sarah in nyc

 I probably shouldn't take the time to post today I am hard up against three(!) deadlines. I didn't want all of you to think that I had abandoned you so here goes this post---typed quickly. Todd's tallit is moving right along. I bound the edges with strips of bias-cut linen, no photos but you just have to believe me. כְּתַפּ֙וּחַ֙ בַּעֲצֵ֣י הַיַּ֔עַר כֵּ֥ן דּוֹדִ֖י בֵּ֣ין הַבָּנִ֑ים בְּצִלּוֹ֙ חִמַּ֣דְתִּי וְיָשַׁ֔בְתִּי וּפִרְי֖וֹ מָת֥וֹק לְחִכִּֽי׃ Like an apple tree among trees of the forest These pinot are affixed to the corners of his tallit and three of the four eyelets have been cut and embroidered. The text for Ale's pinot is: כְּשֽׁוֹשַׁנָּה֙ בֵּ֣ין הַחוֹחִ֔ים  Like a lily among thorns   As I had mentioned ( I think in my last post) Ale had chosen to have  שֽׁוֹשַׁנָּה represented by an Egyptian water lily rather than a lily (how the text is usually translated into English) or as a rose which is how the word is used in Hebrew but the more botanically correc...

 If you have spent any time at all reading this blog you will know that I work best when I have several bits of projects going on at the same time. I have three big projects all due on the same day (just under two weeks from today). I am attacking each of these projects from a variety of directions. When the dust settles all of them will be completed. Friday I sewed Ale's tallit together. In terms of actual tasks, I folded it in half the wrong side out, sewed the raw edges together being sure that the stripes aligned as I stitched. I then unpicked some of the stitches and then turned the tallit right-side out through the small hole made by the un-done stitches. I then carefully pressed the tallit and topstitched all the way around. Much to my delight... You can read the text straight across each stripe --from one side of the tallit to the other. I am so chuffed about this. I paint the text freehand. I am not painting the text while paying close attention to a ruler. This nearly per...

I recently got a message from a woman who had heard that I was a good person to turn a shawl into a tallit.  I told her that I was and we met later on that day. She brought me a beautiful olive green woven shawl woven with a lovely diaper pattern ( that's the pretty diamond woven design) and with a truly lovely woven band in red, blue and orange near the fringed ends. When you look at the photos in this post, please be aware that for some reason my camera had trouble with the colors in this shawl and the green that looks chartreuse in the images is really a soft olive. I wasn't able to use my photo editor to get the colors to read properly. You really do have to trust me on this one. My task with this tallit was to create corner pieces that worked with this lovely bit of woven wool. I had hoped that I might find a bit of vintage embroidered woven or embroidered textile in my stash. While going through my pretty bits of vintage goodies was fun, nothing worked wit...

Shaun’s tallit is nearly done. Shaun is one of those women who has an intense relationship with fabric. One of the fabrics she showed me  while we were working out what her tallit was to  look like was a batiked silk scarf with loosely painted pomegranates   I drew the outlines of the pomegranates with tailors chalk on the magenta silk noil. I like to have each of the pinot/corners of the tallit be slightly different. It gives the wearer of the tallit something pretty to focus on  if they loose focus on prayer. Shaun is someone who gets a bit of whimsy. So I played with each pomegranate, playing with different techniques. Among the techniques I used were embroidering with my sewing machine, hand embroidery, beading and couching ribbon.  I couched the metallic borders with a zig- zag stich on my machine. I like how the metallic borders look like they were doodled by hand.

My friend, the therapist, actually, in this neighborhood, that is like saying in Detroit, my friend who works in the auto industry. My friend, was one of the early women wearers of tallitot. Her first tallit, made in the earlt 1970's was simply a length of cotton/poly eyelet with the tzizzit/ritual fringes pushed through some of the eyelets that were near the corners. Many years ago I made her an atara/neckband for that tallit. But after more than thirty years, that eyelet tallit was becoming a bit tired looking. My friend had purchased a new length of eyelet while on a trip to central America. This was a lovely all cotton eyelet with beautiful quality embroidery. If the first length of eyelet was a Chevette, this new eyelet was a Lexus. As I had mentioned earlier. Coming up with the right verses for this tallit was a long and fascinating process. The atara has a line from Psalms that we say as we put on the tallit, " In Your light, we see light." The corner pieces though...

Today I edged the old shul tallit with bronze metallic middy ribbon. The ribbon gives a tidy edge. I like working with it because it has a fair amount of body and doesn't slide around a whole lot. I had gotten a huge cone of 3/4 inch wide ribbon several years ago at Tinsel Trading. I use it a a ton, not only because I have so much of it, but also I like how the bronze is a lot less flashy looking than a regular bright gold. The corner pieces were to have Samuel's answer when he was called by God., Hineini , "Here I am." In Hebrew, that word is made up of four letters. I played with several ways to lay out the word, in a tight circle, in a diamond. I finally hit on the idea of repeating the word in each of the four corners of each pina/corner piece. I drafted a three inch square and calligraphed the words. Then I tweaked the edges of the letters with a fine tipped pen. Finally, I cut out the letters using an X-acto knife. I'm using a maroon velveteen for the pinot....

I like productive days. Yesterday I sewed the pinot , corner pieces onto Sara-Beth's tallit . I also sewed the eyelets by hand, ( I love the way they look). In addition, I did the lettering for the a tara /neckband. The text that Sara-Beth chosefor her atara is a wonderful one. It comes from one of the Psalms we recite every morning, "(God) counts all of the stars and calls them all by name". I like that every morning I get to re-think the work on this tallit as I chant those verses. I also love how each element in this tallit , the tallit itself, the corner pieces and the atara all reflect the verse. They aren't identical but they all work well together, ( kind of like my kids). The atara is made out of a black tussah silk. It's got a heavy horizontal weft and the fibers themselves have the slightly rough texture of a raw silk. It's a subtle but nice contrast to the slubby rough textured even weave of the rest of the tallit . Sara-Beth, I think, had expec...

I had sewn binding along the edges of Sara-Beth's tallit. I'm actully not sure o the fiber content, but it is a lovely black silky fabric. I sewed it on by serging the raw edges together and then topstitching with a three step zig zag. Unfortunately I had to undo the binding on one of the long sides. My eyes were really not up to the task. Luckily I remembered one of the members of the Creative Machine List mentioning how she used to use a single edge razor as a seam ripper when she was a young girl. I was able to undo the sewing and not cause any damage. This is a very big deal. I finally got the binding sewn on properly. and I'm happy with it. Next, I turned to the corner pieces, or Pinot. There is a tradition to have the corner pieces totally blend in with the tallit and the tzitzit. I don't follow that tradition. I like to have the pinot be really wonderful to look at, so one's attention is brought to the tzitzit, which are of course the most important part of t...