(If you prefer to listen to the podcast version of this post, go to: https://single-soul-circle.simplecast.com/episodes/what-are-you-learning, and be sure to subscribe to receive notifications when new episodes are available.)
It’s been a long time since I have been in school, but I still feel that back to school vibe when fall arrives. I start to think about what I want to learn or accomplish next.
This year, I was caught off guard by what I learned and how I felt about it.
I traveled to Wisconsin for my parents’ 50th anniversary the first week of September and stayed at my sister’s house for a week. I wasn’t sure what we would do during that week, other than buying wine and cheese curds for the party and enjoying the beautiful fall weather.
I wonder if my sister already had a master plan or if it all just unfolded.
I come from a family of crafters. My mom grew up sewing her own prom dresses and moved on to sewing us Barbie doll outfits and making dollhouses out of old TV cases when we were kids. She also sewed most of our clothes, and her famous line was always, “I could make something like that,” every time we saw a shirt we liked in a store. When the granddaughters arrived, she was studying American Girl outfit collections and creating her own version.
When I was young, my mom tried to introduce me to sewing. I recall making a pair of shorts to earn a Girl Scouts Badge, but I found it tedious and frustrating and didn’t touch the sewing machine again.
My sister, on the other hand, loved sewing. I remember being jealous that she could even sew more complicated things like blazers for work. She was always the artsy one, painting pictures that still hang on my parents’ walls, making quilts and completing cross-stitches.
Her latest crafting addiction is the Cricut. If you don’t know what that is, it is basically a printer that can print out designs on vinyl or other materials to create things from t-shirt iron-ons, stickers that go on candles or mugs or you can create cute cut-out cards. I am sure there are a lot of other things you can do with it, but those are just a few that I know my sister is obsessed with. She also got my mom hooked on it, and we bought her a Cricut for Mother’s Day.
I guess she decided it was time to lure me into her world since she had me as a captive audience for a week. She said we could make some cute t-shirts for my nieces and put my Single Soul Circle logo on a shirt to wear to an upcoming podcast conference. I decided that sounded like a good outcome, so I jumped in. At first, I looked at these tiny pieces of vinyl that I was supposed to pull out with what looked like a plaque scraper from the dentist’s office. I wasn’t sure I would have the patience for this. Well, when I finished my first one and saw the cute puppy shirt I made for my niece, I got hooked.
My mom decided it would also be a great idea to make PJ pants or shorts to match the shirts, so a trip to JoAnn Fabrics was next for us. We started walking through the flannel aisle and they had so many bright, beautiful fabric patterns from animals to tropical prints. I started pulling them off the shelf and throwing them in our little red cart. The moment I was fully in on this PJ pants and shorts project was when I saw fabric that was the perfect pattern for a friend who is fighting leukemia. I have been wondering what I could give her that would be meaningful, and I knew this was it. I don’t think I have ever seen my sister’s eyes so wide in shock when she saw that one, I was buying fabric and two, I was actually buying more than they were.
Then the real learning began. It was time to sew. My sister was a great guide. She told me what to do for each step and the common ways that I could mess it up. I sat down in front of the sewing machine with the material under the needle, then remembered to put the foot down, and it was time to press the gas pedal. When I did this, it did bring back memories of attempting to learn to sew as a teenager and felt somewhat familiar. As I pushed the flannel through to be stitched, it felt so nice and soft on my hands. It was a soothing feeling. I was enjoying it.
For the last pair of pants I made, I told my sister I wanted to just follow the directions on the pattern and just double-check with her that I understood each step correctly before doing it, rather than her telling me what to do. I did okay, until I asked her where I was supposed to put the elastic band, and she said I sewed over the hole. Oops. Well, turns out it wasn’t too hard to take the stitches out, so I hadn’t ruined the pants after all. Seeing the finished product was a lot of fun, and I am very excited to give my friend the pants and shorts I made for her. I hope it puts a smile on her face, as it did for me.
So, what did I learn from this crafting time with my sister? I learned that it can be fun to revisit an activity from childhood and see it with new eyes. I learned that doing things for friends can motivate me to learn something new. I also learned that I have told myself I can’t do a lot of things in life – for example, I don’t have the patience to sew, or I don’t have the spatial awareness to understand how the pieces line up. What I found is that with some focus and motivation, I could overcome those obstacles and create things that make me proud and make me feel good.
What could you go back to from your childhood to learn and see with new eyes?