A New Tallit Bag

I've been contemplating making a new  pouch for my prayer shawl. Another blogger that I have followed makes tallits, tallit bags, challah covers, etc. and decorates them with Hebrew calligraphy. I find them delightful and decided that I would attempt the task for this week's post.

When my sweetie and I were married more than 43 years ago, I wore a blue velvet party dress. I still had that dress tucked away in a drawer.

Our wedding photo. Me wearing the blue velvet party dress.

Out came the dress and I set about steaming or trying to steam the wrinkles out of it. Then I proceeded to cut out sections for my bag. The dress also had a lining which I used to line my bag with.  A zipper was installed and I further thought on how I wanted to decorate the bag before I finished sewing it together.

I had a length of  bridal satin that I had been given many years ago that served as background for the script I wanted to use. I confess that I used a Hebrew letter stencil for my script instead of doing my own. The process I used started with stenciling my words on copy paper and filling it the letters with magic markers. Then I taped that paper to my desk and overlaid it with a piece of waxed paper. Over that I placed my satin and taped it down. Using acrylic paints, specifically Luminere by Jaquard and Pearlescent liquid acrylic, I outlined each letter and filled it in with my base paint (blue) and outlined each with silver.

Close up of letters. Blue outlined in silver.

After attaching the satin to the front of the bag with Heat and Bond, I sewed a border of glitzy ribbon around the border. Next I assembled the bag and added the lining.

Barukh attah Adonai Eloheinu melekh ha-olam. Blessed are you, Lord our God, King of the universe.

I love that fact that this was made from a dress that was so important to me. Now it's truly a treasure to be handed down in our family some day.