It’s inspiration Sunday and I’m inspired by poppies!
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Frequently I walk into work carrying a poppy Tervis tumbler (for my coffee) and a poppy Kate Spade bag (for my gym clothes). It was never my intention to be so pattern coordinated. But once in a while my poppy ensemble gets some attention. For example…
Did you buy your coffee cup and your bag together?
No.
You must really love poppies!
Um… I guess.
The poppy coffee mug and the bag were both gifts, and the fact that they coordinate is purely coincidental. In fact, this week when I was asked about my passion for poppies because, once again, I happened to be carrying both the poppy bag and the poppy cup, I had to stop and think about why the gift givers both thought I loved poppies. Â And then I remembered: the poppy dress!
A few years ago I decided to reinvent a simple, black, cotton, strapless dress that I had bought on clearance at some outlet mall store many more years ago. When I decided to reinvent the dress, I didn’t even own an embroidery machine, so all of the restyling had to occur with my simple, old sewing machine.
Probably because I wasn’t thinking about creating a design that fit in an embroidery hoop, I decided to go BIG – I mean really big. I found some images of poppies on-line and simplified the image to three shapes: the outer red flower, the yellow inside and the black in the very center that I  appliquéd in three layers. Once I made my pattern pieces: one large poppy and one smaller poppy, I purchased cotton fabric in the appropriate colors to represent the flower. I cut out the shapes, ironed on some “Heat N Bond Lite” and stuck my shapes to the dress and manually satin stitched around them.
I think the dress turned out pretty groovy but I always feel a little self conscious about wearing the clothing I make. Nevertheless I have gotten a few wears out of the dress – I actually even sported it at a fancy schmancy art museum party. So there.
Here’s what I think: it’s time to bring back the poppies. Now that I know what I am doing with my embroidery machine – perhaps I’ll turn it into a machine appliqué design.
