So. I’ve been sewing for a long, long time. I learned to use a sewing machine when I was 11, and was sewing most of my own clothes by the time I was in middle school.  Thanks to my HomeEc teacher, Miss Marcy Helzer, I got my technique down. I could topstitch like a pro or throw in a zipper – any kind of zipper – like nobody’s business. Miss Helzer taught me that “shortcuts always look homemade.” (Yeah. She’s also the one with the classroom motto “So shall you sew, so shall you rip” that I quote to this day every time I need to rip anything out.) Between Miss Helzer and my time in 4-H, I’ve got Sewing Chops. (Although I don’t use them all that much these days.)

The one thing that gets me – still – whenever I sew (but never when I knit) is using fabric that I have deemed . . . “precious.”

What does that mean, exactly? Well . . . usually it means that it was quite expensive or is unusually delicate. Or maybe both. And if you sew, you know that once you CUT the fabric, there’s not a lot you can do about it if you make a mistake or it doesn’t fit like you hoped or . . . you just don’t like the way it turns out. (You can rip out knitting and preserve the yarn, but you can’t very easily “repurpose” fabric that’s already cut – and maybe even sewn up, y’know?)

So despite having years and years of sewing experience – and having learned how to navigate pattern/fabric choices (because I’ve made my share of poor pattern/fabric choices over the years) – I still get the heebie-jeebies when I decide to cut into a piece of really nice or quite expensive fabric.

It’s just another Making Barrier for me.

So several years ago (5? 6? I can’t even remember now. . . ) when I finally had the chance to buy a 2 yard piece of Japanese Hokkoh Linen Poppies fabric (which is hard to get and stupid expensive), I got it. And then stressed for at least 2 years over what I would make with it. And then decided what to make . . . but couldn’t quite make myself cut the pattern out for at least another year. And then I started sewing, but couldn’t decide if I’d made a poor judgment in matching the pattern to the fabric. So I put it away for awhile. And let it eat at me for . . . oh, at least 2 or 3 more years. And then, of course, we re-painted the basement and I could bury it deep under the auspices of the “reorganization” of my craft/sewing space.

(Oh, the barriers we create for ourselves.) (You can be really good at something and still place barriers.)

It’s finished now, though. And I even like the way it turned out. (Except I’m not loving the buttons. But I had them in my stash already, so I avoided the Need-To-Find-Perfect-Buttons barrier.) It’s a nice (well, Very Nice actually) lightweight linen in a pattern you don’t see every day. The pattern is a kind of “floaty” tunic that is flattering and looks good with jeans or leggings. (I was going to have Tom do a photo shoot, but we lost the light early last night and today it’s raining . . . )

And the most important thing?
It’s finished.
Barrier toppled! Achievement unlocked!

(And this was item #5 in my unfinished project inventory from last month.)