Finding success outside work
My second go at quilting—one for my niece.
Yesterday my mom and I went to our local sewing shop. It has a very small selection of overpriced fabric, but I didn’t feel like making the 20-minute drive to Joann’s and because of my new inclination to be a placemaker in PB we headed to Sewing Machines Plus. As we walked in I headed to the fabrics and my mom stood there wide eyed at all the shiny sewing machines. A professional seamstress before she had kids, my mom was blown away. The endless options and limitless price tags on the machines made her jaw drop. “Look at all of these. And the prices.”
Most of the sewing machines were over $5,000. $5,000!
According to Google the average household income in the US is $79,900. So, 16% of the average US family’s income is going to purchasing a sewing machine?
Doubtful. It’s my guess the majority of these machines are purchased by white, upper class stay-at-home moms who have white bread-winning husbands. Generally speaking, these are the only women who have the time and excess income to sew for pleasure. They are looking for something that makes them feel accomplished, uses their brain and provides belonging and community in a group of other women like them.
I know this because I am one of these women.
Society tells us that much of our self worth and identity is tied to our jobs—the kind of job we have and how much money we make at that job. Now that I’m jobless, one of my greatest struggles is finding my new identity and self worth beyond being a mother. So I write this blog and I sew. I’m using my brain is ways I didn’t even know it was able to think in. I’m creating quilts that give me way more satisfaction in gifting than I ever had at work.
The problem is society doesn’t see the value because I’m not making any money.
Even my girlfriends see it as an opportunity to make a profit. When I showed several of my friends pictures of my quilts last weekend they all shouted in unison “you could sell these!”
“Oh thank you,” I say as I blush exnggeradtly.
I’m flattered, but the thing is I don’t want to sell them. For a lot of reasons. But mostly, I don’t have the time. I have two small kids. If I had the time to make and sell quilts, I’d probably be working (not that making and selling quilts isn’t working, but you know what I mean).
Society tells us that if we can monetize something it holds more (fabricated) value. However, because I don’t sell my quilts, but instead give them to my closest friends they hold more value for me. They make me feel accomplished, capable, giving, knowledgeable, talented—all things that society tells me I am not because I don’t have an income-generating job. And I think a lot of other stay-at-home moms who sew would agree.
