Bunny Fabric

Yay for Easter!

I like fabric. I have to hold myself back from buying as much as I really want to get.

I come by it honestly. My grandmother was a professional seamstress who sewed drill team uniforms, wedding dresses, and did alterations that made clothes fit so well that it looked as if the people who wore them were born in them.

My grandmother's daughter went further, acquiring so much fabric that she actually bought a single wide trailer to keep it all in.

So, I don't know if it's nature or nurture, but I am truly drawn to buy fabric, especially shiny, flowy, beautiful, or interesting fabric.

Yet I saw the futility of having way more than you could make in a lifetime, so I've given a few bushels of fabric away, and I mange to hold myself back, from buying, anyway.

So now I content myself with taking pictures of fabric that grabs my fancy, like this adorable bunny fabric with 3-D bunny tails sewn on! Then I can smile and remember and not have to store the cute stuff.

What do you like to collect?

Do-It-Your-Suffer Project

I have made a bit of a reputation for myself for making or altering things to suit my 'tude. (That's "attitude" for anyone not in the know.) I've combined patterns to make clothes, taken clothes that weren't quite right to unpicked and re-sewed in order to shape them to my will, and generally make things just how I want them.
So I felt confident in my ability to make a custom backpack. It was just the right color, had see-through pockets so I COULD FIND THINGS, and plenty of outside pockets so I wouldn't have to dig for stuff. 
It took HOURS to make, but I was happy with the end result. It was perfect for me.
That is, until I took it on its maiden voyage.
Then, like the Titanic, it fell apart. 
When one strap broke in the airport, I just slung the remaining one over my shoulder, thinking of the best way to re-attach the errant strap. 

But when the SECOND strap broke, holding on by a single thread, I gave up on thoughts of any future salvage attempts. I didn't want to suffer through any more zipper sewing and piece fitting and thinking through what would fit where and what had to be sewn first, second, third...100th! So I carried the bag in my arms to my nephew, Curtis's, wedding, determined that it would be its final voyage.

When I mentioned to my family that I'd like to go out and find myself a piece of luggage that would get me home, my 6'4" brother, Greg, offered me his suitcase, as he had another, newer one. I thought his old one looked kind of big, but he assured me that he'd used it as carry on luggage more than once, and never got stopped from taking into the airplane cabin with him.

Apparently if you're 6'4", any piece of rolling luggage looks smaller by comparison to your towering body.

Half an inch shy of six feet got me STOPPED and told I had to check the bag. That meant going to carousel after the flight and waiting...and waiting...and waiting...and finally getting home at 4:00 am.

(I still appreciate my brother's effort to help me out. He even sent me a horrified little face emoji when I texted him about my predicament.)

I admit, I was jealous of my little sister sleeping on the back seat of the car as I made the 2 1/2 hour drive home. I remember sleeping in the back of the car as a kid, the comforting motion of the car creating soothing sleep, even though most of the time we 8 Anderson kids were sleeping on each other's shoulders.

We had so much togetherness, we didn't even need our own chairs!

(That's me in the middle, brother DellRay on my right, sister Rebecca on my left.)

Did you ever sleep in the car as a child?

Do you still sleep in the car?

The Only Thing I Really Never Wanted to Sew

I like to sew. I can even combine patterns, or even make them up if I want to. I think I got it from my grandma. She was a professional seamstress, and sewed my wedding dress on her treadle sewing machine. Really!
So I come by sewing honestly, plus the fact that not many clothes fit me in my teen years (a girl child of the 60's and 70's wasn't usually 6 feet tall, so I had to sew if I wanted clothing.)
In my more than 40 years of sewing, I've never sewn myself, until now. Last Wednesday, April 29, the needle went through my finger.

I was glad Bob was home to bandage it for me.

Then I went on sewing. (I had a deadline!)

Has one of your favorite activities ever turned on you? (A cook with pudding in the face, a painter sitting on a wet bench, an animal trainer with a squirrel up the pant leg...)

Just wondering!