On Pins and Needles

To keep my hands busy on the long and hot Shabbats, my friend Renske sent me a hand applique quilting block to work on. The patch has been sitting in my house for a couple of weeks unattended because I had yet to find pins to start the project. Pins?
No problem, I could find those at the Zellers or at the Fabric-land. But of course this is Israel, and nothing it seems easy or straight forward for me- although, of course, it makes perfect sense to the locals.

There are plenty of fabric stores in each city which seem to nestle together like colourful Easter eggs. In Jerusalem, there are half a dozen or so fabric shops near the corner of Jaffo and King George, right beside the turn off to walk to the shuk.

Each is a long narrow shop, plied to the ceiling with crowded bolts and rolls of fabric in every hue and texture with very little or no order. The shops are so full that the bolts spill out onto the street both as vibrant advertisement and to provide a little breathing space inside. In the indoor area that these outdoor bolts vacate each morning usually you can find the proprietor or proprietress, ready for business. They are almost always near the door seated on a folding chair or behind a very small and crowded counter barely big enough for the cash register. Despite the sameness of the each store set-up, if you look carefully, you will notice that each store has a specialty: fabrics for curtains, upholstery, ball gowns, clothing, head scarves, etc. I am kicking myself for not taking the camera with me yesterday.

Even though all the fabric jumbled together is overwhelming enough, there were some curious things missing. Where were the threads, needles, pins and buttons? I finally managed to buy pins yesterday off one of the counters displayed as an impulse item like a chocolate bar or a People Magazine. It took two stores in Tel Aviv and three stores in Jerusalem, some bad Hebrew and some funny hand signals to find them. Heaven help me if I ever need a button.

By bedtime I had the quilt piece cut and basted. Then I got up and started stitching, and found it quite addictive, so I kept stitching and stitching. Needless to say, I finished the block this afternoon.

There really isn't much to do on Shabbat but quilt and write blog posts.