Calendulas! - But in Grandmother’s Day They Were Called Marigolds

During the old times basic remedies from the petals have made women beautiful, but the flower now makes a fashionable inexpensive floral decoration. With the advent of homesteading and the back to simple living movement, the old time calendula has been experiencing a tremendous boom. So whether you really like it, or not, knowing about calendulas is useful knowledge not only for using it as decoration but as a helpful medicinal herb in it's own right.

In the past grandmothers had a prettier name for them in Mary’s Gold, or marigold. The quilled petals of the calendula reminded our grandparents of the likeness of Mary with her halo and ‘rays of glory’ which gives the name Marigold.

“The marigold that goes to bed with the sun, and with him rises, weeping…” - Shakespeare

In times past the flower was a favourite and was much used by housewives and the old ‘simplers' (herbalist), and to-day many are making concoctions from the garden Calendula for beauty just as they did in days of old.

Calendulas are good for cutting. One of the disadvantages about the calendula as a cut flower is the strong odour of the stems when stood in water. Every day the water should be changed, and the stems cut down just a little. If the stems are left in the water it makes the water cloudy and unpleasant. Treating the stems also helps keep the flowers to last longer. Bits of old leaves should also be cut off. Don’t pull the leaf off as that encourages the stem to ‘bleed’ or weep where it is tore. 

Calendulas have a long flowering season and the plants are strong and hardy making them an excellent cut flower, and one that should be used for decoration under artificial light as it is a showy bloom which brightens up any corner of the room.

I hope everyone is having a good day or evening where ever you are.

Hankies for gifts -1939

I found this handkerchief edging in a November 1939 Australian women's magazine. It seems a bit complicated but the pattern is doable for someone like me with little experience in crochet. I tried doing the edging when I had a flu and there was a couple of attempts to figure out the pattern. I'm not really sure if I managed to get the pattern right but the finished edge looks nice enough. 

The finished handkerchief was teamed up with a hand painted greeting card and I used the greeting card painting as an embroidery on the handkerchief. For the embroidery I used the ever popular crayon tinting technique that was popular in the '30's for the embroidery.

(Note: The crochet stitches are English/Australian. American crochet stitches are different. I have a chart on my blog in an old post to translate stitches: Here)

Use fine handkerchiefs with a narrow hem and work over the hem into actual holes of hemstitch.

Abbreviations: Ch, chain; dc, double crochet; tr, treble; pic, picot ( 3 ch, 1 dc back into first) spl, single pic loop (2ch, pic, 2 ch, pic); H, hole of hemstitching. If plain linen be used, roll edge and close dc all round, then call every dc an h.

Double picot Edge:

1st row: 1 dc into any h, * 3 ch, miss 1h, 1 tr, 3 ch, 1 tr into next; miss 1 h, 1 tr, 3 ch, 1 tr into next; 3 ch, miss 1 h, 1 dc into next; 5 ch, miss 1 h, 1 dc into next, Repeat from * all round.

2nd Row: 1 dc into 5 ch loop, * 3 ch, 1 tr, 1 spl, 1 tr into 3 ch between first pair of tr; 1 tr, 1 spl, 1 tr into next 3 ch between next pair of tr; 3ch, 1 dc into 5 ch loop repeat from * all round. 

I hope everyone is having a good day or evening where ever you are.

Cottage Journal - Winter and flu season

I took an unintentional blogging break due to getting a bad case of the flu. With winter arriving, it is of course, the season for flu's. It didn't help we had some icy weather after really nice winter days that were much milder. With my recovery I'll be back blogging again.

Blogger also has changed the way it collects information so they are now including the use of cookies. It is likely visitors to my blog will see a pop up to agree to collect cookies.

My study for 1939 is continuing. I'm now saving newspaper and magazine clippings into a scrapbook. There's just about mostly everything that could be useful for a 1939 home now collected into sections of the scrapbook. The articles cover the kitchen, the garden, other parts of the home, and beauty.  Reading the articles have been very interesting and it is true what they say about there being nothing new under the sun, a lot of the articles are really relevant for today's home and have been written about today.  

In the front pages of the current 1939 newspapers there are articles about the problems with Germany and Japan. War is lurking around the corner!

 I hope everyone is having a good day or evening where ever you are.