sarah in nyc

The summer my father was dying, I got this fabric as part of a mystery bundle from http://www.fabricmartfabrics.com/ . I don't think I would have chosen a stretch cotton twill in army green for myself. I made it into a short sheath dress. It was a little on the short side, but was wearable with tights and flats. Never the less, I was less than comfortable with how short it was. (My legs aren't that terrific) So nn an attempt to make the dress a bit more wearable, I added a length of the sheer netting the I had made the "pond scum dress" out of. It was not much of an improvement. A couple of weeks ago, I pulled the not fabulous dress out of my closet and started to rummage in my fabric stash. I found some of the suede cloth that my friend Deb had sent me from her late mother in law's large fabric stash. Tan suede cloth isn't my idea of fantasy fabric either. But since all of the fabric I was working with was either free or nearly so, I decided to forge for...

Hannah's tallit is now complete. Hearing Hannah's reaction as she walked into the dining room and saw the tallit on my dress making dummy was worth the price of admission. It is so nice to be able to exceed expectations. Working with a kid as intellectually engaged and as comfortable with who she is is also a pleasure. Hannah's mom joined us for a lively and fun time tying the tzitzit. They were happy to have tied the tzitzit last night because their rehearsal session at the synagogue is tonight. A photographer is joing them to they are glad to have the tallit be in the official bat- mitzvah photos. Hannah's mom was delighted that I was able to take flashy materials and tone them down to be tasteful and elegant. The silver silk on it's own, without the gold /blue doodles looks like something that could be worn on a Mardi-Gras float. It's funny that adding more flash quiets the whole thing down. It turns out that Hannah had purchased a deep purple dress to wear...

I found this beautiful Nanette Lepore skirt at my local thrift store. it seems to be made out of silk and cotton. The seams are all piped in black and the hem is bound in black. It is just so sharp looking. I love the mix of narrow and wide stripes. Yes, it is lined. I decided to do a Google search to get a sense of what Nanette Lepore skirts go for. They seem to sell in the neighborhood of $300. So what did this gem cost me? $5. I will clean it and then store it until next spring.

This fabric was an impulse purchase at Kabbala Man's. It is a soft drapey knit with a bit of a nap. Kabbala man claims that it is a cotton. It feels like it might be a rayon /cotton blend. I loved the early 1970's vibe that this fabric has. I bought two yards. It has a cozy feel. So what do you think I ought to make out of this fabric? Let me know. Post your suggestion in the comments section. In addition to letting me know the type of garment, ( skirt, jacket etc.) also describe the style of garment so I have a clear idea of what you think would work best with this fabric. Thanks.

Our dear buddy Bill's daughter is celebrating her Bat- Mitzvah this weekend. We are going to Philadelphia to be part of the event. Some b'nai mitzvah reach the day at a high point of spirituality. Meira , at this moment in her life is feeling ambivalent about the Jewish stuff. It seemed unfair to give her a gift that would give her no pleasure. So, instead of giving her a piece of Judaica , I made her a pearl necklace and ear rings. I also made a bag to contain the gift. The bag is a light blue grey silk shantung. I used the pretty diamond stitch on my machine and used regular sewing thread to embroider the diamond motif. The organza ribbon comes from a piece I made about five years ago. Here are the pearls and the gift card that I placed in the bag. For those of you who can't read Hebrew, the border around Meira's name, is her name in Hebrew, all done in pen and ink and with the addition of watercolor.

My work day is rarely ever of a piece. I usually end up weaving my client work time in with other domestic chores. Yesterday, after breakfast, I got a loaf of bread going. As the day went on, I tended to the bread in little bits as needed. It was baked before my son got home from school. I also did a huge load of hand wash along with tons of machine washing. My son is applying to High School this year. For those of you NOT living in New York City, think college application but with much less information about the schools available, many fewer choices and much higher stakes. It's awful. I need to spend some time each day setting up appointments to visit schools or dealing with other inanities of the process. I also managed to get some work done on Hannah's tallit . Hannah's tallit is made out of silk shantung. Shantung is lovely to sew because unlike a chiffon, it's easy to cut. Unlike a charmuse, it does not slide around as you sew. The down side of shantung is that it...

Since my last adventure in making noodles from scratch, I find myself thinking about the lovely, supple feel of noodle dough. I wanted to have that feel in my hands again so I made up another batch of dough. Last time I used the formula in Mark Ruehlman's book, Ratio . This time I turned to my old, trusty Settlement Cook Book. If you want to give their recipe a try, here it is. 4 eggs 2 2/3 Cups flour ( but this may vary based on how large your eggs are and how dry your flour is) 1 tsp salt. Beat the eggs with the salt. Then add in the flour, first mixing with a spoon and then kneading with your hand. Put out on floured counter and continue to add flour and mix until you are able to knead the dough easily. Add flour until the mixture no longer sticks to the counter. Knead until the dough is really smooth and supple. The dough will need to rest for about 20 minutes before you roll it out. Just turn the bowl you began your mixing in, upside down over the ball of dough. Clean off yo...

When I was little my mother used to wear these scarves if she were really dressing up. They were made in Israel in the workshop of Esther Zeitz. When I was a kid many of us wore embroidered blouses or dresses made in Israel. We certainly wore them on Israel Independence Day. Most were made of cotton embroidered in cotton embroidery floss, by hand. There was a more elegant class of these dresses made by Esther Zeitz. They were made of wool or of rayon crepe and featured lots of couched metallic threads. A woman who wore such a dress announced herself to the world as a Zionist woman of good taste. If you attended a black tie synagogue function any time from the 1950's through the 1980's you were sure to see at least one long black Esther Zeitz dress resplendent with lots of couched embroidery. The Zeitz workshop also sold scarves in various sizes. When my parents went to Israel in 1955, my mother bought her mother the white wool scarf with red embroidery. My mother envisioned he...

Levi is one of my son's good friends. His bar-mitzvah is this Shabbat, the week we read Genesis. Levi loved thetext about the creation of the " taninim gedolim ", the big fish. Traditional commentators assume that this is the mythical Leviathan. I made Levi this bag that only hints at what the Leviathan looked like, because we don't really know what this being actually looked like. The water around the Leviathan is filled with quotations both from Biblical and Rabbinic texts about the Leviathan. I made the center of the bag out of painted Ultra-suede. The waves were made out of couched silk cord. The border is an upholstery cotton. I hope that Levi will be happy.

One of the advantages of working with a stencil is that I can make a series of variations of a piece. I made four variations on this challa cover, at least of the center element of the challa cover. I called my client and had her select the one she liked best. There was no contest. She liked the beaded ones I had done on the sage green, but loved the blue grey. I bordered the piece with purple pieced silk shantung that I had purchased on sale at http://www.fabricmartfabrics.com/ . Their prices are so reasonable, I will often stock up on fabrics that seem interesting, even if I have no immediate use for them. The purple picked up on the purples I had used in the stencil. I covered the seam with a utility stitch done in a gold thread. I love that it is both structural and decorative. The challa cover is being picked up this evening. i hope the bride is happy with her gift.

came floating out of the Yom Kippur volume of her Machzorim / holiday prayer books. I am the temporary care giver of these prayer books. They are to be given to my daughter when she is ready to own them. I didn't know that these prayer books existed, but my mother sent them to me as she closed up her house of the last more than fifty years. It seemed so appropriate that the hankie was in the Yom Kippur prayer book. I assume the hankie was put in there to prepare for Yizkor , the memorial prayers. This set of books was published in 1939. My grandmother was born around 1888. I assume that this set was a replacement for an earlier set that had fallen apart. Here is a photo of my grandmother about the time she received her Machzorim / holiday prayerbooks.

The Settlement Cook Book pictured on the left, is probably one of the biggest influences on my cooking life. My mother purchased the book early in her marriage. As a little girl I was fascinated by that army of worshipful cook book reading maidens in their cute hats and dresses. It took a long time before I began reading the recipes in the Settlement Cook Book. What I did devour though were the chapters on how to feed invalids, how to make soap, or dust a room or wash dishes or set a table for either French or Russian service. By the time I was in my early teens I was fascinated by the recipes for food items that I assumed only came packaged, like cottage cheese, or ketchup or noodles. My kitchen has always been light on appliances. The Settlement cook book does not even assume an electric fridge. So, soon after my husband and I got engaged and my non cooking mother in law offered me her copy of the Settlement Cook Book, I jumped at the offer. It has been my go -to cook book. I also l...

I wanted to keep my hands busy on the 4 hour drive to Rafi's funeral. I was so sad. Keeping my hands busy is a good way to deal with grief. My sister's mother in law had given me a load of vintage cashmere sweaters. She loved the work I had done refashioning sweaters. So, she gave me a batch of sweaters to play with. One of the treasures that I hadn't gotten to, was a Pringle grey cashmere turtleneck. It's too hot in New York apartments to wear a turtleneck. I also hate having things tight around my neck. I was planning to transform the turtleneck into a cardigan but hadn't quite gotten to it. Before I got into the car, I cut open the front and then packed along a black eyelash yarn and a lovely hand dyed blue ribbon yarn and a crochet hook. My sister's mother in law died this summer. So it seemed like a nice way to focues on her, and on her not quite in the fullness of her years death as we went to attend Rafi's funeral. After a little over an hour I was do...

The terrible news I had anticipating while I was maniacally ironing table cloths arrived. Rafi Lehmann, almost 28, almost a bridegroom, almost a rabbi, died after a month of difficult hospitalization. The funeral was yesterday. It isn't often where you attend a funeral where the eulogies are puncuated by wails of grief. It isn't often where the gaveside portion of a funeral is attended by two hundred people. It isn't often where shoveling in of the earth is begun by the parents of the the deceased. Again and again as relatives and friends grasped the shovels to do their turn at covering the dead, a wail would rise out of their bellies as they unwillingly did their last act for Rafi. Usually at a funeral one shovels until exhaustion. At Rafi's you knew to limit yourself to only a few shovels full because so many were there to take part in the awful mitzvah. The Rabbi who recited the season's version of the El Maleh Rachamim did it with a choked voice and then cover...