XXXII
EMBROIDERY SUGGESTIONS FOR BOARDING SCHOOL GIRL
A girl who has to make a home of her boarding school should try and make her room and little personal articles as attractive as possible. Her room is her citadel where only her bosom friends and cronies meet. One likes to feel when they enter their room that it is a place where everything is hers and every object in sight means something to her.
A girl might not like to embroider, yet there are hundreds of things that can be done without any needlework decoration, such as stencilling, cut leather or simple appliqué. It always amused me to hear a girl say, "I don't like to embroider." I always feel like asking her, if we are acquainted, if she knows how to embroider. You will find that in nine cases out of ten she does not. Embroidery is like anything else, you have got to know it to like it. It may be you prefer one branch to others. Some branches of this work may be tedious to you but when you stop and think what simple things are classed under embroidery you will find that you have a wide field from which to select.
It is not my object to go into details in regard to stitchery in this chapter but rather to give you some helpful suggestions in regard to knowing what to make and what colours to use. The stitches to be used are fully described in the previous chapters.
The first thing to consider is, are you going to have a bedstead or a couch in your room? Make it the latter unless you have a broad window seat that you can heap up with pillows. No room at a boarding school or college is complete without a half a dozen pretty pillows. When the chairs give out you can use the cushions, Japanese fashion, on the floor. Some girls like to carry their whole room out in cretonne, which is very pretty and dainty if you can afford it. Cretonne covers last about a year and then they get faded and dusty, while a linen background embroidered will last for many years. It may need laundering but it will stand any amount of that. If the embroidery fades a little that also is no drawback as it takes the effect of newness from the room. A room ought to look as if people lived in it and enjoyed it and not as if it were an exhibition room in some department store. Don't think I am trying to encourage untidiness but let the things be used and enjoyed.
When I was about your age for several weeks I spent my spare time embroidering a centre piece for my auntie's dining room table taking care to get just the right colours that would look well with her every day china. It nearly broke my heart when it was finished to have her use it only for state occasions. If my cousins do not use it any more than auntie did it will last for hundreds of years, or be thrown into the rag bag by the next generations if they don't like it. Enjoy all the pretty things that you possess if they are appropriate for the use you intend them for.
Have you ever heard the story of the little dirty boy of the slums who was given a new white tie by his teacher? He had first to wash his hands before he touched it and then he washed himself to wear it and asked his mother for a clean shirt so that everything would go with the tie? Do you know that if you have one beautiful thing in your room of which you are very proud you too will see that all the things around it set off its beauty?
For the girl who has a window seat in a room and wants to keep her room dainty and bright there is nothing as pretty as the lingerie pillow. It may be made of heavy white linen or lawn as you desire and can be oblong, round or square. The cushion is covered in any colour that you prefer and the white top embroidered with large eyelets, Roman cut work, Hardanger or drawn work so that the colour will appear through the openings. Some of the handsomest imported pillows have motifs of real Filet, Irish Crochet or Cluny lace. These motifs are very expensive and not really necessary. The back and front of the linen cover are scalloped on the edges and half an inch above this scalloping a row of large eyelets is worked at intervals. The back and front are laced together with ribbons the same shade as the coloured covering. For a pink and blue room the cushion can be covered with pink and the lingerie slip laced with blue. For a square pillow plan the design on a square and arrange one in each corner and one in the direct centre.