Mending & Mistakes

I never thought that I would ever end up liking to sew. On top of that, I never thought that I would end up enjoying hand sewing so much because it is slow! But at the end of two hours of slow stitches patching a pair of my favorite jeans using some thread that I took from my mom's sewing chest and some denim that I collected from a pair of pants that no longer fit me, I discovered that not only did I patch my pants myself, but that I enjoyed doing it.

The only thing that my mom regrets is that when I wanted to learn how to sew when I was eight, she didn't have the time to teach me. Now, I'm several years older and I am pestering her to learn how to quilt with me and teaching myself how to sew. I think she enjoys the fact that I come to her with sewing problems since she finds herself coming to me with knitting problems sometimes. The only reason that we aren't busy quilting up a storm is that the box of fabric I want to use is out in the coldest part of the house and we only remember about it when it is freezing. I will have to remember when it is still slightly warm during the day to go out and get that box so we can look through it and plan a quilt out together.

I have been slowly stitching together a teddy bear that I cut out using a very old pattern. I spent some of the afternoon stitching together the inside arm to the outside arm so that I have two complete arms for the bear complete with different colored pads for the paws. I am ridiculously excited about this and I hope that I have enough stuffing to fill the bear when it is complete.

The funny thing is that the bear has been riddled with mistakes. I didn't sew anything wrong this time, but I noticed when I was going through the pieces that I had the forehead part of the bear, but I didn't have the part for either side of the head. Everything else is cut out except for that. Not a huge mistake, but a funny beginner mistake. I am going to have to find that pattern piece and cut out those pieces before I start sewing together the body or else I will forget that I have to do it. I also have the rest of the floral fabric that I took from my mom's fabric stash sitting out on my coffee table so that I will remember to do it the next time I have some crafting time.