My grandmother taught me to sew starting when I was six years old. She used to get little samples of fabric in the mail, probably for something dreadful like Sansabelt pants for my grandfather, that she would save, and let me sew them together, into tiny little polyester twill quilts. Her sewing machine was permanently set up in a corner of her bedroom, right by a sunny window, in a purpose-built cabinet. Her machine was unusual, in that it didn't have a foot pedal, but instead a lever that was operated by your knee, to set it in motion. I didn't even get to try a foot pedal until I was closer to eight years old, when my mother let me try sewing on her machine. I stomped on it and went out of control, and she said, "...and this is why we don't let people your age drive." The summer between fourth and fifth grade, my grandmother sent me to sewing classes at the local Bernina dealer. By the time I finished making my first outfit, a pair of white shorts and a red plaid button-front top with a Daisy Duke tied knot at the front, I knew I was hooked for life.
During the salad years, when money was so scarce as to seem illusory, the ability to design and sew my own clothes, and things for the kids, was the difference between feeling normal and feeling destitute. I started making costumes for friends of ours, and sometimes even made a few dollars doing it. I couldn't afford to buy many new clothes from stores, but I could try on things I liked, and then study the construction of them in the dressing rooms, so I could copy them out of cheaper materials. My kids could get fairly accurate copies of outfits from their favorite movies for Halloween and dress up. (I think the best were Scarlett O'Hara and Princess Buttercup.) But when I tried my hand at running a business based on this, I very nearly destroyed my creativity. I burned out on it so badly that for years I didn't want to make anything, and everything I did try made me deeply unhappy. I gave up altogether for a long time, and when my daughter joined the fashion club at school, I had no reservations over giving her my machine and old stash of fabric.
Yesterday, the machine I bought to replace my old workhorse arrived on the porch. I stayed up until three thirty in the morning, making my first machine-sewn project in years, a cushy bed for my little red-headed dog, who needs a softer place to sleep now that he is getting "mature." I tried not to overthink the design. I just went with it and hoped the old skills would reappear. It felt rusty at first, like when I tried to remember how to put in a zipper. By the time I was done, I felt the old passion creeping in around the edges. Tonight, my friend and I went to see Frozen, and while the main character danced and sang "For the First Time in Forever," for the first time in my own forever, I paid attention to her animated costume, picking out the shapes and the fabric weights, the pleats and the lace trim, and thought, I need a reason to make this. I finally took a long enough break that I want projects to do. How am I going to pace myself? I need to finish a few things before I let myself loose on the sewing machine. At least the dog bed is finished in its entirety. I just need to convince the boy dog that it belongs to him. He seems to like it right now, after I chased off the cats. I want to make another one. And who knows what might be next?
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