When I got old enough to have an opinion about what I wore, my mother would take me to the local department stores where we'd look at the latest clothes for sale. If I saw something that I liked, she'd take a good look at it and say "I can make this for a lot less.". So the next stop would be the fabric store. If we couldn't find a pattern to duplicate what was in the department store, mother would make her own.
For me, there were advantages to having an excellent seamstress for a mother. When I hit junior high school, I still pretty small and clothes my size off the rack in a store would have been clothes for kid's in elementary school. That wasn't too cool when you were trying to look like a teenager. I wore age appropriate clothes in junior high thanks to the sewing skills of my mother.
Mother, Karen, Linda and Me - all in Easter outfits made by my Mother. |
The lilac dotted swiss dress that my mother made and then, unfortunately, ruined it when she spilled what she thought was a thumb sucking deterrent down the front of the dress. |
My mother also sewed for people outside the family. Her ability to cut out a pattern and have fabric left over sometimes meant that I'd get an outfit when she made something for someone outside the immediate family. This only proved a problem when she made a jumper and blouse for her adult cousin. Her cousin was also a teacher who happened to teach at my elementary school. More than once, we both showed up at school in matching outfits since mother had sewn me a jumper and blouse from the left over fabric.
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