Memories

When I was a small girl, yes about 55 years ago...my mother and father bought me this little Singer SewHandy Electric Sewing Machine for Christmas. 

 I remember running the neighborhood with a pillowcase full of my mother's scrap fabric, making Barbie Doll clothes and small quilts.  The memory is so vivid I could tell you what the air smelled like, what the sun felt like and how much fun I had with my friend Gabby from across the street.  

My mother was planting a seed, little did she know that it would grow to a life long love of sewing and a passion for quilting.  I have since graduated to bigger machines, but that basic joy of designing something out of bits of fabric has never left me.

They don't make children's toys like this any more.  Made in Great Britain, it is all metal, pretty hard for a child to destroy.  She is oiled up, dusted off and works like a champ!  Waiting for some new needles to arrive from Amazon.com.  

My mom has passed but I still have her little childhood sewing machine, which also works like a champ.  It is operated by a small crank handle, the Little Betty was made by Straco in the 1920's.

I think it's fun to see them next to a standard machine, it gives you perspective on how tiny they were.

Tiny little machines, packed with fun and the ability to unleash a lifetime of creativity!  It's funny, I remember as a little child, looking at my machine and it seems enormous to me, it was very heavy to haul around and in my child's mind, it was every bit as grand as my mothers!

I hope, if you have daughters or sons, granddaughters or grandsons, neighbors or friends, that you will pass along your talents to the next generation.  They will be forever grateful to you for giving them not only a utilitarian skill but an opportunity to express themselves through a myriad of creative options that sewing can provide.  

Here is my son, at 40 with his second sewing machine...learning and creating.  We have enormous fun together.

Here he is putting a new lining into his coat!

And here is one of the 6 pillows that he made for his livingroom.

So Mom and Dad, wherever you are...Thanks...it's being carried on to the next generation, shared with my students and enjoyed on the web.  Little seeds, sewn by you.