Lovely sparkling colours of simple flower heads, show up beautifully on dark linen. Just a circular cluster of the flowers look very effective on a cushion or workbag.

My August 1966 / August 2024 project was this fun and easy embroidery design featuring a flower whose name, at least, was unfamiliar to me: the tongue-twisting Mesembryanthemum. The name encompasses an entire genus of plants, native to southern Africa, of which some species are succulents and others more “flowery” types. The species that inspired the embroidery is presumably M. crystallinum, aka “iceplant”, which I have encountered without knowing what it was called. Now I know!

The pattern is for a cushion or workbag, and the flowers are meant to be worked in wool embroidery on black linen. I have too many cushions and workbags already, so I adapted the design to make another little bag to buy and transport unpackaged fruits and vegetables from the farmers’ market, organic supermarkt, etc. (Here’s an overview of previous embroidered bag projects.) I bought a bunch of old money bags at an antique sale a while ago, which I upcycle and decorate for this purpose.

The flattish flowers with slender petals translate well to easy embroidery — the flowers are all worked in straight stitches, with French knot centres, and the little leaf details are loop stitches. I used scraps of cotton floss instead of wool, since the bag will be used and washed frequently. N.B. the tangled mess in the box of embroidery thread is not my doing! I inherited a big handful of embroidery cotton scraps from someone downsizing their elderly relative’s home. It proved very useful for this project, as I was able to match the colours from the pattern (white, maize, orange, mauve, violet, light pink, light magenta, magenta, spice pink, and plum, plus olive for the leaves) fairly accurately without having to buy anything new. Also, “spice pink” is listed in the materials section, but not included anywhere in the instructions. The colours in the photo are not accurate, either — what looks like sky blue and light turquoise is actually navy blue (my version of “violet”) and white.

The positions and colours of the individual flowers are given on a separate page in the magazine, which was practical as of course I didn’t have (or would have been able to use) a transfer. I had to adapt it anyway to fit the rectangular bag, but kept to the schematic as well as possible. Looking back, I could have balanced it out better by making the second flower from the bottom on the left side purple or orangey-pink instead of white, but whatever. I used my approximation of “plum” plus a sort of brick orange and medium brown for the French knot centres, using up the colours I only had little bits of. I finished off the bag with a button — always nice to find a use for that interesting, but singular button from the 10-cent random button bowl.

And that’s it! This was the perfect upcycling project — I made something useful and sustainable from 100% re-used and/or vintage materials. I love using these bags and can’t wait to show this new one to the cashier at the organic supermarket who always takes a second to admire them. I should make the next one for her.

For this month’s project, I couldn’t decide whether to make the pretty 3-colour “Shaded Blouse” (knowing that I have plenty of knitted tops, and that I would have to buy yarn for it when I am trying hard to reduce my stash) or adapt the tablecloth/dressing-table set embroidery pattern for another vegetable bag (quick, easy, useful, environmentally friendly and reduces the stash of embroidery thread and yet-unembroidered bags). Spoiler: I made both, so the stash balance will remain even. The top will take a little while, so here’s the veggie bag in the meantime.

The pattern is a design of yellow primroses and purple violets, but not in the same “bouquet” — there’s an option for a tablecloth with the primrose sprays in the corners and the smaller, individual violets scattered across the middle surface, or a “cheval set” for your dressing table with one large mat (2 primrose sprays and 2 violets) and two small mats (one violet each.) I chose to just make the primrose spray.

The bag is one of several that I bought at an antique sale a few years ago for a euro each. They are literally old moneybags, formerly used to transport money to and from the German national bank (hence the “Deutsche Bundesbank” and date printed on it; this bag was apparently from January 1997.) After 2002, the German Bundesbank replaced the old bags with newer and better ones (better in the sense that they presumably fulfilled new security regulations for the Euro) and you can now buy the disused old bags at antique markets, via ebay, etc. How they got from the bank to there, I do not know, but would love to find out. (If you are an expert in the sale and trade of disused moneybags, please share your wisdom in the comments — I genuinely would like to know.)

Anyway, apart from the fascinating can of worms that is their origin story, the bags are the absolute best for buying vegetables at the grocery store, farmers’ market etc, being made of a very thick linen (?) fabric and just the right size for small amounts of things like mushrooms, green beans, shallots, etc. Because they are both tough and easily washable (of course I washed them thoroughly before starting to use them for food items — money is literally filthy) they are particularly good for sandy or earthy vegetables like the aforementioned mushrooms, new potatoes, or the kind of carrots that I like to eat, which are grown in peat and therefore quite “dirty” (but taste better than regular carrots).

The actual embroidery pattern was not difficult. Of course, I had no transfer, since I would have had to order it in the mail in 1965. But it was no problem to sketch out the flower spray from the photo. I used transfer paper to transfer the design onto the fabric. The ink was quite faint, so I went over it with a ball-point pen (washable), which worked well enough. There were instructions in the magazine and even a helpful close-up of the stitches, which were all extremely easy: satin stitch for the petals, blanket stitch for the leaf outlines and stem stitch for everything else. I ran out of light yellow after embroidering half of the flowers, and the new skein I bought was one colour-shade different. You can tell if you look closely, but I don’t think it’s a flaw — it gives the flowers a little more depth.

This is the third “Bundesbank” bag that I’ve embroidered, as well as another bag of regular cotton fabric. I used the other bags to buy stuff at the local organic supermarket last week and the cashier stopped in the middle of my checkout to say, “I’m sorry, I just need to take a second to admire this beautiful work.” That was sweet! If I ever get enough of these made, I’ll probably start selling them.

Stay tuned for the “shaded blouse”!

August was a pretty blah month this year, what with the never-ending Covid-19 pandemic and associated long-term isolation, illness and unemployment. My knitting motivation is sub-par and the August 1962 issue of Stitchcraft didn’t have any projects in it that really inspired me. Still, I’ve been trying to turn the situation into an “opportunity” to save money and free up space by finishing WIPS and making new projects from stash.

This month’s embroidery flower was the gladiolus, with a special extra design of wild orchids. I chose the gladioli and embroidered them on another one of the recycled moneybags that I bought at an antique market last year. They really do make excellent sturdy little bags for buying small amounts of potatoes, mushrooms or other vegetable items, and with a zipper on the top they would even be good for buying and storing things like beans and lentils in bulk. They also work well as small project bags — I kept this WIP in the bag that I made in December.

The colours that I had in the embroidery-thread scrap box were more or less accurate to the pattern (mauve, mid-mauve, violet, yellow, gold, dark green and light green.) Also, the stitches are technically not very hard to do: the petals are long-and-short buttonhole (blanket) stitch outlined in stem stitch with straight-stitch center lines and satin stitch centres, the buds are satin stitch, the stems are stem stitch and the leaves are fishbone stitch. I like the effect of the dainty flower embroidery on the rough burlap fabric, too.

On the critical side… I am really not that great at embroidery, especially when I don’t have a transfer and I’m working with fabric like this, on which I can’t draw a design outline very well. I drew a few straight lines and dots with a pencil and improvised from there. Also, since the fabric is already made up into a bag, it’s difficult to use a hoop properly or work on the lower edge. The buttonhole/blanket stitch is a strange choice for the flowers, if you ask me — they look very scraggly! (Just like my real plants at home, ha ha.)

I left the top edge unfinished for now, as I couldn’t decide whether to make a simple button closure like on the other embroidered money bag, a fold-over buttoned closure, or a drawstring. (I don’t have a zipper of the right length on hand and I’d like to stay on the “no-buy” wagon for as long as possible, but it would be the most practical solution.)

I still have plenty more of the bags, so I can keep making one every time a little embroidery project presents itself.

Stitchcraft‘s August 1961 “Late Summer” issue had multiple cute, easy embroidery and tapestry projects. Mine was this little set of rose sprays. To show the versatility of the designs, the magazine usually had directions for and photos of the designs made on different items: a cushion and/or tray cloth, for example. Overall, there was a huge range of homewares that could potentially be embroidered: an apron, a place mat, a chair-back, a wall hanging, a “nightie case”, a project bag, a finger plate, a fire screen, even a room divider or a waste-paper basket cover. This issue added a new idea to the mix: the rose-spray design on a lampshade, complete with a pattern to cut out, sew and fringe the lampshade cover itself.

I don’t need an embroidered lampshade (or finger plate, or fire screen, or tray cloth, or chair-back, or waste-paper basket cover etc. etc.) and I have plenty of cushions and project bags, so I’m often at a loss when I see a nice embroidery pattern and don’t know what to put it on. I’ve made a couple of tablet cosies for myself or for presents for friends, or useful little bags to store “stuff”, but there are limits. I guess I could sell whatever I don’t need, but haven’t gone that route yet. So what to make?

Vegetable bags.

I stopped using plastic bags for vegetables long ago, which wasn’t difficult as I pretty much only buy vegetables at the farmer’s market or organic supermarket, both of which put vegetables in little paper bags (for small or sandy things like mushrooms, potatoes or little tomatoes) or don’t package them at all (I just put them into my basket/cloth shopping bag loose). I try to re-use the paper bags, but my best bag of all is a little linen drawstring sack that originally held soapberry nuts for washing laundry. It’s tough, washable and the perfect size for holding the right amount of potatoes or green beans or whatever. And both the organic supermarket and, incredibly, the regular supermarket in my neighbourhood have now stopped offering even little paper bags for vegetables, so time to make more bags!

Of course, they don’t have to be embroidered, but why not? Cotton embroidery floss is machine-washable even at high temperatures and I have plenty of scraps and bits of plain linen or cotton materials that can be put to good purpose. The bag I made for this August project was made from a piece of linen from shoes, yes, shoes that a friend bought (the shoes came wrapped in this piece of fabric in the shoe box instead of in paper.) I had enough embroidery floss on hand, so this was an almost 100% up-cycled / didn’t have to buy anything new project. (I say almost because I bought the cord for the drawstrings — then realised I could have made monks’ cord or i-cord from leftover cotton yarn. Next time…)

The design is of blue roses, which don’t exist in the natural world but can be created by putting white roses in blue-tinted water for a few days. (Interestingly, this low-tech process is much more successful than trying to create blue roses via genetic engineering, which so far has only made purplish-lavender roses.) I think blue is an interesting colour choice for embroidered roses, because of course when you see blue flowers you don’t automatically think of roses. I love how the colours turned out though. The stitches are easy stem-stitch, satin stitch and long-and-short stitch. Of course I didn’t have the transfer, but the design was easy enough to copy onto the fabric freehand.

I’m really, really happy with this and look forward to making more unnecessarily pretty, but necessarily environmentally friendly vegetable bags in the future.