Someday when she screams at me in a fit of teenage rage that I don’t love her, I’ll quietly go to the old dress-up bin and pull out this dress. I’ll hand it to her and slowly, with tears in her eyes, she’ll look up at me and know she lost that fight.
Dude. This dress. So it happened like this. I was stressed because Garyn wouldn’t stop bugging me to go to Joann’s (a craft and sewing store). I gave in but figured I should get Halloween costume stuff to save myself a trip. Little girl had been coached into choosing to be Rapunzel and I was just going to repurpose an old fairy dress pattern. As we were walking out the door I looked at the pattern and realized it was cut for two sizes too small. No big deal, I’ll just buy a pattern. Imagine now, if you will, me standing in the middle of a busy craft store with a fussy baby in a sling on my chest and a toddler who thinks diving out of the cart would be great fun. I also have two older kids who want to sit in the empty fabric racks. It was in the midst of all this that I had to guess at Naomi’s size and then pick out 4 different kinds/colors of material and figure out notions and the like. Add to this that I chronically over-buy material every time I have a sewing project. I grabbed the right colors and textures forgetting, in my mad haste to be done, that fabric can be expensive. It was cut, and at the check out counter I calmly paid $60 for the privilege of making a complicated Rapunzel dress that I could have bought anywhere for $20.
I’m calling it practice for the prom dress I will make in 12 years. And my other two girls will be Rapunzel for Halloween. And my granddaughters will get hours of enjoyment from dressing up in this dress. And that will make it better.
All whining aside…I do love to sew. It was cool to have a hard project to work on that stretched me and taught me, and that was actually necessary but didn’t matter if I messed up a bit (which I did). I will say, though, that zippers are not as fun as you think they would be.
My mom created a reputation amongst her children of being able to do anything, no matter the timeframe or complexity. So when my teenage sisters would ask for something funny or cool or difficult the night before they needed what ever it was…it happened. Really my mom did that to herself. I am happy (and scared) to report that I am in fact becoming my mother. I love that Naomi loves the dress, and that there was never a question in her mind as to whether or not I could deliver. So no pressure for the future or anything.
Comfy Posy 