Friends, to say I have taken to Pinterest like a duck takes to water would be inaccurate, since a duck doesn't actually live in the water, whereas I am having a hard time prying myself away from my new favorite website without gasping for air.
To think that only four days ago I had no idea what Pinterest was all about and now I'm practically the poster child. It does seem like it's mostly women on that site or maybe they're just the ones posting the Rita Hayworth pics.
Some quick highlights:
1) Cathy fans will be happy to know that my identical cousin has her very own board that includes all her stunning outfits (collect them all) along with links to her glamorous photo shoots!
2) Forties fashion fans will enjoy my new 1940's ALL-COLOR beauty board, bursting with gorgeous vintage portraits, film stills, beauty ads, and more. New additions daily!
3) Everyone loves cute dog pics and I have some great shots of Freddy and Willy, as well as private (well, as private as anything you post on You Tube) home videos of them exercising on their treadmill -- fun, fun, fun!
Of course there's also plenty of sewing machines, tutorial links, and many of my favorite men's sewing projects. Put down the phone, pour yourself some coffee, and check it out!
While I'm certainly no veteran, with less than a week under my belt, I do see how Pinterest is an excellent place to collect images that you want to be able to access for whatever reason (sewing inspiration, for example). You can search the boards of other people who might have similar interests, or upload your own images. I find myself doing both. Best of all, the original link is always attached to the photo (unless you change it), so you can always return to the place you found it.
The layout is very user-friendly, and it's also easy to edit captions if more information about an image comes your way. Have I missed anything? A few questions:
1) I'm still not quite sure what the purpose of "liking" an image is, unless you plan to put it into a board at a later time.
2) If you have a blog, do you generally link photos to your blog only if they (the photos) are original to you, and to the place where you originally found them, if not?
In other news, I was thinking after yesterday's post, about whether or not sewing is easy. Readers, in my opinion, sewing is a lot of things -- fun, sometimes relaxing, often mind-expanding and even confidence-building -- but easy is not a word I would ever use to describe it. It bothers me to think of all the sewing machines sitting at the bottom of closets because someone had the mistaken impression that sewing was easy and got discouraged when they found out it was not.
Sewing is easy like hammering is easy. All you need is 1) a hammer, 2) a nail, and 3) a piece of wood. But there's a big difference between hammering a nail and building a bookcase.
And there's a huuuuge difference between building a bookcase and building a five-bedroom colonial with attached garage. Do you get where I'm going with this?
Sure, it's easy to press a pedal and sew two pieces of fabric together (provided you know how to thread the machine); it's a whole other thing to make a pair of boxer shorts -- and a different thing by an order of ten to make a man's shirt (or even a jersey wrap dress).
Sewing takes 1) perseverance, 2) ability, 3) the right tools, 4) time.
I think it's this last one that is the most challenging for most beginning sewers today. Learning to sew -- especially clothing -- is a big time commitment, which is probably the primary reason more people don't do it. Just as people used to buy their own home-building kits from Sears and erect their own homes, nowadays most people are more comfortable hiring somebody else to do it, so most of us end up with very few practical skills.
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| 1923 Sears house kit |
I get a lot of emails from beginning sewers, especially men, who don't know where to start, so I think I'll be addressing this issue sometime soon. It's easy to forget how daunting the whole thing can be when you're starting from zero, as many male sewers, in particular, are.
Readers, I'm curious to know what you think of my sewing/hammering metaphor, or if you can come up with an even better one.
When you talk about sewing with others, particularly people who express an interest in learning, do you ever describe it as easy?
What advice would you give to someone who wants to sew but knows absolutely nothing at all about it?
Jump in!
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