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What would a Suffragette be without her sash? Before we make our own, let’s do a little research!

During my image searching and reading, I learned that the colors associated with women’s suffrage in America were primarily gold and white. Purple, white, and gold were worn only by members of the National Woman’s Party: “Purple is the color of loyalty, constancy to purpose, unswerving steadfastness to a cause. White, the emblem of purity, symbolizes the quality of our purpose; and gold, the color of light and life, is as the torch that guides our purpose, pure and unswerving.”

Top: Rare Silk Suffragette Sash made for the Women’s Political Union, NYC, 1910-1915 – Jeff R. Bridgman American Antiques. Bottom: Suffrage Sashes, 1913-1917 – Emilia D. van Beugen, photographer

As you can see, suffragette sashes were made in several different color configurations.

Weren’t these women gorgeous? I could (and did) stare at their exquisite clothes and accessories all day! However, everything they wore was part of a strategic message, so let’s get to work on making our own, wearable slogans.

To start with you need ribbon! I used:

• 2-inch wide, white satin ribbon
• 1-inch wide, purple satin ribbon
• 1-inch wide, gold satin ribbon

Once I had the ribbon, I draped it over my dress form to determine how long the sashes should be. (Side note, my dress form is the best $25 I ever spent on Craigslist!)

I cut the white, central ribbon at fifty inches long, and placed a pin to mark where I thought the letters should begin. Eliza helped me with the stickers. I would have loved to use iron-on letters, but I couldn’t find enough at the store, and I didn’t have enough time to order them.

I knew there was no way that the stickers would stay on these sashes, long-term. So, I put a bit of Fabri-Tac on the end of a toothpick and dabbed it under the edges of the letter stickers. Then, I sprayed everything with clear topcoat. As it turns out, these adhesive attempts were inadequate, but more on that, later!

Once the glue and spray dried on the white ribbons, I prepared to sew on the gold and purple ribbons down their sides. I did this by overlapping the colored ribbon edges with the white, central ribbon by about an eigth of an inch. I learned to leave a bit extra of colored ribbon past each end of the white ribbon and trimmed it to match the white ribbon after I sewed. This is because the stitching tended to shorten the ribbon, a bit.

After the gold and purple stripes were stitched, I trimmed all the ribbon ends to match in length, and applied Fray Check to prevent fraying.

At this point, I thought I was done. However…The letters started to pop off as I bent and flexed the ribbon during the sewing process. They continued to peel away during the photo shoot. Amazingly, I only lost one letter completely. This is kind of a miracle, considering that I had to hold Annika a bunch, at the end! So, once we got home, I tried another glue in my arsenal: Elmer’s Craft Bond Tacky Glue. This worked amazingly well. This is the only glue I would use if I were starting over!

And that, my friends, is how I made our suffragette sashes! We wore them over our right shoulders and fastened them with safety pins. In my next post, I’ll show you how I put together the rest of our costumes. Until then, keep marching (and voting) to make the world a better place!

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Good morning, dear readers, and welcome to the 100th anniversary of the of the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution! That’s right: Women have officially been able to vote in the U.S.A. for one hundred years! While this is something to celebrate, we should not forget that our sisters of color still faced many unjust hurdles in claiming their equal rights.

One hundred years sounds like a long time ago. But is it, in the scheme of things? As I pored over these inspiring images of our brave fore-mothers, I wanted my girls and I to join them. In fact, our children are about to embark on a study of U.S. History. What better way to start the school year than by staging our own suffrage parade? However, we were going to need more than just costumes. I mean, just look at these amazing photographs of real suffragettes! Clearly, we needed some picket signs…

…So, I made some! Here is a sneak peek of the finished results. I thought it would be interesting to do a side by side comparison with a black and white version; for old times’ sake. *Ba-dum-ching* Anyway, read on to see how you, too, can join the march with your very own suffragette picket signs!

I wanted something lightweight and durable for the board part of the sign. So, I snapped up two of these seasonal, hardboard signs at the Dollar Tree. I planned to use their plain backs as the fronts of our signs. Next, I went to the hardware store and bought two, 3/4″ x 3/4″ x 36″ wooden stakes for the sign handles.

Once I got everything home, I removed the price stickers which, of course, didn’t want to come off. They left a sticky residue on what I intended to make the front of the sign. This would never do! Fortunately, rubbing alcohol removed the gunk.

Even though the colorful parts of the signs would be painted over and turned to the back, I decided to try to remove some of the glitter on the lettering. This handy sanding block was very comfortable to use. It did a good job of getting rid of most of the glitter.

Now, it was time to paint! And, wouldn’t you know it, but it was pretty much the hottest day of the year. (It’s basically a rule that I only spray paint when it’s either below freezing or broiling.) So, it was obviously not an ideal temperature for spray painting, but what’s a girl to do? Soldier on like a suffragette, of course! I got Rust-Oleum Universal All Surface Paint in Satin White and the companion Clear Topcoat in Dead Flat.

I spread out some newspapers, in the backyard, and weighted the corners with rocks. Then, I sprayed both signs, starting with the colorful sides that were to become the backs. Once those had thoroughly dried, I sprayed the plain sides, which I intended to make the new fronts of our signs. This took a lot more paint than I thought, so I ended up having to finish with some old, white spray paint I found in the basement. It ended up spraying in tiny globules, which gave the sign a grainy texture. This would be a disaster for some projects, but I decided that this just gave the signs some character.

After everything dried, I moved on to the lettering. I am not one of those fancy, hand-lettering people! The idea of free-hand painting “Votes for Women” on these signs intimidated me. *SO* I decided to measure everything and use stickers and glue.

This ended up being quite time-consuming!

Using my trusty T-Square and some masking tape, I figured out the center-line and line spacing marks I would use for the letter placements.

Then, I lay the T-Square across the sign as a straight-edge rule to guide my “lettering”. I placed the middle letter of each word, first. This was the “T” in “VOTES”, the “O” in “FOR”, and the “M” in “WOMEN”.

Once I finished placing the stickers, I carefully removed the masking tape. In order to make the letters stay more permanently, I dabbed a little Fabri-Tac on a toothpick. Then, I gently lifted part of each letter sticker enough to spread a bit of glue to it, before pressing it firmly back to the sign.

I let the glued letters dry overnight. In the morning, I centered the wooden handles on the backs of the signs and secured them with masking tape. Then, I used two, short, wire nails to attach the signs to the handles. I paused in hammering when the nail head got close to the freshly painted surface. To protect it, I put a bit of masking tape on the nail head before driving it home.

A quick top-coat spray finished the job!

And, there you have it! These suffragette signs are easy to make, and would be perfect additions to a Halloween costume or a school project. I look forward to sharing how I made our sashes and assembled our costumes in future posts. Until then, Friends!