Sunday, August 15, 2010

Greetings

My name is Eileen, & I'm a fiberholic.

I love all types of fibers from sewing thread to luxury yarn & fabric that is made up of threads.

My maternal grandmother, Cecil, got me started on this journey.

She taught me how to hand sew, crochet & alter cloth to create clothes for my dolls.
When I was 15, she passed away, but she had imparted me with the love of creating with thread.

She gave me her sewing machine, which I still have. She didn't have a chance to really show me how to sew on it, but I was able to figure it out thanks to her keeping all of the instructions with it.

I used it once in high school to hem the pinafore on my drill team uniform.

Then a couple of times in my marraige to make doll clothes.

But, I really got in to sewing when my daughter. Alberie, was born. It was as if my grandmother's spirit was working through me. I made clothes for my daughter. I loved making frilly old fashioned Easter and Christmas dresses as well as Halloween costumes.
Later, when she began ice skating I created a lot of her outfits.
Then, I began enjoying quilting.

Before during & after my sewing I was usually doing some kind of fiber craft.
I crochet small things for my dolls & also embroidered clothes for my cousin's babies when they were born.

My grandmother gave me a stamped cross-stitch kit when I was about 10 & home sick.
I was hooked!

When I got married I discovered counted cross-stitch, & so my fiber obsession. kicked into high gear.

I loved collection different kinds of fabric to stitch on as well as all the colors of embroidery thread I could find.

Later when sewing was my main passion, I collected all kinds of fabric as well as sewing machine thread & patterns.

Have I mentioned yarn?

Well, that was always there in the background with my crocheting. I just loved the notions sections of the local Larsen's store. It was a little dept store in a strip mall I could walk to.

I would look thru the patterns, yarns, & threads.

As my daughter got older, I started going back to cross-stitch & crochet.

I had always wanted to learn to knit. Apparently my grandmother didn't know how, but my mom, Faye, tried to teach me a few times. We could never seem to get past casting on though.

Finally in 1999 I sat down with an old edition of "teach yourself to knit" book and learned how to cast on, knit & purl.

I knitted for a couple of years, then it kind of went on the back burner for a few years.

I wasn't really doing any crafts for quite a while, then on vacation in Northern Ca, I stopped at a little boutique called Monarch Knitting & Quilts, in Pacific Grove, Ca.

Well, that did it!!! I really got back in to knitting & my fiber collection really got obsessive.