Category: grief

#78 – Can You Feel Optimism in 2025?

This is a bit of a follow-up to my discussion of cultural boredom from earlier this year, a little update to my creative slump, and exciting developments for my hunt to replace my reliable crafting supplies. The world still feels like it is on fire, but I think I am learning how to thrive again. It takes me a long time to process things, so maybe that’s why?

Spaghetti and Gnarly

Le Sserafim released a song that captures the wonderfully nonsensical world of a good K-pop song. Spaghetti is catchy, silly, and makes me crave spaghetti, so that’s what I am cooking tonight. It is what I remember the music videos of K-pop to look like when I took the plunge in 2022. It was fun, and in the last few years, it has lost some of its luster with darker concepts, instead of cute, and a bit uninspired. Although I’m fully into K-pop, it has been repetitive and bland for most of 2025. Except for my favorites – Stray Kids and Nmixx. Enter Gnarly by Katseye. A song that is so jarring it’s bad but also amazing, it’s been a weird one for me, the thesis of this year, it has felt like. “Everything is gnarly.” A phrase that has carried me through bizarre headlines and life’s bumpy road this year. For me, Gnarly was going to be the song that typified what I remember feeling in 2025, until Bleep by Stray Kids dropped in August. But now, I hope I will remember moments that feel like the upbeat wonder of Spaghetti. What about Golden? I desperately need to compile notes for K-pop Demon Hunters because that has been such a gift.

Big Twist at Michaels

Big Twist is back at Michaels, for real, and it’s kind of silly to admit this, but it feels comforting. There’s a Joann Knit and Sew Shop section in the store, and like, maybe it was a bad dream? I mean, all the crafting drama definitely happened this year between private equity, tariffs, and Sci Show declaring the arrival of physicists to help the knitters. The familiarity was maybe all my neurodivergent mind needed to just relax a bit? Now the fabric is not good, but it could get better in time. I’m choosing to be hopeful, I mean, the recent US election showed a strong rejection of the Trump Administration, so as people have said all year, if it can get worse, it can get better. And for me, who hates change with a passion, I’ve learned that if it disappears, it can come back. I just need to work on my patience. I have found a second local yarn store in my own state, and a great local fabric shop. I’d say I’m pleased to the point that I am not missing Joann like I thought I would.

Stitches for Identity

I believe I am finally moving out of the depressed forest that is being laid off due to personal and global trauma. I’ve been listening to Kitchen and Jorn’s Losing Followers Podcast, where they have been talking through the post-Buzzfeed time of their careers. I was in a toxic job at Great Dane Trailers in the late 2010s, and it was freeing yet terrifying to lose that job. Listening to Jen and Kristin talk through the transition of leaving a job that demanded all of them, to be free from that monster, but also lose all connection to the project they built from the ground up, has been a balm to me. When I was laid off, I lost my app and my content calendar, my magazine contribution. I was wrecked, and I didn’t know how to process that for years. I felt like a loser. I dove into crafting, and for years, those stitches of thread and yarn gave me meaning.

The blog, though, and finally this year uploading my manuscript to this website this year connected me back to what makes me feel like me. I have always been drawn to writing, and not having that or a way to work towards something bigger than just sharing my creations on social media was gnarly. But this blog and your community have helped me find my way back. I mean, heck, Udal Cuain and my original blog, where I shared chapters, was the portfolio that landed me the corporate job. Although it’s gone, what I learned and experienced stayed with me and has made me grow into who I am now. This has been a full circle.

It’s been freeing to admit to myself and loved ones that I was depressed by that career loss. Starting over again has been confusing, but it’s not all figured out yet. There is still time to find a new place where I belong. I’m in the process of recalibrating, and that is a direction in itself. I feel freed from the weight of “monetizing my hobby” and the impossible summit of creating a small business as someone who truly is not cut out for the accounting or marketing parts.

Unmasking and Coping for the First Time

Truly, though, as I reflect on this year, getting serious about health – mental, physical, and emotional – for the first time has contributed to the feeling of optimism I have leaving 2025 that I did not have entering 2025. I have healthier boundaries in relationships, more honesty about how I’m doing, and whether I am feeling overstimulated. I recently got into rebounding, aka a fancy term for jumping on a miniature trampoline for cardio. Wow, I like this for my mind! It resets me, and it’s helping me get stronger. I used to feel ashamed of who I am. I didn’t understand why I felt so different, nor did I know how to communicate burnout without pushing friends and loved ones away. Being unmasked was tumultuous for the first couple of months, but now I never want to put that neurotypical mask back on.

How has 2025 changed you? I think it has made me unapologetically empathetic. Bolder to say I disagree with wrong because the stakes have been higher than ever in my lifetime. I hope to carry that forward into 2026, because I think the opposite of late-stage capitalism is community, so let’s burn it down with empathy. Thank you, dear reader, for spending time with me today. I wish you love and kindness.

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Halloween Crochet Vest

Every October, I feel more alive. I don’t mean to sound like a cringe, halloween obsessed person. I think, October fills me with life because it is the first wave of chilly air, and gray, rainy skies. Summer’s heat and bright sun, is great, but I feel burnt out from the stimulation by the end of August. It’s a time to reset and rest, in the spooky season and colorful leaves.

For another reason, I’ve realized this year, Halloween feels like a recharging time, because it is a holiday that is just about fun. There is no family meal, no presents, no longing or ache for those who have died. It is a holiday that does have a focus more on death but in this healthier other space.

It gives me room to breathe before Thanksgiving and Christmas, and the anniversary of my Grandma’s passing, to feel free from this heaviness. For a moment, things feel simple and joyful again.

So to honor this time, I made my first Halloween themed garment with a self-drafted pattern using granny stitches, double crochet, and treble crochet to make this pullover vest breathable.

Purple, black, and orange are colors that work with my existing wardrobe so I believe this piece will fit in all year around…aside from the summer, for obvious reasons.

This is just one of many Halloween inspired creations, I am brewing up. I excited to see those come to life soon!

As a fellow neurodivergent person, or a neurotypical, do you look to October as a time to recharge? What’s your favorite “ber” month?

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I Found A Local Yarn Store!

sheep in a field

If you have been following my blog this year, you will know that I was feeling a bit frustrated, that I didn’t have a local yarn store to turn to after Joann closed – but that’s no longer the case! I found a local shop thanks to the Yarn Discovery Tour of North Eastern Ohio. How wonderful is that!

As a Western Pennsylvania resident, it was a little bit of a drive, but not too far to visit the lovely Three Sheep Gallery and Workshop of Boardman, Ohio. This yarn shop had so much for me and my mom to check out – spinning wheels, weaving looms, yarn brands galore, project kits, needles, hooks, etc. I picked up a sock kit with a superwash merino and nylon blend fingering weight yarn that is self-striping. I was excited to try this sock kit because it came with a free pattern from Urth Yarns. This sock pattern has been full of surprises, some good and some challenging. It is a toe-up sock pattern, based on traditional Turkish sock design.

I’ve never made a toe-up sock before, I’m excited to learn new techniques, but here is where I am struggling. I bought double-pointed needles, on recommendation for sock knitting, and they are wonderful needles, but dang, the combo of a new sock technique and new tools has been frustrating. I’m getting laddering on the sock every time I start over, and I feel a bit on the edge of tears because these needles were expensive – 21 USD! On top of the sock kit for 29 USD for 100 grams of yarn and a PDF pattern. I feel a lot of pressure, from my own mind, because I was not paying attention to the price and feel like I made a mistake, but I need to remember that new skills take time. With patience and practice, the skill will come in time.

The second project I purchased was a scarf kit with two yarn hanks of worsted weight wool and a pattern from Urth Yarns, that my mom also purchased so we will have matching scarves! I’m so excited. The biggest blessing of this day was the opportunity to share what I love with my mom, my Scott, and my Kyle. I am truly grateful for all that these guys did to make this a great day of bonding for my mom and I, and for the four of us. It’s been a heavy few weeks after losing our beloved Sully, and getting a day to explore a new yarn store, learn about weaving, and getting to meet the lovely owner of Three Sheep was a bright spot after days of gray.

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#74 – Ain’t That Just the Way

So this week started off amazing. My mom and I began finding a healthy way forward, for real this time. Nothing shoved under the rug to deal with later. No festering. No harsh talk, instead patience, love, realness. It was truly an answer to prayer that I learned, required me to put into action what I was feeling.

I journaled all my raw feelings, and sat with what these words on paper showed me – I wanted more. I wanted realness, and nothing less. We each reaches this point at the same time, and it got better. Over last week, it got much better. Kinder. I even spent time with her on Sunday.

Monday morning though, life decided things were too good. Our family dog, Sully, became extremely sick. He had been dealing with some health issues over the past year, but it fell apart over night. He died on Tuesday. I am heartbroken, but crying together with my mom instead of on own like we did for other big losses.

I think the most challenging part of losing a pet is that sense of home you associate with them. He was my safe place for 14 years, all of my adulthood so far, and his steady love will always be missed.

Have you lost a pet? What helped you heal? I’m going to try to get back on track with writing next week, but yeah, life just keeps getting weirder, everyday.

Upcycling Pillowcases into a Vest and Skirt

What if the clothing we wear is more than just a garment, but connects us to the fibers of our being?

What if a pillowcase, from a loved one no longer here with you, could be more than just an item cluttering your closet? How could you repurpose it so the memories can walk with you in the new days ahead. All while the smell of their laundry detergent, and their home, so distinct to your senses, that being near it makes you feel comfort.

That is what this project is to me. More than an upcycle, or a thrifty hack, but a way to process feelings. Find a way forward. So the things left behind, that remind of what is missing, can do more than drown us in memory and stuff, but become a tangible way of healing.

Letters Of Healing #2 – Letting It Out Is Important Too

I have a bad habit, I’ve acquired over the past few years: I bottle things up so people don’t leave me. Hi, I’m Magz and I have a problem. A two-prong issue, actually, I am not processing my feelings, and I am irrationally concerned about rejection. It’s not good. I was taught to believe by family and society that it was because of divorce, specifically placing the blame on my dad, and to be honest, I believed that for a long time. But that answer leaves all of us who have experienced that or who fear rejection in this weird pseudo-reality of things being out of our control, which doesn’t help. It turns the intensity up all while limiting personal growth. How can you move on if this is baked into your personality, right? I mean, everyone who knows your story will instantly know your flaws – your parent or parents “didn’t love you enough” to stick around. Yeah, this is a toxic bunch of nonsense.

So what has helped me get more clarity on this, honestly, is learning about what makes my mind tick and how I can work with myself to be healthier. For me specifically, learning about neurodivergence, and specifically the possibility of undiagnosed autism or adhd, has helped me understand that there might be more to my penchant for brutal honesty than just being an off-putting person or a bad person. It might be that my brain simply processes differently, yet because I want to fit in – masking, I fall into people-pleasing patterns to “fit in” with those around me. Similar to learning about high-masking autism in females, with adhd, there is a sensitivity to rejection and difficulty with emotional regulation that makes processing the rejection more difficult. I can see these in the ways I have interacted with people throughout my life, especially family members.

I get stuck in these camps of either feeling the need to be brutally honest, especially if I feel an emotional meltdown coming on from bottling everything up, or I clam up and shove it down, no matter how much it hurts to “please” the person. All this does is create a cycle of emotional repression, overwhelm, and meltdown behind the scenes. Loneliness, anger, bitterness, shame, fear of rejection, and pain. This is not what a healthy person looks like.

For too long, I’ve mistaken being “tough” with being healthy. It’s been the one-two punch of finding Elena Carroll’s reflective essays and watching Scrubs for these to start clicking in my brain. I find myself pinballing between being like Dr. Dorian, who lets people like Elliott walk all over him, and Dr. Cox, who shoves it all down and sinks into a pit of loneliness behind the shadows because dealing with my problems makes me feel uncomfortable.

My constant dysfunctional relationship, which gets more unhinged every year, my relationship with my mom is the place where I see all these problematic habits come to the surface. I will bottle something up for a decade, afraid of the confrontation, and then one day I will just explode about something else. To be fair, when I do blow up, it’s usually after my mom has contributed to my anger with a gem of guilt or a little nugget of criticism on some part of my personality. Like recently, I was told she was intentionally withholding her health updates after two concerning ER visits, because I am too “sensitive” to handle anything after I told her it has been scary thinking of being sick because I love her. Yep, I see where I have learned to shove everything down – you can’t be weak and express emotions, that’s for losers.

So where does that leave me? Well, I can either choose Option #1 – be honest about my frustrations and stand up for myself, which comes with consequences, Option #2 – bottle it up and fake a smile, all while my shoulders knit themselves into a stress knot and my jaw clenches like a bear trap, Option #3 – I avoid the relationship for months at a time and pretend like nothing happened. Lately, I’ve been thinking, why can’t I just be honest as it comes, instead of bottling up to the point where I am furious? I don’t live there anymore, there are no consequences for being honest gently, and in the moment that I disagree? That would be healthier, and somehow, over all these years, I forgot how to do this. Because adulthood is lonely. Grief is lonely. Sometimes that fear of rejection and people pleasing is all that you crave just to keep a relationship with a loved one steady, because you miss how easy it was when you were a kid.

I think health, though, might be more important than the illusion of peace, because I have not been managing stress well over the last ten years. My mental health took a toll, and so did my physical health. I’ve stored so much stress in my body, pretending I was happy about things that hurt me because I didn’t want to hear how I was different, not enough like my mom’s family, or weak for being sensitive, or a bad person for getting angry sometimes. I’ve had the same knot at the base of my neck for 5 years, which is not healthy at all. So what am I doing with all these revelations about who I am and what is healthy and what is not? I am slowly shifting through it. I’m taking space and a break from some of my more trying family relationships to get this stress worked out of my body and find my calm again. My husband, friends, and my beloved bun deserve better than for me to let things out of my control take a toll on my mental and physical health. Especially when they are the ones who pick up the pieces when I fall apart.

How do you manage stress? Do you struggle with people pleasing or bottling up emotions? Have people ever told you to change who you are to fit their standards?

Phone Calls in the Smartphone Era

As a Zillennial, on the cusp of both Gen Z and Millennials, my generation(s) have been stereotyped by the older folks as being afraid of phone calls, preferring a text to a voice on the other end of the line. And for a while, I’d say, yeah, I fell into this place of preferring a text as a teenager or chatting online, in my moody, insecure teenagedom, but then the phone call became this novelty of a thing. Calling someone seemed so serious, I became apprehensive if my question or answer was “serious” enough to warrant a call.

I didn’t want to be a burden, which is such a strange upside-down world from childhood, when the phone was the only way to contact your friends. I remember in the days of late elementary school, email being another exciting tool to communicate, like letters, but now email has become an intrusive contact on my smartphone. And maybe, that’s because email felt like real mail, when you could only check it on your window of computer time on the shared family computer. There was a boundary between online and offline. My mind has been marinating on this since watching a Theresa Yea video called, Why the Internet Will Never Be Cool Again.

I’m currently stuck in an endless game of phone tag, which is quite common when I am talking regularly to one of my parents. With my dad, it was a long game of waiting for that perfect window of nothingness. His layover in a city he found boring, I’d keep him company as he complained about life. Entertaining him and supporting him in his time of boredom, because if he were home, he was on the go every single moment. If I needed him, he would usually call me back on a drive home with a small set window for his attention span or horrible service.

My mom, in a similar fashion, gets stuck in these loops going non-stop. Except she answers the phone in loud restaurants, in the car, or at events, just to tell me that she is not available. She will even talk to other people around her, making me wait, or will pass the phone to the people she is with, as if I want to say hi to them when I really just wanted to converse with her about something important.

There is nothing like being on the brink of a panic attack and having your mom pass you to an acquaintance to say hi instead of listening to your crisis. Especially when you called because you thought they were home and available, but really, your loved one is always on the go. Not emotionally available. I hate calling and being met with passive-aggressive pressure to stop talking and let her go, even though she chose to answer the phone and enter into conversation like she was available at first, only to break that illusion as soon as you answer “how you are doing”. Read the room, kid, but honestly, how can I? This is particularly confusing when my parents both let me know how they would prefer me to live closer so I would be more available, but would it matter?

The video call and the text have become two of the most intrusive manners of communication, because a text should be responded to promptly and a video call, in her mind is perfectly normal to answer in a public setting like a restaurant or car without letting me know before I speak, what I believe I am saying in private to a person who is available to talk, to be swiftly gotcha-ed by the fact that I am not alone, and my privacy is not respected. The video call is like a two-edged sword; it is nice to connect with friends and family over long distances, but it is also a tool that hinders connection. It drops in unannounced and forces conversations that should be private to be open to the room.

I crave the dedicated correspondence of my grandma’s era, when she moved to another town, which meant that calling her mom would be categorized as long distance, and so she and her mom wrote letters to each other every day. I haven’t had that kind of connection with my mom since she got remarried, and I miss that feeling of connection, of being heard. It’s something that carried through my Grandma and my Aunt Florence’s generation, my phone calls with them being so intentional and full of connection. It was a visit, a catch-up, and was treated with hard boundaries. The common thread here is the lack of a smartphone.

Phones were still seen as tools to converse, not mini-computers full of distractions. I find this intentionality coming back to conversations I have with my friends; there are boundaries and moments set aside to converse without distractions. We have planned phone calls or dedicated pauses to set aside other tasks to write longer messages, like letters, through messaging apps. It has improved our communication and respect for each other’s time, in a way that I wish I could have with my parents. I just want to connect and not be connected. I want to converse and not call. I want to correspond and not text.

It is all a pipe dream, because this is never going to happen, they are just too enamoured with technology and the endless possibilities of their boomer generation, and the financial leg up that their generation has to be on the go and do things nearly constantly. We live in two different worlds, and that makes me sad.

Crafting in 2025

To and fro my footsteps roam, upon the miles of white, fluorescent aisle – vast, void, verigated, vexing wanderings. Where to next? Weaving textiles. Fiber miles spin, spun into nothingness. A paywall of digital footprint. Add to cart.

I Accidentally Felted My Magic of Scrap Cardigan

In the summer of 2024, I returned to an old fiber friend, wool, and introduced a new natural fiber – alpaca. When I began knitting in the early 2010s, I bounced between wool and acrylic fibers, not really looking at fiber content and instead looking at the pretty colors and my stitches so I didn’t drop one. Oh, how times have changed! When you love something you begin to obsess, dig, and it becomes a fiber woven into your identity. That’s where I found myself as a knitter for 10 years. I am constantly thinking about fiber content when planning a new project because it’s more than just the make that matters; it is how the garment is worn and washed for many years to come.

Wool

I think we have deep scent memories just like how wool fiber remembers the shape it is blocked into with water and pins. The scent of wool is woven deep into my memories of traveling to Ireland as a child in 2001. It is the fiber my Grandma wore most of the year. She was always cold, even in summer. Wool has always seemed a bit scratchy to me. It triggers my neurodivergent aversion to certain sensations. It was not a fiber I would choose to wear a whole sweater out of, although small accessories I could handle. Coats were fine too, until they weren’t.

After my grandparents passed away, within 6 months of each other I suddenly had things they used to own. Clothing being one of those things, a lot of those clothing items contained wool. I couldn’t stand the fiber being near me. I’d get a head, a migraine really. I’d feel stuffed up and allergic, at least I thought. From 2020-2024 I avoided the fiber. Begging my mom not to knit me anything in wool. I rounded up the wool items and put them in quarantine in a box in my house, the “allergy” being such a wave of anguish to my body. Looking back on it, I can see it was an expression of grief and stress. That smell of wool, it felt like a ghost lingering in the shadows of my mind not a normal fiber. Grief makes things so weird!

Acrylic

Under this belief of a wool allergy, I pivoted solely to cotton, bamboo, linen, and acrylic. If you are looking for a cheap and cheerful fiber acrylic is your yarn. It’s everywhere in the big box stores and that’s exactly what I did. I experimented with Red Heart, Big Twist, and Caron. They come in value packs and the worsted weight is an excellent fiber weight to use when learning how to create complicated garments such as wearables like sweaters that involve sleeves, shoulder shaping, and necklines. I’ve made a lot of mistakes along the way, it’s part of the learning process, yet using these affordable and easy-to-source yarn options took the trepidation out of the creating process.

Acrylic is seen as the “low-brow” yarn for a lot of the knitting community. It’s looked down upon for not being a natural fiber. Take organic and insert natural fiber and it is the same sort of elitism. But honestly, aside from how it’s made, acrylic being a polyester fiber, I don’t get the hate. It’s washable. These garments I was able to block in the dryer. As a knitter who was new to blocking this process taught me how and why blocking matters without the high stakes of felting, shrinking, or destroying my hard work during the wool sweater blocking process. It’s an approachable fiber for beginners.

Fiber Curiosity

Acrylic was my bread and butter, but after a while, we all crave some variety. For winter sweaters the other fibers – cotton, linen, and bamboo aren’t going to cut it. This is where some field trips came in! I’ve mentioned Keystone Safari before on the blog, it’s a wildlife preserve and education center in my region and they have sheep, alpacas, yaks, camels, and llamas. All of which I feed and pet without any allergies! This is where I began to question my “allergy” to wool. How could I spend time around these fibers, in their natural state where there would be more allergens like hay and not have a reaction (when I’m actually allergic to hay and grass)? It didn’t add up.

So in 2024, I began to run experiments. In the yarn shops, I’d pick up wool and alpaca-specific skeins and feel them in search of the truth! At my mom’s house, I’d ask her to see her skeins of wool and I’d do the same, even sticking them in my face, demanding they show me an allergic reaction. Nothing happened. Nothing. Could it be, that was I ready to find my true knitting form? A natural fiber artist, possibly a spinner, with a vast knowledge of wool, alpaca, mohair, and more? Yes, it was time.

Magic of Scrap Yarn Cardigan

So how does felting come into play in this story? It doesn’t sound like a story of woe, but it is. I was quite inexperienced with wool and how one cares for wool, that lack of experience came back to bite me with this lovely cardigan. I made this cardigan from wool extra skeins from my mom. Some of those skeins I put right up into my face to see if the wool would make me allergic. But this cardigan was not just a project of wool, it was a project made of extra wool skeins, wool-acrylic blend skeins, and acrylic skeins. Those fibers require different strategies to care for them properly.

This was my first mistake. I mixed fibers willy-nilly without thinking about each one has unique advantages and disadvantages. Wool is naturally anti-bacterial and requires very little cleaning. You can spot clean and refresh in the air or the snow. But you can’t throw it in the washer, and if you wash you must be gentle to the fibers with delicate movements and gentle water temperature, or else it will felt. Acrylic on the other hand is very durable. You can wash it in the washing machine without worrying about the possibility of felting the fiber. Acrylic fibers do not felt. It does not have anti-bacterial properties though so you clean it. Can you see where this is going? I screwed up the washing portion of this project.

I washed it in the washing machine without thinking and the cardigan shrank. Next, I tried to stretch the cardigan as it dried, while it was wet. Not gently, although the washer had already set the stage for stressed wool fibers. The cardigan no longer fit my person. To remedy this I thought I would hand wash delicately and attempt to re-block the cardigan. This was the nail in the coffin. This fatal mistake transformed the project from a knit cardigan to a felted mess. It was too far gone, like a burnt cooking disaster. There was no coming back from this, the damage was done.

I began to panic. How would I continue using wool and alpaca? I was currently knitting wool socks, um how was I going to wash those? Was I screwed? I was convinced I could never hand wash again without feeling sick to my stomach. I had to find a new solution. Steam. Steam was the answer. I have an iron, an iron with steam. Could I use this instead of purchasing a garment steamer? The answer amazingly was that simple! I steam my wool and alpaca projects now and the steam helps them bloom, they almost block from the steam along. It’s incredible. Just a little steam and the fibers refresh, safely! It’s transformed how I care for my knitwear. Sometimes these creative misfires lead us to places we may not have tried without the failure as a catalyst to try something new. I feel equipped to work with natural fibers, confident that if I spend months on a project I can care for said item for years to come. Have you tried streaming your wool garments before?

Remaking My First Sewing Project Four Years Later

Last September, I felt this aching in my creative heart to make what I didn’t make well the first go around. A project that some would say was insane to attempt as a beginner because of the difficult nature of velvet and the frustration that is sewing with stretch fabric. The dress pictured below was my first wearable garment. I saw the same purple stretch fabric on sale for Halloween at my local Joann’s and my heart skipped a beat. It still exists – I could try again!

You see the first dress I made was constructed so poorly that I ended up cutting it down into a skirt because I was embarrassed to continue wearing it out. After all, the bodice was bunching up and gathered strangely in the back. I lacked the confidence to keep going and try to alter the dress for success. I see now that it would have been an easy make to take out the gathers and bunches of fabric for clean seams, but that kind of thought came with trial and error. I needed a bit more experience and patience to make it right, and at the time in 2020, my younger self was not willing to wait.

But what if I am living in the past? My mind thought, maybe I should let it be and let the dress be a learning experience. I put the purple velvet down and left it, it was not on sale, it would be a sizeable impulse purchase at 15.99 a yard for 4 yards. I can’t justify 60 USD for a passing whim, that would be a poor use of money. So I left the daydream and moved on. Still thinking about that fabric. Another few weeks passed, finding myself in my local Joann’s again. It was my favorite place to explore. I went to the shopping plaza over the weekend where Joann’s remains live boarded up with the lights still on. It was eerie. I found myself thinking about what was blocked off inside? Was the fabric slumbering in the bolts, waiting to be made into something new? Would the yarn ever find a home in a fiber artist’s hands? It felt like a mistake, a bad dream, but it was not. It is over and now it is just a memory.

Anyway, on the second trip to Joann’s during the Halloween sales, I found my purple beloved. The bolt was still full, now marked down to 7 USD a yard. But this time I couldn’t get the project out of my mind. I’m glad I did give in to the creative urge or this project would be left without an ending. At the time, I had no idea Joann’s was going to go under. I thought I had plenty of time to remake this when in reality the window was closing. As I worked on this dress in 2025, I followed Joann’s story with frustration and weight of expectation. This remake is the final try, for this fabric I will never find again.

I made a different dress from the original and that surprised me. I believed going into the remake project that I would duplicate the same dress but with better technique. Instead, it was a project of feel. This time, I had a dress form I could drape the garment on. I had fabric clips with securely held the the slippery fabric together while on the dress form or for a quick test of fit on my own form. This time I understood proportion and where this dress would fit into my wardrobe instead of making a dress that only went with my moto jacket. I reinforced the shoulders and was thoughtful about my stitching, to make the garment strong. I added darts to pull the dress in where it was fitting baggy instead of leaving it like a velvet sack.

It became something new and I am okay with that. None of us are the same as we were years ago, we grow and evolve with every passing year. Making a dress for now, with the spirit and the fabric of my first garment, but with a new neckline and a new fit I think is an inevitability of learning and growth. I had the patience this time to try on the dress, mark what was not fitting right, and go back to work until it was correct. That was not something I was willing to do when I started, because it was all so new and confusing, but with time and practice, those new concepts became a familiar old friend. Like this tan carpet. It wasn’t until I looked at the 2020 mirror photo and the 2025 mirror photo that I saw it. The carpet in the house we bought looks just like the carpet in our apartment in Meadville. How random is that?

I have one more section of the purple velvet left over that I plan to make something with, possibly a mini dress, a blouse, or maybe a jacket. I think knowing this fabric is a relic now, makes me feel unwilling to finish this scrap project, because once it is done. I’m going to feel like my time experimenting with fabric from my first craft store is done. A chapter of my sewing life is over, and I hate saying goodbye. I’m a sentimental person. When things end, I take it hard. I dwell on the loss and muse on it. It might be unhealthy. It certainly makes life harder as a person who wants to keep things alive that are gone, it’s why I think I was drawn to study history in college.

As I keep making things, some of these projects become an archive of crafting past. What are some things in your own life that have moved from the present to part of your past? Does it surprise you to consider these things as your history instead of your current story? Thank you, reader, for joining me again down this sewing memory lane. I hope you have a wonderful day!

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