Here’s a little side story for you, before I get to the real reason for this post.
Do you remember in high school and college when you’d reach the end of term and push yourself so hard to finish the papers, study for the exams, and turn in all the last assignments, and afterward you’d just collapse? Often it would end in some dramatic flu or bug that would result in bed confinement over the break that followed. Or at least that was my experience.
I’m having flashbacks to those days. In a mad rush to finish the spring patterns, find testers, sew all the photo shoot samples, take the photos, and prepare the apartment, the cats, and myself for my return to the U.S., we rented a photo studio instead of taking spring photos out on the streets of Madrid in the cold. And I’m so glad we did. I love our outdoor photos in various parts of Madrid. But here’s why I’m glad we didn’t take the photos outside in December:
Just a couple of days later I landed in Chicago, spent a couple of days with the kid and my parents, rushed off to a family wedding, and BAM: full-blown virus. We still managed a road trip (Chicago, Toronto, Niagara Falls, Detroit, Chicago), but I returned home to Madrid and slept for five days straight. Then I discovered I have pneumonia! I can’t remember being this sick in quite a while! So yes, it was a good not to not take the photos outdoor this year. And I’m really pleased with the results of the shoot, which I’ll share with you just as soon as I can!
Spending the past week in bed, coughing and sleeping, has gotten me thinking about the past year. I shot the photo below just before I left for the U.S. Everything on the rack in the photo below is samples I’ve sewn this past year, and they’re only a small portion of my sewing from 2024. The rest is in my closet or given away. Each time I develop a new pattern I sew multiple development samples to get the fit, proportions, and details right. Then I sew additional samples for the photos and, often, one or two more for the blog and for my own wardrobe. I don’t hold onto everything, so I suppose I don’t recognize the volume of items I’ve sewn.
And that brings me to what I really wanted to say here:
Do you sew sewing goals for yourself? Or do you let inspiration guide you and sew when and if you feel like it? I’m sort of a mix of both. I have to sew a lot to develop our sewing patterns, make the samples for the photo shoot, sew examples for the blog. But I also like to let inspiration hit me and sew impulsively sometimes. I think it keeps the fun in sewing when I can allow myself to get lost in an audiobook at the studio for an hour or for a day. If I didn’t sew for myself, for fun, sewing would just become another job, another “must do,” and I wouldn’t enjoy the work I do anymore.
I don’t have a lot of free time to just play, to experiment and just sew something for myself, for fun. For example, I’ve been dreaming of a tango dress I’d like to sew for myself for more than two years. The design has been sketched and re-sketched, transferred into new notebooks while it awaits a block of time required to drape, cut, and sew.
I would imagine your sewing time is similar. Maybe you have kids at home, or a full-time job, or both. I’m sure you have other hobbies, other activities, other plans. With our busy lives, we can’t always make time for sewing. But sewing can also give life to the rest of life. It can feed your soul, give you a little space for yourself, allow you to escape or to process the rest of your life so you can re-enter the other difficult or mundane parts of life with a little more lightness or clarity.
Which is exactly why this year I’m setting myself a concrete goal to make that tango dress. In between all the other items on my list I’m making a commitment to myself that I’m going to create that time for myself. Because I know that time I invest in making something I want to make, something that I’ve been dreaming of, will also pay me back with more enthusiasm and energy for the things I need to do. And maybe I’ll check off the mundane things a little more quickly as a result.
Want to join me? Is there a skill or a pattern you’ve been wanting to try but haven’t found the time? Let’s commit to making that time for ourselves, shall we? Within reason, obviously.
I’ll be showing you some of my personal sewing soon. Maybe it will inspire you to try something new. But more than anything, I encourage you to make that time for yourself. You need it.
Happy 2025!
No Comments yet.