Vintage embroidery

I've been meaning to show you these hand stitched vintage textiles I picked up at a car boot a few weeks ago. (It's weird to call something vintage that is only about 50 years old!) There was loads of old style linen, quite a collection, and a few caught my eye because of the stitch detail. My favourite was this apron with hand stitched flowers in a variety of soft colours and a lovely cross fastening of the straps on the back.

Someone must have spent a lot of time sewing away on these pretty flowers and they have paid close attention to the placement of the colours too to get a good balance overall. I love the little dots and dashes that make up the flower heads! I've just noticed the flower on the left has a yellow stem when all the rest in this section are green. I wonder why?

But they are yellow on the pocket and yellow at the top so maybe it was to stop a total green band at the bottom to soften the feel. The pocket is a little damaged and it needs a wash too but it all adds to the charm of the piece! You can just see in the top left of the picture where the strap joins the apron with a button fixing.

A little close-up of the pocket stitching....

I found quite a few long runners I will show you later on but I wanted to show you this small sachet. It has been very prettily embroidered and it seems like it has been loved and cherished in its time. It's sad to think this was someone's collection of prized belongings that are now sitting in a car boot sale for any and everyone to rummage through the essence of their life. Any sentiment, meaning or memory is gone.

This is looking a bit worse for wear and it's yellowed along the top fold but it still suggests secrets safely hidden or maybe it was more prosaic and held tissues:-)

But still, someone spent time and effort making and decorating this and I shall keep it and start building new memories for it to hold.