Raven and Sparrow

Linens for Lisa

Having finished the tablecloths for Lisa's seasonal series, Mike and I had to clear away furniture in the living room and take down our biggest picture to make a place to photograph them. It was enough trouble to make me put it off for quite a while and now that it is done I can see that I didn't get the lighting right. Oh well. At least I have pictures of most of the pieces I've made, starting with  foxglove and dragonfly Summer, which is a large enough square to use on the table without an undercloth.

For Spring I have the quilted square in fresh yellow green, to go under a runner that Lisa and I purchased together in one of our favorite shops. It is a woven wool scarf that we both agreed reminds us of Northwest springtime....darks and grays shot with the bright colors of flowers. When I started working with it I realized that the colored bits were a little too understated, so I tried to punch them up with embroidery in chartreuse and turquoise.

That still wasn't enough, so I added a 24" square of navy blue with bright embroideries. There are similarly embroidered napkin holders to go with it. The colors are not the usual spring pastels, but I hope the green undercloth will send the right seasonal signals.

For Winter I purchased fabric in a pattern of brown, gray and black leaves that I first thought would be good for autumn. The more I thought about it, the more it looked to me like the ground under the alder trees in winter after the leaves have fallen and turned to a brown jumble underfoot. It will go over the full sized undercloth in grayish natural linen that I made ages ago, with french seams.

I have recently shown the autumn runner, but here it is again to complete the set, with its quilted undercloth dyed with chestnut. Click on it to see the detail.

These are the textile pieces I'll be using to set her tables. I am down to the final details now. There is one bonus piece I purchased with a subdued broad stripe which looks really good with her dishes. It will go over the same gray full sized undercloth that I will use for winter. I am not sure how to accessorize it, but there is something simple and carefree about it that I like. I keep imagining geraniums with it, but it could be used in any season.

Now I have to set a date with Lisa.

 

 

End in sight

With the purplish gray napkins for Lisa's autumn table finished, I am very close to the end of this incredibly drawn out project. I still have to photograph the foxglove square, and should probably do the winter and spring cloths too, just for documentary purposes. I have to iron everything and pack it up so as not to have to iron it again, and tote all the elements down to Lisa's house, about an hour and a half away. There I will take pictures of all the settings with her dishes and silverware and then hand them off to her and keep the pictures for myself. The centerpieces are the wild cards, since I won't know what flowers are available until the last minute. It will take a full day to get it done, not counting the packing and list making. It has really been a long time since my last seasonal project for Becky. Lots has happened, or stopped happening, in the interim. I am thinking ahead to future ideas, and wondering if my pace is so slow as to make the whole idea unfeasible. I don't know. it does feel satisfying to get Lisa's table to the finish line. I hope the settings will be worth all the time it has taken.

Pattern on pattern

It has been a long time since I have set a "new" table. In recent years the pandemic and my illness combined to keep my table settings infrequent and minimal, always defaulting to the easiest options that I had set before. This weekend, finally, I tried something different. Because it is so close to Valentine's Day, the grocery store was full of red roses so I thought maybe something in red would be appropriate for the season. I don't use red very often, but I did have a length of dull red linen from a project that never got going and I thought it would be easy to pair it with a lacy runner and the red roses to make a romantic sort of feeling on the table. Once I pulled those things together, though, they were flat and uninspired. I kept thinking PATTERN was needed, but was at a loss for what to do until a search through my bins yielded a chintz square that I made in the nineties when big florals were the rage. I thought it had the requisite romance, and because it introduced blue into the scheme I could use my Wedgewood reproduction plates for pattern on pattern. I usually use the little round red candle holders as vases, but they easily switched roles and echoed the true red of the flowers. It is pretty simple, really, relying on the patterns to underline the intense, dense roses as the the focal point. I'm not sure it is the best thing I have ever done, but it felt good to flex my ingenuity a little and come up with a response to the moment. The dinner party was quite successful in introducing some people who didn't know each other before and I hope the setting helped make them feel cared for and welcome.

The Sabbath

 
     I usually find Ezra Klein's podcasts for the New York Times interesting, but every now and then he talks about something that really draws me in. The recent one with Judith Shulevitz about the Sabbath prompted me to purchase her book The Sabbath World and the book that they referred to many times, The Sabbath by Abraham Joshua Heschel. I read Heschel in a couple of hours and am halfway through Shulevitz. On the podcast Ezra worries about the creeping hold technology is exerting on our lives and wonders if returning to the old "day of rest" practiced by the Jews forever and many Christian sects as well (remember the blue laws?) would help us re-assert our humanity in the face of ever the escalating badgering of phones, computers, texts, emails, and social media and the demands of commerce. Taking a day off from technology and endless striving might be a way for us all to remember that we are not just what we produce and give us time to bolster connections with the people we care most about. That was the purpose of the original Jewish Sabbath...one day out of seven that was dedicated to being rather than doing. This reminds me of the current emphasis on mindfulness and presence in the moment. It seems like working out the balance between one's interior life and the demands of the world is an ancient problem. Reading these books about the Sabbath have prompted me to think about the purposes of religion and the ways that people have tried to incorporate sacredness into their lives. There are a lot threads to pull here and I feel like I have just begun.

     So many of the descriptions of Jewish Shabbat....the preparation, the attention to beauty, the abrupt cut-off to all fussing when the time has come, the gathering, the meal, the feeling of complete immersion in the experience of community....remind me of throwing a dinner party. I do work hard to prepare most of the food ahead of time and of course I always try to make the setting as beautiful as I can, but once everyone has arrived (I don't have a sunset cut-off but it is usually about that time of day) all cleaning, cooking and tweaking stops and the event...the gathering...becomes the essential focus. The emphasis shifts from the ratcheting pressure to provide things (food, clean bathroom, pretty table) to the interaction between people and the dynamics of the group. No matter how good the food is a party is never successful unless the people around the table are joining together wholeheartedly. Their interactions can never be controlled but outside interruptions (checking cell-phones) can definitely de-rail the flow of the party. Sitting face to face around a table makes it possible to tune-in completely to your companions and I think this interaction is holy. Merriam Webster defines holy as: exalted or worthy of complete devotion.  Making space and taking time for extended interpersonal exchange is the kernel of holiness that links a secular dinner gathering with historical religious practice. Setting a whole day aside for personal concerns, including sitting down for lengthy meals, can seem impossible for many of us, nor do we wish anymore to be required to conform to religious requirements, but in our ever more secularized world some of the essential connections are being lost. It seems to me that the dinner table can step in to hold some of the essence the Sabbath used to offer as we rush into our future.

Catching fire

Being the lucky recipient of Nancy's lovely hurricane lamps has reminded me of the role of fire in table setting. Candles are so ubiquitous on company tables that we hardly notice them, but the presence of fire is an elemental energy straight from our deepest memory. Gathering around the campfire to share food, stories and warmth, with faces illuminated by the glow and the black night pushed back behind us, is an experience as old as our species. It is an archetype of communal life that we all recognize instinctively. Firelight is comforting and flattering in a way that other light sources cannot achieve...a universal symbol of home. 

It is also sacred. The mystery of fire....its heat and light, its power and fascination, its flickering mutability, its undercurrent of danger.... is essential to our spiritual ceremonies. A fragment of the solar furnace, it represents that source of life and the inevitability of change. It is used to indicate the presence of God among us and to facilitate the transmission of our prayers across time, space and religious boundaries. Lighting a candle is the quickest way to create a sense of intention and occasion, and concentrate diffuse thoughts into reverence.

No wonder we use candles to invoke the power of fire and make our gatherings special.  When we moved away from the conflagration of the campfire to the more formal atmosphere of the table we knew we needed to bring it with us. Real fire. We have fashioned holders, sometimes out of crystal and silver, to display and contain the flame, but even the smallest ember carries an implication of all that we do not control. The more refined we think we are, the more we need it to remind us of our origins and of how we are (still) connected to the earth, the sky, the unseen and each other. 

New old treasures

As the world unfurls across my various screens, I find myself without anything to say. I am struck with horror at the death of George Floyd and further dismayed by the continuing deaths of black people at the hands of the police, even in the face of the massive protests around the world.  The problems of our country seem way too overwhelming for any blah blah commentary from me, at least for now. Unfortunately, chatting about my own projects also seems uninteresting amid the turmoil. I assume this detachment will pass....at least I hope so.

One gleam amidst the gloom....I received a package from Nancy full of old family linens and accessories for the table. The items themselves are very fun and inspiring, but Nancy's greatest gift was her enthusiasm about my table setting. I often wrestle with the validity and importance of my obsession so it just meant the world for her to take the trouble to pass these things to me because she was touched by my efforts. How very generous and kind....Thanks Nancy! What a mood lifter!

The box(es) were full of possibility:

Beautiful crocheted linens, probably made by Nancy's great grandmother, and a footed brass tray from India. 

Appliqued and embroidered hand towels, and a Mason jar full of thread on wood spools. How long has it been since spools were made of wood?

A printed linen tea towel and linen cocktail napkins with quotes and characters from Dickens novels. Dickens? How literary. I like the way the blues go together.

Silver and crystal hurricane lamps...wow.  These are very nice indeed. As I unwrapped the bases I thought the pattern looked familiar. When I compared them to the silver candlesticks my great aunt gave me for a wedding present forty eight years ago it was clear that they were all made by the same company. (The shorter candlestick in the foreground is mine and the taller lamps are from Nancy.)

Besides the obvious similarities in style, the stamp on the bottom is identical. They all come from the M. Fred Hirsch Company of Jersey City NJ, made between 1920 and 1945. I find myself wondering about the tables these pieces have graced in the seventy-five to one hundred years since they were manufactured. Old things impart the weight of time to any arrangement and draw the imagination back along the threads of experience. This grounding in the past reminds everyone at the table of all the people who have been gathering for meals through the years, sharing food human to human. Perhaps this is a good time to be reminded of connection and community. It makes me feel a little more hopeful. Again, Nancy, thank you.

 

Back to squares one

After setting my blue patch runner aside for a little while I decided to remove the lavender silk wisps and begin again. Hazel suggested I start with a smaller area and work from there, so I picked out a low contrast "moon" that I had dyed on very lightweight cotton and attached it with glue stitch. I went through the usual fret about turned or raw edges. The patch seemed to melt into the blue background better with frayed raw edges, so that is what I chose. I hope it will hold. Once sewed on and encircled by a corona (sorry) of running stitches, the moon asked for companions so more pale gray squares with faint circles on them will be added. I still want to put lavender wisps somewhere, but what size, what shape, and what kind of attachment has not so far been revealed. I am like the traveler that crossed the country driving only at night. All I can see is what is immediately within my headlights. I am not sure what my destination will look like.

My other project, Lisa's Summer, is making no demands on my tolerance for uncertainty, but does require patient, repetitive work. I am transferring the foxglove dragonfly drawing to my linen square with a Pitts pen (warm gray III). I find that the underlying drawing I made from my giant computer photographic collage still has some enigmatic areas that will trip me up when it comes time to add color, so I trace and modify as I go. I find that I can't do it for too long. I have more stamina for waxing (the next step), but there is something about the drawing/tracing that tires me out. Still, I am inching forward.

Finish and start

My computer problems in January prevented my posting of Lisa's finished autumn runner. It is hard to capture its golden shimmer in a photograph. (Click on it to see the whole thing.) It is also proving to be hard to find accessories that work well with it. It is so low contrast that most of the vases and candles that I have tried have been too harsh. I am stalled at the moment while I look for what I need, online of course, and who can really tell that way?  

I was making good progress on cleaning up my studio when Jude's large cloth musings struck a chord. I decided suddenly to make a runner from my scraps (of which I have many, mostly heavy linen in solid colors) based on the comforting light shining from the house to those coming home on a winter evening. That is all I know right now. I usually plan my projects way more thoroughly than this, but I have decided just to start and go where I am led. I turned all my scraps out onto my recently emptied table and picked out everything blue, black, gray or purple. I have cut out some squares and that's where I am.

Ironing out the wrinkles

Finally, finally I have finished the gold under cloth for Lisa's autumn table. I have been experimenting with quilted tablecloths to try to make them easier to handle and to iron. The first one I had quilted by long arm machine and I thought it turned out well, so I tried to quilt this one myself. To keep everything very simple, I just sewed line after line to make a checkerboard. It took forever and I found it pretty tedious. My sewing is wobbly and I think the final result is more like alligator skin, but it will be okay. Once it was finished, I had to wash the quilt. Taking it out of the dryer damp, this is how it looked.

It is very knobbly, but it lays well. It could be used this way. However, I wanted to see how hard it was to iron and how it would look if I did. It took quite a while and some pressure to flatten it, but it did become more smooth. Once ironed it was much easier to handle without re-wrinkling it than an unquilted cloth but I am not sure if the quilting is worth the effort. Even ironed it retains some texture...that alligator sensibility.

Laying the finished runner on top shows that the color of the under cloth may be a little too strong. Even though it matches the thread of the embroidery, the dimensionality and glossiness of the floss reflects the light differently and makes the wheat et al look lighter. 

Over time the quilt will lighten and probably become more integrated with the runner, but this is what I have now. The next step will be to decide what centerpiece, napkins etc. will be the best to take this table to a finish. 

 

Winter's end

And now for something completely different....from last week's colorful birthday to the final table of winter. Outside the naked branches in the underbrush are starting to sport beads of green as leaves swell along the stems. The native red currant bushes are showing hints of the dangling pink flowers to come and the daylight increases everyday. Still, it is gray and chilly and the mournful rain splats against the windows. I decided to respond to persistent winter and set a monochromatic table for a dinner with friends. I used Mike's mom's vintage cut work tablecloth over a natural linen under cloth, with white flowers and gray banded plates. The selection of white flowers was disappointing at the store. Baby's breath was the right color and I thought it would look kind of snowy, but now I think lichen-y branches would have telegraphed winter more clearly without the bridal overtones. Oh well. 

The simplicity and calmness of the setting evoked the austerity of winter to me, but I can feel the "the force that through the green fuse drives the flower" getting ready to ignite. Spring is coming.