The Rickrack Rag

We’ve been so busy it’s making us dizzy! So it seemed like a good idea this week to show feedsacks whose patterns suggest a spinning or swirling motion. Among these, some of my favorites are the bold art deco patterns.

But there are many other types, including florals, that incorporate swirls…

And if I wasn’t dizzy enough when I started selecting these, I certainly will be before I finish - even the checks and stripes are moving as I look at them now….. So maybe I’ll have to quit after these few others, and try something different next week!

One of our favorite series of feedsack designs featured a Mama and 4 or 5 babies of various animals. These seem to be rather scarce now, whether because they were popular and were all used up, or unpopular and did not sell, I don’t know. What I do know is that we don’t see them very often at all, and I have a limited number of images from the series. Here are fish in two colors, and yellow ducks:

I don’t know how many other kinds of animals were featured on these sacks, nor how many different colors were used, and as I said have seen relatively few examples. It strikes me as odd that I don’t remember ever seeing this pattern featuring hens and chicks! If you know of other examples, we’d love to hear about them. One other picture I did find in our archive was the one featuring pigs.

I believe this one was available in several different colors as well, but have no other examples to show. Did they do horses, cows, or other farm animals? It only seems logical that they would, and we’d love to see pictures of any that you may have found in your travels.

Do you have favorites of the novelty designs? Or are florals your passion? The possibilities are seemingly limitless, and suggestions for future Feedsack Friday topics are always welcome!

I know it’s been a while, but now that we’re settling into the spring and summer selling and gardening seasons, we’re busier than ever - so I thought it was a great time to get back to the blog, and get things updated. So here’s the latest installment of Feedsack Friday.

I don’t have a theme this week, so once again I’m just going to post some of our newest finds. I don’t know what we’ll ever do if we run out of new and interesting sacks, but we haven’t come close to the probable 20,000 or so possibilities. And in this lifetime, we probably won’t!

These are some of the sacks we found at our spring show:

On other fronts, asparagus season is in full swing, and our white wild strawberries will be ripening over the next couple of weeks, just ahead of the red raspberries, which are plumping up nicely, if still green. We’re so glad to have fresh home grown produce again. More soon, now that we’re back….

While we’ve found that the rose is the flower most commonly found on feedsacks, the daisy isn’t far behind. Perhaps it’s the daisy’s simplicity that lends it to a wide variety of design, by itself and in combination with other flowers. The first design we present here is the one we’ve found in more color variations than any other single feedsack design - we have at least seven different examples in our photo archive:

And there are many, many more in a vast variety of colors, although the flowers themselves are generally white, with a few exceptions….

There are many that also include roses, and many that do not.


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The last couple of weeks have been busier than most, what with various medical appointments, sales, and then two back-to-back accumulating snowstorms. So last week we missed Feedsack Friday, and this week again we’re ill-prepared. Rather than skip it altogether, though, I thought I’d feature a selection of new sacks we recently purchased from a central Pennsylvania estate, some of which, as always, we hadn’t seen before. So here’s a selection of some of the new ones. First, some geometrics:

And then some interesting florals:

Many of these, and other new arrivals, are now available on our website, Sharon’s Antiques: Vintage Fabrics - New Arrivals.

Another cold weekend ahead here in the northeast, so I’m glad to be continuing our visit to tropical climes. This week we’re headed south of the border, down Mexico way. Here’s a selection of feedsacks with a Mexican theme:

This is by no means the only selection of Mexican themed sacks; I’ve seen quite a number with larger-scale vignettes, in various colorways - perhaps I’ll be able to feature them later.
There are also sacks that feature cactus from the desert southwest, and finally, you’ll want to wear one of these sun hats woven from palm leaves to keep from getting too hot.

I don’t know how much longer we’ll be able to use the tropical theme to escape the reality of our winter chill, but we’ll see what we can find for next week on Feedsack Friday.

After posting last weeks array of feedsacks depicting pineapples, I couldn’t shake the relief I felt from the long winter nights and chilly days - so I decided to continue this week on a tropical theme to relieve the midwinter blahs. This week we have sacks featuring palm trees, island scenes and even dancers in grass skirts!

The first and third sacks above are almost identical, just changing red and green in the background.


Many of these other sacks have color variations as well, I’ve seen several different combinations on the first of the two below:

We found other sacks featuring palms and some other tropical features this week, but instead of presenting them now, we decided to extend our feature next week with a visit south of the border, featuring those and other aspects of Mexican and southwestern themes.

Hope you enjoyed this week’s edition of Feedsack Friday!

Welcome to another edition of feedsack Friday. Today, in order of counteract some of the chill that’s present in the northeast this time of year, we’ll feature something tropical, that venerable symbol of welcome: the pineapple. The pineapple is hardly a welcoming fruit in appearance, even forbidding with its spiky outer covering, but from the time of Columbus’ second voyage has become renowned as a special treat, and used as a symbol to welcome guests.

Feedsacks, as a part of everyday life, did not neglect representation of the pineapple, both realistically, and somewhat abstractly as we see in these examples.

Well, ok, maybe more than a little abstract in the case of those last two, but I think you’ll have to agree that those are pineapple-inspired designs, however wild and garish. Wish I could get to Hawaii this week to compare with the ones there….

We’re now well into winter, and much of the country is feeling the chill. This morning we had another dusting of snow here; things have been covered in white for the past week, and we’re not due for a thaw until next week. So it’s a perfect time to play in the snow.

Feedsack designs have celebrated snowy weather in a number of ways. This pup obviously enjoys his downhill slide, while the kids have fun sledding and building snowmen.

A snowy winter landscape is perfect for skating and sleighrides.

Finally, the snowflakes themselves can be considered as beautiful works of art.
A word to you southerners: don’t envy us our snow too much, until you’ve had to shovel it, or pull your vehicle from a snowdrift. It can be fun, but it can also be a lot of work.

I’m sure we’ll see more snow this winter, but I’ll soon be ready for it to end.

Lots of kids got lots of toys from Santa this Christmas. And lots of us are still kids in many ways, and we all love our toys. Here are some feedsacks covered with a selection of little toys:

Three color variations on the same toys, and then some larger toys, too:

OK, everybody play nice - there are plenty of toys to share - and we’ll see you all back here soon for another edition of Feedsack Friday.

Happy New Year!! And don’t miss the feedsacks we’re currently offering on eBay!