Two types of Frontal

Why am I always completing tasks in a rush?

Two weeks ago I was asked, if it were at all possible, and if I didn't have too much on, if I could make some Baptismal Bibs for a set of quads who were to be Baptised today, Low Sunday. I had lots of other things to do, not to mention trying to prepare spiritually for Easter, but being a sucker for babies I couldn't help but push them to the top of the queue. I kept them simple with a Baptismal Shell and 3 drops of water plus the name of each child. Made from fine cotton lawn with a woven sateen stripe through it, interlined with towelling, and backed with soft cotton Tee shirting, they should hopefully provide the Godparents with plenty of stuff to mop up any tears/dribbles of joy on the big day!

Those were one type of frontal...
Having moved most of our house just before the Easter break, I am now stuck between two residences, one in Shropshire, the other in Oxfordshire, where my husband's job is. My main sewing equipment is in Shropshire, but we were going to be attending the Triduum at our parish in Reading, so when our Parish Priest came up to me with a hopeful look in his eye, at the beginning of Holy Week and said "The fabrics we ordered for the altar frontals have arrived" and plonked them in my arms .... since I knew that it wasn't his fault that the supplier had taken soooo long to send the silks from Spain, (he had hoped for a Lenten set) …. how could I refuse to at least attempt to make a new Tabernacle veil and Frontal by Easter? One main problem was that all my liturgical trims and backing linens were now in Shropshire. My poor long-suffering husband offered to drive me back up there so I could get the things made. (I was trying to get another Priest's lacey alb restored too, so I thought if I sat in the back of the car I'd be able to spend the journey time hand-stitching it...a most headache-inducing experience..)To my horror, once we had arrived, and I'd sorted out the trims, and backing cloth, I couldn't find the frontal fabric anywhere.  That was because it was sitting in the boot of my car on the drive in Oxfordshire. So, with no time to relax, and having reminded my dear husband that his suffering was no-where near what Our Lord had to suffer for us (even though my dearest was probably thinking, at least Jesus didn't have to put up with a dumbo wife...) we made sure I had everything I needed to complete the sewing, and set back down South. At least the Oxfordshire house is now almost empty, so plenty of floor-space to lay out altar frontals, although trying to sew large items at a very small kitchen table was a bit of a challenge.
It was worth it when I managed to get them to the Church on Holy Saturday afternoon to try them on, seeing the chuffed look on the PP's face when he noticed it after coming out of the Confessional!

I'll have to tweak the bottom right corner before I take some better photos, where the tabernacle veil can be seen too, but it certainly added to the beauty of the Liturgy at this most Holy time of the Year!

Resurrexit, Sicut Dixit! Alleluia!

Now the Purple one can wait for a bit, but I've got no excuse to not get the red set ready by Pentecost...apart from that Wedding dress I should be getting on with....

Recent Shenanigans

Well, the busyness of the business has been taking over to the degree that I haven't managed to post anything much lately. So here's a random selection of what Zelie's Roses has been up to...

A winter wedding dress of pure silk

It started out as some very large circles - I am so grateful that I have my wonderful cutting room floor!

And became a very elegant flowing gown, with almost a 1940's feel...

Then to carry on the circles theme, I managed to make a couple of circle skirts for a little lady...

Who chose the teapot one for her first day back at school!

Whilst I'm also working on several altar frontals/tabernacle veils, I did manage to get this one made in time for Easter...

This was it being tried on for size, during Lent, hence the purple Tabernacle veil!

Oh yes, and somewhere in between all that I managed to pop in a set of vestments for the Shrine Church of St Augustine, and the National Pugin Centre. It included an Alb, Chasuble, Cope and Mitre.. as well as a Monk's habit. As it was to be a Pugin-esque Chasuble, I was very blessed to find just enough vintage orphrey banding to make it look sufficiently authentic....

You may well ask how I managed to do all that in such a short space of time, well, they are meant for children on their educational visits to the centre, so didn't have to be too perfectly finished, although I did spend time making sure they were robust! I hope to get some pictures of them all being modelled in the not too distant future.

And just as I thought I could settle down to some serious work on a real-life full-sized Chasuble that needs to be ready for an Ordination in June, a Bride to be in distress got in touch asking if I could make her a Wedding Mantilla Veil, as she hadn't been able to find anything big enough, and her Wedding was in two weeks' time! Happy to oblige, I fortunately had some lovely lace in stock so was able to come up with this...

Now, back to that Chasuble...(and the next Wedding dress I'm working on too...!)

Liturgical Splendour, Finally Done!

At last I have finished the altar frontal, superfrontal and tabernacle veils I started during Lent this year. It is for St Birinus Church in Oxfordshire, one of the loveliest little churches I've ever seen. I did get everything rigged up in time for Passiontide, but there were a few tweaks needed, and I've managed to find time to do some tweaking now the First Communion dresses are coming to a close (still one to finish off for August, though!)

 Although it's a lovely church, it is very difficult to get a good photo with my camera, these are the best shots I could manage.

It was a major effort of pattern-matching, since two different types of fabric were sent as being suitable to match - unfortunately one, being partly made with metallic threads, turned out to be much more closely woven, so ultimately smaller (shorter in length) than the other. Being a determined sort of person, I did as much stretching as I could in order to get the patterns to match up across the panels, and in the end it didn't turn out too badly, although there was a fear that the stretched one would either split with all the stretching, or surviving that, would shrink back and cause some rippling along the join,  It doesn't seem to have done that to any great degree so far!

Resurrexit! Sicut Dixit

What do you do when a Priest asks, on the Tuesday of Holy Week, whether you could find time to make up an altar frontal for his Chapel in time for Easter? You get cracking, of course! Although I couldn't do it on the Wednesday, fortunately I had Maundy Thursday fairly free, so I was able to complete it before Good Friday.

   There was just enough fabric left over to make a lectern fall, but no time to do more than edge stitch it to stop it fraying! It will be properly backed and finished in due course.

I thought it would be easier to make up than the previous one I was asked to make - for Advent and Lent, all those wobbly bits of gold trim - so hard to get in a straight line!!

But pattern matching the edge pieces needed to extend the width is not so easy when they are on full view with no gold trim to hide the joins, so it took almost as long.

However, I think it turned out splendidly to make a fitting frontal for the Feast of the Resurrection. 

Happy Easter.