I’m A Crafty Lady

Photo by Volodymyr Proskurovskyi on Unsplash

As the daughter of a dressmaker, I grew up surrounded by creativity and the many projects my mom was always in the middle of. Fabric and sewing notions were constantly all over the house. If you weren’t careful, you could end up sitting on a needle that she’d put in the sofa armrests, which she treated like her pin cushions. Worse was when a pin or needle got stuck in our gross green shag carpet and you’d step on it. Ouch. 

My mom would save paper towel rolls and food containers, glue stick caps and cereal boxes and construct giant castles and rocket ships out of them for her grandchildren. She’d assemble all the pieces, glue them all together, and then cover them in glittery scrapbook paper. She also loved making greeting cards, some decoupaged with pretty napkins she’d find at party supply stores. She had dozens of fancy paper punches that she’d use to edge her cards, and she often dried flowers to put on the fronts.

Creating and making were things I just grew up doing. If I wasn’t baking cookies with my mom, I was holed up somewhere with one of these two craft books that I was obsessed with. I’d go through my mom’s stash for crafting supplies and try my hand at making paper sun hats or felt finger puppets. 

A few years ago I searched Google for these two books, which had long been lost in my parents’ house. I remembered the covers for each book, but had no idea what the titles were. After scrolling hundreds of Google Image results, I finally found both books on second-hand bookstore websites and bought them. It was surreal flipping through the musty pages and reliving my childhood days of making. 

I intend to do some of these craft projects with my 12-year-old son, who’s taking after his grandmother in many ways. Whenever I have an interesting piece of packaging—a box, a sheet of clear plastic—I’ll see if he wants it for something. He always does. Then I get to see what he creates out of the random pieces of cardboard and plastic. He’s his very own kind of Rube Goldberg. 

The only iffy thing about being a crafty lady is that there’s a fine line between having a well-stocked craft space and hoarding. I have materials for every thinkable craft: greeting cards, knitting, jewelry-making, journaling, brush lettering, watercolor painting, sketching, resin tumblers, sewing.

Photo by J Williams on Unsplash.

Ah, sewing. Sewing was my mother’s special skill, but I’ve been a slow learner. She tried teaching me how to sew when I was younger, but I was always too stubborn and impatient. When she died almost seven years ago I felt compelled to conjure her spirit by trying to sew a dress by myself. Whenever I got stuck on something I didn’t know how to do, I’d watch a YouTube tutorial. I’ve gotten a lot better in the past few years, but I wish she was here to see it. I know she’s looking down on me from heaven—sewing has made me feel close to her—but I’m bummed for all the years I didn’t spend sewing with her. 

We did lots of other projects together though. When I was getting married she and I handmade my wedding invitations, all 100 of them. People likened them to pieces of art and many kept them long after the wedding. 

On my mother’s birthday my sisters and I invite her friends and our cousins over for a tea party in her memory. We always think up a fun crafting project to do in homage to my mom. One year we made fascinators—you know, those fun headband-slash-headpieces all the Royals wear at weddings and christenings. This year we made gold halo crowns with zip ties. We pull out some of my mom’s own craft stash for these projects. All of us who were in her orbit just love celebrating her this way. 

I now work at an art and design school—it’s one of the best places to work ever! I’m surrounded by creativity. Not only are the students exceptional, but the faculty are all working artists and designers. Turns out, lots of us on staff are as well. We have amazing facilities, like a ceramics studio, photography darkroom, printing press, and a wood and metal shop. When I’m on campus I’ll pass a building or a room and hear the buzzing, whirring sounds of creativity happening. I love it. 

I keep reading articles about how essential having a creative outlet is. This is something my mom knew light years before everyone else. I’m so glad she shared her craft with us. And while I need to start working through my craft supplies more, I’m glad they’re there and will feed my insatiable need to create for years to come.