When I was a girl my Mother sewed all the time. There are loads of photos of me as a chubby little toddler with reddish curls – dressed in gingham nappy pants and little matching apron like smocks with cute little iron on motifs on the front.
As I got older there were ballet costumes, party dresses and then for my 9th birthday a blue velour dressing gown with frills around the neck and bottom of the sleeves. How grown up I felt swishing around in that dressing gown! Funnily enough not that long ago Mum and I were fossicking in an op shop somewhere and we came across the vintage pattern for that dressing gown – what a hoot!
So of course as children are want to do – from the get go I bugged my Mother to let me use her sewing machine. Mum told me stories about when she was a girl and how back then she used to use her Mothers sewing machine to re-fashion hand me down clothing into something she could wear, shortening skirt lengths and turning dresses into tops and so on.
It’s only natural then that my daughter Kitty is hot on my heels. She received her first sewing machine at the tender age of 5 – a gorgeous vintage children’s Singer (thanks Kath!) and has gone on to be given a number of other children’s sewing machines to practice on. The thing is there is never quite anything like your Mothers sewing machine – so as soon as she sees me get to work she wants to make things on MY machine! To her credit – she is actually pretty good at it and as my machine is finger operated as opposed to foot operated – she seems to find it easier than I did to sew on. I always remember that my feet were never quite long enough to reach the pedal properly!
When I first started my business – I used a beautiful old vintage machine I had found in an op shop for $25 and later an egg shell blue 60’s machine (which weighs an absolute tonne). As the business progressed and I needed to use fancier stitches I had to upgrade to a modern machine. Of course I haven’t looked back. Lots of what I do and make today is thanks to my trusty sewing machine. Thanks to Mum for having the patience to give me a go all those years ago and thanks to my High School Textiles teacher Helen Amor – who I have seen recently at various markets I attend – and have been able to reminisce with about the various projects I worked on at school! Particularly the embroidered Mum 4 Dad oven mitt!
Congratulations too to Lioness Lady who has won my 100th Blog post giveaway! Congratulations!