Tag: memories

#16 – Florence, a True Friend

I was looking for an image on Unsplash, something that would represent such a special lady. We had such a short time together that I realized I didn’t have a photo with her. But I was thinking about what she taught me, what she loved, and I remembered a conversation we had a few years ago about the changing seasons. I love fall, from the sights of painted fiery leaves to the crisp air. I find it to be a spectacular beauty, but she said that fall has always made her sad since she was a little girl. Florence said something that stuck with me, “I don’t like fall because you are watching all the beautiful leaves and flowers die away. Spring has always been my favorite because everything comes back to life.” I hadn’t thought about that way before. Now, as she is gone and I see signs of spring everywhere I look, I feel the warmth of her friendship in the flowers that seem to pop up anywhere and everywhere. The birds that call and the trees that bud, it is beautiful.

She was my great aunt, two generations older than me, but someone that understood how my mind worked better than any relative ever had. She just got me. I got to know her as an adult after I moved back to the Greater Pittsburgh Area in 2021, not long after her husband passed away. She was my grandma’s younger sister, and I was drawn to her company after losing my mentor, my grandma. But what I discovered was a warm friendship, a safe harbor during a time that was a transition to life after death. Through her friendship, I learned how to be a good friend again. To make time for people and open up even if I was feeling low. She would remind me to give as much as I take, which has helped me be brave and seek out new friendships where in the past I would have been too shy to put myself out there.

Florence inspired me to not see the challenges in life as a roadblock but to make the best of the circumstances you have. She had a tenacity and a fierce spirit of adventure, at 80 years old planning a trip back to Ireland to see our relatives at the family farm. As a young adult, she took a solo trip to Europe, in a similar way I did the same when I was 17. She understood the desire to see the world and soak up the wonderful possibilities it had to offer. Florence understood my love to try new food, garden, make my own clothes, and be determined while still treating others with dignity and respect. She empathized with my concerns about starting a business, with the desire to simply give my garments to people who really need them instead of wanting to make a profit. Through her stories, I learned that sewing and food preservation are two skills that I have, that her mom also had. I felt such a connection to my ancestors through our talks, and now I know I am keeping traditions alive. She gifted me my first working sewing machine and set me up for success when I didn’t feel confident enough to take the leap.

I wish we had more time here on Earth, but I am glad to have made such a deep friendship in the time we did have. The lessons she taught me during our time together will bless my life for years to come. I hope to be like her and when I leave this Earth to have made a positive impact on those around me. To inspire love and zest for life in my friends and family. Thank you, dearest friend. You will be missed.

#14 – Blanket Dress

A satin hem. Rosalina of the Mario universe. A blanket that has been an heirloom for 50 years. Comfort at the final moments. These are ingredients that wove together my inspiration for this unusual dress design.

This was a project of perseverance. I initially wanted to make a long midi dress with a shirttail hem. It was supposed to have a button placket and straps instead of sleeves. The mockup was not pretty! I felt like a thick column of plaid, compared to the easy breezy girl walking the beach I had in my mind.

As a maker, what do you do when the pieces are already cut? There’s no going back. Especially if it is a self-drafted pattern, which it was. You have to sit with it and see the piece for what it has become. Accept that your choices led you to this destination and figure out how to keep moving forward. It’s just like life and how things that happen, good or bad, shape us into the people we are today.

Some days I feel like pattern pieces that don’t fit together, but other days those pieces I can see make something beautiful. It’s all about the perspective we see the world in. Mine comes from God’s word and so I know that God is working all things for the good of His Kingdom. (Romans 8:28)

Making the Best of Things

But how do I apply that to a failing project? I try to see each project as worthy of improvement. Instead of getting frustrated and quitting, I try to give the materials the respect to make the best possible garment out of what the fabric is providing. It was plaid, casual, and oh-so-cozy to the touch! Those are good qualities! So I tried it on again and tucked the skirt so that it hit around the knee- it looked pretty cute! I decided it was time I hacked it off. This part is always nerve-wracking but thankfully I cut it straight.

With the dress in two pieces, the bottom portion of the skirt no longer looked like a skirt. It featured that shirttail hem I mentioned before, which curved like a familiar shape. I realized if I turned them upside down they looked a lot like the curve of a sleeve! A lovely oversized bell sleeve that would insert easily into the already sewn shoulder straps. Perfect.

Looking whimsical already, and giving me Rosalina from Mario vibes, I went digging through my stash for a specific trim – satin blanket edge binding. Suddenly this uncertain design became a dress of nostalgia.

On my bed, since I was a little girl, I had a blanket with a satin edge binding. It was a blanket similar to my grandparents’ one on their bed through 52 years of marriage. When Papa was sick he had a small blanket with a satin blanket edge binding on his hospital bed. He kept it there through the isolation of lockdown. He gave it to me as he passed on, and it now lives in my trunk.

End of Project Wrap Up

This dress even in its upcycled state still had some fit issues that have kept me from wearing it like a closet staple, but this project reminded me that sometimes you got to make things that evoke emotions and memories. Things that make you happy! When I see that style of blanket on my bed I smile because it reminds me of the memories that have shaped me into the person I am today. I know that if they could see this dress my grandparents would be amused and that brightens my day.

In the future, I hope to re-make this dress with either a stretch fabric or a stretch cotton twill that will help with the shape. It slides off my shoulders so I may need to add a tie across the back, spanning the opening of my shoulder straps, or create a snap system that can attach to my undergarment. I think this dress could be fun in another print or maybe a solid. There are a lot of possibilities to explore!

#13 – Tootsie Roll Pop

I think running my sewing machine is one of my most contemplative times. Maybe it’s the melodic sound of the needle and bobbin working in step? As the seam flows like a fabric river through the machine, the world drifts slowly away.

I am transported to the place of thoughts, memories, dreams. I am observing, thinking, existing.

Yesterday I was sewing a dark, espresso brown fabric. Chocolatey you could call it. Under the machine the side seam went, I watched the pattern disappear from one end to the other, and I was overcome by this familiar sensation. A taste foreign to my lips, yet a familiar friend – tootsie roll pops.

A chocolate tootsie roll pop. Now, I haven’t had one of those since, high school? Probably high school. The grape and raspberry ones were my flavor of choice, which were a hot ticket item for my cousins too. I remember eating a lot of the chocolate and cherry ones because they were the ones left over after my cousins came for the day. But before they went home, my grandparents would let us pick out a tootsie roll pop.

It’s amazing how memory, is so attached to taste, smell. Yet sometimes it doesn’t even need the taste or the smell. Yesterday the birds were chirping, it was a clear sunny spring afternoon. My husband was listening to a Braves vs Red Sox Spring Training game. The sounds of the baseball. I loved played baseball with my cousins. It was about 2:30, the time we used to drop them off at home, with a tootsie roll pop.

All because that fabric looked so chocolatey? I don’t know, memory is such a fickle thing but I am sure glad it pops in on those random moments and reminds us of those small delights from childhood.

What is a small delight from your childhood that you wish you could taste right now?

#9- Early Medieval Ireland

I think my fascination with Ancient Ireland began when I was eight, on a family trip back to Ireland to see “the old country” and meet up with our cousins who live on the homestead in County Antrim. It was a tour around the island, starting in Dublin and rounding the coastline to the Wild Atlantic Way, finishing with the North. As a child, seeing both modern Ireland and ancient ruins next to each other was unlike anything I had experienced before coming from America. I mean, my hometown was founded in 1802, not very old compared to the beehive monastery I’m standing next to in the image above. To me, a storybook had come to life, and what intrigued me the most was what these ancient people were doing with these now stone ruin buildings that were so odd to me compared to how buildings function in our modern context. I was fascinated to understand what this world looked like.

Fast forward to high school, I am impatiently waiting to learn about ancient Ireland as I sit through World History, American History, and European History hoping maybe just maybe this is where I’ll catch a break, but no there was nothing but a short line about the Potato Famine, Oliver Cromwell and the obligatory St. Patrick mention on March 17. I wasn’t the only one disappointed by the underwhelming coverage of world history, a classmate didn’t even get the chance to learn about his home country of Australia.

But one day in my college class History 201 I was assigned a final project that fit the bill, a historical abstract and thesis, on any topic I wanted, this was the moment! Fascinated by this unknown Ireland, puzzled by why Belfast was closed down on our trip for violence, and curious to know why there was tension between my Irish Republic and Northern Irish relatives, I decided to dig into the 1916 Uprising and Home Rule Movement.

When we toured Dublin, I remembered that bullet holes pointed out in the post office, which I found odd at the time, and started there. What I didn’t expect to discover as I did this research was this call back to Ireland’s identity, and ancient Ireland before the Norman Conquest of 1069 AD. One of the High Kings and great legends, castles, and beauty. Ireland of the ruins I saw, a land of fortresses to defend against Vikings and neolithic structures that seemed impossible to build. I also found a deep Catholic sacrificial nature to this rebellion, an identity so complex it was so much deeper than I was expecting and made me crave more! Even after three months of researching for my thesis, I felt like I had just begun there are innumerable layers to the Irish fight for freedom.

A few semesters later as a junior, I had the opportunity to plan my own independent study. I decided to feed my curiosity about the inspirations behind the Uprising and Gaelic culture revival which began before the fight for Home Rule. I wanted this independent study to help me understand the poets, the language, and the culture. I chose the Early Medieval period from the 5th century to the 11th-century invasion by the English to basically study an overview of how Ireland turned from a pagan faith to Christianity, what this meant to the culture and how did Ireland look during this time of Vikings and High Kings. I dove into the legends of the mythical first Irish that enchant the spirit of the ancient culture. The storytelling and imagination were so beautiful to me. This space before the Normans came and began centuries of despair was so pure to me at the time, like Harry’s first time in Diagon Alley or Hogwarts Castle.

I carried this sense of wonder into adulthood, determined to understand this world of myth and legend deeper. When life gave me a few curve balls and I found myself with empty, looming days of unemployment, this sense of wonder carried me into creativity by starting the Muirin Project site and plotting out the novel Udal Cuain, complete with side journals of the Celtic calendar and character journals to fully immerse the reader in this world of my imagined storybook Ireland that my eight-year-old self wanted to explore. But I didn’t expect it to get so dark, and it did get very, very murky. Not that this is a bad history or unworthy to be studied, but I did learn to be careful of what you open yourself up to.

To be continued.

#8 – Victorian Walking Skirt

After my first sewing project, I knew exactly what I wanted to make – the garment I had watched every historical sewing Youtuber make on my marathon consuming of sewing content during 2020 – the Victorian, super swishy, walking skirt. The flowing bell of fabric elegant drapes off the hip gathers at the back, and elegantly transports the wearer into a world that is not panicking. Really the only thing I wanted in September 2020, after the second family member died and my wonderful kindred spirit, my grandma, was checking out, I also wanted an escape.

For this project, my husband found a local fabric store that turned out to be a Mennonite sewing shop run by the sweetest Mennonite couple I’ve ever met. I outfitted my sewing kit with odds and ends from her notions and bought a few yards of a green, simple polyester blend fabric that Amish and Mennonite women use to make clothes. She gave me a few tips about hand sewing and gave me a proud smile for choosing such a noble task of sewing. I felt accepted for being a stay-at-home wife for the first time since I was laid off. At the time, not a lot of people understood what I was doing with my life, to be honest, I didn’t either. I knew I was grieving the loss of my grandpa, my career, and a miscarriage, muddling through a pregnancy scare that I was not ready for and hoping sewing this skirt would make me feel like a real historical sewist so that anything would make sense again.

That summer I discovered Bernadette Banner, Karolina Zebrowska, and Rachel Maksy’s channels on Youtube and fell deep down that rabbit hole. They made sewing look possible and exciting, a way to bring the past to life with fabric and humor. Bernadette’s channel helped me see that I could start even with a needle and thread, her tutorials are so crisp and informative. With that confidence, I followed a few different videos for inspiration, including a Rachel Maksy video where I carefully mimicked the shape of the pattern she used to drape the skirt. I followed Bernadette’s tips for finishing and gathering the skirt for that perfect Victorian shape. It gave me so much confidence! I even put in a zipper, which was uncharted territory for me, and a vintage button on the closure.

I took this picture the day I wore this skirt to her shop to show my Mennonite friend my finished product, and she was so proud like the mom I needed during this awful year. She could not believe how well my construction turned out. I remember I felt respected by a peer for the first time in years doing work I actually was passionate about. I felt like me again, the girl who had confidence, passion, and drive. I had been beaten down by conniving coworkers at my corporate job and stabbed in the back by family members, I wanted to be wanted and loved by the world I was living in, but had felt like my life was disintegrating until I found sewing. This will always be one of my favorite projects to date because it helped me find my way when I didn’t know how to move forward. Thank you, sewing friend, for being so kind to me when a lot of people weren’t and accepting me even as an outsider to your community. I will always treasure your friendship.

#7 – Winter 2023 Soundtrack of Life

Track One – Yoshi Win by My Phone’s Notification

Track Two – Circus by Stray Kids

Track Three – Ping Pong by HyunA & Dawn

Track Four – Error Sound of Wrong Thread Tension by Singer Heavy Duty Sewing Machine

Track Five – Howling by the Wind

Track Six – Hum of a Tractor by Farming Simulator 19

Track Seven – 45-Second Beep by Emi Wong workout videos

Track Eight – I’m So Blessed by Cain

Track Nine – Plunge of a Fresh Pot of Tea by Yerba Mate

Track Ten – Endless Coughing in Cadence by the Flu

Track Eleven – Brass Band by Samurai Japan’s Cheer Section

Track Twelve – Sizzling of a Frying Pan by Tilapia

Track Thirteen – Birthday by Red Velvet

Track Fourteen – Electric Guitar chords by Husband

Track Fifteen – Run BTS by BTS

Track Sixteen – Cows by Clarkson’s Farm Season 2

Track Seventeen – Tim’s Grunting by Home Improvement

#2 – Missing

I think the hardest part of the grieving process for me has been settling into life without the ones I love. I knew that it would feel strange continuing life without my grandparents because they were my real parents and that is a big space to fill once those nurturing figures are no longer here to support you. I think about them often. Like today, when the sun shines brightly through my window with a strength that warms my skin as I sit at my sewing table. The warmth of love is one of those tangible things that death strips of this world.

It’s not all bad, the warmth of the sunshine reminds me of those core memories. Moments I may not recall without the prompt of warmth and light, like sitting upstairs in the loft where the big windows of their living room washed the house in beaming brightness. On days like this grandma would hang the laundry outside on two long rows. From my swingset, I saw the sheets dance in the billowing breeze of a warm summer day. But if I hold on to the feeling of the sun on my skin, my mind walks deeper into the library of memories zig-zagging my brain, and selects a deeper track.

Summer morning. Sunshine. Walking around the park, me riding a bike flanked by my cousins while my grandparents discussed the history, the beauty of the sights, the sounds of the birds. Warm. Cozy. Sitting in the loft on a wintery sunny day after baking 10 tea-ring pastries (a big ring of cinnamon rolls that remain uncut to resemble a wreath) with my grandparents sitting beside me on the couch. We share a round of Hershey nuggets most likely for our hard work. Especially Papa who watched us bake from the counter, sitting on a high stool, there for the conversation and the atmosphere.

In the small moments of my day, three years later, I still think of them and I wonder if that will ever change. It no longer makes me tear up, which I like. I don’t enjoy crying. The missing is here to stay. It’s like the longing we feel for heaven and closeness with our Savior. The world is missing something, but the reminders of unconditional love evoked by the warmth of sunlight on my skin pulls me out of whatever task I am working on for a quiet moment of reflection. I reflect on the blessings I have experienced from the love I received here on earth and rejoice that it is not the end. I remember that I am not alone, because the Spirit lives in me and is filling me with love from my Creator.

“But let all who take refuge in you rejoice;
    let them sing joyful praises forever.
Spread your protection over them,
    that all who love your name may be filled with joy
For you bless the godly, O Lord;
    you surround them with your shield of love.”

Psalm 5:11-12, NLT

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