Seamstress in Training

Near the end of school Aubrey had one last big project to complete. She studied a person from the Revolutionary War time period and then needed to make an "artifact" to represent the person. She decided that she wanted to draw a picture of the individual and then sew a Colonial-style doll dress.

Gulp. That meant that I needed to teach her how to sew a doll dress. 

Let's review my sewing history . . .

I learned to sew when I was young. I took 4-H classes and even sewed a blue ribbon-level vest and skirt for the Grant County Fair when I was 10 years old. However, that blue ribbon could mostly be attributed to my mom's excellent seamstress skills, as she helped me significantly.

I thought sewing was frustrating and painstakingly tedious. And I didn't feel like I could do it well enough to be successful, so I didn't continue trying.

Fast forward almost 20 years. I was a Mom of two young kids. I was perfectly capable of performing all necessary sewing tasks, such as mending and sewing on buttons, but I didn't feel comfortable sewing for fun and that bothered me. So, I signed up for a sewing class in AZ, along with my sister-in-law Lindsey. I learned (or re-learned) a lot during the class, and I completed two main projects: costumes for my kids for Halloween and a Sunday dress for Bailey, who was about 2 years old.  I was pretty darn proud of myself.

Below, Bailey's "Hershey's Kiss" costume and pretty Sunday dress.

     

And that was it. Shortly after finishing these projects we moved to Utah and began a new phase of our lives, with a growing family, a husband who traveled a lot, and busy church callings. Other than sewing patches and badges onto Scout uniforms (grrrrrrr - not fun) and a few simple costumes for plays, etc., I didn't attempt any more sewing projects and I forgot just about everything I had learned.

So, fast forward another decade, and Aubrey's school project struck some terror into my heart. I didn't know if I remembered enough about sewing to teach her how to create an end product which would meet her highly discriminating tastes.

I laid out my limitations to Aubrey and told her that we would take it step by step. First we researched online until we found a simple doll dress pattern which she liked.  She followed the directions online and traced the pattern onto graph paper and cut it out.

Then we spent most of a day carefully following all the instructions. We had to stop to look up a few sewing tutorials on youtube along the way to refresh my memory.

Aubrey was a very patient seamstress. She might have inherited the sewing gene from both of her grandmothers. It certainly skipped my generation!  By the end of the day this is what we created:

We are very proud of ourselves.

Even more than learning to sew, I hope that my children learn a more important lesson.
That they can learn anything, no matter how daunting.
That it's okay to feel uncomfortable and unsure at first, and anything can be mastered if they take it step by step and ask for help when needed.
That things don't need to be perfect. Good enough is usually just fine.
I really believe that with this attitude they can accomplish anything and approach new experiences with confidence.