Drum Stick Bag

There have been so many signs this year that my daughters aren't little girls anymore, and one of the biggest is our loft. The toys that cluttered the floor in that room for years are gone, packed away over the summer except for a few small bins of toddler playthings that my girls use when they're babysitting. Except for the occasional Lego project or jigsaw puzzle on the breakfast nook table, that part of our life seems to be over. My feelings on the subject are decidedly mixed. Nostalgia gets the better of me now and then, but honestly, it's wonderful to see the girls growing up. There's so much to love about this new chapter in our lives, and the loft has become part of that story. What used to be the play area has now become the music studio, and it's definitely one of the most popular hangouts in our house.

We've always been a musical family. James and I both spent time learning music when we were growing up, and I've been singing for school, church, and other events since I was a child. Any number of instruments have found a place in our home over the years and each of us can play at least a little bit on one or more of them: piano, guitar (acoustic and electric), ukulele, banjo, and mandolin. We took things to a whole new level this year when my youngest daughter was given an electric drum set by a family friend who was heading off to college and didn't need it anymore. Mouse had already started taking drum lessons from one of the drummers at our church, and this allowed her skills to really take off. Bunny and Bear have both been singing on youth worship teams at church and putting in more time on piano and guitar this year, so it just seemed natural for the three of them to form their own band. While I'm always here to advise them when they need help, it's been fantastic to watch them work together to choose music, practice for hours on end, and then perform for the family every few months on special holidays. Right now they're working on a Valentine's Day program, and it already sounds pretty great. 

Anyway, Mouse has been asking me to sew a special bag for carrying her drum sticks to her weekly lessons, and I decided that today was the day to get it done. She's obsessed with cats, so I pulled out a favorite Japanese print that I've been saving for ages to fussy cut a few scraps for the project. I featured one on the flap and the other on a tiny pocket on the back. The blue ticking stripe canvas print makes a soft but sturdy exterior, and I paired it with a matching cream and blue dot print for the lining. A wrist strap on top will hopefully make it a little easier to hold. The hardest thing about this whole project was sewing a bag with such an incredibly narrow opening - just 2 1/2" in diameter - but by going slowly, I was able to do it.

I can't tell you how delightful it was to start and finish a project in one morning. Usually I save my sewing as an incentive for getting my daily work done, but the truth is that there's always more to do than I can finish before bedtime. My days fly by, and I get to the end of them without ever getting around to the reward. I think I'm going to start taking my sewing time in the morning for a while and see what happens. It feels a little naughty, like I'm sneaking dessert right before dinner, but this was just too much fun not to try it again.

Hello Summer

This morning I sewed my first project in ages, a zipper pouch made of canvas from Rifle Paper Co.'s Bon Voyage collection that will be a gift for a friend. It felt so good to sew again. I never realize how much I miss it until I come back to my fabric and thread after some time away.

My sewing room is in a state of total chaos at the moment which is why there has been neither sewing nor posting around here for some time. In the fall, my sister and I will be teaching enrichment classes to our girls every other week, so I'm trying to reconfigure my setup ahead of time to have classroom space as well as work space for my own projects. I'll be teaching music and sewing, my sister will be doing cooking and art, and my brother in law will be giving the girls pointers in martial arts and self-defense. It's going to be so great, and I'm excited to get into the planning stages over the next month. Once I have everything looking somewhat put together again, I'll show you pictures of the finished space. 

After months of work, my husband's garden is in full swing. With all the craziness at the supermarket this year, we decided to go big here at home, so the garden is about four times larger. The photo above was actually taken a few weeks ago, and at this point we've got a lot more growth happening, especially in the watermelon patch in the lower right hand corner of the picture which is now wreathed in vines.. Keeping it alive during this Texas heat streak has been a challenge, but so far it's working. My husband has already harvested all the sweet onions and some of the herbs for my cooking, and they taste amazing. My youngest loves to go out every morning and snag a few raspberries from the berry bushes after breakfast along with a mint leaf or two. It's her favorite morning treat. 

Now that we've wrapped up the school year, I'm thinking about projects for the summer. Most of them involve cleaning and organization, but I'm also hoping to finish the quilt I've been slowly working on as well as the EPP pillow I started years ago. After that, I'm going to open up some favorite books and see what looks like fun.

But summers are mostly for family, and I'm happily storing up the memories from every minute of time I get to spend with my favorite people in the world.

Having More Fun

It's another 5 A.M. morning at my house. Having a puppy has put me back on newborn baby hours, and I'm feeling ever so grateful that I finished having children in my early 30's because I am definitely too old for this now. Still, despite the exhaustion that starts hitting me around 8:00 every night, there's something I'm coming to love about these quiet mornings with my Bible, journal, laptop, and coffee. There's a peace here before the whirlwind of the day begins, and getting to watch the sun rise outside my dining room window every morning is a nice bonus. My oldest daughter turns 15 tomorrow -- how is that even possible?? -- so today's to-do list is a bit longer than usual. I have dozens of balloons to blow up for her That Thing You Do! 1960's themed party, chocolate chip Heath bar cookies to bake for her ice cream sundae bar, and a whole lot of decorating to do. But this is the sort of thing I enjoy. Our family loves to celebrate everything, every chance we get, and we've made a lot of great memories over the years doing it. 

My sewing output has gone way down in the last 2 years, but I can honestly say that I'm having more fun with what I make. One of my favorite finished projects was actually for a sewing swap I did with my friend Angela almost a year ago. We each made a large version of the Booklet Pouch by Aneela Hoey for each other after we exchanged information about favorite fabric, colors, styles, etc. I decided to go with a retro theme in a rainbow of colors.

The outer panels are made with linen and canvas for more stability. Instead of using just one fabric, I used rows of squares in a fun mix of prints. It would be embarrassing to tell you how long I spent rearranging these squares until I got them exactly the way I wanted them. There's something in me that just can't leave well enough alone until I'm satisfied that I love it. 

I added a thin strip of fabric along either side of the zipper, and it wound up looking just like piping. Such a happy accident! I need to do this kind of thing more often. That zipper pull might just be my favorite thing about this project, aside from the patchwork exterior. 

A vintage text print for the inside cover was a great contrast with the bright, candy colored prints I used for almost everything else. The small pocket on the front inside cover holds a needle book and pair of snips, and I tucked some goodies inside the zipper pockets too.

It was unbelievably hard to send this one off in the mail, but I knew it was going to a good home where it would be well used and loved. And that's what we want for our creations, right? 

Happy weekend, friends!

Old Fashioned

Hello, dear friends! I can't tell you how happy it makes me to be back in this space again after such a long time. I almost don't know where to begin, so I'm going to just list a few things on my mind this afternoon... 

1. I'm going to start blogging again. I've been missing the creative side of things for a while now -- writing, sewing, etc. -- but I wasn't exactly sure what to do about it. I have zero desire to jump back into marketing and social media which brought so much stress to my former life, but I've been feeling a real yearning for the old days over a decade ago when everyone was sewing and blogging for the fun of it. Spending a little time each day with my favorite blogs was like dropping in on a few friends for coffee and a long, friendly chat. Things have never been quite the same since everyone moved over to social media. So I've decided to be old fashioned and return to my blogging roots because that's what I really love. I'm looking forward to being on here more often in the days ahead.

2. I have a new puppy. Last fall we lost our two precious dogs, Fritz and Emma, to cancer over the space of only a few months. It was absolutely devastating, and I can't tell you what an empty hole it left in our hearts. Thankfully, we were able to bring a new puppy into our home at the start of the Christmas season to help all of us start to heal again. Sam's official name is actually Samwise Gamgee (my husband just finished reading all of Tolkien's Lord of the Rings books to us in the evenings), and the name is a perfect fit for this guy. He's a 5 1/2 month old bundle of energy and a ton of work -- like having a baby in the house again, honestly -- but we just couldn't love him more. 

3. Little Joe is all grown up. My rescue kitten is a cat full of attitude nowadays. He especially loves the girls who stop by his room to play with him at all hours of the day. I don't know that he'll ever forgive me for all those baths I gave him when he was little and we were trying to keep the dander allergies at bay, but I love him just the same. He's perfectly content to spend his days perched on the ledge where he can survey the world outside the second floor windows. 

4. The girls are all teenagers now. Still trying to wrap my brain around this one. For all the challenges that come with helping your kids grow up, there's nothing so wonderful as raising kids that are a delight to be with each day. These girls and their daddy can make me laugh like no one else, and our family time in the evenings -- eating dinner, reading books aloud, watching old movies or shows, and ending with prayer -- is absolutely the best part of my day.

5. My sister's family moved to Texas. I can't even begin to tell you what a total game changer this has been for us. Having my sister, her husband, and her two girls living only 20 minutes away is AMAZING, and my parents are over the moon to have all of their children and grandchildren together again. Sunday dinners after church, the girls' new "cousin clubhouse" in my sister's backyard, using every holiday on the calendar as an excuse to throw another party at one of our houses -- it's been a year of joy having them close by, and I couldn't be more grateful.

6. Sewing is slow these days, but it still makes me so happy. I've been working on a stack of Greek Cross quilt blocks for the last few months from this book by Suzuko Koseki, hoping to finally make the king size quilt that's been on my bucket list all these years. I don't have nearly so much time in my sewing room as I used to, but I still enjoy every chance I get to play in there. Though I still love my small projects, I've been trying to spend more time on quilts this year, and I have a list of projects I hope to start in the months ahead.

Thanks for listening, friends. It's so good to be back.

All the Buttons Quilt Tutorial

It's been ages, friends, I know...

Back in the middle of June I shared on Instagram that I was taking a break from social media for the summer, and it has been the BEST THING EVER. Don't get me wrong -- I love chatting with so many lovely people on Instagram and getting to see all the beautiful projects they're working on. But I've been trying to focus my attention on what's right in front of me these days, the family and friends I love who need me the most right now. After running through my days at breakneck speed for so long, becoming numb to everything except the demands of my to-do list, I almost thought it wasn't possible to live life any other way.

I'm so happy to tell you that I was wrong about that. Life has become a hundred times simpler, slower, quieter, and more peaceful than it's been for years. Suddenly I have time again to read, to talk with my husband, to sew with my girls, to play, to think, to dream. It's been a balm to my soul and a treasure that I can't imagine giving up lightly. So for now, I'm continuing my break from social media, though I did want to drop by this space to say hello, catch up with a little news, and share a quilt tutorial that I promised myself I would give you before the summer was over.

Little Joe at 2 weeks

If you follow me on Instagram, you'll remember Little Joe, the tiny tabby kitten I found abandoned in the middle of the parking lot at my local Target. He was about two weeks old, lame in his back paw, and very near death when I rescued him that day and took him home.

Teeny tiny Joey

At the time, I had no clue how much care and commitment is involved with raising young orphaned kittens. It's truly like taking in a newborn baby. I spent weeks bottle feeding him through the days and nights, keeping him warm, massaging his back legs, relying heavily on videos by The Kitten Lady and on help from my vet to face each new challenge.

Joey at 3 months

I promised Joey's many fans that I would give an update on his progress during the summer so that you could see how much he's grown. He's now 3 months old, and not only are his legs perfectly healed, but thankfully we've also been able to set up a room for him inside our house despite my parents' and husband's cat allergies. A special air filter in the room and weekly baths have kept the dander at bay. My husband loves to have coffee with Joe every morning while he feeds him his breakfast, and Dad pops in to cuddle with Joey every afternoon. Watching my men together with this cat just melts my heart. I'll always be his mama, but I think he saves his loudest purrs for the guys.

Joey is still a rambunctious little goofball who loves to climb and play with his toys and my girls every day. But my favorite moments are when he climbs up into my lap and touches his wee nose to mine just to say "I love you." We are so incredibly grateful to have him in our family, and seeing him happy and playful in his special room just brings me all kinds of joy.

I also wanted to share with you these sewing kits I made for my girls, who all wanted to practice sewing hexagons this summer. I let them each choose their main fabric from my stash, and then I picked coordinating prints to go along with that.

The pattern is the Double-Zip Clutch from my first book Sew Organized for the Busy Girl which I shrank down to about half size. It makes an absolutely perfect travel sewing kit. I made one for myself years ago which I've taken on plane trips for easy-to-pack sewing on the go. I love that it has a spot for all the supplies and every tool I need to bring along. Right now the girls are sewing Laundromat Coin Pouches from my book Patchwork USA, and they're having so much fun.

And now on to the pattern! This quilt was originally going to be published in my abandoned Carnival of Patchwork book. I had dreamed for ages of making a quilt with a ton of little button blocks on it, and it was so much fun to see that dream become reality in this project. It took me three long months to sew this one together, but I'm absolutely crazy about it. My friend Jennifer at Farm Fresh Stitches did the gorgeous quilting in a classic baptist fans motif. This block would look darling on so many other projects too: a tote bag, a zipper pouch, a pillow. Even if you don't feel like making a whole quilt, try it out on something small and have fun with it!

All the Buttons Quilt Tutorial

Finished Size: 53’’ x 60’’

Finished Block Size: 3 1/2" x 3 1/2"

Materials

From 97 5’’ squares of various colored prints, cut from each:

- (2) rectangles, 1’’ x 2’’ for button blocks (A)

- (2) rectangles, 1 1/2’’ x 2’’ for button blocks (B)

- (2) rectangles, 4’’ x 1 1/2’’ for button blocks (C)

From 2 yards of white solid, cut:

- (2) rectangles, 1’’ x 2’’ for button blocks (D)

- (4) squares, 1 1/2’’ x 1 1/2’’ for button blocks (E)

- (98) squares, 4’’ x 4’’ for alternating squares (F)

- (4) rectangles, 4’’ x 53’’ for borders (G)

From 2 yards of wide batting, cut:

- (1) square, 70’’ x 70’’ for interfacing (H)

From 2 yards of 108’’ wideback fabric, cut:

- (1) square, 70’’ x 70’’ for quilt backing (I)

From 1/2 yard of pale blue floral fabric, cut:

- (6) rectangles, WOF x 2 1/2’’ for quilt binding (J)

Make the Blocks

1. Sort the pieces for each button block into 100 stacks. Each stack should include 2 A rectangles, 2 B rectangles, and 2 C rectangles from a single Colored Print. It should also include 2 D rectangles and 4 E squares from the White Solid

2. Sew a D rectangle to either long edge of an A rectangle. Cut the resulting piece in half through all 3 rectangles as shown in the illustration above.

3. Sew the pieces from step 2 to the upper and lower edges of the remaining A rectangle. Sew the B rectangles to the right and left edges of the block.

4. Sew the C rectangles to the upper and lower edges of the block. Use the E squares to snowball the 4 corners of the block, to yield a finished block as shown above.

5. Repeat steps 2-4 with the pieces for the remaining blocks, giving you a total of 97 blocks. 

Make the Quilt

1. Arrange the button blocks and F squares as shown above, organizing the colors in whatever order you like best. Sew the blocks and alternating squares together in rows. Then sew the rows together.

2. Sew a G rectangle to the right and left edges of the quilt top. Then sew a G rectangle to the upper and lower edges.

3. Quilt and bind as desired.

All warm and crinkly after coming out of the wash...

If you make anything with this tutorial, please share your photos! You can use the tags #fabricmutt and #allthebuttonsquilt. I'll be back on Instagram sometime in the fall to check in, so be sure to tag me @fabricmutt so I can see it then.

I hope you're all having a beautiful summer and doing the things you enjoy best. Most of all, I hope you're getting time with the people you love. Enjoy every minute of it!

Parenting, Perfection, and Perseverance

A pair of cardinals has set up housekeeping in the small sago palm tree beside our backyard swimming pool. James spotted three speckled eggs in a tiny nest almost a week ago, and several days later they were replaced by a trio of fluffy chicks that look so much like miniature plucked turkeys to me that I grin every time I see them. Since we've had a sudden run of summer weather, we've been taking a dip in the pool every evening before dinner, careful not to bother the new family while we do it. I was worried that maybe our presence would scare the parents away, but a few nights ago as the girls were taking turns doing handstands in the shallow end, we suddenly saw the father swoop down to check on the babies. He lingered for a few seconds, flew back up into the nearby oak tree, and was immediately replaced by the mama bird who did the same thing. For the next ten minutes or so, I couldn't take my eyes away from watching those two birds take turns looking after their little ones. It reminded me so much of James and I as we shepherd our girls through this strange time together at home. There are moments when he picks up the burdens because I'm feeling weak, and then I turn around a few hours later and do the same for him. Sometimes we tackle frustrations at the same time with grit-your-teeth determination, and other times it's all so ridiculous that we can't stop laughing. But we're facing it together, and I love that. Teamwork: it's a good idea whether you're parenting cardinals or strong young women, and we're getting a little better at it each day.

Yesterday I spent almost two hours working on a new pattern I've been wanting to write, and it ended in failure. I walked away from it until later in the evening, started from scratch, and promptly failed again. Sigh . . . it's all part of the creative process, of course, and you can't let it get you down. So I put that new pattern away for another day, and this afternoon I'll be working on something that I know I'll enjoy. Because that's part of the creative process too. You have to know when you're up to a challenge and when you need something pleasantly simple, and today is a day for comfort sewing, I think.

For the past few days, I've been working on cleaning out my guest room/office which has been in desperate need of some purging for some time now. Going through the stuffed drawers of the dresser in there feels something like conducting an archaeological dig of my life, and the various piles that I've been sorting read the same way: here lies Heidi the fabric designer, the artist, the antique collector, the writer, the interior designer, the teacher, the quilter. I look at all the pieces of myself spread out across the guest room bed, and I'm reminded again of one of the character traits that I constantly struggle with in myself: that dreaded perfectionism. I want to try absolutely everything, but I want to do it all really well. And this stubborn streak often paralyzes me so that I can't get past the excitement of the planning and into the actual doing, turning me into a first class procrastinator. Hence the gouache paints that have never been opened and the journals that have only a few pages of writing and the stack of sewing patterns that I've never started. So I'm choosing to see this time at home as a chance to grow, to play with some things that I normally wouldn't have had the guts to try. Step one: some day in the next week I'm going to break out those paints and see what happens.

Part of my cleaning in the office has been going through the book samples and props that have been stored in containers for so long. I always like to spread the quilts and pillows around the house, but a lot of the small things wind up in storage for future trunk shows. Well, no more of that. I'm saving a few items for future gifting, but it's nice to pull more of these happy little pieces out into the open where I can enjoy them. For instance, the pencil cases in the photos above were designed for Carnival of Patchwork, and I love seeing them out on my desk. I wanted a mix of fabrics that was both cheerful and a little bit vintage, and it turned out just the way I hoped it would. Incidentally, that red print is from the Lola Dutch collection by Sarah Jane for Michael Miller Fabrics, which my girls adore. My mother bought them all the picture books in that series for Easter this year, and they've been taking online drawing classes with Sarah Jane ever since the quarantine started. I love watching my daughters not only develop their artistic talents but also start to gain a creative fearlessness that I want more of myself. It's so easy to encourage them to just have fun and enjoy it without getting hung up on perfection, (funny how it's always easier to speak those words to others than it is to say them to ourselves), and seeing them do that makes me want to do it too. We may be stuck at home for now, but it doesn't mean we can't still find ways to spread our wings and fly.

Staying with Grace

I've been trying to write a blog post for over a week now, but the words keep escaping me. What can I say to you, friends, that you're not already experiencing yourselves? Yes, it's hard to stay home all the time. No, nothing much has changed in the past few weeks. Yes, some days are harder than others. No, I'm not handling everything well either.

Sometimes I think we're doing great. We already homeschool, so that was something stable in our little world. I'm grateful that we can stay in touch with friends and family through technology, and I'm so thankful that we can still get together with our church family on Sunday mornings online. Having James here with us, teaching from home, has been an absolute joy. He brings encouragement to all of us every day -- playing board games with the girls, giving my parents a hand when they need it, and always there to listen to me and make me laugh.

Other days I can feel myself coming apart a little bit. I give in to tears or make frequent visits to the bowl of cookie dough in the refrigerator when I'm frustrated or discouraged. I stay up too late at night and struggle to get out of bed in the morning. I had a near panic attack sitting in my car at the Walgreen's drive-thru last Monday as I watched the clerk bag up my dad's medication and place my change into an envelope, suddenly wondering if both were covered with the virus. James and I are the only ones who run errands right now so that my parents can stay safe, both of them being in the high risk group due to their age and health issues. I've had nights when I couldn't sleep for worrying over whether we're doing enough.

And then this passage from Present Over Perfect by Shauna Niequist spoke to me last weekend:

"It's easy to be liked by strangers. It's very hard to be loved and connected to the people in your home when you're always bringing them your most exhausted self and resenting the fact that the scraps you're giving them aren't cutting it....It seems to me that one of the great hazards is quick love, which is actually charm. We get used to smiling, hugging, bantering, practicing good eye contact. And it's easier than true, slow, awkward, painful connection with someone who sees all the worst parts of you. Your act is easy. Being with you, deeply with, is difficult. It is better to be loved than admired. It is better to be truly known and seen and taken care of by a small tribe than adored by strangers who think they know you in a meaningful way. We know that's true. But many of us, functionally, have gotten that math wrong in one season or another....Quick charm will always be easier for me than deep connection. People out there are easier than the ones in here. But quick charm is like sugar -- it rots us. It winds us up and leaves us jonesing, but it doesn't feed us. Only love feeds us. And love happens over years, repetitive motions, staying, staying, staying. Showing up again. Coming clean again, being seen again. That's how love is built....It's all in here, not out there."

I've wondered if one reason why this temporary life change is so difficult is because all the coping mechanisms that we've used for so long are being stripped away. When you're confined to your house with your family for days on end, there's no room for quick charm. Even worse, your quirks and irritations and insecurities have nowhere to hide. You have to deal with them and so do the people you love. And though right now we have no choice except to stay where we are, there's a big difference between staying resentfully and staying with grace. I can be a very generous, patient person on social media . . . over the phone . . . when I'm all by myself. It's harder to be any of that when the dogs are barking incessantly and the sink is full of dirty dishes and the girls are fighting with me and each other. My family needs my love, and the truth is that sometimes I feel so worn out that it seems like I can't even muster the will to try. But I have to keep trying, even when the best I can say is, "I'm cranky and tired and not happy with you right now, but I'm going to love you anyway because you're mine." I've told my girls so many times that love isn't a feeling; it's what we choose to do. I'm learning that lesson over and over again these days.

But like I said, there are good things happening at our house too. So let's talk about some of them...

1. Quarantine is delicious. I've been cooking so much more and making a greater variety of food. We've also been eating more meals together as a family which is wonderful. Preparing food for seven people each day can quickly become an endless job, so I've started making a large meal at lunch which can then be stretched for leftovers at dinner. Mom makes a loaf of her famous oatmeal bread in our bread machine almost every day, and we use any stale slices that don't get eaten to make croutons for salad. A big pot of soup or stew can last us for two days or more, and every now and then I'll make extra pans of pasta bake or enchiladas that can go in the freezer to be pulled out on a day when I'm too tired or busy to cook. All in all, I think we're wasting less food and making better use of our groceries than we have in ages, and that feels pretty great.

2. Time stuck at home is the perfect chance to tackle all the jobs that we've been putting off because we didn't have the time. James has been working on replacing old sink drains in the upstairs bathrooms. I'm deep cleaning our closet for the first time since we moved in five years ago and slowly getting my sewing space reorganized. It feels fantastic to get some of these jobs finished after they've been on my to-do list for so long. On the other hand, though, I'm not freaking out over dog hair on the floor and a cluttered pantry stuffed full of food and paper products right now because nobody's going to see it but us. So it's good to walk that balance between taking on some long overdue organizational projects while not going crazy over the day-to-day stuff.

3. Being together as a family is the best. For a few days the pool was (just barely) warm enough to go swimming, so we made the most of it. James has been taking the girls outside after lunch or in the afternoon to play basketball, soccer, foursquare, or just walk laps around the front circle. Sometimes we go for walks as a family, and sometimes my husband and I go out for a "date walk" while my parents stay home with the girls. Almost every night we watch a show or movie together. Since my eighth grader is studying World War II, we've been introducing the girls to some old movies from the time period that are favorites of ours. The girls have enjoyed To Be or Not to Be and Casablanca, and we had some great discussions about both films. I've also been reading The Long Winter by Laura Ingalls Wilder aloud to the family while the girls take turns practicing hairstyles on me in the evenings before bed. It's been interesting to talk about the Ingalls family's isolation brought on by blizzards versus our quarantine due to the virus. We all agree that we definitely have it better than they did.

4. Quiet time is good for the soul. I find that I make it through the day much better when I start and end with some simple encouragement. So before I face the news on my laptop in the morning, I read my Bible for a few minutes as I drink my coffee. And each night before I head to bed, I spend some time at my desk writing my thoughts down in a journal and reading a short devotion from Each New Day by Corrie ten Boom, a woman of deep faith whose writings have meant so much to me over the years (read her book The Hiding Place if you haven't already -- it's unforgettable). These small, quiet moments have been anchors for my soul. Some days they're the only thing keeping me from flying all to pieces, and they're habits I want to keep even after this crazy time is over.

5. Sewing still makes me happy. The days are busier than I would have expected, but I still try to sneak off to my sewing machine when I can. Making pretty little things just because I want to is such a wonderful way to spend an hour, and it always lifts my spirits.

I'm thinking of you often, friends. You're always in my prayers. Be safe and well, and know that you're loved.

Why I'm Retiring from Professional Sewing

Oh, my friends, this is a hard one . . . a long one. And I'll need you to be patient with me, because even as I'm typing this sentence, I'm struggling to find the words and to keep the tears from falling. But there's a happy ending to this story, I promise. So let's begin at the beginning . . .

In the fall of 2011, I was an exhausted stay-at-home mother of three little girls under the age of five. My days were long, full of dishes and laundry and mindless cartoons, swinging wildly between frantic activity and tedious boredom. I loved the time I was investing in my daughters, but it was a challenge that left me burned out and stale by the end of each week. It quickly became obvious that I needed some time to play.

And so I tried quilting. 

It wasn’t until I started sewing that I realized how desperate I had been for creative playtime. It energized me, gave me a break from the craziness to breathe and think and make again. I look back on those early days now and smile. 

My new hobby started a chain reaction that I honestly never expected when I first picked it up. It would be easy to say that everything just happened all at once, that it was completely beyond my control, but I know that's not really true. A combination of factors caused things to take off in a big way over that first year -- my love for sewing, my need for community and acceptance, my sometimes compulsive personality that leads me to chase new pursuits with a passion that borders on obsession, and just being in the right place at the right time. And like so many things in life, it was both wonderful and difficult together.

My quilting led me to blogging which then led me to social media. Over time, I sewed samples for fabric companies and publishers, hosted blog tours and sew alongs, and eventually wrote my first book, Sew Organized for the Busy Girl for C&T Publishing. This led to more sample sewing, more blog tours, pattern writing for magazines, and invitations to teach and share my projects. I got the opportunity of a lifetime when Riley Blake Designs gave me a contract to design fabric for them, and I threw myself into the work with a fervor, spending countless hours at my computer sketching ideas for fabric collections. When Lucky Spool gave me the chance to write a second book, Patchwork USA, I was overjoyed, pulling together years of patterns and stories to create what was definitely my favorite project yet. I couldn't have been more thrilled when it was finally published last July.

On the flip side, balancing my creative pursuits along with homeschooling my daughters, keeping house, and staying involved in family and church activities was getting more difficult by the day. "I don't know how you do it all!" people would say, and I felt desperate to maintain that image of being both capable and creative, a busy person with important things to do. But there was no denying that the hobby I adored had become all consuming work, and I was struggling to hold it all together. My own perfectionism and the constant pressure to keep producing as much as I could had sent my to-do list spinning out of control. 

My family was getting the short end of the stick in so many ways. I shudder now to think of how many times my girls asked me to play with them, only to hear, “Not now . . . Mommy has to finish this first.”  And of course, whenever I finished that thing, there was the next thing. So many afternoons and evenings my wonderfully supportive husband took the girls outside to ride bicycles or swim or play in the front yard so that I could meet upcoming deadlines on time. And I would sit upstairs glued to my computer screen or my sewing machine, every now and then glancing outside the window to see them all having fun together down below, feeling an ache in my heart because I was missing out on moments that I knew I could never get back. Even when I was with them, I wasn't always really there emotionally. I remember taking the girls out for a mommy-daughter lunch one day. We placed our order, sat down in a booth, and I automatically pulled my cell phone out of my pocket to check emails. My oldest daughter reached out her hand and gently placed it over the screen. "Stay in the moment, Mommy," she said quietly, with a meaningful look that cut me to the heart.

It was almost two years ago that I started having unexplained health problems leading to doctor visits, with every one ending in the same diagnosis: “It’s stress. You’re doing too much. You’ve got to slow down.” With each warning, I promised the doctors and my worried family that I would handle it this time, really. Yet every time I tried to scale back my commitments, they slowly crept back in . . . and so did the ongoing stress and fatigue. I wanted to have it all, but I didn't know how to manage it all. Eight years ago, the solution to my stress was sewing. Now sewing seemed to be the problem.

But I didn’t want to stop sewing. I just wanted to find a way to make it fun again. How could I return to the place where I began, those early days spent happily stitching away at my dining room table while my toddlers played nearby? Could I rediscover the hobby that I loved so much? Was there a way to balance creativity and everything else in my life? I knew that something had to change, but I didn't know how.

And then last week I was hit hard by a sudden serious infection with which my burned out immune system seemed completely unable to cope. The fact that it wasn't life threatening didn't make it any less frightening, but it was, at last, the wake-up call I had been needing. There's something about lying on your bed in a state of pain, helplessness, and total exhaustion that has a way of clearing the mind. I finally came to grips with the fact that my health and my family had to come first -- truly first -- and that the only way to do it was to make a clean break with the work that was throwing my priorities out of order. There were still tears and discussions with family and plenty of emails to write, but for the first time in ages, I felt a peace that had been lacking in my heart for too long. I had the power to make a choice, and this was the one I wanted to make.

So what does this mean going forward? It means that at the end of February, after I finish two more blog tour commitments which I want to honor, I will be retiring from professional sewing. It means that I will no longer be doing blog tours for sewing books or fabric collections, and that all my teaching will be at home with my three precious girls. It means that I won't be writing any more patterns for magazines or subscription boxes. And it means letting go of a third book which I've been working on for the last nine months. I can't even begin to express to you how hard it is for me to walk away from these things, but I know without a doubt that it's what I need to do.

Yet the truth is that, in spite of my sadness and regret, I feel so incredibly blessed! I've gotten to have a fantastic side career for all these years, work with all kinds of unbelievably talented people, learn a host of new skills, and meet so many dear friends from all over the world in the process. It's been one of the most amazing experiences of my entire life, and I'm deeply grateful for it.

And just because I won't be working professionally anymore does NOT mean that I won't be sewing and blogging and dropping in on social media. Things will be a little different, of course. There will be more works in progress, I think, and more slow sewing, and sometimes just me talking about what's going on in this new life experiment I'm beginning. In the weeks ahead, I'll show you some of the projects I've been working on in secret over the past year for that third book I'd been planning (like the sneaky peek at the top of this post!), and it will be so much fun to finally share them with you.

Honestly, I'm still coming to terms with this change in my life, still figuring out what it's going to look like. It reminds me of when we moved to Texas five years ago and let our dogs Emma and Fritz out into our huge backyard for the first time. After growing up playing on the small patch of grass in our suburban California backyard surrounded by a cinder block wall, they had no idea how to handle the massive stretch of lawn behind our new home on almost two acres of land. That first evening, they stepped cautiously through the gate, sniffing as they went, and slowly they started to walk and then run between the trees with their tongues hanging out their mouths as if they were laughing. It was all good until Emma suddenly spotted the neighbor's dog through the metal fence posts. Having no experience with a see-through fence, she thought she could run through it, headed straight for the unfamiliar dog at breakneck speed, and slammed right into the metal bars. I thought she had killed herself for a minute, but she got up and shook her head in a daze while James went to go bend the bars back into place. I have a feeling that this new life may be something like that for me. At times I'm going to be unsure of myself and go slowly, some days I'm going to be giddy with freedom, and once in a while I'm going to crash and have to shake it off while I figure out what my new boundaries are going to be.

But for now I'm going to rest and heal, read more books, sit outside with my girls while they show me how well they can ride their bikes, have coffee with James without talking endlessly about my to-do list, and enjoy the fun of starting a new sewing project without having to write down any measurements while I do it. I suppose that sewing, like anything else in life, can pull you to pieces if you turn it into something it was never meant to be: a compulsive assembly line, a popularity contest, the measure of your worth. It's time for me to slow down and appreciate this hobby for what it is, to remember why I loved it in the first place, this chance to make something beautiful with my own two hands.

I'm finding my way back to joy, friends, and it feels a lot like going home.