The Reindeer Keeper

 IN RECOGNITION of SEPTEMBER BEING NATIONAL SEWING MONTH I have written extensively about my mother’s fabric shop which was attached to our home out in the country where I spent many a school evening ‘designing’ outfits instead of doing homework, especially math. When I was in my preteens my grandmother taught sewing on Saturday mornings during the winter in my mother's shop. That is where I learned about darts and inseams, marking, and pinning patterns and secrets on how to cut patterns out. While it took me forever to trim a pattern, pin it to the fabric, and cut it out, my grandmother did it in lightning speed. And when she was not the instructor, she would be in her home, in her sewing room sitting at her little black Singer sewing machine with a tape measure around her neck, pumping the foot pedal and turning out one beautifully sewn item after another. She had the eye for her artform and when you have the eye, creativity is the driving force. My mother also had the eye. She w...

For a time, my mother had a fabric shop out in the country. It was an addition added on to our home. The best thing about that little fabric shop was that it provided me hours of creating when I shut the door in the evening. I'd tell my mother I was going to do some homework. I did do homework for a while. But when it came time to do my math, I'd turn my attention to the bolts of fabric and the pattern books, and especially the antique hutch full of items used to make hats. That antique hutch was so much more than a hutch. It was magical. Full of colors and possibilities. Before I began my creating, I'd take loose leaf paper and scribble some designs. To get the juices going, I'd open the pattern books and look at the sketched models for different ideas and ways to wear the hats. Most of the models on the pages wore hats, especially in Vogue. I guess I thought I was a hat designer. Anyway, hat frames came in different shapes. Once I decided on the frame, the fun beg...