7 Jan 2014

A play cloth

Years ago we have been in Tunesia for a winter holiday. And also there browsing a "flea market" like we do everywhere. Don't ask me where in Tunesia it was because I can't remember the place.

A jacket caught my eye because it was sewn together of wonderful old Javanese pieces of printed cotton. It reminded me of a journey to Bali and Java several years ago.

some patches already embellished are looking like that...

 

...and so

I took it.....it was cheap. I thought to wear it in the French Vosges. But it showed that it was not warm enough though it was padded thickly. I never took a photo.

So a year ago or so I decided to part from it, but I still liked the patches. I cut them out and stuck them on a matching background (I used wonder-under, which normally is fantastic to work with) and started to embroider them, but .......

It was hard to stitch through the layers and this is the reason I burried it very deep under similar stuff. Ufos.

It was not comfortable to work on this project. I very gladly forgot about it.

But it happened that I remembered the existence of something unfinished and....

Machine stitched parts

"talking" with Deanna resulted in machine quilting over the hard patches - however a few French knots here and there were manageable and seed stitching. Thanks to Deanna who caused the kick-off.

added hand embroidery

So now I will call this my Play Cloth (until I find a better name) and stitch on it whenever I feel like it.

I am also knitting - a few rows in the evening - not too much, they say it makes you nervous - a fact that keeps you from sleeping - but I suppose also other things keep me from sleeping .........

 

100 g of wool went into the back by now

The colour is not real but it is nicer to see - picture taken on the east side of our house when the sun was shining on the other side - in the west.

This is more like the real colour.

That's it for today.

 

8 comments:

  1. i'm loving the stitching on your patches. the embroidery connects them together beautifully. and i find knitting very meditative and calming. love the pattern and the colors.

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  2. Machine embroidery and machine quilting is the answer when there is a piece of fabric that is too difficult to stitch by hand.
    Why would knitting make you nervous?

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  3. Great idea! I love the colors.

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  4. good top see that you have persevered with this fabric, the embellishments are working so well. Just shows how the colours photo differently with and without the sun,

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  5. Much too lovely to have hidden away with your UFOs, and machine working over the difficult parts is the right idea. It is a be beautiful play cloth. Lovely knitting too.

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  6. your play cloth should be called magic cloth because you will be performing your magic on it. Wonderful that you have uncovered it and can now play with it.

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  7. I can see why you saved the patches. They look very nice and what a good idea to use them as a play cloth for stitching on.

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  8. I like the idea of "Play Cloth", something amazing could come out of that :-)
    x

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