My daughter just turned nine (how did THAT happen?) and amongst her birthday gifts were a plethora of arts and crafts kits. Given that this extremely creative girl usually makes works of art which can also be classed as mechanically and scientifically useful (and often justifiably get mistaken for a piece of trash), these are perfect birthday gifts. Of course, she usually takes old boxes, duck tape and bits of paper to make these things, so having a fully prepared project in front of her was a real treat.
Armed with a beautiful smile she approached me as I sat in a longed-for quiet moment reading a gourmet cooking magazine and dreaming of the lavish dinner parties I could host for wonderful friends. 'Mum', she said (because of course she is the only nine-year old Bostonian I know with a broad North Staffordshire accent), 'Will you teach me to sew?'. And in her hand was the pink packaging of an American Girl box containing everything you needed to create two lovely stuffed owls. One for her, and one for her doll.
Gulp.
Okay, so I have a fairly limited sewing ability, but I can sew. I can thread a needle (albeit with the help of strong prescription specs), and sew a hem, replace a button, or even darn a tear. I can thread my simple sewing machine and accelerate at a modest speed to sew straight lines or a modest zig-zag. I've sewn curtains made to my own design and made simple cushion covers. But that's it. I can sew - but I don't want to. And to be honest, American culture makes it easy not too - our dry cleaners can do all these repairs for a great price and to a higher standard. So why not let them do it?
In Britain in the 1970's and 80's, sewing and needlework was a part of the school curriculum from a fairly young age. FOR GIRLS. I have NO idea or recollection what boys did between the ages of 7-11 during our weekly hour of introduction to domestic textile skills. Probably hitting each other with sticks or playing 'footie' outside. But I'm sure nothing highly educational.
At seven years old we started sewing things called 'gonks'. First we had to knit squares (my knitting skills - or lack thereof - is worthy of a whole different blog post), and then we had to sew them together and put eyes on them to create this creature. I knew that I didn't have the skills of a proficient knitter or seamstress when mine wasn't included in the parent's evening display of crafts. 'There wasn't room on the stand' the teacher said, and sheepishly handed me my project and said I could take it home earlier than the other girls. In my innocence I excitedly put it in my bag and brought it home to put on my windowsill in my room. I am sure it gave me night terrors with its misshapen head and unexplained lumpy bulges. It finally met a gruesome end when my brother used it as an indoor soccer ball and its guts spilled out over the floor. I'm sure that somewhere the brotherhood of gonks breathed a collective sigh of relief as it was disposed of into the trash.
A couple of years later came embroidery. My teacher was a very strange looking spinster who was probably in her late fifties. She was overly made up with perfectly pink lipstick applied in an immaculate rosebud formation. Each day she wore the same style dress which she probably designed and made herself in a multitude of man-made and highly itchy-looking fabrics. I remember she was a diminutive barrel of a woman, with no womanly curves or female silhouette visible due to her unflattering clothing choice. She taught beginners French and would often express her frustration with chatty girls in a dramatic tossing of the head, pained expression and murmuring of some exotic-sounding French phrase escaping through the rosebud.
As we picked out pretty threads to sew samplers of ornate stitches and create table mats (because everyone needs ONE table mat) my textile malaise re-appeared. My hands just wouldn't sew as fast as the other girls did. I remember it took me one whole lesson to pick out thread and put it in the needle. By the time I'd finished a border of cross stitch, herringbone, back-stitch (whipped, not laced), and daisy stitch, I realized that the other girls were on to more advanced projects. Aprons, peg bags, and ironing board covers were the choices. I was the only girl who didn't bring one home at the end of the year. I sincerely hope my mum had somewhere to store her clothes pegs.
My only foray into fashion creation was at high school when I tried to make a skirt. It took me nearly six months to sew this ugly looking thing which quickly fell apart when I tried to wear it. The other girls were progressing to soft furnishings, ra-ra skirts and wedding dresses by then but I sat huddled in my traumatic world of unpicking my work, sewing it up, and unpicking it again. One week I managed to spend the whole hour and twenty minutes of the lesson just ironing the fabric before I cut out the pattern. I hated needlework - it was my most reviled subject at school. I would much rather have been doing woodwork or technical drawing with the boys.
I am sure the teacher realized this. She was a lady with little patience and tolerance for those students not aiming to be the next Elizabeth Emmanuel (Google 'Diana's wedding'). With her attention focused on the sewing starlets of the class, those of us who didn't know the difference between the wrong side and the right side joined together as a sewing-impaired sisterhood at the back of the class. Even though we couldn't always stand each other during the rest of the week, Wednesday afternoons became a support group for us eight or so girls who were academically very smart but would never be mistresses of the needle. The teacher would sigh at our lack of progress and occasionally whisk our pitiful efforts off to her sewing machine muttering something like 'the only stitch you'll ever get is by going for a run'. As she sneered at our efforts, we muttered our thanks for her help and skulked back into our corner wondering what the heck to do next. More ironing, maybe?
As my daughter and I laid out the pieces for her sewing project, I was pleased to see that the holes were even pre-marked so as to get it lined up. I showed her how to thread the needle (which she did because I didn't have my specs on) and then helped her to get started. As the end of each stage I showed her how to finish off securely and then start the next piece. The joy in her eyes as she watched it all come together was remarkable. And as we sewed together we chatted about how my mum would repair our clothes, alter them, and how her mother (my nana) was a whizz at sewing. We talked about patching clothes, darning socks, and letting down hems.
And then the bombshell; 'So why don't you mend things when they need fixing then, mum'?
Silence. I had no response.
Yet she was right. She never sees me get my needle and thread out to replace a button, or attack a broken vase with superglue. As children of the Wal-Mart era we've become dependent on everything being cheap, disposable, and replaceable. And we regularly chant the environmental mantra of 'REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE'. But what about 'REPAIR'? Sure, many things can't be fixed because they're cheaply and badly made. But what about the things that can? Am I raising my kids to be good stewards of the possessions that they have? Or will they simply think that a breakage is mended by MasterCard as a trip to Target helps us to replace what we broke. Is it that we don't like things with stitches, cracks, or blemishes and everything needs to be perfect?
So our next sewing class is how to sew on a button. It's apparent to me that if don't teach my kids these simple life skills no-one else is going to. Although if it saves them the angst of creating a genetically-mutated gonk and the shame of depriving their mother of a bag for her clothes pegs or a cover for her ironing board, then I'll probably have to teach them more than just sewing the button.
And then, if they are really lucky, in a few years maybe their Dad will teach them how to change the valve-stem-oil-seals on a car. Now that, my friends, is another story.......
