New sewing hobbie

WHAT YOU CREATE

DOESN'T HAVE TO BE PERFECT.

DON'T LET FEAR OF FAILURE

DISCOURAGE YOU.

Dieter F. Uchtdorf

Isn't it nice how making something with your hands makes you feel satisfied. Or is it just me? And yet so often I refrain from trying new things or I hide it for fear of failing.

When I finished High-School and I had to decide what kind of education I wanted to get, I hesitated between being a clothing designer (not the one that comes up with new trends, the one that makes the patterns - I'm not very creative , I'm more of a technical person), and being a super geek. I chose the big geek (Materials Engineering), I'm still wondering why... probably because I was already pretty good at being a geek so I wasn't risking much.
I've never learned how to sew, but I've always wanted to (and attempted to). How shameful it is to admit that my sister is an awesome fashion designer and my Mom herself made me some really cool homemade dresses when I was young. But I never really had the patience (or courage) to learn.
So now I'm thousands of miles away from them and I have to learn by myself.

And I can't sew a straight line, I can't and I won't follow a pattern (it's never exactly how I want it), and I have to open my sewing machine's instruction manual every 5min. but I've managed to finish a few projects. Of course, if my Mom or my sister took a look at my stitches they would disown me, but mehh, I'm too lousy to even see the difference.

One of my favorite things I made, I don't have a picture of but I found the tutorial here.
It's a really cute tee-shirt refashion using pleated trim around a scoop neck shirt.

After that I failed another tee-shirt refashion idea I found on the same blog (stripes of sequins on a white shirt). Although I wear the failed version I'm still planning on fixing it some day so it looks more presentable.

Then I bought a vintage skirt from a thrift store and turned it into a dress. Not much sewing there, I just narrowed it a bit and wore it as a bust-dress with a belt. I loved the result.

Then I bought another dress I thought I liked at a thrift store... and it's still in my closet waiting for a genius idea to make it modest and wearable.

Oh, I also cut a pink sweater open and added lace to turn it into a cardigan. I loved it and I've worn it a lot, but I've abused it a bit and now it's not looking so good.

So I'm still completely unable to make any piece of clothing from scratch but I'm quite enjoying taking old pieces of clothing and refashioning or customizing them.

One of my last projects was this yellow cardigan I made using an old sweater I had and a piece of ruffled ribbon I had bought for another project (aborted). I like how classy it turned out.

I also "made" (customized) our Halloween costumes this year, and my very first baby blanket for a Friend's baby shower. And I'm planning on continuing on making stuff, failing, learning, until I get tired of it and switch to something else.