Tuesday Sewing Nights

          Every Tuesday evening my friend Amy packs up her sewing machine, sewing box and whatever project she is working on and comes over to my house for dinner.  After we tuck the children in for the night we turn the kitchen into a sewing room, put on some tunes and sew until we are too tired to do another stitch.  

I have wanted to write this post forever, but was having trouble finding the words.  Then last fall I had a conversation with a patient that helped me find my way here.  I asked her if I could share her wisdom and she said that I could.  Through the course of our day we found ourselves talking about crafts.  I freely admit that this is a common source of conversation for me.  At one point Amy who was acting as our charge nurse that day came in to help me with this patient and we told her about our Tuesday Sewing Nights, and this is what my colorful patient had to say on the matter,

“You know what? That is what is wrong with women these days.  We used to get together, to do blankity whatever, can, sew, knit, quilt.  And now we don’t.  You know what was important about those times?  It wasn’t the blankity that we were making, it was being together.  It was figuring out this blankity life with one another, it was supporting each other through the blankity-blankity stuff that gets thrown at us. It was our time to celebrate joy.  If women started making those times a priority again, I think we could deal with all of the blankity in this world much better.”

I have found everything that my patient said that day to be true.  We are not only exercising the artistic parts of our brains, we are figuring this life out.  In the middle of deciding if this fabric goes with that fabric, we are tackling life’s obstacles together.  Trying to find away to keep a calm, clear head in the midst of a storm, and having a good cry while we are at it.  We decide how to use our lessons, and if we are going to let our scars dictate our future.  We have learned that Amy’s ability to navigate tasks after 10:30pm is greatly diminished.  Also we have recognized and embraced the fact that I am not the tidiest person (think stacks of fabric, papers and books, not vermin). There is a lot of laughing, especially when discussing the shenanigans of our little ones, and we celebrate the people that we see them becoming. 

I am so thankful that we stumbled onto Tuesday Sewing Nights.  I don’t think that either one of us realized what we were creating for ourselves, but I know that we both understand how much it has helped us continue to grow into the women that we are supposed to be and also we get to make cool things. You couldn’t ask for more than that.