A Needle Pulling Thread - Sewing in Storybooks
As a children’s librarian with a passionate love of worn quilts, my grandmother’s Bernina, bright craft felt, jars of buttons, stacks of cotton fat quarters, and rows of colored threads, it’s hardly surprising that I took notice of the following books for children released during the past few years. I hope you will take them into your home (and heart) as well!
Abbie in Stitches
written by Cynthia Cotten and illustrated by Beth Peck
New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2006
Abbie would much rather read than learn the “womanly” arts appropriate in the nineteenth
century, but finds herself rewarded in unexpected ways when she rebelliously expresses her love of books through her embroidery.
Fanny
by Holly Hobbie
New York: Little, Brown and Co., 2008
When denied a store-bought fashion doll that her mother deems “too much,” Fanny sews her own doll, which receives a lukewarm reception from her friends. Can high fashion and homemade ever really play nicely together?
The Elephant Quilt
written by Susan Lowell and illustrated by Stacey Dressen-McQueen
New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2008
Lily Rose and her grandmother record the family’s journey by wagon to California
in their collaborative patchwork quilt.
Stitchin’ and Pullin’
written by Patricia McKissack and illustrated by Cozbi Cabrera
New York: Random House, 2008
This emotional book of poetry celebrates the art quilts created by the women of Gees Bend through the observations of Baby Girl, who remembers important moments in her family’s history as shown in fiber art.
Amazon Says: It’s the early 1800s, and Abbie’s sister, Sarah, is a proper young lady who loves needlework. She has already made a sampler displaying her neat and even stitching. But wh...
Amazon
Amazon Says: All Fanny wants in the world is a Connie doll, but Mom says "NO!" But no one ever said she couldn't make one instead! With some scissors, glue, and her craft box in hand, Fann...
Amazon
Amazon Says: “We’re going to see the Elephant!” That’s what people say when they head West on a journey promising to be “something powerful strange. Like a real live elephant, bu...
Amazon
Amazon Says: MOTHER AND DAUGHTER, grandmother and granddaughter, aunt and niece, friend and friend. For a hundred years, generations of women from Gee’s Bend have quilted together, shari...
Amazon