1948??

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A couple of weeks ago we were at Dan and Carol's, the King's parents, house. They are doing a huge spring cleaning, decluttering, remodeling project. Carol had a chest full of magazines and craft patterns that she wanted to go through. We started hauling piles and piles of patterns and magazines from her chest to the table and going through them one by one. We worked on this for three hours, then it was time for us to leave. She had to finish up on her own, and we were not half way done!

All of the magazines I saw were craft magazines, covering a wide range of decades! Several of them were from the eighties. I remember looking at those with her when the King and I were dating! I never dreamt she still had them. Many of the magazines were from the seventies. Her girls graduated from high school in the late seventies and the King was in high school during the late seventies. That meant she had a lot more time on her hands than she had had for several years. She still has many afghans in her house that she crocheted during this time. All of her kids have afghans she crocheted then.

We found a few magazines from the early sixties, when her children were quite young. As we looked through those patterns, she showed me toys and Christmas ornaments she had made for her kids. Her writing was even on some of the patterns, marking her place!

One pile I pulled out of the back of the chest had several magazines from the forties! Are you kidding me, Carol? 1948? You were only seven years old then! What are you doing with these oldies?!! They had been her Mom's. We started looking through some of those old, smelly, musty patterns! We saw her Mom's writing on some of them, marking where she had left off. Many of the patterns during this time frame were for crocheting or knitting doilies, tableclothes, lace on the edge of a ladies handkerchief. Carol and I were both able to pick out doilies that her Mom had made for us! Did she still use these magazines in the eighties and nineties, or did she have the pattern memorized by then? Neither of us know. I can still see her sitting in her chair, crocheting, but I never looked for a pattern. As soon as someone showed up at her home, she would put whatever she was working on off to the side.

A few days ago I was talking to Carol on the phone. I asked her if she finished going through the chest of magazines yet. Yes, she had. I asked her if she found any more of the old ones. She found one from 1936! She believes that pattern book was her Grandma's! There was writing in there, too, but she does not know if it is her Grandma's writing or not. That particular book had patterns of crocheted edgings on ladies dress collars. Carol remembers a few of her Grandma's dresses having a fancy edging on them. I am assuming those were her "good" dresses. I wouldn't think she would have taken the time to doll up her everyday dresses like that. But maybe she did, who am I to say?

At first I was laughing at Carol because she had stacks and stacks of craft magazines stashed in her trunk. However, as we got going through them, it brought back many memories for both of us. It was neat to look through some of those ancient patterns, too. There were a few patterns for crocheting the edges on pillow cases. I remember seeing some of those when I was a child. I don't know if they were at one of my Great-Grandma's houses, a Grandma's house, our own house or somebody else's house. Too bad we don't pay more attention to some of that stuff when we are little tykes.