In keeping with our theme, "Come Celebrate the Work of Our Hands", you can participate in an exhibit at the Fair this year showing the work of YOUR hands!

My grandmother, Beatrice "Lorette" LaLonde Cassidy passed away in 2002 (at age 98!) and left me her bag of patterns. I am the oldest granddaughter and the only one who she taught to knit and crochet who kept at it.

It was difficult to go through, so I put it off. In 2008, I brought it with me to a "Do It In Public" meeting and we all eagerly and tenderly looked through the bag and found some great retro stuff! We thought it would be fun to take one of the patterns to interpret and create an exhibit for the Fair. The result was a stunning display of every kind of interpretation: knit, crochet, quilt, felt, beadwoven, sewn, etc.

We will continue the tradition in 2010 and honor those who taught us and those who have inspired the work of our hands.

It's HERE! Are you up for doing something different?

Create this "retro" 1945 handbag - your way - and we'll exhibit it for all to see at the Fair! There are a couple of rules:

1) It has to have ridges
2) It has to have buckles
3) It has to be in proportion

However, you can make it a clutch...or a laptop case...you can knit it, crochet it, bead it, weave it, felt it, quilt it, sew it ....Let your imagination run wild!

Click here for complete information on how to obtain the pattern (for inspiration, or to follow it).

Click here to complete your entry for the Vintage Handbag Exhibition 2010.

Note: Please send your entry fee by check, payable to the Midwest Fiber & Folk Art Fair, to:
Midwest Fiber & Folk Art Fair
Vintage Handbag Exhibition
PO Box 754
Crystal Lake, IL 60039

Thank you to Coats & Clark for the use of this great pattern!

Fiber arts, fiber art fairs, women, and activism have a long history in the United States. Sayings, including the one above were embroidered into quilts and other household goods and sold at Great Fairs in the North to raise money to support the abolitionists prior to the Civil War. In the South, women sold Gunboat quilts to raise money for the army. Groups like the Woman's Relief Corp that existed right here in Crystal Lake, IL, all got into the prewar effort.

Further back in American History, we all remember and learned about the Boston Tea Party, but tea wasn't the only or the first sticking point between the Colonies and the British government. More festering still was the bitter battle over the colony's efforts to begin and sustain textile production. In 1699 the British passed "The Wool Act" which basically prohibited the colonies from selling textiles to anyone but the British government, who in turn sold it back to the colonies. In protest of this act, the ladies of Boston marched out on the Commons and spun yarn in defiance and...in public!!

Other interesting fibery facts:

Do you know...

• According to an article on the front page of the Wall Street Journal on April 19, 2008 53 MILLION Americans are now knitting? WooHoo!!
• Knitting, especially those active between the ages of 40 and 60, may help stave off Alzheimer's disease? (According to a study presented at the American Academy of Neurology's 52nd Annual Meeting).
• Knitting could help alleviate major trauma effects? (According to British psychologist Dr. Emily Holmes)
• "A group of mathematicians is taking a new look at some old problems and using crafts like knitting and crocheting to solve them. From the way the atmosphere generates weather to the shape of the human brain, knit and crocheted models have provided new insight into the geometry of the natural world." Read article
• Knitting and crocheting have been proven to reduce stress according to a study done by Harvard Medical School Mind Body Institute and another study done by University of Toronto?
• There's even research that suggests that knitting induces a meditative state similar to that of Nepalese monks - who increase the capacity of their brain through meditation.

Lorette Cassidy