Elizabeth, a wonderful repeat customer, who blogs at
Crafts of Destiny contacted me months ago (March, actually) to commission a handbag for her Mom's birthday in June. She gave me a couple themes to choose from and asked me if I would like to design something. The nautical theme captured my imagination right away. After doing some google searches, I discovered that nautical flags actually stand for letters. Part of me thought it'd be really cool to spell something out in nautical flags - like a secret message for sailors. Another part of me thought I was out of my mind. When I emailed Elizabeth about the idea, it was exactly what she already had in mind - perfect!
The flags spell "Margaret," which is Elizabeth's Mom's name. I cross-stitched on 22count Hardanger (I didn't make the smallest possible X, but I liked the tighter weave of the 22-count fabric). Originally, I wanted to use metallic gold where the light blue is, but the metallic floss was a bitch to use. It pulled funny, broke apart, and was generally finicky. It also didn't look as cool as I thought it would as the ground for the flags.
I made a simple felt square keychain to match. Anchors are a great nautical image, and it was fun stitching this little one.
Now that I've become familiar with nautical flags, I'm seeing them everywhere. Even though I only know the letters m-a-r-g-e-t, I can figure out words sometimes. Last time we drove to the shore*, I realized the flags flying across the roof of the Atlantic City Convention Center spelled "Atlantic City." I'm so smart! ;)
*In South Jersey (or the southern part of New Jersey, as everyone else would say), the beach is not the beach, it's the shore. You even see this on the highway signs when driving south out of New York. There are all sorts of exits for "Shore Points," meaning cities along the coast. I've lived a lot of different places in this country, and I always enjoy learning the colloquial language of an area. It helps me feel at home.