SEWING PARAPHERNALIA

As many of you know, after Mum died just before Christmas last year, we had to clear out her flat within a month.  This job was undertaken by my sister, Karen, her daughter, Jolene and me, with our brother popping in from time to time.  It took us quite a long time to go through all her various items of furniture, clothes, costume jewellery, ornaments, baking tins, etc etc but at the end of each day, we went home with something we didn’t even know we needed!

Many years ago, Dad had made a sewing box and had covered it with old carpet - it wasn’t something that any of us wanted, so that went to a Veterans’ charity shop - and I noticed when I went by a few days later that it was marked at £35 - I don’t think I would have paid that for it, but as the saying goes, “Someone’s junk is someone else’s treasure”!  

When I was looking for something yesterday in the bottom drawer of our filing cabinet, I came across several boxes and tins that I had brought home from Mum’s - obviously because no-one else wanted them.  The tins themselves looked quite old and the half-moon shaped, Royal Edinburgh All Butter Shortbread tin, contained hundreds of buttons - so these can be added to the box of buttons that came from Mr. HCB’s mother.  

A small Jacobs Biscuit Tin contained Sylko cotton reels, mostly plastic, with beautifully named colours printed on them, and another small St. Bruno Flake tobacco tin contained several plastic and metal thimbles - Mr. HCB’s mother would have loved these, as she always used one when she was sewing, but I could never quite get the hang of using one.  In fact, I can never even remember my mother sewing, let alone using a thimble! 

A small oblong tin marked “Panter Sigarenfabrieken” from H & J Schuppen N.V. Veenendaal, Holland has a mixture of needles, hatpins, buckles, a magnet, and several keys, but goodness knows what they would open!  This is a vintage Mignon 10 cigarette tin box and looking on eBay, they are selling for almost $20 or about £15 in English money.

When my sister and I found several old tins, Mum had written on scrappy bits of paper “Keep this tin (or box) it might be worth something”, which made us laugh, but she might be right!  In one of the boxes is a plastic darning “mushroom” that unscrews and is filled with darning needles and a bodkin.  I doubt that will ever be used now because people don’t darn socks or the elbows of jumpers like they used to years ago.  There is even a card with Nylusta thread for “tights and stockings mending” - can you imagine anyone doing that these days?

There was also a small cardboard box full of wooden Sylko spools of Machine Twist Silk Substitute, machine twist cotton, made by J. Dewhurst & Sons Ltd.  These also had wonderfully named colours, such as Lt Mole, Dark Lovebird, Lagoon Blue, Spring Green, Turkey Red, Silver Pine, Lt Clematis, Rust Red, Red Salmon and Champagne.  

However, I was very surprised to see a small spool containing dark brown cotton with the name that is no longer in use today except as a derogatory and racist term, which makes us think that these spools must be almost 60 years old.  

Looking on Google, I found out that there were about 600 colours of Sylko were produced, originally on wooden bobbins, up to the 1960s and then on plastic ones in the 1970s and 80s.  I do wish I had known Mum had these, because I would like to have known where they came from - did she buy them - and at least one of the packs was purchased from McIlroys, a wonderful haberdashery store in Swindon that closed in 1998 - or were they passed on to her from someone else? Apparently, the wooden bobbins are haberdashery and vintage collectors’ items - so they could also be worth something!  Perhaps I need to try and sell some of this stuff on eBay!

I don’t really do a lot of sewing, but this quote is especially for my Blip friend, Topsyturvy and I’m sure she will agree:

“Remember, people will see your quilts
     long after you are gone - 
          not your housework”! 
Anon

P.S.  Happy Birthday to any who are celebrating their "once every four years" birthday - we have at least one friend who is!