A New Broom

It's tutorial time once again. I realized that I didn't have a broom in the Colonial Kitchen. We can't have that! So you get to make several types of brooms/mop along with me.



There are two types of broom in the photo. The colonial broom on the left and the modern broom on the right. They are both made from the infamous Penelope needlepoint canvas. You will also need some 1/16" dowel or a bamboo barbecue skewer cut into 4" lengths , some embroidery thread and if you are making the modern one you will need some fine wire and a scrap of wood about 1/4 x 3/4", the grain running lengthwise. The crochet thread is if you want to make an old fashioned rag mop.

The first thing you do is cut a piece of needlepoint canvas 15 holes by 35 holes. The 15 will run on the straight unwoven threads and the 35 will be on the woven.

Next you run two lines of running stitches the length of the canvas on the 8th and 9th holes from the bottom.

Then you run glue on the backside of the stitched area and fold it around the scrap of wood. I used 1/16th bass wood left over from the armoire. The canvas should go around twice.

After the glue dries, take a pair of tweezers and pull out all of the threads below and above the stitched area. Leaving one course of woven threads on either side of the stitches.

Put some glue on the end of the dowel and stick it down into the area above the stitches and fix it to the wood scrap and let it dry.

Pull up all of the strands of canvas above the stitch line and wrap fine wire around it and the handle. I marked the broom to indicate where you should start wrapping. You will go up the handle and end at the top of the bundle.


The mop and the colonial broom are done the same. The mop is done with crochet cotton and the broom is done with the threads that you pulled out of the modern broom. The handles are cut 4" long. If you want to paint the handle do it before you start and let it dry.

I don't normally measure or count for this one. I just wrap enough crochet cotton around two fingers to make a pretty full mop or broom. Put some glue on about 1/4" of one end of a 4" dowel. Glue the threads with the long part towards the top of the handle. Next wrap the bundle about 1/4" from the end with matching thread. I used contrast so that you could see what I was doing.

When it is dry pull all of the long threads down over the tied part. Arrange them to cover evenly all around. Then wrap with matching or contrasting thread. and glue or tie off. There you have it. Two brooms and a mop.

Now get to work! Actually the brooms do a pretty good job sweeping a mini house.

I've got to go clean house now. See you tomorrow.