It is a truth universally acknowledged that a lady 3/4 of the way through a massive illustration project has to take a moment to put down the paintbrush and do something completely different. And so— these little sachet sets were born!

   Recently I’ve been reading some good books that have me thinking about how I do things around the house. Most important of these books is “A Guide To Green Housekeeping” which I absolutely LOVE. What it basically is, is a beautiful book about the old fashioned way of doing things around the house. So much of it is crazily easy— most of it involves baking soda, vinegar and lemon juice. Stuff you feel totally safe having around the house and it really works amazingly well.
   But before I digress too much, there was a section in the book about taking care of your linens and taking the time to really care for them and make sure they’re kept lovely and fresh. This has inspired me (and Audrey too) to set out my favorite old fashioned nightgown so that its hanging nicely waiting for meat the end of the day, and kept sweet smelling by a stuffed heart sachet made of scrap fabric and dried lavender.

   I even made some smaller sachets to stick in the dresser and my linen closet so that my best little things are kept a little bit nicer, a little bit more well cared for. It even inspired me to do a massive clean out of my closet and my dresser, getting rid of all those “well maybe one day I’ll fit in it again…” pieces or things that are fine, but I always pass over for something else. I felt a real need to pare down, to keep only the things I really wanted and liked, and to be intentional about my care of them. And so, the sachets were born…

   And enter yet another book that I just finished that gave me inspiration for the theme of these hearts— Jane Austen heroines!
   I just finished reading “Longbourn” by Jo Baker about the life of the servants in Elizabeth Bennet’s home, Longbourn, and it was so good. It really got into the nitty gritty of the grueling day-to-day of a servant’s life. How when they went to bed, who they were able to associate with, where they lived, who they could love— it was all dependent on the whims of their employers and was really poignant and humbling.
  It also made me think of the housework that was going on in those great Austen houses like Longborn or Hartfield in “Emma”, and all the linens and lace and dresses and I was inspired to create two different sets of sachets inspired by “Pride and Prejudice” and “Emma.” 

   What fun to imagine what lovely dresses could have been used to create these sachets, can you imagine the exquisit ‘rag bag’ of the Woodhouse manor? Let’s see….lets imagine the floral is from the dress Emma wore to the Weston’s wedding and the stripe? Perhaps from the apron she’d wear to paint the garden with Harriet while Mr. Elton looked on?

   The Hartfield Collection comes with a large (6″ in length) heart with an antiqued cotton tie at the top so that you can hang it on a hanger, a door knob, a mirror, etc. and two smaller (4″ in length) sachets that are good for tucking into a stack of linens, in a drawer, or under your pillow for sweet dreams!

  Oh! All those girls in that house! Can’t you just hear the piano music and the laughing and squabbling, all with a screech of “Mr. Bennet!” coming out over the top? I totally can 😀 imagining the linen closet at Longbourn was so fun because I imagine there must be so many dresses in the mending pile, hems to let out for younger sisters, or frocks that have gone through two or three girls and now must retire to patchwork. And so with the idea of patchwork in mind, I made this fun collection of three sachets inspired by Lizzie Bennet’s girlhood home. I imagine they’re made from scraps of all those outgrown and worn out dresses— perhaps the dress Jane got caught out in the rain? Or the dress that Lizzie wore, tromping through the mud, to go see her sick sister at Netherfield Park? Perhaps all that mud couldn’t be got out of the hem, so into the rag bag it went.

   Much like the Hartfield Collection, the large hanging heart here is 6″ in length with a tie and the little ones are 4″ in length meant for tucking.

  I had such a fun time making these and letting my imagination run wild! I’d love for you to have some to enjoy as much as I enjoy mine! I’ve listed both of these sets of sachets in my esty shop. Go have a look and see if there’s one that you might need! 😀

  Thanks so much for your visit today–
~H