Handkerchief serves as nice baby bonnet

Now, when it comes to the human nose, paper products rule supreme. Handkerchiefs have been relegated to the realm of collector’s items, quaint little squares of fabric edged with fine crochet, tatting or machine-made lace. Some are hemstitched, most are white, but others come in flower prints or pastel colors.

Handkerchiefs make me think of my third-grade teacher, who wore one pinned like a droopy pastel flower on the left front of her dress, and of my high school English teacher, who tucked a white handkerchief into the sleeve of her sweater because her skirts lacked pockets.

In the 1950s, my grandmother Herrick tucked a pretty flower-print handkerchief into the pocket of the white nylon uniform she wore when she worked in the “lunchroom” she and my grandfather owned.

I remember receiving handkerchiefs as birthday gifts, often a fancy one folded in a square box with a cellophane “window” in the cover. Some were embroidered with tiny flower motifs – roses or forget-me-nots – in one corner.

Handkerchiefs may be obsolete, but they fall into the realm of being too good and too pretty to throw away.

This charming idea using a handkerchief for something besides dabbing tears and catching sneezes has been around since before the 1950s – a bonnet for a newborn to wear home from the hospital or on christening day.

You will need:

. A handkerchief with a lace edge.

. Needle and matching thread.

. A yard of narrow satin ribbon.

What you do:

. Fold the handkerchief almost in half. The lace forms a double row that will frame baby’s face. Make a gathering stitch at the edge of the fold and pull it tight to form a circle. End off. Sew ribbon ties on either side of the front of the bonnet. Place ribbon rosettes on top of the point where ribbon ties are sewn to the bonnet.

This is the poem that goes with the handkerchief bonnet:

I’m just a little hankie, as square as square can be, but with a stitch or two, you can make a bonnet out of me.

I’ll be worn from the hospital, or on christening day, then be neatly pressed and carefully put away.

On her wedding day, as I’ve always been told, every well-dressed bride must have something old.

So what would be more fitting than to find little old me. With a few stitches snipped, a wedding hankie I’ll be.

And if perchance the baby was a boy, some day he’ll surely wed, so to his bride he can present the hankie once worn on his head.

Snippets

. The Island Community Quilters report that they have been working on quilts for the Head Start program in the Deer Isle-Stonington area, and on a quilt to raffle for the benefit of Community of Christ church, where the group meets from 9:30 a.m. to noon the second and fourth Wednesdays of each month. The group is open to all quilters, but does not meet in June, July or August. To learn more about the group or the raffle, call 367-5865.

. If you knit and live in the Brooklin area, you may want to attend the group that meets 2-4 p.m. Tuesdays at Friend Memorial Library in Brooklin. Call 359-2276 for more information.

. The Center for Maine Contemporary Art in Rockport is offering classes and workshops, for ages 10 to adult, in spinning and knitting, 9 a.m.-noon, and in paper- and book-making, 1-4 p.m. Saturday, May 8, at the center. Cost of the classes is $15.

Linda Cortright, publisher of Wild Fibers magazine, will give a lecture at 2 p.m. Sunday, May 23, at the center.

To learn more, call the center at 236-2875.

. A reader e-mailed to say that she recently visited Whippersnappers, a new-within-the-last-year quilt shop in Hallowell, which offers quilting classes. Call Lynn Irish at 622-3458 to learn more.

Ardeana Hamlin welcomes suggestions. Call 990-8153, or e-mail ahamlin@bangordailynews.net.