9½" x 12"
The story of "Arin's Tallis Bag"
It's the custom in our Jewish religion that the Bar Mitzvah boy, age thirteen, must now have his own Tallis or prayer shawl. In addition to gifting Arin with his Tallis, I wanted to needlepoint a Tallis Bag for Arin knowing that this gift would be used all of his adult life. It had to be a bag that he would be proud to carry and know that his Grandmother had stitched each stitch with love.
Arin Cherry-Turk, son of my daughter Debbie Cherry and son-in-law Peter Turk, older brother of Lauren, is the eldest of my four grandchildren. I knew that by stitching this first bag, I would be creating a stitching tradition for myself and I liked the thought. Besides, it gives me a shopping mission to find more canvas to stitch.
In March of 1998, Lou and I were on vacation in Arizona. Lou had to fly to Burbank California for one day during that time. He doubted whether I would want to go along but I didn't want to miss an opportunity to find a needlepoint shop!
When we arrived in Burbank, Lou went to his meeting and I went to find the nearest phone and yellow pages phone book. Looking up needlepoint shops, I found six listings. I eagerly phoned five shops and no answer! Finally, when I reached the sixth, a woman answered. She was within a twenty minute taxi ride and would be closing at 5:00. It was now 3:00. My next question: Do you have a large selection of canvases? Her response: Is 3500 square feet enough? "I'm on my way!" was my reply.
The shop or rather warehouse was fabulous. As a fashion buyer I was used to looking for "a needle in a haystack", that one valued item among many. There it was! Arin's tallis bag canvas was just hanging on a wall waiting for me to discover its presence. Within twenty minutes, I chose the threads and the shop closed. My taxi arrived and we hurried to the airport, my treasure in hand.
The bag is stitched with Splendor silk on 18 mesh mono canvas. I blended the colors of the background to give a tweedy textured "look". I inserted a diamond motif at the bottom although I don't really know why it's there. The silver swirls are couched with Kreinik braid.
Just as I was nearing the completion of the stitching and happily thinking about my next project, my stitching friend Lenny asked me a question: "What are you going to put on the back?"
"Velvet or Moiré fabric. What does anyone put on the back? Fabric!" I snapped.
"No you're not," she sang, "you have to stitch the back!"
"I DON'T HAVE A BACK", I yelled, tired of the whole project my now.
"MAKE ONE" she ordered.
The challenge was on. We do this to each other all the time. I call it needlepoint by committee. My friends all laughed and I knew that I would design a back for the bag.
I duplicated the motif from the upper right side, stitched Arin's name in Hebrew below, added a heart for love, and then stitched the date of his Bar Mitzvah. I must admit that I'm very happy to have stitched the back and I look forward to doing the same for my other two grandsons and also Lou's grandson's for their Bar Mitzvah's. I did feel extremely proud as I watched Arin carrying my creation on this special day in our lives.
>Click within the stitchings to see the detail images: