Gabriel's Tailor

Yes, I survived the costume sewing marathon on Saturday.

Barely.

For those that wondered, some of the ladies I was sewing with do occasionally read my blog, although none of them read Friday's post before we met to sew on Saturday. When I mentioned it to them, they were highly amused that I had minored in home economics in college.

Yes, that was their take away value.

Since I hadn't touched my sewing machine in over three years, I decided Friday night that I should get it out and make sure it was in working order. Meaning I should wipe the coating of dust off of it. So I dug it out of the back depths of the closet and opened the case. My first thought?

Why is it pink?

I had a sewing expert advise me when I chose the machine, and if I recall correctly, we got a great deal on a close out. I just hadn't remembered that the front was hot pink. Even more strange, the thread in the machine was hot pink as well. I have absolutely no idea what on earth I could have been sewing that would have required hot pink thread.

At any rate, I decided to do a quick test run so I plugged the machine in, and ran a scrap of material through. It stitched for a couple of moments and then the thread tangled, the needle jammed and the material stuck. It took me several minutes to get it all apart.

Yep. That was the sewing I remembered. Guess I was ready.

I walked in with my machine and a small Rubbermaid container of thread, bobbins, and  miscellaneous sewing stuff. I looked around at various large and custom-made sewing kits, and shoved my little rubbermaid container in a corner.

After cutting out pattern pieces and then actually cutting out some costumes, my moment of truth came. I was told to set up my sewing machine in the corner. While someone helped me plug it in, I frantically tried to remember how to load a bobbin and how to thread the machine. It wasn't coming back to me easily, and after accumulating quite a useless pile of thread, I finally had to ask for help.

Once my machine was up and running, I was assigned the task of sewing a costume for the angel Gabriel. No pressure here. Don't be too impressed--I was just sewing the basic tunic part of the costume. Still, it seemed a little larger in the front than in the back. Had I known I was the one who would have to sew it, I would have paid a little more attention when I was cutting it out.

Fortunately for me, Gabriel's mother is one of the more accomplished seamstresses. She took the costume home for some fittings and--possibly--a little alteration? Fine with me. I certainly don't want the poor angel's costume to come apart at the seams while he's on stage. Who wants that on their conscience for the rest of their life?

So, I showed up and did my duty. And--as I should have known--no one really expected a whole lot out of me in the creativity department anyway. But we did do a lot of laughing. Apparently I really was there for the comedy relief.

Well we all have our calling in life. I'm so glad I spent my weekend fulfilling mine.

My Public Shame

I've mentioned before that I'm not a craft person. It's not so much that I don't like crafts. It's more like they don't like me.

I actually minored in Home Ec in college. I figured it was appropriate since I was going for an MRS degree. I took a decorating class, and the project was to create a small decorated item for your future home. Most of the girls did some sort of cross stitch project, but with no ability in that area, I bought a latch hook kit and made a Christmas pillow. But I really didn't understand all of the directions. Unfortunately when I was done, you could still see some of the matting around the edges, and you could even see some of the masking tape the instructions told me to use to bind the edges of the matt. The teacher actually laughed at it and commented that it wasn't much of a project. Maybe not for a college class, but I'm pretty sure it would have been great for fifth grade.

Since I got my MRS degree early, I didn't finish college, so I didn't learn to sew until years later. Even then, it didn't come naturally to me. Most of the time the directions seem to be in another language and I can't make heads or tails out of what they're saying. Once I ended up painstakingly following directions for pinning the pattern together, only to discover that I was pinning the pockets to the knees of the skirt instead of at the waist. The problem was, no matter which way I turned the material I couldn't get the pockets up where they were supposed to go. I finally had to call a friend to come over to my house to help me.

I can crochet, but it took me four years to finish an afghan. And I never did quite get the border done. And by the time I finished it (except for the border) I had changed colors so it didn't go with anything else in the room.

With all this failure in mind, you can imagine how my heart sunk last Sunday night when it was announced that this Saturday, all the ladies were meeting together to sew costumes for the upcoming Christmas pageant. Those that are talented in this area assured the rest of us with comments like, "It's just sheets. We only need to sew straight up and down seams."

But they don't know me. No matter what I do, my thread gets tangled and breaks. My sewing machine needle breaks. My machine refuses to work. I was not made for this type of creativity.

Still, I can't get out of it. My children are all in the pageant. Plus, I'm the pastor's wife. It would be noticeable (to say the least) if I don't show up. I can't seem to get anyone to realize that this project would truly go faster if I weren't there.

When I tried to explain this, one woman pointed out that, if I couldn't do machine sewing, there was also hand sewing that needed to be done. Her tone implied that even an idiot could do that.

Well then perhaps I still qualify.

I panicked

There are some things that really scare me. Spiders. Snakes. Dark nights. Murderers jumping out of the bushes. Crafts.

That's right. I'm afraid of crafts.

There are some things that I have absolutely no knack for doing. I realize this and so I avoid doing them, knowing it's only going to end badly. I accept this. Meals brought to church fellowships fall in this category.

And then there's crafts.

The mere word sends shivers up my spine. When I taught a VBS class, we were given the option of coming up with a craft for our class. I opted to give them more time to memorize verses. It was good for them, I theorized. They would win prizes. They would hide God's Word in their hearts. Who needed crafts?

In truth, I'm petrified of trying them. The crafts, that is, not the kids. Once we get beyond pulling a page out of a coloring book and handing out crayons, I'm in over my head. There's a vast, dark emptiness inside me where craft ideas should be.

We did paper mache in art class when I was a kid. My sister ended up finishing for me because my art was falling apart. We did paper mache again when I was helping someone else with a VBS class. Looking at the glue made me so sick I ended up throwing up in the bathroom all evening. In all fairness, I was pregnant and going through morning sickness, but still ...

In our Wednesday night kids' group, we did a craft last December. It was basically punching out figures and gluing them into a Nativity scene. I panicked as I watched kids puddle glue under their figures. Surely someone who knew how to do this would keep the kids from making a mess out of their project. How could I send the kids home with white glue oozing out behind Joseph's head? And yet, that's just what happened.

Wednesday night we did another craft. The kids had to trace shapes and cut them out. Then they cut slits in the paper and weaved other strips of paper through them. The result was a decorative and colorful basket weave through a heart. Or a butterfly. Or a tree. I helped one girl hold her shape in place while she traced, but my hand kept getting in her way. Then I showed her how to weave the strips. I even figured out how to alternate the strips, but when we got to the second one, I realized I had the thing put together backward. And the ends were too long. And I was ruining it. Panic shot through me and I shoved the craft toward the woman in charge, babbling frantically about how it was too much for me, and I couldn't do it, and no one should make me. The woman calmly fixed the project while I took refuge in the next room, under pretense of preparing myself for the story I had to read.

My failure haunts me. I should be able to do this. I teach children, for pete's sake. I'm a homeschool mom. How could I not have the craft gene?

And yet, I know this is an area where I will never triumph. I've tried all varieties of crafty-type things. I even learned how to sew. I tried to make a skirt, but no matter how I laid out the pattern, the pockets kept ending up at the knees.

There is no hope for me. I've finally accepted it. My children will stick with coloring, or they will get their craft projects from their Sunday School or VBS teachers. I will shop for clothing instead of making it.

My name is Jill. And I have no craft ability.