A Red Letter Day

I have been so looking forward to it - and today it finally happened. I arrived home this afternoon, after finshing my paid work for the week, and there it was in the letter box. The new edition of Selvedge. It's been a long wait as they moved offices a couple of months ago and the edition was delayed so they could produce it up to their usual high standards. It has seemed like a particularly long wait, which reinforced for me that this magazine was something that I really wouldn't want to have to do without. Other things may have to be sacrificed in these times, but for me Selvedge won't be one of them.

There was nothing else for it. I immediatley abandoned thoughts of sorting out the sewing room, made myself a pot of feijoa tea, got out my favourite tea cup and one of my gransfather's embroidered cloths, put my feet up and lost myself in its pages.And it was wonderful. Each page better than the last, full of colour, georgeous textiles and inspiration.

I mean just look at these pages of 18th and 19th century samples of French mattress tickings. They are just begging for a quilt to be made based on the colours and stripes....

I think this may have to go onto the list of quilts to be made - someday...

Another fascinating article was about the tradition in parts of Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina for women to prepare clothes that they wish to be buried in. Margareta Kern, an artist, undertook a photographic and video study of some of these women for an exhibition called Clothes for Living and Dying. The photos are moving and I was so swept away reading about them that I was late to pick the boys up from school.

Thank you Selvedge - you enrich my life.