Readers, Barbara Sher, the author of the single most influential book I’ve ever read, died last month. She wrote Refuse to Choose! A Revolutionary Program for Doing Everything That You Love. My copy is heavily underlined, flagged, and dog-eared. It has also survived a rainstorm. Refuse to Choose is so important to me that if our […]
Sneaky Old Sunk-Cost Thinking
Readers, Isn’t it uplifting to read a post where a knotty question is presented in the beginning, followed by a few colorful missteps in the middle, leading to a predictable, satisfying conclusion? Whatever prompted me recently to yearning for Getting Things Sewn, the Agatha Christie cozy mystery edition? Hint: I’ve been confronting my fabric stash–again. […]
Write It Down!
Readers, It’s been almost four months since a fateful day in late January when I began an experiment to dramatically improve my sewing productivity. I gave this experiment a grandiose name: the Getting Things Sewn Project Management Improvement Daily Challenge. You can read about it here. More than a hundred days into this experiment, I […]
The Five Knowledge Bases It Takes to Get Things Sewn
Readers, Quick–What image comes to mind when you think of a sewer? Don’t think long–just answer. Betcha it was somebody running fabric through a sewing machine. Me too–and it’s a perfectly natural response. But a blinding glimpse of the obvious I had a few weeks ago went a long way to explaining just how inadequate […]
Smart Pants
Readers, I recently reached a sewing milestone: pants I like in every way. The impossible dream has come true! I like the fabric–Nevada linen, from Stonemountain & Daughter Fabrics, and the color, Nectarine. It’s a warm, medium-deep coral-terra cotta color that’s summery but wouldn’t look out of place in the warm days of early fall. […]
The Least Popular Piece of Sewing Advice Ever
Readers, If someone asked you what advice sewers least like hearing, what would you say? My answer would be, in the words of Kenneth King, author of Smart Fitting Solutions, “Make muslins, make muslins, make muslins!” Imagine: A newly released pattern catches your eye. A beautiful fabric captures your heart. You swoon–and all you can […]
Quarantine Quandaries and Questions
Readers, Yesterday my sewing machine had a conniption fit, and I didn’t know why. I was starting to sew a wearable test of a knit top. Actually, the third version of this wearable test, which was already testing my patience. The stitching in the shoulder seams looked so weak I thought I’d better stop sewing this […]