Monday, February 15, 2016

Happy Valentine's Day from Isaac


Isaac was visiting on Friday and wanted to sew.  When I said yes he dove underneath the sewing table and found the box to lift up the pedal, and got himself all ready to go.  After he had worked on a new collage for a while I realized -- the day after tomorrow was Valentine's Day!

So I found a piece of beautiful hand dyed red fabric sitting on the work table, and cut out two hearts.  Found a piece of hand dyed hemp that had never been put away since I worked on a project, and cut it down to work with the hearts.  Told Isaac that he could make something beautiful for his Mommy for Valentine's Day.  Then he found some sparkly gold sequin fabric on the sewing table (do you begin to see a theme here?  when you never clean your studio you don't have to look very hard for your raw materials).

I changed to red thread, which occasioned an explanation of how the sewing machine uses two threads and the second thread comes from the bobbin.  He was particularly excited at the intermediate step when we had red thread below and green thread on top.






















Then he sewed and sewed and sewed and sewed until the hearts were nicely stitched down.  He would sew to where he wanted a sparkly gold square, and I would cut it out of the backing and put it in front of the needle.  He sewed and sewed and sewed some more until he was done.

Last time we sewed, before Christmas, I sat next to him and supervised closely.  This time I worked around the studio unless he needed a gold square placed.  He's getting more independent, and as long as he stays scared of the needle and keeps his hands away, I don't think he can get into too much trouble left to his own devices.

7 comments:

  1. How lovely, Kathleen. How old is Zac? We're about to buy our 6 year old granddaughter a sewing machine for her birthday. I hope she's not too young ...and enjoys it as much as Zac obviously does.

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    1. He just turned 5 in November. I think this is a good age to start sewing!
      I like the Bernina features that allow you to set a very-slow needle speed, and that refuse to sew if you don't lower the presser foot. Makes it a little more mistake-proof for little kids.

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  2. What a great way to spend the afternoon. I love the vivacity of his stitching lines. Ah, that I would stitch so freely!

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  3. Just keep the rotary cutter away from him. (speaking from experience)

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    1. I have had that experience too. I don't even let him use scissors!

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  4. Oh how fun. That brings back some wonderful grandma memories for me!

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