My Wild Strawberry tablecloth

My wild strawberries table cloth

 “Strawberries that in gardens grow
   Are plump and juicy fine,
But sweeter far as wise men know
   Spring from the woodland vine.” 


- Robert Graves in his poem “Wild strawberries”

Closeup of the strawberry corner

Strawberries are one of my favourite summertime fruits, ummm.. and it was just natural to have them forever on my table by embroidering this tasty-looking tablecloth.

I used satin stitch for the flowers, fruits and leaves, and chain stitch to mark the seeds, while the stems are in stem stitch.

I picked up the design from the Anna magazine's Swedish edition of the 80's.  Here is a picture of the original design showing several variations which can be done with this motif..

Lakshmi whose blog I follow, has a nice picture tutorial on stitching strawberries;  Here is the link >>

Interested in some Strawberry fun facts I came across?  Here they are..

Strawberry Fun Facts and Trivia

• Berries on a straw? There is a legend that strawberries were named in the nineteenth-century by English children who picked the fruit, strung them on grass straws and sold them as "Straws of berries".  Another theory is the name was derived from the nineteenth-century practice (and still today, although most farms use raised beds, enclosed in plastic) of placing straw around the growing berry plants to protect the ripening fruit. But the most widely held view is that the name Strawberry was derived from the berries that are "strewn" about on the plants, and the name "strewn berry" eventually morphed into "Strawberry".
• Fragrant - The strawberry belongs to the genus Fragraria in the rose family, along with apples and plums. The name of the scientific classification was derived from the Old Latin word for fragrant.  The modern Italian word for strawberry is still "Fragola".
• Very berry or not? The strawberry is not classified by botanists as a true berry. True berries, such as blueberries and cranberries have seeds inside. The strawberry, however has its dry, yellow "seeds" on the outside (each of which is actually considered a separate fruit). Even then, Strawberries are not fruits! They're actually receptacles. Strawberries are the first fruit to ripen in the spring.  There are more than 600 varieties of strawberries, each with their own size, shape, and color.
• Native American Indians called strawberries "heart-seed berries" and pounded them into their traditional corn-meal bread. Discovering the great taste of the Native Americans bread, colonists decided to create their own version, which became an American favorite that we all know and love .. Strawberry Shortcake. 
• The ancient Romans believed that strawberries alleviated symptoms of melancholy, fainting, all inflammations, fevers, throat infections, kidney stones, bad breath, attacks of gout, and diseases of the blood, liver and spleen. 
• To symbolize perfection and righteousness, medieval stone masons carved strawberry designs on altars and around the tops of pillars in churches and cathedrals. 
• In parts of Bavaria, country folk still practice the annual rite each spring of tying small baskets of wild strawberries to the horns of their cattle as an offering to elves. They believe that the elves, are passionately fond of strawberries, will help to produce healthy calves and an abundance of milk in return. 
• Madame Tallien, a prominent figure at the court of the Emperor Napoleon, was famous for bathing in the juice of fresh strawberries. She used 22 pounds per basin. Needless to say, she did not bathe daily. 
• In medieval times, strawberries were served at important functions to bring peace & prosperity. 
• There is a museum in Belgium just for strawberries.
• Ornamental value - The English and French also found strawberries used the beautiful heart-shaped berries to landscape their gardens. In fourteenth-century France, Charles V ordered twelve hundred strawberry plants to be grown in the Royal Gardens of the Louvre.
• Lovely berries - Strawberries have long been associated with love and flirtation. Folk lore states that if you split a double strawberry in half and share it with the opposite sex, you’ll soon fall in love. At wedding breakfasts in provincial France, newlyweds traditionally were served a soup of thinned sour cream, strawberries, borage and powdered sugar. Miss that "borage"....
• Seedy characters - On the average, there are 200 tiny seeds in every strawberry. Ninety-four percent of US households consume strawberries.  If all the strawberries produced in California this year were laid berry to berry, they'd wrap around the world 15 times. That's enough strawberries to provide every U.S. household with 12 pint baskets.
• Are you weird? Over 53 percent of seven to nine-year-olds picked strawberries as their favorite fruit. Respondents to a recent national survey labeled strawberry lovers as "health conscious, fun loving, intelligent and happy." Non-strawberry lovers, on the other hand, were described as "weird, boring, stuffy--picky, fussy eaters who avoid healthy foods."

Healthy Tips and Nutritional Facts

• Eight medium-sized strawberries contain 140% of the U.S. RDA for Vitamin C. One cup of fresh strawberries provides about 88 milligrams of ascorbic acid, which more than meets the Recommended Daily Dietary allowance of 45 milligrams for the average adult. Vitamin C is well retained when the strawberries are handled carefully. Capping, injuring, cutting, or juicing, however, will reduce the vitamin content.
• Strawberries are low in calories: one cup of unsweetened strawberries has only 55 calories.
• In addition, strawberries are good sources of folic acid, potassium and fiber. Strawberries are also fat-free and low in calories.
• If you're expecting a baby, you'll be very interested in some of the new discoveries about folic acid. In fact, 8 strawberries have 20% of the folic acid you need every day.
• Fresh juice from sieved strawberry pulp has a cooling effect on feverish patients. For a cooling and purifying drink, either pour water on crushed berries or chop the berries roughly and whirl in a blender with a little water.
• As part of the 5-a-day program suggested by the American Cancer Institute, strawberries can also play a part in helping you to reduce the risk of cancer or heart disease.  
• Strawberry juice combined with honey will reduce inflammation or sunburn. Rub the mixture thoroughly into the skin before rinsing off with warm water and lemon juice. 
• Eating strawberries, which are rich in nitrate, can increase the flow of blood & oxygen to the muscles by 7%.  This prevents muscle fatigue, making exercise easier. 
• In a test, subjects who ate nitrate rich foods like strawberries, before exercising burned 100 more calories than those who did not.

California Strawberries

• The largest producing state, California harvests 83% of the strawberries grown in the U.S. on approximately 24,500 acres. And with about 5,000 commercial acres, Florida is the second largest producing state. Surprisingly the entire land of the USA is considered to be fertile for growing strawberries.
• Americans eat 3.4 pounds of fresh strawberries each year plus another 1.8 pounds frozen per capita.
• Ideal temperature for strawberry plants should not exceed higher than 78 degrees or lower than 55 degrees.
• From the end of September through the end of October, strawberries are planted and harvesting occurs from mid- December through mid-July in Ventura County, CA, which produces more than 27 percent of the state's strawberries. The peak harvesting season in California runs from April through June, when up to 10 million pint baskets of strawberries are shipped daily.
• Every strawberry plant is hand-picked approximately every three days. This is the time in which it takes for strawberries to complete their cycle of turning from green to white to red. There is no storage of fresh strawberries. After picking, they are rushed to coolers where huge fans extract the field heat. Then they are delivered to supermarkets across the country via refrigerated trucks.