Making it work during transition
Quilting isn’t exactly the most portable hobby I could have chosen a couple years ago. I had wanted to learn to knit. But when I shared that idea with my husband he had strong feelings against it. He pictured in his mind future Christmas and birthdays opening presents with homemade knit sweaters with one arm longer than the other. He never has been much of a sweater guy. So it just so happened I learned to quilt. It really was an accident. I can tell you more later. But the point is… our lifestyle isn’t super conducive to all the things that come with quilting.
For example, we came to visit our home country in October. Eight months later we are still waiting out a pandemic. It hasn’t been easy. We stayed in Oregon and visited our family. Then, we flew to Georgia to visit friends for what we thought would be a couple weeks. Now we wait… we don’t know how long we will be here. But one thing is for sure, I’m sure glad I brought my sewing machine with me.
In each place we have stayed I have been able to find a small place or table to set up my machine. Is it ideal? No. Is it convenient? Definitely not.
Let me give our current living situation as an example. We are currently staying in a friend’s basement. Think creepy, with lots of spiders and only two windows and you have the right picture. All six members of our family are sleeping in one room. Well, I guess that’s not totally true, my 1 year old sleeps in the closet of said room. When we got here two months ago there wasn’t a chair in sight or a table for that matter.
All right, all right, that isn’t actually true either. There was a brand new pool table taking up most of what would be considered a living room. And I must confess, I cried the first night we got here. You see we weren’t actually sure what the living situation was going to be. We just knew that we would have a kitchen, washing machine, dryer and some beds. So really, there’s nothing to complain about.
After we were able to settle in as well as we could, I bought two chairs from a thrift store and we found a folding table in a back room. This quickly became my area to plan out my kid’s homeschool, work on projects, and sew.
This little area has been my place of peace and sanity during this strange time. Usually it isn’t quite this picked up, because it’s common to find me am helping one of my kids with school, or in the middle of developing a pattern, or arguing with my one year old to eat her vegetables instead of throw them on the floor.
Oh, and did I mention this is in the kitchen and right between our only bathroom and door to outside? It’s basically in the middle of chaos. Here is my real point. It isn’t ideal and I’m not near as productive as if I had more space or my regular set up. But it’s something. It’s better than nothing and it serves it’s purpose.
If we ever get back to our flat, my sewing desk will feel extravagant. But for right now I am making it work where I’m at with what I have. Now next week is a whole different story. Next week we start driving across the country back to Oregon… There is sure to be a story and some adventures awaiting. I’ll keep you posted.