Well, I finished my first sewing project. I put the finishing touches on my dress hem and viola! It was ready. But ready to wear? Not so much. While not horrible, it definitely is not leaving the house.
I will admit that at first I was a bit discouraged. All that effort, all that time and material and the end result was disappointing. And this was supposed to be an easy pattern! One that I could do in an hour. Sheesh - can you imagine what a nightmare it would have been if I had tried something intermediate?!
After a teensy bit of wallowing, I gave myself a bit of a pep talk. This was my first try after many years away from sewing, and although the end result is slightly off, it was a great learning experience. I have a much better understanding of how to figure out a pattern. I also learned that sleeves are way harder than I thought they would be. Dang it! It made me think of this episode from The Cosby Show.
I now have a much, much better idea of where things can go wrong which will be helpful going forward. For example, even being slightly skewed when cutting out the pattern can throw off the whole thing. So for the next one, I'll have to do a better job of following along the lines. I had a bit of a struggle with this one - I was cutting it on the floor and it wasn't entirely comfortable for me given my whole chest thing. I have to be a bit more patient with this step.
With some of these learnings in mind, I started to think about my next project. I had a look through some of my patterns. I'm already better able to assess where my trouble spots might be. I'm going to get a bit more experience before I try tackling sleeves again. I'm also a bit wary of pleats. They look simple but I think that's deceptive. I found a pattern that seems like it's the easiest possible one, which is a better starting point for me. It consists of three pieces - front, back and a pocket. And I think I might not try doing the pocket. Why make it unnecessarily complicated?
All in all, while I'm not necessarily proud of the end product I am proud that I finally made time to do some sewing. It's gotten me out of the fear of starting into actual doing. If I keep at it, eventually I might be good. Of course, before that I'll have to go through the other phases - still pretty crap, not as horrible, somewhat better...it's a journey!
I will admit that at first I was a bit discouraged. All that effort, all that time and material and the end result was disappointing. And this was supposed to be an easy pattern! One that I could do in an hour. Sheesh - can you imagine what a nightmare it would have been if I had tried something intermediate?!
After a teensy bit of wallowing, I gave myself a bit of a pep talk. This was my first try after many years away from sewing, and although the end result is slightly off, it was a great learning experience. I have a much better understanding of how to figure out a pattern. I also learned that sleeves are way harder than I thought they would be. Dang it! It made me think of this episode from The Cosby Show.
I now have a much, much better idea of where things can go wrong which will be helpful going forward. For example, even being slightly skewed when cutting out the pattern can throw off the whole thing. So for the next one, I'll have to do a better job of following along the lines. I had a bit of a struggle with this one - I was cutting it on the floor and it wasn't entirely comfortable for me given my whole chest thing. I have to be a bit more patient with this step.
With some of these learnings in mind, I started to think about my next project. I had a look through some of my patterns. I'm already better able to assess where my trouble spots might be. I'm going to get a bit more experience before I try tackling sleeves again. I'm also a bit wary of pleats. They look simple but I think that's deceptive. I found a pattern that seems like it's the easiest possible one, which is a better starting point for me. It consists of three pieces - front, back and a pocket. And I think I might not try doing the pocket. Why make it unnecessarily complicated?
All in all, while I'm not necessarily proud of the end product I am proud that I finally made time to do some sewing. It's gotten me out of the fear of starting into actual doing. If I keep at it, eventually I might be good. Of course, before that I'll have to go through the other phases - still pretty crap, not as horrible, somewhat better...it's a journey!