2017 My Year of Sewing not Fixing

This year I will be doing more sewing. 

When Ivy decides something, Ivy does something.
I regretted hardly sewing in the last few years. I actually am an expert sewer (sewist? Better?). I even made my own wedding dress! I have been sewing for forty years, ever since my grandmother taught me. She taught me everything I know. I have never been to a single evening class to learn sewing.

However in recent years 

I have always only done the necessary. I did not bother making things which were merely decorative. Hence, I only made curtains, sofa covers, mended jeans, hemmed skirts, children's clothes, costumes, patched children's jeans, alter things - shirts, sleeves, hems and so on. The fixer. There was always a deadline. There was a reason. A practical, down to earth reason. It is needed, and it is needed now.
But this year I want to make something beautiful, stop being a fixer and become a creator. That is the first aim.

Now my first project

really, really should be a vintage dress. I bought the pattern already from Tesco Extra from the magazine stand (one of those magazines which caught my eye). It was an impulse buy, agreed. I will go for the one on the right (the third one, long sleeved). I like the the first one too but at my age it will look very auntie-ish. It would suit a young girl. You have been warned.

Second reason I need to sew: I am having anxiety attacks. This is due to doing crowdfunding my book. It is not for the faint-hearted. I'm finding it very tough. Although I am around 5 weeks in, and 41% funded, I do not know if and when my book is fully funded. I am human, after all, and people who buy books are human. No robot or machine can predict the outcome. Sewing is very calming, did anybody ever mention that? True.

Third reason:  After I had focussed at losing weight and sobering up, I am back to square one. Over the Christmas and New Year break, I put back on the 2 kg I fought hard to lose since September. It's alcohol and chocolates, I know it is. Three months' work down the drain. Sewing will not exactly help me lose weight but it will keep me from gaining weight, let's put it that way.