Seamstress Dreams

I stared sewing around the age of nine. I still rememeber the thrill of taking a sock (nothing) and creating a doll (something). I still have that first doll. She's pretty rough, but I dreamed her up and brought her to life with needle and thread.
I sewed a nursery set for my first niece when I was a senior in high school. The next year, I realized one of my first sewing dreams; I sewed one of the homecoming queen candidate's dresses. Back then, you had about a week to get everything together and create the dress. That job was taken on one condition--that my mom would put the zipper in for me. The velvet didn't scare me. The lace didn't scare me. Even the fitting didn't scare me. Zippers, however, had me by the throat for a while. Thankfully I'm past my zipper phobia, and can now put one in without hesitation. That year, I also sewed two or three swing choir dresses for hire.

In those dark years when we were longing for babies and kept losing them, I would sew tiny little onesies and shirts and hats. I continued to put them away for several years, and often would open my "baby box" and hold those miniature garments with sadness. Baby sewing was a seamstress dream.

I sewed for others, even for hire for a long time. I sewed for myself. I entered and won third place at a state level "Make It With Wool" contest. That was another of my seamstress dreams. Sewing has long been my therapy, and I used it a lot.

But remember March 15, 1999? Not only would I have a baby to sew for, I would have two baby girls to sew for! What joy that brought, and the seamstress dreams began anew. Naturally, the first job was to outfit the nursery, which I did with great joy. Curtains, quilts, dust ruffles--they were darling and oh, so fun!

I began to create the baptism dresses in my mind. That job could not be started until the girls came home since we didn't know how big (or little, as it turned out) the girls would be, but I planned and scouted out fabric and notions for months. I wanted to be ready.

When we got home with them, I remember sewing up a fury while they napped. They needed dresses for church! They needed coats! They needed pajamas! When the time came to start the baptism gowns, I was in sewing heaven.

All of the other things I had sewn or would sew for my children were nothing compared to the dresses which they would wear as we presented them to the Lord. I think every seamstress cherishes that dream, and is grateful for the chance to live it.

Tonight I have been sewing on another seamstress dream. The girls will receive their First Holy Eucharist soon, and the dress production has started. Working on them, I am reminded of those days when I worked on the baptism gowns while my little babies napped down the hall in their cribs. Tonight I sewed as they practiced multiplication on their new whiteboard in the school room. The times may have changed, but my seamstress dreams haven't. I pray that someday I will look back fondly on this sewing dream as I realize yet another one--one that involves much more white satin and lace .

Ahhhh...the dreams of a seamstress.