The Romans are Coming! The Romans are Coming!

***Techno-Dud alert: For whatever reason I keep getting LOTS of space between my photos and such in this post. I've edited as much as possible but it doesn't seem to want to work for me. So, for those of you who think this post looks a bit off, it is.

Christmas is coming so I thought I would make some gifts for my wonderful husband, Spurius, even though I told him that it's all about me right now so don't expect anything. I can't help myself though. I love hand made Christmas presents! So, first on Mrs. Claus's workshop list is a Roman style banner. Spurius had mentioned that he would like to have two...one for peace time and one for war time. His designs are as follows...

Peace Time: Translation: "You may break me but you shall never bend me." (Basically, he's a stubborn ass...ergo the ass. The 3 daggars represent his family: Me, Spurius, and our daughter, Nerina of Sparta)

War Time: Translation: "Kiss my shiny golden ass."

Nice sentiment don't you think?

And so, these are my results: A reversible banner...peace on one side with war on the other.

Made with leftover red canvas that Spurius used to cover his shield I thought it would be durable material to be brought onto the "battlefield". The yellow appliqued designs are also canvas. Now, when I say applique, I realize the more "period" way to do this would be to hand applique, but since I wanted to have this ready for Spuris for THIS Christmas and not next year, it is all done on the machine. Believe me, there was plenty of time put into this...the lettering was the most tedious machine applique job I have ever done. And I've done a LOT of machine applique in my sewing lifetime!

Here is a view of it from farther away, showing how it would hang with the gold cord and "gold" dowel (yes, ladies and gentlmen, it's a cafe rod!) The gold fringe gives it a nice touch too.

Here is a closeup of the applique job done on the device itself. The black areas on the daggars are actually filled in using "free motion" machine sewing. I also outlined all the yellow applique with a black line to emphasize it.

See?

And a closeup of the lettering.

My favourite part is the detail on the ass. His main looks great with the black. And I think I managed to make his face look good and mean...on both sides!

Overall I think it looks fabulous. Would I do it again? Well, after machine appliquing all those letters I must say the idea of fabric paint looks really appealing!