Pretty Sakura. Maybe I do Enjoy Pink? Reclaiming Girlhood.

The title of this post is actually a haiku, in honor of the post’s subject, Sakura. Sakura also known as cherry blossom in Japanese, has significance in Japanese culture. What the Sakura represents is a contradiction, the cherry blossom season, although beautiful is fleeting and represents life and death, beauty and violence.

Significance of Cherry Blossoms

As Sakura season marks the beginning of spring a season that celebrates new life and vitality the cherry blossom’s life span is quite short, reminding us that life is fleeting. It is a beautiful yet poignant message that is wise and to be honest, a message that I don’t see discussed much in the West unless it is through unserious dark humor, doomsday-type rumblings, or in the Christian faith where we remember that our time on earth is breath compared to the eternity with God.

Life as a fleeting concept is not highlighted as much in America. We seem to have a false sense of prosperity, invincibility, and unwavering desire to plan for the future our culture demands we are owed – wealth planning, retirement, endless health, etc. But truly we are more like the cherry blossom than the rocky mountains.

This deep and beautiful concept has sparked my interest in cherry blossom season in Japan and Korea for the wise sentiments of the cherry blossom season. It has helped me look forward to Spring which in the past, has not been a favorite season for me. Animal Crossing New Horizons brought this full circle with the joyful way the game brings the season to the player even if you don’t live near cherry blossom trees. The game envelops you in the pink splendor of the Sakura while giving you a mission – collecting cherry blossom petals to craft into cherry blossom recipes – wallpaper, flooring, umbrella, picnic set, bonsai, etc. It’s so fun and it’s helped me appreciate this color palette.

Feelings Toward Pink

I’m not sure if I’ve ever loved pink. I’ve been a purple girl and I wonder if my dislike of pink came from a stubborn moment from childhood. I appreciate the design and beauty that my mom created by coordinating our third-floor “suite” at my grandparent’s house in a color palette of pinks and greens. She mixed wallpapers, textiles, and carpets to create this cozy and cute little world that I can see now was a little floor of happiness. She put a lot of effort into it. As a kid though, my friends were able to choose the design of their rooms and I was annoyed that I didn’t get this chance, instead of being grateful and appreciative, I decided that I hated pink. All pink. I’ve held this opinion for 20+ years I’d say, which is honestly insane! Past self you were truly salty!

I’d say the Barbie pink and the bimbo and mean girl association with pink reinforced my dislike of this color. It was a color that was demonized and treated as frivolous feminity, and an enemy to third-wave feminism in the 1990s which was the culture girls my age grew up in. It gets tied up with being “not like other girls” something that was an easy trap to fall into in the 2010s. Basically, I took these opinions in and let them inform my feelings of a beautiful color instead of seeing it for what it was, just a beautiful color that appears everywhere – the sky, flowers, fruit, etc. It’s ridiculous to write off a color.

Maybe it was K-pop girl groups? Maybe it was millennial pink? But slowly as I’ve entered my thirties, pink is no longer an enemy. Animal Crossing has provided a way to play around with pink, in decor and clothing. My little character looks so cute in these pink looks and her house is filled with joy when I use pink accents. It’s not scary, it’s not frivolous, it’s fun.

Electra Dashwood’s Positive Influence

I think Electra Dashwood’s style has been a huge help to me in associating the color pink, specifically the light Sakura pink with positive feelings because of how she decorates and styles her world with this rosy shade. Her content is filled with light, kindness, and warmth. It is an example of pink in a positive way. So much so that when I brought a poetry notebook (ahem, very much influenced by her poetry journal habit) I bought a light pink one with cherries that are in the shape of hearts. A very aegyo (cute display in Korean) choice!

In my thirties, I have learned into what makes me happy, kawaii things. Kawaii means cute, tiny, or loveable in Japanese, and is similar to aegyo in style. I have been gravitating towards this kind of style because it makes me feel less like the world is depressing. It reminds me that we can seek the light, the hope, the goodness out in our world. It’s kind of like the fixation cute things have on strawberry milk right now. It’s pink, it’s cute, I’m not sure what makes it bring so much joy to the world right now, but it’s really cool.

I’ve started buying pink accents for my workspace like a pink sewing machine mat with a matching pedal mat, a kawaii light pink dust pan with a winking face, not to forget I have begun sewing with pink fabric. I’ve been gravitating towards girlier patterns and hues, including bows which I credit to the blokette and coquette aesthetics becoming popular last year which brought them to my feed. K-drama protagonists and K-drama fashion have a cool yet feminine vibe that has made these girlie accents inspiring to me. I feel like I am reclaiming girlhood in my style instead of being afraid to join in.

Have you ever disliked a specific color? Have you seen the Sakura in real life?

1990’s Inspired Princess Seam Dress

When we were living in Meadville in 2019 and I was getting into thrifting, I found a lovely 1990s dark purple velvet princess seam dress. It was longsleeved and midi length with a scoop neck and stretchy velvet knit that draped lovely from the waist. I could tell from the label it was vintage. It had a different attitude. The dress reminded me of dresses I wore as a kid that were so special yet accessible.

I was thrilled. It was a comfy dress that I would style with lace-up boots, tights or leggings, and a moto jacket. It made me feel special during a period of my life where nothing felt that special. In 2019, I was bored, stuck in a dead-end job, looking for a new purpose, navigating some drama with my dysfunctional family, and getting used to a new city. It was a weird time.

Over the years my body changed and I donated it back but it continued to live in my head, wishing that I had kept it, so much so that the first dress I ever designed was a recreation of the piece which I talked about in #3 – First Sewing Project. Comparing the pieces I made side by side, I can see the growth in my skills and understanding of fabric which makes me pleased to see.

October 2020
March 2024

The left dress nailed the color but everything else about it was jacked up. The sleeves were poofy, and the skirt and bodice were draped well but I know the construction was questionable because it was the second item I sewed ever. I think if I can find this fabric again I’d like to recreate it with my current skill set. The dress on the right I cut out with my own drafted pattern piece based on my measurements. I cut it out in two pieces and sewed it with a zig-zag stitch with medium to low tension and tapered the waist with four princess seam darts. I also reinforced the shoulder with a second layer of fabric that anchored the shoulder seam.

I think I’m going to get a lot of wear out of out of my new princess seam dress. I’ve worn this dress over a few days when my local weather shifted from a warm stretch of 70 degrees Fahrenheit to a rainy, cool 50s and 40s. Because this dress is a polyester stretch knit jersey yet is lightweight, it was comfortable on a warm day. Yet when it cooled down I was able to pop on a sweater and found it easy to style with a pair of boots.

With a sweater, this dress looked like a skirt and it has transformed my approach to how I want to wear my clothing. It may seem elemental, but I’ve usually been a pants and top girl in the winter reserving dresses for the summer, but as my style evolves I’m finding that layering and pattern clashing is something I feel most like myself in.

Long story short, my new me-made dress has surpassed my love for the original, thrifted dress. I love the animal print and the fact that this was a remnant fabric from Walmart yet I believe looks like it came from a higher-end fabric store.

I’m excited to continue designing items in this silhouette and utilizing my own paper patterns which has been a huge step in achieving my vision for the garments I make. I’ve also been working in a lot of stretch fabric this year to gain more knowledge and improve my skills to keep growing as a designer. Without the practice and determination to keep going, not to mention patience because mastering any skill takes so much longer than the internet wants us to believe, this would be a different dress. It would not fit me well, it would not be constructed well, it may not have even made it through the sewing process, and would have been scrapped.

That is why practice is so important. And you know what the real big moments are? Not just your successes but being able to look back at the failures, and the mistakes, and see how far you have come. Such as this dress that I made in 2021, which although the design was cute, fell apart because I didn’t understand how to properly construct stretch fabric nor did I understand how to choose the right fabric for a garment for it to be successful. But now I get it and now I understand how to fix it and if I decide to remake it, I could! And that brings me a whole lot of joy!

#51 – Forsythia, Thumb Print Cookies and Rain

Driving home on a cloudy, rainy Sunday a wash of bright, sunshine-yellow that burst upon the landscape once I got within my hometown’s county. A golden, almost firey shrubbery that dotted the yards of homes near and far. But what is this? This long-forgotten friend that signals spring, the forsythia.

At first, I thought this was a local plant, potentially a Pennsylvanian cherry blossom? But actually, I learned that forsythia originates from Eastern Asia and Eastern Europe. I wonder what brought them here? Maybe the simple beauty or immigrant communities from Eastern Europe who came to Beaver County brought a sense of home? That would be cool.

Since I moved from home, I think my springs have been colored with different shades of spring. The crocus, the daffodil, and when May creeps in, the rhododendron (a tongue twister). I look at photos and videos with wanderlust of the Sakura and forget my local splendor, the forsythia.

I didn’t realize how much I missed those beautiful golden blossoms until I saw them again. It was a welcome call, a return to normalcy to a world of childhood that felt like a warm hug. As I mentioned before in Easter Traditions and Celebrating the Resurrection there isn’t a lot of familiarity in my holidays anymore, but this, it felt like a moment stuck in time.

This wasn’t the only familiar sight of the weekend. I went home and got to give my parents hugs, and my family dog snuggles, and ate a new little tradition – thumbprint cookies from My Sweet Lily. My mom and Scott (who I’m referring to when I say my parents) travel down to Pittsburgh’s Strip District each Easter season to get a ham at Wholey’s Market and make another stop. To a bakery that sells dairy-free confections of creme-filled pastries called lady locks and these cookies called thumbprints, rolled in sprinkles with a dollop of icing on top.

This variety with the frosting, is incredibly sweet, vibrantly colored, and sort of stomach ache-inducing but I love them and choose to indulge in their sweetness once a year. I’ve had these cookies with jam and with a chocolate ganache, which is splendidly rich. I was curious where these cookies originated from and they are an Americanized version of the Swedish hallongrotta cookie. The name hallongrottor translates to raspberry cave, as these cookies are traditionally served with raspberry jam filling the depression in the top of the cookie.

Today we have a familiar friend visiting our basement, rainwater. Oh rainwater, flowing into the basement and making the journey to the washing machine an adventure of tiny stream crossings. I’m trying to be patient and accept that this Spring is going to be a rainy one, just like the rainy winter we had and it will pass. The basement will dry out.

Meanwhile, the rain is kind of calming, gentle, and cozy on this April day. I can’t believe it’s April already and I’m so excited. I’ve been designing up a storm for summer and I can’t wait to share it with you. ❤

#50 – Irish Landscapes

My go-to inspiration in high school was this daily calendar my mom had in her office. Each day featured a photograph from a scene in Ireland, and each day, at the end of the day, my mom would bring the paper home and give me the photograph to draw from. Before the days of Pinterest and Instagram, it was a bit tricky to find beautiful images to practice with. There were magazines of course and books, not to mention literally the world around you, but this was a game changer to get daily inspiration. In the 2000s, it was before the supremacy of the touchscreen smartphone with apps galore and fantastic cameras to snap photos in that you could carry around in your pocket. If you took photos for inspiration, you had to print them and it was not cheap. Printing even on printer paper was not cheap and trust me, parents did not like us wasting ink.

This is a taste of what the images featured via a modern source – Unsplash.

What is special to me about the framed image above is that I didn’t frame it. My grandparents did. It was a piece that I guess spoke to them and they framed it and hung it in their bedroom. Something I didn’t appreciate at the time, as a moody teenager I was embarrassed by it. Now in 2024, it hangs in the hallway outside my bedroom and when I see it hanging there proudly in its frame I remember how much they believed in my art, my writing, my fashion sense. I wish I could show them all that I am doing now. I think they would be proud.

Easter Traditions and Celebrating the Resurrection

For a while now, during Easter Week, I feel a bit like Charlie Brown, and like unsatisfied Chuck, I’ve been doing some thinking. Why does it feel like however I’m celebrating Easter that year, it’s just not exactly enough or appropriate for the gravity of what Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Resurrection Sunday truly represent?

Tradition!

Some of this feeling is my fault as I have changed churches a lot and gone through big moves and stretches of not knowing where to attend for a complex of reasons. That being said, I remember as a kid the feeling of joy and exaltation that filled the house from Palm Sunday on when I lived my grandparents. There was the music, a 1995 Easter cantata that my Grandma would play while baking tea rings, a Swedish wreath shaped pastry, for us and the whole neighborhood. It was a tea ring factory filled with music that told the story of Jesus’ triumphal entry, his walk to the Cross, his death and Resurrection, as told from different perspectives of witnesses.

My grandparents, I see now as an adult, gave me an example of balance for this holiday, because it wasn’t somber and it wasn’t trivialized into a holiday about bunnies and chocolate with a splash of Jesus. There was genuine joy, faith, and love for others expressed. Grandma would usually play piano at church on one of the Sunday services and Papa would help serve communion as part of his duties as a church Elder. He and I would enjoy the Easter chocolate after service and my extended family and friends would come over after church for a meal. There was usually a small candy egg hunt for me and my cousins too.

Since then two things have changed in my experience of Easter – the absence of family for those traditions and the absence of faith in our Easter celebrations.

When my mom got remarried I experienced my first Easter holiday where believing Easter was about Jesus was weird. My new family were and are some of the nicest people I’ve met and yet, this day was so weird because I’m not exactly sure what we were celebrating? As they grew up in the church but had moved away from the faith into adulthood and raised my cousins without any context of Jesus, it was an odd day, full of love and great memories, but a bit hollow? It was eye opening in a good way of the bigger context of the world and how not everyone believes the exact same things as you but you can still get along. It was a point of maturity for sure and put this ache in my heart for the old holidays with my grandparents.

The weirdest of these experiences for sure has been the holiday with traditions but without family. Do traditions matter if there is no one to share them with? It’s a weird place to think through because you don’t want to lose your family traditions, but like, you can’t help feeling like its dead without the rest of the family to share with. And this is not because my family all died, no just my grandparents did, and my extended family on that side lives within a 10 mile drive of each other. They simply have no interest in getting along anymore and have just dropped our family connection because of silly disagreements and its sad. Being on the receiving end of it it honestly feels like crap. There have been holidays I have absolutely dreaded because of this and its taken time to start to be okay with the new normal of being an island.

Love Your Neighbor as Yourself

Something that has helped me move forward to a new normal has been to focus on what the holiday is actually about – Jesus’s death and resurrection so that we can have salvation from our sins and become a new creation in Him. In doing this I found myself ironically back at the same problem, no matter how I celebrate this day it doesn’t feel like enough. Until yesterday while I was doing dishes and was daydreaming, I thought about something I think is profound.

I think the reason this holiday in the United States feels a bit flat is because this day represents a moment in humanity that is a bit bigger than just a day of remembrance. It’s a day where I want to give thanks to God for sending his son to do this amazing work of redemption. It was the ultimate gift that I have received. It symbolizes a new start and also a day of freedom and independence from my sin. It is essentially four of our major holidays rolled into one – Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years, and the Juneteenth/4th of July. Because of this I’m not sure if I will ever feel truly satisfactory with how I celebrate this holiday. I don’t think its possible and that’s okay. And potentially how the Reformed Presbyterian church (as much as my Wesleyan mind grumbles giving Calvinism the nod here) is right and celebrating the resurrection every Sunday is the most satisfactory.

So I guess my point here from all my rambling is that I miss my family, I wish they would come back but if they don’t its okay because there are others who love me that may not share my beliefs and the ultimate point of this holiday is not ham, candy, or pastry, it’s the resurrection and what we do with this fresh start. Giving in love of our time and our resources to bless others with what we have to continue what Jesus started almost 2000 years ago. He is risen! He is risen, indeed.

Stashbusting in 2024: Color Palette Knitting

A goal I have in 2024, is to go through my yarn stash and use what I have to create unexpected pieces. A lot of my yarn has been sitting on my yarn shelf for a year so I decided to try a new approach to my design process – to create a garment from a color palette. I chose these five yarns to make a striped and joyful sweater that encapsulates the coolness of a winter landscape, yet the minty green hints at the spring yet to come.

This project was a journey! I didn’t quite know where it was going to end up. At first, my plan was to make a striped cardigan, but I worried about the sleeves. I thought the stripes would be too busy if carried on to the arms. I also had fears of playing yarn chicken. So I pivoted to an unusual piece because of how cool the bodice looked over a t-shirt. In the climate I live in there is no reason to wear an acrylic yarn vest over a t-shirt, but I couldn’t get the image of that out of my mind, so I made a “t-shirt” looking sleeve with the light gray yarn. For length and a bit of vintage flair, I added a peplum that took this piece to a place of whimsy that brings me joy.

When I look at this piece, I smile. When I wear this piece, I am filled with joy and sunshine. It is the first piece of knitwear I have designed that I think would show wonderfully on the runway and that is freaking cool! Lastly, I added a navy blue collar to the neck opening and gathered the neckline slightly so that it sat on my shoulders properly. The peplum was knit in two pieces where I continued the pattern and knit the sections wider than I needed to pleat it. Now that I’ve blocked the piece in the dryer it floats over the body and looks so effortlessly.

A new technique I used for this sweater was to knit one side at a time. I knit I believe 60 stitches across and began my striping pattern, switching colors after three rows. Next, I bound off stitches at my desired armhole position and carried on to the neckline where I again bound off stitches which made the shoulder more narrow than the rest of the garment. I then continued to knit down the back of the piece, mirroring the neckline by casting on a new row. I continued on to the armhole where I again, cast on more stitches and then followed the piece down to match the length of the front.

I did this a second time on the other side, mirroring the original. It is important to make sure you are mirroring so that the two pieces will match up knit side + knit side or else one side will be inside out – which is easier to do than you think! I ruined a previous project by doing that and had no choice but to rip it out. That’s okay! It’s all a part of the learning process!

If you’re a knitter or crocheter, I hope this project inspires you to get creative with your stash and make something out of the box. Or if you’re an artist, a maker, or just a human reading this, get creative with what you have! It is a fun journey. Thanks for taking time with me today! I hope you know that you are worthy, you are loved, and you are special to me. Until next time ❤

A Stunning Green Loewe Shirt

Seungmin in the building! I am beyond excited that Loewe chose Seungmin of Stray Kids to be an ambassador because he flies under the radar but has fantastic potential in this role from his personality to his visuals, this is going to be a great combination.

Loewe was another brand that I learned about in 2024 that is quickly becoming a favorite. I first heard of the brand in a discussion on Fashion Roadman’s channel and didn’t believe it would be for me, but I was sorely wrong! This is next-level art.

I truly enjoy the textures of Jonathan Anderson’s designs. Like the texture on the collar of the leather blazer, the texture of the rolling garden behind the dog, or the fluffy cloud-like texture effervescently emerging from the bottom of his knitwear. Not to forget the carpet-like floor of the black sweater vest with a brown collar. There is fun, there is whimsy, how is it this sophisticated and fun at the same time? I like the way the clothing is draped from the pants to the layers of lightness on his blouses and coats. The stunner is the plaid dress that melts into a stripe and then a solid like Willy Wonka’s Three Course Gum. Have I found a new designer whose work inspires me to want to learn more and create more? Yes.

A Cup of Wisdom Warms the Heart

“Whoever ignores instruction despises himself, but he who listens to reproof gains intelligence. The fear of the LORD is instruction in wisdom, and humility comes before honor.”

Proverbs 15:32-33 ESV

Doesn’t that sound like something Uncle Iroh would tell Prince Zuko in their quest to catch the Avatar? That’s what I thought of when I read it. A lot of my reading through Proverbs so far has similarly struck me. I will be reading a chapter, line after line of little tidbits of wisdom in the style of literature Solomon seemed to favor, that at times feels sing-songy like a bit of Shakespeare, and then “BAM!” I’m caught in my tracks by the profoundness of what the line of poetry just said. In those moments, I think of Uncle Iroh. I think anyone who is a fan of Avatar the Last Airbender, wishes they had an Uncle Iroh in their life because people like Uncle Iroh seem few and far between.

I think that’s why the loss of my grandparents feels like such a hole in my life, a vacuum of wisdom. I love my mom but it isn’t the same kind of relationship, there isn’t that well of wisdom that flows into our conversations because there is a different approach to life she follows. It’s a well-developed, rich, sort of wisdom that can only come with hard work and deep study of wisdom itself. They had that and they shared it willingly, sometimes to my chagrin as like young Zuko, I didn’t want to hear it.

And like Zuko of season two learns, the echo chamber of losing the voice of reason in your life is way more frustrating than hearing hard truths that mirror your own folly. It is irreplaceable. I miss their wisdom. I miss the surrounding of elders and wise people who seemed to be around me in childhood but seem harder to find with age. I think there is a passing of the torch so to speak whereby aging you are supposed to grow, change, and dwell with the wisdom of life to pass on to others and that transition can sometimes feel like you are treading water.

“If you look for the light you can often find it. If you look for the dark it is all you will ever see.”

Uncle Iroh

Growing older is odd. I never thought I would miss reproof and instruction but I do.

In the spirit of both the verses from Proverbs and the quote from Avatar the Last Airbender, the only way to fix this void is to look deeper and further to continue to seek out good influences in my life, and ways to be challenged to never settle who and where I am now, but to push further to find the well of wisdom and in turn be a well of wisdom to others.

Where do you go to find wisdom? Is it a person? A belief system? A text? Have you continued to seek after it, even crave it as you have gotten older? Have you been able to be an Uncle Iroh to someone in your life?

Using Stretch Fabric and A New Technique

Stretch fabric and I have been at odds since I began sewing. I fight with it during the cutting process. The pins slip out while sewing. I’ve cut on the wrong stretchway and ended up with ill-fitting items and not enough scrap to fix it. My Heavy Duty Singer sewing machine which is named, Señor Senior Singer, tends to eat my flimsy knit fabric and lightweight gauze projects, dragging them underneath to jam the machine, and ripping the fabric in the process!

It’s overall been a losing battle, so much so that I have been wary to purchase stretch fabric unless it is on a ridiculous clearance sale because my patience is shot.

This is literally how I feel when the fabric gets trapped under the needle plate and the only way to jailbreak it is to rip it. It drives me bonkers! Why must it keep eating the nice fabric I cut, pinned, and draped into this beautiful form. Was it done so that you, my sewing machine could devour it like a snack?! I digress.

This is where I had to humble myself, accept that something was missing in my technique, and do some research. It turns out I needed to change my approach, which is progress! I first, took a break from my machine sewing, because we needed some relationship counseling at this point, and returned back to hand sewing. I took an approach that matched the speed of a tortoise, sewing small pieces together each day. Work on it no longer than 90 minutes or give my fingers a break or the tendonitis returns in my knuckles. It was tough to keep myself to this snail’s pace of a schedule. It took a week to sew one shirt. That is incredibly slow, even for me when I was hand sewing, but it allowed me to remember, and appreciate, why my relationship with my sewing machine is important. And why I needed my technique to change because this pace drove me mad.

It turns out the secret fix to my woes was adjusting my tensioner on the machine way down, like below five to a section of the dial I didn’t realize actually existed. I thought this would make my garments flimsy but instead, it allowed my fabric to feed under the needle without getting gobbled up.

Secondly, I needed to begin seams about an inch or two away from the edge and sew from there, backtracking at the end to finish the seam. This allowed the fabric to have a tail that guided it over top of the needle plate as I started sewing instead of getting drug underneath by the needle.

Lastly, Kyle helped me add some structure to my sewing table, by adding support under the middle of the table directly under my machine to keep the machine from vibrating and bouncing my seams into nonsensical shapes. I purchased an anti-vibration mat for my machine to sit up on and a matching anti-slip mat for the pedal to have more control and finesse in my sewing, instead of chasing my pedal with my foot.

It was a night and day difference. Dare I say fun? Yes, it made sewing the stretch fabric and the light flimsy fabric a blast. A quick, neat seam was no problem in my sewing studio now!

Here’s the result of my new-found knowledge – four new properly sewn stretch garments that make me feel properly chuffed! The moral of this story is to not give up but to have a teachable spirit when life throws you some curve balls. There is always room to grow and improve if we are willing to seek out the wisdom.

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