Green beans and zucchini

Sometimes, they sell those vegetables in sturdy green nets which are great for all sorts of applications including bags for airing shoes.

Here, I used them for pockets inside a ladies shoulder bag and a cosmetics pouch.
 
The former was made from regular flimsy one-way nets which were knit. Leather was used for the sides and the flap; the inside was lined with fabric.












As for the cosmetics bag - the material I had liked for the outside was not strong enough so that I strengthened everything with potato net sheets between lining and cover. 

 


 

 

The mattress and the footstool

 Although I do like the one-way nets as a raw material, once in a while I need to do something else to reset. Triggered by the upholstering we had done of mypartner’s kitchen chairs (him being the woodworker, me the sewing lady), I felt like upholstering some more for the fun of it. I had kept an old mattress in the basement for just such a purpose (Ours is not one of those dusty, moldy cellars, so the mattress did not smell). There were tree branches left in the garden shed and fabric I have galore. Trouble was, I did not actually need new furniture. But, I figured, I could use a footstool. Actually, I would have liked bright colors on it, but I could not come up with a proper design. The sisal sack eventually brought it all together fitting the pallet table we had worked earlier. It received a print made with a stamp recycled from one of India’s textile factories. The corners were sewn with leather donated by a dancingcompanion.

 

My lesson learned – after breaking down with my footstool in a very unladylike manner - was to observe the growing direction of wood when building anything which is supposed to hold some weight. Fortunately, I had an expert on my side, who, shortly after, felt in need of a footstool for himself. So, I did get my chance to make one with bright colors in the end.

Oh, I wanted one with this fabric, too!

Naked wreaths, apples and potato sacks

When I was a child, my grandmother used to earn a few Pfennig (Pennies/Cents) by removing decoration and greenery from the wreaths people had taken from the gravesides of their loved ones and thrown away. She would carry them to the garden shop for re-use. I was allowed to help every now and then and I remember vividly the red hands from the rusty wires and the prickly fir-tree green. It was not a pleasant job. If my memory does not fail me, I received 5 Pfennig per piece.

Forty years later, my mother still un-wraps old wreaths, but she also redecorates them herself for the family’s gravesides. Each year for the Sunday of Commemoration of the Dead she sends a package across Germany with a wreath to be placed on my second grandmother’s grave. 

And each year my aunt returns a package containing the used wreath base. It arrived when I visited recently and contained, in addition, tasty apples from my aunt’s garden. All content was protected by padding made by the one-way nets of produce she had collected for me for some time.

Yes, I agree, looking at the whole procedure from the outside, it has its funny aspects. But hey, it is not junk, we move across the country, but crafter’s raw material…

Ground cherry

They sell physalis in cute little plastic baskets. They worked great as a base for a bottle carrier ennobled with red leather.

 





 













 

A square or not a square

Some of the plastic net material potatoes are sold in is quite stiff so that I figured that it would do well as a base for needlework. It seemed to provide perfect anchors for cross-stitching and I thought it to be good material for needlepoint training of children. However, when I tried it myself, I realized that the holes are not perfect squares but rather trapeze-like. That messes up your orientation within the planned pattern considerably. I got off the track all the time. Nevertheless, with the right application such as Kelim or Florentine needlework it works just fine.