 |
March 10, 2019
Most of my opportunity and my excelling moments have come during periods of trial. Obviously, sewing means a lot to me. It has seen me through rough times that frightened me to my core. It has seen me through times that were a drone of days and days on end. And it has given me the blessing of contributing in some way to the betterment community around me. I couldn't ask for more of a vocation.
But there's more than this believe it or not. My days do not pass in a doldrum of, "Oh dear, what will I do today!" It's more that every day I wake up with something waiting for me in my studio - something fun, challenging, exciting almost always new and most of all something I can do to add just a little to my clients' and students' lives. And sometimes that involves challenges that I wouldn't usually put on myself, like integrating woven
sewing techniques on a stretch garment; or wondering why specific techniques are better or worse for a project and why; or how to keep from getting pulled from one project to another (this is a real bear for me)!
Unlike a lot of folks out there, it's hard for us not to come up with something to sew on our days at home. As a matter of fact, for most of us, it's harder to find the time to sew. But now, that's all changed. We have gobs and gobs of time - almost like a gift.
While the rest of the world, or at least those who don't have a particular skill or passion that is close to their heart and mind, is suffering, we are really blessed with having more time to practice and hone our sewing skills. This is the perfect time to do that. What may seem like a burden and certain remand, for others, is a time that we can devote to not only developing new skills but practicing and perfecting our old or new skills.
I want to encourage you to do this. Before we know it, this period of social distancing will be over, and this opportunity of the gift of time will be gone. It will be a little like stretching a rubber band, and then letting it go. The boing-boing after so much time apart, we will all be so busy catching up on togetherness that our time will be more valuable and busy than ever.
Using this gift of time now can not only make our future skills more adept and easier, but it will also make our skills more apt to use them in the future. Yeah, I know this sounds like the typical used-car salesman - buy this car and you will be richer, thinner and better looking! Think of this like college; that wonderful time in which you are not plagued with the daily duties and tasks, only to learn and practice what you are learning. This is like college
for adults, allowing us the time to learn new things and practice them. When we are practiced at new skills, they become like good and well-worn friends that we can use over and over.
Pick out something you've wanted to learn, buttonholes, mastering top-stitching, working on fitting techniques, practicing tailoring stitches, thinking about designing and developing new patterns for yourself, working on a pattern that was formerly confusing or too difficult or making a list of tasks you wish to accomplish during this time, even if you don't work all the way through it. With this gift of a huge block of time, you can do these things.
Here are some great guidelines to help you stay on track:
- Take a break every 1 to 2 hours - this is a short 3-minute break.
- Take a longer break every 3 to 4 hours - walk away, get a glass of water, have a cup of tea - the point is to walk away for at least 3 or 4 minutes.
- Get plenty of sleep - this is NOT an endurance contest - at a good breaking point, leave and get your set amount of sleep that you need to function well.
- If you feel yourself getting off-track, you can switch tasks for a couple of hours.
- If errors are taking over, this is a sign of you being tired. This is not an endurance race - if anything it's the opposite, with the gift of lots of time. So rest. It's amazing what a night of sleep can do for the most complicated of problems. Something that seemed totally insurmountable the night before is, in the morning, totally solveable!
- Working from a list may sound anal, however, what it can do is bring about a great sense of accomplishment. Looking at your list when you check off or scratch out the tasks accomplished does add to your sense of getting something done and in concrete terms, allows you to see all that you are doing.
Hopefully, this will inspire you to do something outside your normal boundaries where you have been working. And it's even more rewarding when it's something you've wanted to do for a long time, but didn't feel you could devote attention to it cause the project, you thought, required so much time.
This new year will bring a new look and lots of new things added to the sewingartistry.com to the site. In the meantime, things will be placed a little different, and if you can't find something that you liked or would like to find, just let me know. It's easy as pie - you can simply respond to this email and I'll get it. I get all these emails and I read all of them. so let me know if something seems awry for you or out of place.
We're working on simplifying it and changing it to a more functional and easier place to get around.
If there's something you liked from before and don't see, LMK.
If there's something you've never seen, but would like, LMK.
And of course if there's something that seems haywire or good, LMK!
You all will be the first to know when it's more settled, but for right now we're still moving the furniture around!
On the Blog
January 24, 2020
January 21, 2020
January 14, 2020
January 1, 2020
December 29, 2019
PS - I do a lot of posting on Facebook as SewingArtistry - like my page to see more goodies!
To view this email in browser or to see past emails click here. (This works now and is a lot of fun to check out!)
We respect your email privacy
|
|
Follow Me!
  
 
|
|
