Sew long ago
You don’t see smocking much any more, but when The Dark Lord was a little girl she was given a beautiful smocked floral dress that had been handmade by her greatgrandmother.
The Dark Lordette was very proud of this pretty dress and when anyone commented on it, she would lisp: “This is my smoking dress.”
It was a slow start for Toni Jones from Sheering, Essex, in the school sewing class. She says: “Your column last Friday about runaway sewing machines reminded me of my needlework lessons at school in the late 1950s.
“I remember being very pleased with myself after ‘smocking’ an apron, only to discover I had smocked it to the skirt I was wearing at the time. Sister Agatha was NOT pleased with me.”
Sadly Toni was not blessed in the knitting department either.
“Then one of my aunts taught me how to knit, but sadly the largest garment I have ever knitted was a doll’s dress, which had holes in it. Many years later I was attempting to make a ballet tutu for my little daughter.
I sewed the zip in very neatly, but had joined the back of the dress to the front of the dress.” Still, she’s not completely at the bottom of the class, and adds: “I am proud to announce that I can crochet and sew buttons on.”
However, I can’t say the same of Helen Tabern in Garswood, Merseyside.
She says: “You reminded me of a funny memory of a particular sewing lesson when I was at junior school, many moons ago.
“My best friend was a girl called Elaine and we were inseparable.
“We were also both very bad at sewing and dreaded the weekly class.
“This one time, we had been told to practise tacking stitch, and for some reason, I can’t remember why, Elaine did mine and I did hers.
“At the end of the lesson I took my sample to show the teacher, a Miss Whittle, who was very daunting, and she exclaimed that it was so bad, even Elaine wouldn’t have produced such a mess.”
■ Send your needlecraft memories to siobhan.mcnally@mirror.co.uk