More work on Jane's tallit

I suppose that if I just had a standard tallit that I made over and over again I would be quicker at it. This tallit has taken longer than I expected because it has presented what my sewing buddies would call design opportunities. In regular people’s words it’s what you do when you have a series of problems that need to be solved. The design opportunities are what occur after you finish cursing.

One of the things that drives me crazy when I see tallitot that are constructed out of appliques stripes is that the underside of the tallit is blank, naked. When you have a woven tallit the design “reads” on both sides of the tallit. When you wear a large tallit, the kind you flip back over your shoulders, the stripes on the right side and the wrong side of the tallit interact with one another. It’s one of the visual pleasures of seeing someone wearing a tallit.
Jane who has commissioned this tallit using linens from her grandmother's trousseau, has asked that I limit the colors in the tallit to just the ivory and the gold. Each of the lace strips has been backed with gold and more ivory silk. Sewing each of those strips to the base of the tallit creates a seam. One side of the seam is clean, the other has messy parts that need to be covered.
I have been trying to figure out the best way to cover the seams. Today I reached a solution.

I had purchase this wonderful braid from the Hyman Hendler sale. I would guess that this braid is from the 1920’s. I’m not completely sure about it’s age, it isn’t marked, but it just has the feel and the look of braid from that time.
So this is what the tallit looks like now. However Jane wears the tallit, either simply hanging down or flipped back on her shoulders, it will please the eye.

Yes, I do see the threads. Yes, this tallit does need a good pressing. Never the less, I’m feeling really happy with how this is coming out.

The lace is spectacular.

I still have to edge the top and the bottom of the tallit. I have to make the atara/neckband and get the corners/pinot attached. As I look at the tallit I think I need to add one more row of the metallic ribbon.

I no longer feel like cursing.This tallit has provided me with many design opportunities. I think I have taken good advantage of the opportunities presented to me.

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מְחַיֵּה הַמֵּתִים

וְנֶאֱמָן אַתָּה לְהַחֲיוֹת מֵתִים: בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה יְהֹוָה מְחַיֵּה הַמֵּתִים You are faithful to restore the dead to life. Blessed are You, Adonoy, Resurrector of the dead. That particular line is recited at every single prayer service every day three times a day, unless you use a Reform or Reconstructionist prayer book . In those liturgies instead of praising God for resurrecting the dead God is praised for giving life to all. I am enough of a modern woman, a modern thinker, to not actually believe in the actual resurrection of the dead. I don't actually expect all of the residents of the Workmen's Circle section of Mount Hebron cemetery in Queens to get up and get back to work at their sewing machines. I don't expect the young children buried here or the babies buried here to one day get up and frolic. Yet, every single time I get up to lead services I say those words about the reanimating of the dead with every fiber of my being. Yesterday, I e...

Connecting with the past

A few months ago I had a craving for my father’s chicken fricassee. If my father were still alive I would have called him up and he would have talked me through the process of making it. My father is no longer alive so I turned to my cookbooks and the recipes I found for chicken fricassee were nothing at all like the stew of chicken necks, gizzards and wings in a watery sweet and sour tomato sauce that I enjoyed as a kid. I assumed that the dish was an invention of my father’s. I then attempted to replicate the dish from my memory of it and failed. A couple of weeks ago I saw an article on the internet, and I can’t remember where, that talked about Jewish fricassee and it sounded an awful lot like the dish I was hankering after. This afternoon I went to the butcher and picked up all of the chicken elements of the dish, a couple of packages each of wings, necks and gizzards. My father never cooked directly from a cook book. He used to re...

The light themed tallit has been shipped!!!

I had begun speaking to Sarah about making her a tallit in the middle of August. It took a few weeks to nail down the design. For Sarah it would have been ideal if the tallit were completed in time for her to wear it on Rosh HaShanah., the beginning of her year as senior rabbi of her congregation. For me, in an ideal world, given the realities of preparing for the High Holidays I would have finished this tallit in the weeks after Sukkot. So we compromised and I shipped off the tallit last night. I would have prefered to have more time but I got the job done in time. This tallit was made to mark Sarah's rise to the position of senior rabbi but it was also a reaction to this year of darkness. She chose a selection of verses about light to be part of her tallit. 1) אֵל נוֹרָא עֲלִילָה God of awesome deeds ( from a yom kippur Liturgical poem) 2) אוֹר חָדָשׁ עַל־צִיּוֹן תָּאִיר May You shine a new light on Zion ( from the liturgy) 3) יָאֵר יְהֹ...

sarah in nyc

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