My Mom's sewing machine

I snagged my Mom's sewing machine while I was home for the wedding. I figured I better make a break for it while none of my other sisters have any interest in sewing. :) I love having her sewing machine in my house. I can't really explain why, but it just kind of feels like she's nearby when I see it on my table. Those of you who knew my mother know she's an amazing seamstress. She made this:

and these:


and all of these:

She can do anything. Naturally, I've always wanted to enjoy sewing, because I've always wanted to be like her. Cooking has never intimidated me. Pie crusts, bread making, baking in general, yes maybe that once intimidated me because the measurements need to be exact when you're baking and I like to be more flexible when I'm cooking. But sewing freaked me out. It just never came naturally and I screwed up a lot of projects HORRIBLY. I would over-think everything and get nervous working the machine. I always felt like I was going to break something and then my Mom would yell at me. I once asked for her old Singer sewing machine that she hadn't used since either before she got married or before she had kids and she told me no, that she wanted to hold onto it. My Mom's not really the sentimental type. I was totally surprised that she wanted to hold onto something that she was obviously never going to use again. So instead she bought me a Brother Walmart special for Christmas one year. Maybe she recognized that I was not a natural-born seamstress, because she researched what was the best model of the cheapest brands. She gave me a pair of Gingher sewing shears, a 25 dollar Joann's gift certificate, and my brand new sewing machine and I decided my first project would be a pair of pajama pants for Bobby. So one night while Bobby was at his night class, I set to work on my sewing project. I bought a pattern and some cute fabric that actually matched a "quillow" my Mom made for him while he was on his mission. I set up the sewing machine on our kitchen counter because we didn't have a kitchen table and spread out all my tissue paper patterns. I was so confused- I was holding up pieces, trying to decipher which ones I needed, etc. when I started to smell burning. I look up and one of the pieces had caught FIRE from the candle I was burning. Well, I've never seen anything burn that fast. The tissue was burning rapidly and there was ashy pieces of pattern paper EVERYWHERE. Somehow I managed to still sew the pants without the necessary pieces, but the pants ended up being too small for Bobby and even too short for me. Bless his heart, he did wear them once for me.

Also, until a week and a half ago, I did not know to get my bobbin thread to come up and be ready to sew. It's embarrassing to admit. I'm embarrassed, but it's the truth. Thank you Jessica and Jenny for all your help. I'm sure I'll need more but you have both been so helpful. Ashley's birthday was coming up and I had this great idea to give her an apron. Cute sassy aprons seem to be all the rage these days for my demographic. I thought about buying her one, but then I thought, "what if sewed it?" Then I found this tutorial on this girl's blog. It's a great tutorial and really inspired me to start sewing. It is all I want to do now. I've made four aprons so far.



I also made this cute little purse for Franny. We have a reward system in place for her where I give her pennies whenever she makes a good choice. She can trade those pennies in for a bigger reward later. This system is called a token economy. I'll write more on that later. I learned about it at the autism conference I went to a couple weeks ago.



She loves the purse and wants to take it everywhere! It makes me so happy. I adapted this tutorial and didn't bother with the boomerang clip or the ID window and just added some decorative stuff and a strap. Also, I made it just a little bigger.

I have to laugh at myself. I mean, I am sort of notorious for never finishing projects. This is not really me to get into these projects. I mean, I've been to Walmart three (or is it four) times this week to pick up more fabric and sewing notions. Just ask Betsy if she's gotten the baby quilt for baby Emma yet. Oh yeah, how old is she now? Almost 2 1/2? Sewing makes me feel better. It's probably a combination of wanting to be like her and wanting to do something that would make her happy and proud. So I feel a little embarrassed about being such a super-spaz, but I think I'm just going to roll with it and hey, at least I'm learning to sew!