Birthday Petassoun

I have an early birthday present !  A beautiful broderie de marseille petassoun has come to live at my house.  Here are a few pictures to give you an idea.
 A petassoun is  a small lap quilt used to protect a mother's clothes from any newborn "accidents".  The everyday ones were probably used up, and I have seen quilted examples that were very worn.  These very beautiful ones were reserved for important occasions such as baptisms. 

This one is quite fine.  Most are finished with a tape on the reverse side of the scallops.  Sometimes a straight edge is finished with a knife edge hem.  There are regional variations, and the Marseille pieces are stuffed very well, probably because there was easier access to cotton goods, which would have been harder in small villages further away.
Several different sized pieces were made for important family occasions, always happy affairs like weddings and baptisms.  Each event was represented by certain symbols with different significance.
In this way, the women stitching were able to transmit the story of their family and their personal history.
I adore this work, I love making these pieces, buying them sometimes when I am really lucky,  reading and learning  about them and showing others.  I think I'm hooked !

Playing with wool

Yesterday Janet (no blog yet but coming soon !) and I spent some time playing with our new wool block of the week from here
I don't like working with fusible web, it is a personal preference (I know many people love it !), so I was happy to find some new tips in this book:

These ladies suggest washable glue sticks and staples !   Well, it's worth a try I thought, so I got out my little stapler and glue stick, and I have to say - love it !!  The stapler does not leave a mark in the wool, the glue does not stick hard but seems to hold things in place.  Here are the first two blocks:

To be fair to the designer, I changed the flower on the second block drastically, hers was much more complicated.  Another thing about this summer project, is that there is a freebie each week; this summer these are small blocks of wool applique on cotton, here are the first four (not stitched yet, and the last two are glued/stapled, on the others I used fusible web)

I am going to match my thread to the appliques, mostly using DMC and some nice silk floss I have on hand.  I like a lighter look on the embroidery. 
Hope everyone gets some stitching time today !