Sew What?

I'm so happy, I could spit sunshine.

I splurged today and bought a Singer Sew Essentials container -- a modern day sewing basket. It's got 165 pieces that fit together nicely in this nifty, snap together plastic satchel of a box, which basically means it's got everything I'll need to start sewing all over again.  And I mean everything. Bobbins. Seam rippers. Pins. A jillion yards of thread. Everything!  I'll keep my old sewing kit for the overspill.  It's cloth and a little dingy but perfectly useful. I just needed to cook with gasoline.

I can build on this -- one stitch at a time. I'll start by making small repairs on everyday things. A hem here, a pair of socks there, a missing button on this, and on and on.  Once I'm really comfortable, I'll yank out my sewing machine. I have to get proper sewing scissors, beautiful shears.  Sewing is fairly relaxing work that's hardly distracting once I get into the feel of it. It leaves my mind to wander and that's when ideas come to me.  Get that left side of the brain going and the right side of the brain is free to wander and explore.

This is a new beginning that's really me going back to the beginning.  What's new is what I used to do. I learned how to sew when I was a small child.  One summer, my Godmother/Aunt Doris enrolled my cousin Leslie and I in sewing classes at the Singer sewing shop in the local mall. I started by making simple things, like a-line skirts. My Aunt Doris gave me my own little sewing basket and looked over my shoulder from a great, grand distance -- she was an expert seamstress -- and by the end of the summer, I could make my own dresses.  By the time I finished college, I fell off.  I had a stint in the costume department of the theater wing that was fun but that came and went. Now that wearing vintage is essential, I'm pretty crafty -- and those sewing skills have come in pretty handy.

I'm already thinking about stuff I want to make, stuff I have to mend, stuff I want to take apart. Hopefully when I get dressed, I won't look like anyone else.  I'll look the way the music sounds.

The older I get, the closer I get to the kid I used to be. When I am old, I will be that girl all over again -- living in the Lowcountry, knitting and sewing and baking and cooking, floating on my back in the water and swimming for hours on end, running just for the feel of my legs spinning out from under me, reading and researching ideas and writing and thinking and making cool art and dreaming of living in New York City...