I read this in the 1970s but it was probably from the 1950s. I believe it was a short picture book in which someone is making an apron out of (possibly) yellow-checkered or calico cloth, but there isn’t quite enough material. She ends up sewing a ruffle on the bottom to make it work.
This book might have had other fashions in it and been printed in just three colors – blue, pink and yellow?? – with black outlines. I have a recollection of ’50s-style flared A-line skirts and tiny-waisted tops. But I might be confusing two different stories.
Was this a story in which the woman was trying to lengthen the apron? In the story she took the fabric for the ruffle from the top of the apron. I recall it from probably 1940-1960 in very simple colors.
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Hi Mary — Thanks for your reply. That sounds right, though I don’t understand how you can make an apron longer by using fabric… from the apron! 😉 Yet it does seem like that’s what happened. The timeframe is right, too.
Do you recall if anything else happened in the story? Or did the book contain additional stories?
I wonder if you might be thinking of ‘The Little Old Woman” series by Hope Newell? Titles include “The Little Old Woman Who Used Her Head,” “More About the Little Old Woman Who Used Her Head,” and “The Little Old Woman Carries On.” It’s been a long time since I read any of those stories, but I believe she did try to lengthen an apron by cutting a piece off the top of it and sewing it to the bottom – it certainly does sound like the sort of thing she’d do! (She also tried to cut the holes out of her blanket – leaving even bigger holes, of course! But all came out right in the end, when she plucked her geese to make a feather bed for herself, and made coats to keep the geese warm from the remains of the blanket.)
Hi Chanda — it doesn’t ring a bell but I will check it out — thanks very much for your reply!
I seem to recall the woman being young, and adding the ruffle was a clever, pragmatic solution.
The Houghton-Mifflin reading series from the 50’s 60’s contained a story about a little old woman who did something like that to her apron to make it longer—cutting a piece off the top to add to the bottom. She also did things like cooking a piece of meat with her glasses on, then eating it with her glasses off and being amazed at how small the meat was (w/out the magnification of her glasses). It was a silly old woman type of story.