Failure

I’ve been regularly performing in front of people for a good, long time . .. . probably 15 years or more. If you are in the performing arts, you know that you can’t have a perfect 15 year run. There will be mistakes and there will be failures. I think I’ve had pretty much everything happen to me:

• I’ve forgotten words
• I’ve forgotten notes (THAT was weird)
• I’ve lost my place in the music and had to invent words
• I’ve missed my entrance
• I’ve forgotten a costume piece
• I had an accompanist who was playing who the heck knows what and I had NO IDEA where she was . . she hissed at me.
• I wrote down the wrong hymn number, so I had so pretend I knew the words to the hymn WHILE “leading” the congregation.
• I’ve had music fall off of the piano while playing.

Pretty much, nothing surprises me.

I’ve been sewing regularly for about five years. Not as long as performing, but long enough to have experienced plenty of mistakes and failure there as well. Things such as:

• Sewing the right side to the wrong side.
• Using a 1/2 inch seam allowance instead of a 1/4 inch.
• Cutting the fabric with the picture picture upside down.
• Trying to sew my finger to the fabric. (Yeouch!)

And most recently, making a set of pajamas for DS2, winging the pattern, and having them turn out WAAYYY too small. I’m totally bummed about this failure because they turned out so good in every other respect. I upcycled a man’s dressshirt for the pj’s, so I didn’t have to sew a placket with buttons and didn’t have to sew a collar, the two trickiest parts of making a shirt. I was so pleased with myself.

See, cute pajama shirt with matching bottoms.

Note the collarless look, the nice stitching detail on the sleeve and the litte mini pocket at the bottom. (Granted, the pocket was just luck, but it was a nice touch, none-the-less.) And see how the stripes line up nicely on the pants?

When I put them on him, I just had to laugh. The pants were in no way big enough to accomodate the giant diaper butt. And so, there were casualties, quite a few casualties.

I thought the shirt might be better . . . . no such luck! He looked like he was trying to show off his pecs, it was so tight! From the back, it looked okay.

From the front . . . . he was busting out!

Oh well. I tried. Maybe I can fix the rips and keep it for baby #4 . . . . then again, maybe not!