It seemed all my life I had this yearning inside of me that I wanted to lay thread to fabric and bring it to life. My only delimna was that I did not have the knowledge to pull this off in the manner that I dreamed of. When I was a small child I had a little toy sewing machine that was red metal (that was in the days Before plastic was Queen) and it had a little handle that your turned to make your needle go up and down, but I was never able to pull off any creations for my dolls that looked like anything except trash.
Next as at about the age of 8 my Mom taught me a little about the art of hand embroidery. I learned a few of the basic stitches and really strived to the best of my ability to perfect my stitches. Sometimes Mom would trace objects from my coloring books onto pillowcases and give me something to practice on. It did not matter that I was not yet creating works of art - I was spending time with the greatest lady in my life and for that I was grateful. Now that I am older I guess that she was trying to find ways to keep a youngest occupied and out of her hair so she could get some work done. My love for the embroidery grew and I loved added the beautiful colors to make gifts for others to let them know how much I appreciated them and then later when I married at age 17 to make our home have what I thought to be the signiture of someone who yearned to inspire her nest to take on its own unique characteristics, full of love.
I made simple new curtains for our first nest and yearned to make quilts - like those ladies that I saw that inspired me - working with their hands. I actually did piece together my very own , Dutch Girl quilt - which turned into a disaster when I attempted to quilt it myself and ended up with something that made me think of a limp sleeping bag , with the filling flopping from side to side - like some wild creature that would not be tamed.
Time moved on and in 5 years we welcomed a new baby girl into our lives and with the help of a friend giving us a baby shower we received several little sleepers - which I fell in love with. But the little one quickly started to outgrow these sweet creations and I did not have the money to purchase the new ones that were needed so I looked to the fabric store that we had in a local basement and found myself falling in love with fabric all over again. Each piece seemed to call to me - teasing me with ideas of things yet to come , and I gave in to the call and purchased a small , soft piece that whispered to me that it could become my precious baby girl's new sleeper. I took it home like it was a purchase of pure gold and waited for the time my child would fall asleep so I could tackle this new dream? I carefully took apart the old sleeper that the toes were wearing through and measured how much more we needed in length and drawed out a pattern on an old brown grocery bag. Next I drug out the sewing machine that my Mom had purchased used for me ,from my husband's step-father - who was a used sewing machine salesman. My dream was coming closer to being a realization. I carefully and lovingly cut out each precious piece of the puzzle from the soft material and laid it on the sewing machine and took my first test drive , wondering why the stitches did not look like I had imagined - Only to discover - a big mess of tangled threads on the back of my new wondrous project? O NO - what in the world had I done wrong? There was no manuel with this machine that I could turn to for advice. There was no internet that I could turn to - to ask from help from others who had walked this path and there was no other human being that I knew who knew how to sew. There was only me- with a dream.
Ha ha! and OOOPs!
ReplyDelete