sewing

One of my mom's favorite things to say is (well she says it in Chinese), "I can make that myself."  She says it in reference to everything (except food, in that case, the phrase becomes, "Dad can make that too." Or, "Dad's version of that is better.").  She made rompers for us as kids, skirts for us as girls in private school, and dresses for us as ice skaters.  Today, since I quit ice skating over 15 years ago, I don't go to private school anymore, and well, my sisters and I don't generally dress in the same outfit anymore (see sweet pic below), my mom does a lot of painting, calligraphy, and a little bit of woodwork.

Anyway, the point is, my mom has always encouraged me to do some sort of crafts.  She used to take me to fabric and craft stores all the time and let me pick whatever I wanted--as long as I could produce something from it.  So when my sister (the tall one in the pic above, with the disproportionately long legs or maybe her romper is too short, I'm uncertain) offered to let me borrow her sewing machine for "as long as I needed", I jumped at the opportunity.  This would be a great way for me to contribute to our house project and save a little money.

I went to Mary Jo's fabric store in search of some cheap fabric to make some curtains.  Turns out fabric is actually kind of expensive right now.  Like, it might take me $150 to make curtains for our living room at $10 a yard.  So I decided to make pillows instead, but even that wasn't as cheap as I was hoping.  I bought a yard of fabric, two zippers, and $8 worth of stuffing (because inserts are like $12 a piece).  All in, I spent maybe $25 to make these two pillows below.  I mean, that is better than spending $30-$50 a piece, but maybe in my mind, I was imagining they would just give me free materials to make pillows.

I think they definitely do a good job of pushing my greige-yellow-with-pops-of-orange theme along.  Plus, I actually had a lot of fun making them.  It was really nostalgic for me, lacing up that sewing machine.  The best part is, husband was legitimately amazed at my work.  Even though this is like, day 2 material for any home ec class, he couldn't believe how quickly I threw these babies together.  This coming from a man who built this.