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I haven't spent any real time in my sewing room for over a month... :(
I remember when I was a girl and summers were magical - open and free, full of uncommitted time to do whatever I wanted. Not so true, now that I'm an adult. This summer seemed even more frantically busy than the rest of the year.
Don't get me wrong - a lot of it was good stuff. Lots of special company, an exciting project that I'm not quite ready to "unveil" here, a great vacation...
But I find myself wishing that life would get back to "normal". I could use a dose of "uneventful routine" right about now. ;)
How about you? Do you have "dry spells" (or busy spells) when you just can't get to your sewing? If so, how long do they last and how do you cope? If not, how do you avoid them?
Photo credit: tawalker
9 comments:
I've had a dry spell for a while sewing for myself because there just isn't enough time in the day. The past few months my sewing has involved my students projects, not mine. I've been working on the same pants for about 4 weeks now. I hope when the kids go back to school I'll be able to find some hours for myself. That is after I make some pencil holders and book covers needed for school.
Sewing is a positive we can give to ourselves. Peoples have good intentions of wanting to sew but we let other things take us away from our pleasure - just like going to the gym. I'm amazed all the time how many people pay for sewing classes but never attend. If we could only learn how to give ourselves our pleasures. There's only 24 hours in the day. I do wish there were more :)
I have cobwebs in my sewing nook, too! This has been a very long, very dry spell. I've had a lifestyle change and I'm working three days a week...and *pouf* there went my sewing time...
So I'm going to have to make a paradigm shift, because I just can't spend whole days in the sewing room anymore. On the two days I don't work, there's groceries to buy and laundry to do and errands to run and...and...and...
So, I'm going to have to just adjust myself to sewing in small bites. 20 minutes or so at a time.
And I have a Burda pattern on the cutting table that I've been trying to trace all week; I'm about 1/2 done. Maybe.
So I hear ya.
For me summer and school holidays are my time to sew (I'm a teacher). But I miss it during the school year. So I'm really trying this year to try to do something in my sewing room every day - even 15 minutes.
I think it's about re-defining success - if 15 minutes is all I have, that's it. I'm not going to feel guilty or bad that I don't have more time (well, I'm going to TRY).
In order to try to improve my success, I'm spending the Labour Day long weekend CUTTING THINGS OUT! That always takes so long - needs space, etc. Then, I can (hopefully) work away at things at my own pace. Or at whatever few minutes I have in a day.
I haven't sewn clothing in a few weeks, I did just finish a quilt last week. I enjoy summer so much, that my sewing declines during summertime. During the long winter months I can sew more and I enjoy it more, too.
Add me to the no-sew list! Hard to sew when you're gone every day of the week. Life has just been crazy recently. I'm ready for fall, and hoping things slow down. I NEED TO SEW !!!
No time to sew is all too often the reality for me. Since I'm working a minimum of two jobs at any given time, and the flute teaching part of it takes up quite a bit of my evening time, usually my sewing is limited to weekends (mainly Friday nights and Saturdays, because Sundays are almost always busy between church and flute orchestra rehearsals) and the occasional weeknight. And if I have weekend plans, or actually decide to exercise like I should be, that time is even less.
It's a good thing I can leave my sewing area set up at all times-- I try to do things like keep a project cut out at all times so I can just pull it out and do a few seams when I have time. Or spend a little time just cutting out. Or stick something on the dummy to play around with reconstructing it. I do literally daydream about sewing at my non-music part-time job sometimes!! It's just one of those things I need to do to keep my sanity, so I do try to do at least a little something once a week.
I rarely go through dry spells. It is a rare day when I *don't* turn on my machine. I think that the interest level in my projects vary, just because there is always something to sew with the four of us to sew for, plus clients and other family. When you're making a pattern you didn't pick, in a fabric you didn't pick, when you know there were better choices, the interesting level is pretty low, so I guess you could call those projects "dry spells".
I've had dry spells when in one year I sewed some Christmas presents, or special occasion clothes, but that was it. But I've always sewn intermittently, and then not for months. And, I didn't always have a sewing machine at my disposal. Since I started sewing more for myself and the children (almost two years now), the longest I've gone without sewing would be about a month, and that rarely.
I find that blogging helps immensely with adhering to my plans, and I might finish a garment I'm not sure about so I can blog about it as a way of mentally "checking it off". Also, the internet sewing community is a great inspiration, as well as the trendy patterns (such as Ottobre for kids), and if I don't feel like going through with a sewing plan I don't get stuck but get a new idea very soon.
I'm in one right now. I have 4 things to finish, just no time/energy to do it. I find if I force myself to go and sew I enjoy it and get right back into it again.
Then the free CoPA this week killed all my free time. I will say it's gotten me drafting, if not outright sewing.
Blogging does help, and usually I try and just do it. Sometimes it lasts for a month or so, then other times it can be a day or two. When I'm not sewing, I do plan projects, and things I need so when I get to a machine, I know what I want to make.
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