Finally admitting it...

It's time to come clean... I have a fear of fabric and sewing. I've been taking advantage to a slow summer with lots of reading about techniques with paper, collage as well as embroidery and some sewing. In quite a few of the books, people share why they create and their inspirations. I want to be like the people who just dive in and play around but my block seems to be that I don't really have a clue how to start. Yup, the ostrich with its head in the sand syndrome... not sure how to make something well so I don't get started. But this is a pattern I'm trying to break and admitting the silly fear is the first step I suppose.

My mum has always been an amazing sewer. She made me dresses, toys including a doll that looked like me, and xmas decorations like this beautiful angel we would hang for the holidays. I love its cheeks!

She can make anything from a pattern but it was never something that I sought out. I do remember making a pillow case for my doll house and I'm pretty sure there were tears involved.

My friend Kat was spectacularly generous and gave me her old sewing machine when she upgraded machines. I've done a couple of sewing workshops but would like to take something a bit more intensive to help me wrap my mind around fabric and such. Sew Be It Studio is my first choice because I met the owner Dilys and she was fun, encouraging and really practical so I figured her course would be a good fit for me.

But for now, in the interest of saving on cash since I'm starting school in the fall, I'm going to just try and dive in. I've got some felt from my mum and that's the least intimidating in the fabric world so I'm going to try and make a stuffed bird. Birds have always been lucky creatively so far so it should be fun. And by putting it out there in the public domain, now I have to make something... it's a strategy that's worked for me in the past.