The Fleur-de-Lys (or my distant past)

I was looking in old files this morning, searching for something - can't remember what at this point, but obviously didn't find it. Oh well. What I did find were some amazing things I had totally forgotten about - mostly done before I even had a color copier for reproduction. These finds are exceeded only by the charted martini glass I used to paint for people, which I found a few months ago in the "Religious" file folder. Figure that one.

Anyway, the first thing that fell out of a file unexpectedly, was this little canvas with two Fleurs-de-lys, which I had drawn in preparation for putting onto a tiny vest for a Beanie Baby about 12 years ago for an auction by the alum group of my college Greek letter affiliation.

Our flower was the blue iris, so the conventionalized form was also used - which is the "fleur-de-lys." (also stands for the "lily of France") I could not find anywhere the photo of the little vest, but as I remember, I also made a silk ribbon iris on one side in blue. I needed this symbol to be 1/2" high or less, and then stitched it with beads. I drew this again today, and colored it with a drawing pen that was lying on the table to illustrate where I would put the little cross band (in gold on mine)

One thing leads to another, and I was reminded of one of the angels I designed for the Christmas tree at the Governor's Mansion here in Austin back when Mrs. Perry (Anita) asked for a collection of angels of the 40 sq." size.

The next one was in remembrance of a past Governor's wife, Mrs. Price Daniel, who was also a member of my sorority, as was her daughter, who was active in the chapter when I was. The irises on this angel are not "blue," but are in the colors I love so from the Leah Schwartz paintings.

I remember we used to giggle about that Fleur-de-Lys, as it is on the coat-of-arms for the Royal Stuarts, as Mary, Queen of Scots was essentially French - (her father was a Stuart king of Scotland, but she went to France as a child to marry the Dauphin (who died very young) and become Queen of France.)

The Fleur de Lys was symbol of the French ruling house, and Mary's son became James I of England after Queen Elizabeth I died with no heir. Thus the Stuart tartan became the Royal Stuart tartan, and Queen Elizabeth II has adopted it for her own personal tartan - her honor guard wears the kilts in this pattern. Prince Charles, when at Balmoral, wears the hunting coloration of this same tartan, which is in darker, cool colors ( blues and greens) Obviously, this is my favorite period of English history, besides the Plantagenets.

Next find was a drawing - the color picture has vanished. I remember really enjoying drawing and painting this one. The note to myself on the tracing paper says it's for a 4" x 6" photo. The spider web in the center is just a better tracing to use when putting it onto canvas, as the one in the corner was rough and not good to use for the final piece.

I drew this a number of years ago - but was told by a few shop owners I showed it to that people would not be interested in stitching Halloween stuff. Oh my. Those little dots, I believe, were silver, representing stars. Now, with more wonderful novelty threads, this would almost tempt me.

My original inspiration was the reallly great photos we took of my first two little grand daughters at Halloween. I thought it would be fun to have those displayed year 'round, but they needed more than just a plain frame. I never did get around to stitching it- and have no idea where it is.

Looking at it, I see DMC Memory thread on the pumpkin vine tendrils, and plenty of P.V.V. on the pumpkins. I had to buy a book on carving Halloween pumpkins to get the facial expressions. Fun!! More on the finds maybe tomorrow - this is too long as it is. I may have to give myself another day off and go dig in the bottom drawer of the file again. I might even remember what I was originally looking for.