Jug or pitcher covers were meant to keep insects out of the milk or other liquid inside the jug. Beads around the edge of the cover kept it from slipping off the jug.

I recall a time, maybe in the 1980s, when crocheted, beaded jug covers appeared some magazines and pattern leaflets. The photo-styling showed pitchers of lemonade or iced tea with drinking glasses on tables outside. The covers were to keep bees and flies out of the beverages.

In 2025, I found a few patterns online for crocheted jug covers with 3-D teacups in the center. They were not exactly like this one.

I bought this jug cover in 2022 or 2023 at a down-sizing sale a few blocks east of Mopac Highway in north Austin, Texas. The collector of the jug cover had many other interesting and beautiful textile pieces in her collection.
]]> My mother made this so that I can wear with my colorless midnight navy blue woolen top that looks quite formal with skinny wool pants of white or beige. Adding this around the neck was to make it possible to wear it more casually. The technique is simple and primitive. My mother is a rough, not minute person. She doesn’t care for details being flawed. Thus this is not a good example for careful knitters.

]]> This is a set of Woodins, knit from the Woodins pattern by Anna Hrachovec that appeared in the Fall 2007 issue of Knitty. The creator knit it for her niece's second birthday and added felt birthday hats for each creature.

The project consists of a five small creatures made from single ply wool yarn from the creator's stash and a log also made from stash yarn. Both components were fulled (felted) in the washing machine and by hand, then stuffed with polyfil.

]]> This white crochet doily has bright yellow Black Eyed Susan flower motifs around the outside edge and at the center. Each brown center is padded and raised. The centers have been sewn into the center of each flower. Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Arch Lamb, Accession number TTU-H1977-096-032

]]> This knitted yarn bomb hangs inside my front porch window. I designed and made it in support of the Black Lives Matter movement in July of 2020. I used size 13 needles and employed intarsia technique.

I live in a small community 30 miles east of Madison, Wisconsin. I wanted to do something to show my support for the Black Lives Matter movement. There hasn't been any protests here, but that doesn't mean people don't care. So I made this. It's not much, but it's what I can do with my voice.

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The significance of circles plays a key role in the artist vision for her collection. For instance, circles are representative of enlightenment, or they may represent the spirit. In indigenous cultures, circles are used for sweat lodges and drum circles and represent harmony, balance and treasured oneness with nature. Knots also carry a specific significance as they are used in prayer beads symbolizing the connection to the higher power. The artists finds that the repetitive knots create a quiet atmosphere to connect and for healing.

Mandalas are significant to the artist given they represent the transformation and healing from trauma and chaos to harmony and balance. Her collection of “Mandalas of Transformation” are representative of a scar, seen, heard, validated and healed. Additional mandalas are continuously being created to represent the intention to heal, to bring hope, to show support, to bring a splash of color or simply to be a whimsical reminder of our Divinity.

]]> History of Blue Hand-Knitted Ski Sweater Handwritten by Mary Ruth McGinnis (transcribed)

"November 16, 2015

Augusta Adelia Lehner Newman knitted this sweater for her son, Charles Wynn Newman, Jr., when he was a boy. So it was knitted sometime in the late 1920s to early 1930s.

After he outgrew the sweater, his younger sister, Margaret Thais Newman McGinnis, began wearing it in the late 1940s.

In the 1960s, Margaret’s son, Paul Lee McGinnis, began wearing it.

In the 1970s, Margaret’s daughter, Mary Ruth McGinnis, took over wearing the sweater.

Sometime in the 1980s, Margaret darned a hole in the lower back of the sweater and the right sleeve cuff.

The sweater was retired from use about 2000."

CKC Notes:

David M. Newman contributed this sweater to the Center for Knit and Crochet in December 2021. It was originally knitted for his father, Charles Wynn Newman, Jr., when the family lived in Detroit, MI. David M. Newman commented, "I have no use for the sweater and although I have no wish to display it I recognize that it may serve as a well-executed example of a traditional craft performed in the service of the craftperson’s family."

The sweater appears to be knitted of navy blue wool accented with traditional Scandinavian-style decorative motifs in red, yellow, green, and white. The motifs are made using two techniques -- stranded knitting (patterns are knitted in) and duplicate stitch (patterns are applied as surface decoration after knitting). The sweater shows signs of wear and has been repaired, which only attests to the family's appreciation and care of the maker's work. It has otherwise survived in excellent condition. It is notable that the sweater was worn and enjoyed by several generations of the family.

The sweater and accompanying documentation will be used for educational and promotional purposes by the CKC to encourage others to add their knit and crochet items and stories to CKC's Crowdsourced Collection.

]]> One family gave her some heavy cotton yarn. Anna wanted to try a doily pattern she had seen in a calendar. Normally people use fine cotton to crochet doilies, but by the mid 1940s, toward the end of World War II, money and supplies of all kinds were difficult to come by in the village. So Anna used what she had. She crocheted the doily, learning in the process that when you use larger yarn than normal, you get a larger doily than normal. Her adult-sized granddaughter's hand in the photo gives an idea of the doily's scale. The doily is in Anna's collection.]]>
The significance of circles plays a key role in the artist’s vision for her collection. For instance, circles are representative of enlightenment, or they may represent the spirit. In indigenous cultures, circles are used for sweat lodges and drum circles and represent harmony, balance and treasured oneness with nature. Knots also carry a specific significance as they are used in prayer beads symbolizing the connection to the higher power. The artists finds that repetitive knots create a quiet atmosphere to connect and for healing.

Mandalas are significant to the artist given they represent the transformation and healing from trauma and chaos to harmony and balance. Her collection of “Mandalas of Transformation” are representative of a scar, seen, heard, validated and healed. Additional mandalas are continuously being created to represent the intention to heal, to bring hope, to show support, to bring a splash of color or simply to be a whimsical reminder of our Divinity.
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According to her blog, bellacrochet.blogspot.com, Ann (her preferred name), worked in the crochet pattern publishing business for the next twenty years. She was an in-house designer, technical editor, and eventually a crochet pattern book editor.

Ann continued designing as a freelancer. In the 2020s she sold her patterns online. She offered quite a few free design downloads, too.

The doily shown here is Ann’s Cameo Butterfly Doily, from her Butterflies and Roses Pineapple Doilies pattern collection. I crocheted it in 2019 using Aunt Lydia’s No. 10 crochet cotton.

Ann’s pattern instructed crocheters to glue the flowers and the butterfly to the pineapple motif base. I was shocked, because…glue?—on a doily?

However, I followed directions. After the fabric glue set, I stitched down the slender antennae and the tips of each wing, just to make sure they would stay put.]]>
Gene met her future husband Bob Frederick on a blind date. Soon after they married, they moved to West Covina, California, where they lived for several years, and where their son Tom was born.

The Frederick family lived for a year in Maracaibo, Venezuela, before returning to Bob’s hometown of Houston, Texas, where their son Charles was born in April 1961. Gene knitted the Winking Santa Christmas stocking for Charles.

Gene worked as a librarian for a number of years. She was a member of the Presbyterian Church and a local woman’s club. She knitted occasionally. Gene was a wonderful seamstress, cook and hostess. She inspired a love of cooking in her sons, from which their families benefit to this day.

Gene Thomas Frederick died in 2004.

. . .

According to information found on Ravelry and other online sources, the 7592 Jeweled Winking Santa Stocking pattern was by an unnamed designer for the Bernhard Ulmann Company, later known as Bucilla. In 1960 Bear Brand yarn offered the Jeweled Winking Santa Stocking pattern as part of a kit which also included yarn and presumably supplies for the sequin embellishment.

Search Ravelry for “7592 Jeweled Winking Santa Stocking” to learn more about it.
]]> Top of cuff to tip of toe: 21 1/4 inches
]]> This Christmas stocking is one of a pair of stockings that Betty Lindsay, my mother-in-law, had knitted for me and my sister-in-law when we joined the family. The pattern is the Victorian Stocking Pattern by Valerie Root, published in Better Homes and Gardens Holiday Celebrations Magazine, 1993. At the same time, Betty had coordinating stockings in a different design knitted for our husbands – her sons. I am still searching for the source of the patterns for those.

This stocking is hand knitted of cream-colored wool. The wool is DK weight. The design features panels of heavily embossed bobbles in a swag pattern separated by columns of garter ribbing. The top of the stocking features a knitted loop for hanging the stocking, and a knitted casing, 1.5 inches wide, that holds a 1” wide, dark green grosgrain ribbon. Below the ribbon casing, there is a 3.25” deep decorative edging, heavily embossed with bobbles. The initials “JL” are embroidered in green wool on the heel of the stocking using duplicate stitch. I recall that my sister-in-law's stocking was finished about a year earlier, and that hers had a red ribbon and red initials.

Betty was the co-owner with Bonne Hassler of Yarns International in Bethesda, Maryland. Betty and Bonnie hired several knitters to knit samples for the store and to do commission knitting and repairs for customers, and it is likely that one of these knitters was hired to knit the stockings. The knitting and finishing details are all beautifully and skillfully done.

Betty’s Christmases were legendary celebrations, and I know she filled this stocking for me when she gave it to me. It is simply gargantuan, measuring 27.5” inches from top of stocking to tip of toe, and 9” wide (18” in circumference)!

I like to think the large size demonstrates my mother-in-law’s overwhelming love for me, but from notes shared by “theytoldmesew” – another knitter who posted her project on Ravelry, www.ravelry.com, the photo of the pattern in the magazine was deceptive. The instructions include more repeats around and more repeats in length than the magazine photo of the stocking shows, resulting in a much larger stocking than would be expected. The large size is especially obvious and humorous when I hang it next to the stocking Betty had knitted for my husband that same year.

Because of its size, I use this stocking as a fun holiday decoration, but not as a Chrsitmas stocking. My sister-in-law found a different use for her gargantuan stocking, along with some of the swatches in Betty’s large swatch collection. She had them cut up, felted, and sewn into multiple stockings – one for each family member. You can see an example of one such stocking, which has a cuff made from a portion of her original Victorian Stocking, now felted.

It is wonderful to see these items getting the love they deserve, whether in their original form, or in a new one.

]]> A hand knit coin purse with crochet or looped bobble decorations made in Accha Alta, Peru, a small Andean community located about 2 hours north of Cusco, Peru.

I purchased this coin purse in Cusco in 2017 at the Centro de Textiles Tradicionales del Cusco. (https://www.textilescusco.org). The CTTC, established in 1996, preserves and sustains the artists of Peruvian Inca textiles and their diverse communities throughout the region by providing a venue for them to demonstrate, exhibit, and sell their work.

The purse is made of hand spun, hand dyed Alpaca yarn. I recall from my visit that the dyes used are all traditional dyes, including plant dyes. The knitted gauge is very fine -- approximately 10 stitches and 10 rows to 1".

Artist: Margarita Huaman Puma, b. 1986

I often purchase local textiles as a way to remember places I have visited. Studying textiles made for and collected by travelers to various regions of the globe throughout history is endlessly fascinating.

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Unlike most Irish Crochet, the separately-crocheted motifs were joined with needle and thread. Usually, Irish Crochet motifs were joined with a plain or fancy crocheted net background.

I used one collar around the v-neck of a fuchsia silk dress. In the third photo, I’m wearing the dress with the crocheted collar, about to attend the wedding of a childhood friend in the late 1980s.

The dress I wore to my own wedding featured a dropped waist that came to a point in front. I placed the group of three leaves of the collar at the dropped-waist point at the front of the dress. I hand-stitched the rest of the collar across the front and around to the back of the dress, following the seam where the bodice met the skirt. I think we could call that crocheted ornamentation “garniture.”

The crochet thread was a linen/cotton blend. I sewed both dresses.

This project was in The Irish Crochet Book No. 2, reprinted in 1981 by House of White Birches, page 25, Figure 65.

The original pattern book was titled Priscilla Irish Crochet Book No. 2, edited by Eliza Taylor, published in 1912 by the Priscilla Publishing Co., Boston, Mass. In 2025 the original was available for download from the Antique Pattern Library, https://www.antiquepatternlibrary.org/pub/PDF/6-JA025PrisIrish2.pdf
]]> 26 1/4 inches around inside of collar
2 3/4 inches across Pinwheel motif
]]> Christy Lockard crocheted edges for dozens of hankies for her family and friends. For this handkerchief she used a variegated blue thread. Lockard (1894-1982) lived in Middletown, Dauphin County, PA, USA. Most of her crochet work was done between 1950 - 1970

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