Skip to main content

We Make Things: Intro

I come from a family of makers, so when I began writing down stories of them, I figured writing what they made was the most sensible.  The DIY trend was not a trend for me in my life, it is my life.  My mother comes by the making rather naturally.  Both of my maternal grandparents were Midwestern children of the depression, and making items was useful as well as necessary.  They were incredibly resourceful people, a trait which they passed down to their children.  On my father’s side, I think my grandparents were makers for pleasure.  My grandmother doodled and wrote all her life, and had the creative clean chaos in her home that I so understand as an adult.  I’m not sure about my grandfather.  From stories passed down through my family, I know he was handy, but I’m not sure how well he was handy.  The evidence of this is the deck in my parents’ back yard.  Every year my dad replaces more and more pieces of my grandfather’s handy work to create something sturdier.

Now why do I find this important to talk about now?  Why must I have a quarter life crisis and delve into my making past?  Good question.  Well, my grandmother Jeanette passed away in August of 2015.  This was a shock to my system.  I had seen her not 2 days before she had died, discussing my upcoming wedding and the work needed to be done on my dress.  It stung to know that she would never see the end result.  Throughout the proceedings for her memorial, one theme came up: what she made.  We had examples of her sewing and painting, and every granddaughter discussed the projects we made whenever we would spend weekends with her as children, and in my case as an adult.  The first thought I had at the end of the memorial was “I need a sewing machine.”  So, I bought one.  Out of the blue.  And began focusing a great deal of my energy on making things that were useful.

While my family are prolific makers, I had a hard time finishing projects.  I would start something, think it was useless and discard it.  There are a few things I finished, like my thesis film for animation and crocheted hats, but for the most part, I was filling my apartment with supplies for projects that I had no reason or desire to finish.  But after Grandma Jeanette passed away, I felt the need to make things, and I have.

To be in my family is to make, and I want to share that with the world.  We make things to be useful, to be cost effective, to be busy and to make things look how we want.  We make to be quiet, to be social, to be us.  Making is a way of life, and I really want to share that. 

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

We Make Stuff: I Make Popcorn

This reflection comes from a series of facebook posts by my family.  And with all things, because I am one hell of a defensive human being, I’m going to give a little context. My fiancĂ© and I rarely eat at home.   We both work full time, and for a teacher that means 11+ hour days every weekday.   I get home around 6-6:30, and he gets home around the same time.   Generally, the best we can do is pop something frozen in the microwave a rock what I like to call fancy hotdogs.   What are fancy hot dogs?   The nicer sausages at safeway that have stuff in them.   Like apples or mangoes or your hopes and dreams.   The usual.   As a woman, people began to give me a little grief that I couldn’t “Take care of my home.”   Did my fiancĂ© hear this?   Not sure, he doesn’t talk much.   However, I will always bow to societal pressure, so I started making dinner on Sunday nights because we had a little more time and it left me a ...

Too Many Interests

There's a saying:  Jack of all trades, master of none.  Which is how I feel more than 90% of the time.  I can do a handful of things fairly well, but I can't do any particular trade particularly well.   What you will see in this blog is a smattering of what I like as well as some family stories mixed in.  This list includes but is not limited to: Drawing Painting Animating Music Sewing Embroidering Crafting Needle felting Knitting Crochet Croquet Food Eating Building Breaking Teaching Dog walking You know, usual stuff.  Tutorials mixed in, one hopes, as well as completed projects.   I can't promise much outside this, but I'll try to amuse you like a sewing, dancing Schnauzer puppy.  Like my Schnauzer puppy.  He amuses me. I might also complain about messing projects up.  That's likely too. No matter what, I'm going to enjoy myself and I hope you do too.

Me Made May 2018: AKA Me Made Maternity

Yes, you read that title right.  I'm going to attempt Me Made May for the second time.  Oh, and I'm 20 weeks pregnant.  Yeah, so it's been a process.  My little buddy girl has just started to pop out a little, so I've been making the move into maternity wear.  The first trimester was actually somewhat mild compared to those in my new mother's support group thing.  I had fatigue and nausea, but overall it wasn't like the worst thing.  I mean, I slept a lot but I think that was my body preparing for insomnia to come.  And the second trimester, which many call the best trimester, has been good so far.  The body changes have been weird, and I feel like I have a new body like every few days, but other than that it's been fine so far.  Luckily, I'm tall, so she has plenty of space to move around.  I have a feeling that my blog posts for Me Made May will have a similar "Baby Update" vibe to them, but if I've learned anything about how I ...