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Quotations about Needlework
Plain Sewing and Cooking are so old-fashioned that they are fast becoming new Fads. ~Minna Thomas Antrim (1861–1950), Don'ts for Bachelors and Old Maids, 1908
All my scattering moments, are taken up, with my needle—
~Ellen Birdseye Wheaton, diary, 1851
The girl who sits in the porchway low
Sings to her needle as to and fro
It weaves the seam with its glittering glow,
Close in the garment she holds to sew.
Sing to the seam;
Sing it your dream;
Lodge in each stitch
Part of its gleam...
A song's good company while you sew;
It helps the needle to onward go
And trace its work in a dainty row
As the tossed threads shorter grow.
Tune and labor, together aglow,
The richest blessings of time bestow.
Sing to the seam;
Sing it your dream;
Lodge in each stitch
Part of its gleam.
~Sara L. Vickers Oberholtzer, "Sing to the Seam," Come for Arbutus, and Other Wild Bloom, 1882 [a little altered
I am a soul in process. I am life in the making. I am a weaver with shuttle and thread, and back in my loom the design begins to show. ~Muriel Strode (1875–1964), My Little Book of Life, 1912
Oh what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to weave. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1963
Needle, needle, dip and dart,
Thrusting up and down,
Where's the man could ease a heart
Like a satin gown?
See the stitches curve and crawl
Round the cunning seams—
Patterns thin and sweet and small
As a lady's dreams...
~Dorothy Parker, "The Satin Dress," 1926
Methinks it is a token of healthy and gentle characteristics, when women of high thoughts and accomplishments love to sew; especially as they are never more at home with their own hearts than while so occupied. ~Nathaniel Hawthorne, "Miriam's Studio," The Marble Faun, or, The Romance of Monte Beni, 1859
...women — be they of what earthly rank they may, however gifted with intellect or genius, or endowed with awful beauty — have always some little handiwork ready to fill the tiny gap of every vacant moment. A need is familiar to the fingers... The slender thread of silk or cotton keeps them united with the small, familiar, gentle interests of life... ~Nathaniel Hawthorne, "Miriam's Studio," The Marble Faun, or, The Romance of Monte Beni, 1859
Weave in faith and God will find the thread. ~Proverb
She watched and taught the girls that sang at their embroidery frames while the great silk flowers grew from their needles. ~Louise Jordan Miln, The Feast of Lanterns, 1920
I found a quantity of sewing waiting with open arms to embrace me, or rather for me to embrace it, and I could hardly give myself up to "Nature's sweet restorer," for the ghosts of out-of-order garments crying for vengeance upon my defenceless head. ~Emily Dickinson, 1846
She can sew...
She can knit...
She is proud...
~William Shakespeare, Two Gentlemen of Verona, c.1594
Most of the time occupied in sewing. It seems as if there was no end of that branch of work in this house. ~Ellen Birdseye Wheaton, diary, 1851
Give me that life that is seamed and riven with living. ~Muriel Strode (1875–1964), My Little Book of Life, 1912
If I could patch a coverlet
From pieces of the Spring,
What dreams a happy child would have
Beneath so fair a thing!
A centre of the dear blue sky,
A bordering of green,
With patches of the yellow sun
All chequered in between.
Bright ribbons of the silky grass
Laced prettily across,
With satin of new little leaves,
And velvet of the moss.
In every corner, violets,
Half-hidden from the view,
With many-flowered squares betwixt,
Of pinky tints and blue..
Embroideries of little vines,
And spider-webs of lace...
With gold-thread I would sew the seams,
And needles of the pine;
Oh, never child in all the world
Would have a quilt like mine!
~Abbie Farwell Brown, "Spring Patchwork," 1901
Take your needle, my child, and work at your pattern, — it will come out a rose by and by. Life is like that, Myrtle, one stitch at a time, taken patiently, and the pattern will come out all right like the embroidery. ~Oliver Wendell Holmes, The Guardian Angel, 1867 [Byles Gridley
Jane Austen was successful in everything that she attempted with her fingers... spilikins... cup and ball... handwriting... Her needlework both plain and ornamental was excellent, and might almost have put a sewing machine to shame. She was considered especially great in satin stitch. She spent much time in these occupations, and some of her merriest talk was over clothes which she and her companions were making, sometimes for themselves, and sometimes for the poor.... the same hand which painted so exquisitely with the pen could work as delicately with the needle. ~J. E. Austen Leigh, A Memoir of Jane Austen, By Her Nephew, 1870
A knitter only appears to be knitting yarn. Also being knitted are winks, mischief, sighs, fragrant possibilities, wild dreams. ~Dr. SunWolf, professorsunwolf.com
Shall I stitch and stitch that my flesh may be covered, and leave no time for the weaving of fabric for my shivering spirit? ~Muriel Strode (1875–1964), "A Soul's Faring: XVIII," A Soul's Faring, 1921
...the innocent sleep,
Sleep that knits up the ravell'd sleeve of care,
The death of each day's life, sore labour's bath,
Balm of hurt minds, great nature's second course,
Chief nourisher in life's feast,—
~William Shakespeare, Macbeth, c.1605
Sleep knits up the raveled sleeve of care, but it doesn't sew on buttons. ~"Poor Richard Junior's Philosophy," The Saturday Evening Post, 1903, George Horace Lorimer, editor
Many a bachelor could be lured into society if someone would start sewing-on button parties. ~Mary Wilson Little, Reveries of a Paragrapher, 1897
I couldn't sew on a day like this. There's something in the air that gets into my blood and makes a sort of glory in my soul. My finger would twitch and I'd sew a crooked seam. So it's ho for the park and the pines. ~L. M. Montgomery, Anne of the Island, 1915
Every day a thread makes a skein in the year. ~Dutch proverb
Out of life's tangled skein
Draw here and there a thread;
And one is black with pain,
And one with grief is red,
To show a heart hath bled.
And one is white as youth;
It marks its perfect time,
When life, untouched of ruth,
Mounted toward Summer prime,
Through love, romance, and rhyme.
Beside Love's glowing threads,
Here one is cool and gray,
Where passionate morning weds
A neutral-tinted day,
And Peace comes down to stay.
Imperial purple weaves signs,
Hints of loftier bliss bespread,
Memories in royal ray tread
With pallid and paling lines
Of youth forever fled...
Yet, touching them, they glow,—
Again the young, warm thrill,
The tones all sweet and low,
The hushed heart waiting still,
As eyes with love o'erfill...
We seat us down some day;
And from life's tangled skein,
That Memory holds alway,
We smooth out lines of pain,
And love-threads hold pure gain.
O myriad-tinted threads!
We gather you all at last;
You mark our whitening heads,
You bind us to our past,
And we hold you close and fast.
~Mary Clemmer (1831–1884), "Life-Threads," 1882
I mean, that my heart unto yours is knit
So that but one heart we can make of it...
~William Shakespeare, Midsummer Night's Dream, c.1595
To make you brothers, and to knit your hearts... ~William Shakespeare, Antony and Cleopatra, c.1606
All school-days' friendship, childhood innocence?
We, Hermia, like two artificial gods,
Have with our needles created both one flower,
Both on one sampler, sitting on one cushion,
Both warbling of one song, both in one key,
As if our hands, our sides, voices and minds,
Had been incorporate. So we grow together,
Like to a double cherry, seeming parted,
But yet an union in partition;
Two lovely berries moulded on one stem;
So, with two seeming bodies, but one heart...
~William Shakespeare, Midsummer Night's Dream, c.1595
Threads do not break for being fine, but for being gouty and ill-spun. ~Portuguese proverb
The priest was on a roll: "Each person you meet is worthy of your compassion!" he prayed loudly. "Sheep, too," the knitter mentally added. ~Dr. SunWolf, professorsunwolf.com
She winced, shook her head, agitated her rocking-chair with petulance, embroidered vindictively, and hardly so much called out as sighed very loudly toward the hallway. ~Rupert Hughes, The Thirteenth Commandment, 1916
the sweetest pastimes to old age to sit down and slowly unravel them, recalling the hours when first they were spun. ~James Lendall Basford (1845–1915), Sparks from the Philosopher's Stone, 1882
Yesterday's weaving is as irrevocable as yesterday. I may not draw out the threads, but I may change my shuttle. ~Muriel Strode (1875–1964), My Little Book of Life, 1912
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published 2006 Jun 13
revised 2021 Sep 11
last saved 2025 Jan 3
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