Stitching, again

Oh my goodness, I have missed this. The tidy satisfaction of cutting perfect rectangles and squares, the planning on the graph paper, the stitching.

My mom paints watercolors. She spends a lot of time at her boring desk job thinking about watercoloring, about the play of pigment on wet paper. We talked about it a few weeks ago. I entertain similar fantasies of sewing: not the process, exactly (well, maybe when it comes to embroidery), but the look of a seam after it's pressed, when you look at it and see its straightness and its tidiness and its perfectness. Life feels like a totally manageable project, looking at a perfect little seam like that.

The project is a curtain for the laundry room door. I spent awhile trying to figure out what fabric to use, as it requires about six yards, total. I'm using a pretty linen print for the back, but for the front I wrestled. I wanted something more creative than taking a big rectangle of fabric and stitching a hem, and finishing two looong sides, and sewing a rod pocket, and calling it done. I wanted to make art. It's been so long and all.

Then I remembered this image I've carried around in my head for I don't know how long. I spent a solid fifteen minutes Googling to see if I could turn it up again (I believe it was published pre-Pinterest!) and, success!

I didn't have linen scraps to work with, sadly, but I did have two worn-out pairs of Patrick's work pants! And some old sheets to tear into pieces! It'll work, right? I'll make it work. Every here or there I'll work in a rectangle of a gorgeous print I've been saving, or something from my scrap basket. I think it'll come together. Just one little seam at a time.

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