‘Ah, the cats, they are not very affectionate. They are okay by themselves’, something of this nature said Dutch Maryse when we had a phone call before we came over to house sit their pets. Geo and I would travel to Italy to watch someone else’s pets (since we lost all our own).
Our going off to Italy was for 5 months and so I carried a stash of hand dyed pieces of fabric and threads. I’d made a design this time, had draw it on the fabric of a rather indecisive colour of hemp cotton. I’d dyed it with a combination of plant stuff but natural doesn’t always come out bright, especially not on cotton. The fabric being flimsy I had sewn lines onto it, all the while trying to make this new project a phulkari: ‘designs come forth from memory, no drawings are made and is embroidered on the reverse side of the fabric.’ Well, not mine. My phulkari is one of it’s own.
Our first house sit was in Pescara. We’d to care for a Mastiff dog. When that got too intense, I went for a hike in the Abruzzo mountains while Geo stayed behind. Little time was left to embroider but a start was made.
The nameless piece of fabric went along on hikes in Sicily. Coming back from a hike to and back into Matera, I was able to embroider a serious chunk as I was waiting for Geo to pick me up. Sitting on the pavement opposite a hospital I did receive a few curious looks but, you know, I also received praises from a lady in a cafe. Embroidering in public, without being punk or young and fashionable, is rather odd. I certainly don’t embroider to make a statement or to impress (or to make a profit, for that matter).
As so often with embroidery projects, they start off boring and not very promising. It’s beauty appears when a motive is often enough repeated. Matera had me sleeping the night in a medieval church of which I was elated, although I slept bad on the uneven cobblestone floor. Walking back to town I met a goat and several cats that met me with pure joy (although some cats were rather very moody). The kind of moments where thoughts vanish and you are left in full present mode. To me, animals have that effect.
The full post of the hike to Matera and the house sitting post into Sicily and later on to Ted & Tina.
And so, after some hikes, when Geo and I arrived at Maryse and Eduard we were soon left behind with a Maremmano dog (nearly the same weight as me), two chickens and cats Ted & Tina to care for. I went easy on the cats, careful not to burden them with my desperate needs for their attention. How is that done best, you might wonder? The answer is: ‘with a piece of fabric to embroider’ and thus started our bond.
It took me strain not to delve onto these two cats. It took patience, but not much. It had me sitting in their area, a light filled conservatory, where I sat soaking the sun that never came through the thick wintery mist. I needed not sunlight but cats and very soon indeed they were on my lap. Both of them, not knowing whether they had a competition going for attention or warmth from my lap, or trying to aim at more treats. To me, intentions don’t matter, what counts is the outcome.
Ted & Tina were not allowed to come into our guest room. They tried, of course. Instead, attention was given every morning in their quarters. After I woke up to the moment I would practice Pilates. I would leave their conservatory around 11 o’clock, soaked up enough cat while embroidering. Ted & Tina made me see once again that a home is in the animals that are living around it. I sure felt at home yet the wintery circumstances made me also aware of the difference between North Italy and South Hungary: not remarkable much.
Click the photo below to go to a former post about the forest we live in, the changes it makes through the spring and why I need to go there.
Pouch-to-be Ted & Tina was finished at cafe’s in Bracciano where we cared for traumatised Chakra, a sweet, funny dog. At last, Ted & Tina was stitched together in our own home. A place, when I look out of the window, changing dramatically with the seasons. A home without cats, with a growing number of bright green geckoes (that I all name Felix), an expanding frog family (in the pond and in the vegetable garden), birds that are able to nest without disturbance and eggs that hatch. Fish that splash and rats that never get caught. Pouch Ted & Tina is as colourful as the spring season in Hungary, the autumn in Italy and, to me as soothing as the attention given by cats.
Inspiration: the colours are very Indian: I dyed the silk lining by hand, a shade that I saw often in India. To me, this pouch is an accumulation of India, the stitch, the colour combination that is inspired on Rajasthan. The fabric that represents maybe not the best quality, yet it is. As is the case so often in India, the great mismatching, the seemingly incoherent combination of colours and motives, the transparency of fabrics and their shades. To me, pouch Ted & Tina combines this all. The silk lining that has suffered from too hot a colour bath is ripped in places, which I have enforced with interfacing before stitching a grid onto it; even this reminds me of pieces of fabric from India.
The swivel hooks can be clipped off and you can add a string to your own liking.
