaver when you are in the academic world, even when you are in the offshoots of that world like I am.

So off I went to see what I could find and here's what I found:

Sonia was born in Winnica, Russia (now Ukraine) on October 12, 1904. She and her family moved to the United States; they arrived in Baltimore, Maryland on December 20, 1913. 

At some point she had married a photographer named Frederick Roetter and lived in Chicago. She became an American citizen on December 29, 1941. She died at the age of 87 on September 15, 1992.

She was an illustrator who worked for Peter Pauper Press, a company founded in 1928 and which still exists today. She even entered exhibitions, such as the Chicago Artists Exhibition in 1957 and 1958. I would love to know what her actual style of art was. Did she use the same style she used for her illustrations? The same medium, silkscreen? Or was she a painter?

From what I could find, she had illustrated the following books for Peter Pauper Press:

1) Hickory, Dickory, Dock: And Other Poems of Childhood, 1950.

2) Mother Goose Book, 1946.

3) Japanese Fairy Tales, 1948.

4) Chinese Fairy Tales, 1946.

I hope some day to at least find a decent copy of the Chinese Fairy Tales book. From the images I have seen online of it, she illustrated the book in a similar style to that of the Japanese Fairy Tales book.

The Japanese Fairy Tales book contains 78 pages featuring twelve stories that are illustrated with silkscreen images using a repeated color scheme of pink, blue, and white. On each page of text, the midsection is illustrated with a long motif, such as a monkey, fish, willow branches, or a woman in a kimono.

On my searches, I noticed that Peter Pauper Press also published other fairy tale books using different illustrators....I think there was a Russian and even a Turkish fairy tale book.

I wonder if I could contact the company and see if they had records on the various fairy tale books that they published in the 1940s? Hmm........my bookworm brain never shuts down!! LOL

I hope you enjoyed learning about a forgotten artist. Who says you can't learn new things?

Until next time ^____^

National Best Friend Day Package ♡

Good afternoon! Two posts in one day? Why yes, yes indeed. It's been a crazy work week. We had meetings everyday with the longest being yesterday, which clocked in at 4 hours. With so many meetings, which took up my regular work day, I was feeling cranky, antsy, and drained.....even to the point that I was crying in one of the bathrooms! I was joking with my friend Amanda that the introvert in me wanted to go hide in one of the stairwells to avoid any meetings.

Needless to say, today couldn't come any faster for me. On Monday, I decided that I wanted today off. I didn't know that I would be facing a week's worth of meetings beforehand. It just happened that way.

So this morning, I slept in as long as my brain would allow, which wasn't too late.....around 7:30am or so. I got up, ate some oatmeal.....pumpkin spice by Quaker.....wasn't impressed with the supposed pumpkin spice 'flavor', put some laundry in, walked outside to see if we had gas for the lawn mower, came back inside for some sunscreen lotion, and mowed the lawn for about 2 hours. 

The weather was beautiful today. Warm with a cool breeze. An added motivation for mowing the lawn was that every time I passed the blueberry bushes, I could snag some berries ;) After mowing the lawn, I went back for seconds, but don't worry, I remembered to leave some for the birds. I would have picked some to freeze, but we didn't use last year's berries so it wasn't worth the extra time.

After laundry and lunch, I wrote my first post on Lucile, went out to check the mail, and found a package from my friend Amanda. She had texted me earlier that I had a small package coming :)

She sent me an assortment of goodies: a beautiful Korean bookmark featuring a woman wearing traditional costume, a Starbucks card (YES!!! Feeding my addiction to their midnight mint mocha frappuccino), a roll of adorable bunny washi tape, some colored UV resin (can't wait to try them!), and two pairs of bunny socks (can't have too many cute socks....even if you are the only person who sees them!).

She sent me a long letter in reply to one I had sent earlier in addition to an absolutely beautiful handmade card. She knows I've been going through a rough 'patch' so this card is a reminder that nothing is as tough as it may seem and that there are people who care even though you may have forgotten it along that rough patch of life.

In December I had bought a journal, one of those question/answer types. One of the questions was what would you do if you won the lottery. I know I would definitely help out my friends for sure.

I always thought it would be lovely to have a bakery and next door Amanda could have a specialty stationery shop where she could sell her creations :) And next door to that my friend Kristina could have a cross stitch shop! LOL That would be amazing!

Thank you darling for this lovely 'Best Friend Day' package! It brighten my day :)

Until next time ^____^

Book Review ~ Lucile by Owen Meredith

Good morning, everyone! One of my goals this month was to pull books from my shelves that I hadn't read yet and actually read them. This week I pulled out Lucile by Owen Meredith. 

It was originally published in 1860 by Robert Bulwer-Lytton writing under the pseudonym, Owen Meredith. The book was published in England several times over the years while in the U.S. the book was published over 2,000 times from the date of its publication until 1938. The University of Iowa has an interesting website devoted to the publication of Lucile called the Lucile Project. It gives information on the book and is attempting to keep a record of various publications of the book since quite a few of the publications were not dated, like my own copy of the book.

The story of Lucile is a narrative poem written in anapest meter. It begins with a letter written by Comtesse Lucile de Nevers to Lord Alfred Vargrave. She congratulates Lord Alfred on his upcoming marriage to a young girl named Matilda and asks that he return any letters he might have of hers from their romantic affair years before.

Lord Alfred travels to France to return the letters, but after encountering Lucile again, he realizes that despite his supposed anger at Lucile for their breakup, he still cares for her. For her part, Lucile never forgot Alfred; over the years, she had been the belle of France and had many potential suitors, but she rejected everyone. 

Her current potential suitor is Eugene de Luvois, a young Frenchman, who is continuously gay and merry, flitting from one party to the next, spending money lasciviously with no care in the world for making something of himself. With Lucile at his side, he thinks he can make something of himself and achieve meaning in his life.

Alfred confesses his feelings to Lucile, but she asks that he wait for her reply. Eugene confesses as well, but is rejected. At that same time, Alfred receives her letter that says that they can never be together and he is heartbroken, but after reading it a second time again, he realizes that Lucile still loves him, but cannot be with him because he is 'not free'. 

On his way back to England to 'free' himself from Matilda, he meets Eugene on road, who despite being rejected, gives Alfred a triumphal grin as if he had won Lucile's heart. Alfred took that grin as triumph, not jealously; he returns to England and marries Matilda.

The second part of the story sees all four characters at the same town and inn in France. Eugene's life has continued to be one of dispensation. But seeing Alfred and Lucile speaking once again, he decides to cause havoc by revealing to Matilda that Lucile was Alfred's previous lover.

Matilda had always loved Alfred and assumed she was loved as well, but with Eugene's words, she doubts everything. Fortunately, Lucile comes to the rescue and tells Matilda that Alfred loves her and no other. She reprimands Eugene strongly and refuses him once again. She tells him that she will always be his guide if he needs her in the future. She tells him to make something of himself and forget the past.

Years later, we see Alfred and Matilda, now poor (due to a dubious uncle who squandered the family's money), but happy because of their only son. Their son is in the army fighting during the Crimean War. He has been injured, but is nursed back to health by a nun named Sister Seraphine. Despite her care of his injury, he is dying from a broken heart. He has fallen in love with a girl named Constance, but cannot be with her because of her uncle's refusal.

Sister Seraphine goes to the general of the army to ask for his help with the boy. It is revealed that the general is Eugene de Luvois. No longer a layabout, but an upstanding man who has devoted his life to helping others. When he realizes that Seraphine is Lucile, he is astonished, but all of his anger comes back when she mentions who the boy is, his rival's child. At first he refuses to give his consent for his niece Constance to marry, but in the end he relents. 

The story comes full circle with Alfred and Matilda together, their son and Constance together, and Eugene and Lucile still alone, but atoning for their 'supposed' sins by giving help to the world where they can.

I have a theory as to why the book resonated with American audiences. In any other story, Lucile would have been the catalyst that broke Alfred and Matilda's relationship apart, she would have been the villain. Instead, the author gives us a character who gives up her love for Alfred and becomes a nun. She transfers her love for Alfred to a love for everyone. She is a constant source of comfort and solace for those she encounters. With Eugene, she convinces him to become something, to do good in the world, when she could have left him to his own devices and let him destroy himself and others.

Considering America's ideals of women in the late 19th century and early 20th century, Lucile's character is one that women could see themselves in. Forgiving, noble, and loving throughout trials of life.

With the book's popularity, it was made into at least four plays in the early 20th century before 1910. It was also made into a film in 1912 by the Thanhouser Company, but sadly it did not survive. Perhaps it will come to light one day if a copy still exists in the world, but is buried in a storage somewhere. We can only hope.

While reading the book, I found some interesting ephemera that a previous owner had slipped in the book. The first was a receipt for Century Subscription Agency to extend a subscription for Biff Magazine. The receipt dates to 1913 and was signed by a woman who lived in Omro, Wisconsin.

The second item was a partial silver gelatin photograph. It shows a young boy wearing a black cap sitting beside a woman in a white blouse. I wonder who they were? Family of the owner of the book and receipt?

Don't you love finding notes and other items in used books? I know I do. Gives the book an addition life beyond the words on the page.

With the date of the receipt, I would hazard a guess that my copy of the book was published circa 1913. It was published by M.A. Donohue & Co. in Chicago. My version is one of their 'handy volume' editions of the book.

I hope you enjoyed my ramblings today. If you would like to read the book, Amazon has it for free on Kindle and you can also find it through Project Gutenberg, a great website for books in the public domain.

Until next time ^___^

Saturday Book Hunting :)

Good afternoon. As you can see, Kristina and I didn't make it to Louisiana this weekend. The weather decided to conspire against us and the entire Gulf Coast for that matter. So she went on the hunt for yard sales this morning despite the rain and I went to the library (yes, I know I said I was going to read what I have at home....and I have...but I was looking for craft books.....I have excuses for everything!! LOL).

After spending some time at the library, I drove over to Springhill College to the Book Nook to browse. I wasn't expecting to find anything, but imagine my surprise when they had a small selection of books by Sidney McCall (real name Mary Fenollosa).

I ended up buying Truth Dexter, her first novel and The Breath of the Gods, her first book set in Japan. Both books are published by Little, Brown & Company. Truth Dexter was originally published in 1901; the book I bought was published in 1907. The Breath of the Gods was published in 1905 and I was lucky enough to buy a first edition of the book :) 110 and 112 year old books in decent condition!!

I absolutely LOVE the decorative covers on these books. I consider it a shame that you don't see that type of workmanship on modern books unless the company puts the effort into presentation of their books or a company is making a 'special' or anniversary editions of a book.

For those of you that don't know Mary McNeil Fenollosa was quite the character. She ended up getting married three times (first husband passed away, second husband divorced her, but kept their child, but the third and final time was true love). Her last husband was Ernest Fenollosa, who she worked with at Boston MFA. He was married at the time, but divorced and married Mary. It was quite the scandal....so much so that he was asked to leave Boston MFA!

They spent a few years in Japan and eventually came back to the United States. Fenollosa was quite influential in people's perceptions of Oriental art. He and his wife were friends with a circle of Western scholars in Japan, which included Lafcadio Hearn, Edward Morse, and others.

Mary began writing novels under the name Sidney McCall in 1901. Her first book Truth Dexter was about a southern woman whose marriage is threatened by a Boston socialite. (Interesting subject matter considering the origins of her marriage to Fenollosa). She would continue to write books until 1919. Several of her books were made into films or plays.

Not bad for a woman who grew up in Mobile, AL. Alabama Heritage magazine has a great article on Mary Fenollosa that they published recently.

Hope you liked learning a little literary history of Alabama.

Until next time >___<