It may not look like much to you but this is my #teahousedress sewed in beautiful dark blue linen I bought at the The Fabric Store a few years ago with my sister. I fell in the love with the linen and at the time thought I’d make a roomy wrap dress.

Then I came across this pattern from @sewhouse7 which is inspired by the lines of a Japanese kimono. For a fairly novice sewer like me this required careful concentration. The pattern is so well written, it was actually a pleasure to follow. I took the advice of others and sized down for a more fitted look. I am so so happy with the result - it is truly comfortable and beautiful feeling dress that doesn’t over expose or hide away oneself. The deep pockets and waist tie and box pleat at the back are my favourite details. I now want to make another three! 

I’ve felt for a long time that sewing my own clothes is a profound act of love to myself. Taking the time to make something for my specific shape and needs. To champion patterns by independent, female designers and purchase fabric from small businesses who follow sustainable practices and source their fibres ethically. To limit waste and save the leftover "scraps" for future making. 

There's a tension that I feel between wanting to care a lot about clothes, and not care too much at all.

In a time where collectively as a culture we own more material posessions that ever before; when fashion fads seem to come and go at whim; when clothing is cheaper and flimsier than ever; when garments are made by people who are underpaid, undervalued and overworked; when we dispose of so many still "wearable" things into landfill or dump by the garbage bag to our local charity shops (for them to deal with) in our pursuit of "joy-filling" minimalism - I want to say enough! I want to spend more time making and mending garments I will savour wearing, and save up for fairly-made items I can't make myself but will last a very long time. Because the process, materials, intention and feeling do matter. The ethics and disposing of our things matter too. 

Here’s to our clothes, and the stories we sew into them... 

ode to summer goes something like this:

you began slowly friend,
such a timid, mild beginning
I almost begged you to
turn it up a notch
so we wouldn’t need to light the fire
put on socks, wipe dripping noses

but then a few weeks later
we were in a heatwave, sweating -
and so began the irregular
shape of you this time:
hot and cold
dry and wet
smokey and clear
back and forth
again,

You’re circles around the mulberry tree
staining our fingers blood red on berries
prickles from the blackberry brambles,

You’re eagles soaring above our heads
and we marvel at your beauty
and your cunning, picking our chickens
off like popcorn,

You’re the mosquitoes we hear buzzing
around our heads at night,
always one we missed,
the damp air and the red bites
on my children’s faces

You’re the beautiful stone fruit
apricots, peaches, nectarines,
plums, pineapple, mangoes
zucchinis from friends,
the first from our own garden:
first vegetables grown in this place -
You’re the clothes that dry stiff on the line,
the bare feet and brown shoulders,
the sun on my cheeks, light on my face -

You’re the waxy sedum,
the tall hollyhocks, the mass
of pink valerian, the wavering lavender
the frenzied sound of flies
of bees, moths, wasps -

You’re the country shrouded in smoke
the land that burned (some still smouldering)
the loss of creature, plant, life, livlihoods
to great to count, so big to bear
omnicide we said,

You’re the confusion,
the disbelief, the knowing
our climate is changing,
people diverging
lamenting, regenerating -

You’re that time my family visited
when we ventured outside after dinner -
it was still light, and we basked
(all nine of us)
in the warm dusk:
sprawling on the grass
on the veranda,
reclining, chatting,
strumming a guitar -

We revelled in the blessing
of being able to gather like
we never could at our old home -

the soft grass, green leafy shade
space and peacefulness
a time I will tuck under my skin
to remember always,
our shared contentment

Dear home,
How do I sum up four years and seven months with you?

How do I begin to offer thanks
for the safe keeping and comfort
you have brought my kin?

Not only shelter -
a place to rest and work and create in,
nooks to fill with beauty,
stories weaved into the walls
and floors of you,

the sound of a lamb
pattering in the kitchen,
of babies crawling
and hiding in cupboards -
of wind howling
of rain on the tin roof -
the squeak of a child’s fingers
drawing fish on foggy windows
of trucks creeping past loaded with hay,
and the distinctive rattles of the local utes:
that’s Michael we’d say,
that’s Marty, or that’s daddy -

of the ground around you:
the gardens we grew,
what thrived, died,
the trees that survived;
fig, oak, plum, walnut,
pomegranate-
the vegetables you gave us,
flowers too

the pasture around our fence:
so familiar are the bumps and curves
the trees and grasses,
the games we played, dam we circled,
and the time Reu first rode a bike
and the afternoons we spent
carrying dead logs and sticks
for our wigwams one, two and three -

You hold so many moments, memories
firsts, birthdays,
newborn babies,
the school bus,
hundreds of loaves of bread baked,
thousands of eggs packed,
chickens plucked by the shed,
picnics on the grass -

of seasons, of struggle
and beautiful peace,
of drought and flood
bushfire smoke and thick frost
sunshine and full moons
and the stars that take our breath away -

there’s the old grey gum tree we can see when lying in bed,
the one I watch as I hang clothes out to dry,
that I never tire of watching sway in the breeze -
”give me a home among the gum trees” I think,
indeed,

of the people who came:
dear friends and helpful travellers,
strangers needing directions,
each of my siblings -

and all the creatures:
bugs, beetles, bees, mice
cats, snakes, a tiny dog
who chewed holes in our flyscreen -
the moths, butterflies, dragonflies,
grasshoppers, mud daubers,
swallow nests under the eaves,
frogs under the bath tubs,
kangaroos grazing,
echidnas by the road -
the wild geese and the tiny ducks in the dam,
black swans, turtles, yabbie claws too.

that we could lie on the trampoline
and look up through the branches of the big cypress tree
and spot birds resting:
galahs, cockatoos, sparrows,
parrots, magpies, and kookaburras -

I will remember all of these things,
and I will see myself sitting on top of the nearby hills
looking out at the sweeping granite country
farm land, dam, fence, forest, road:
and the sight of that tiny redbrick house with a green roof
where my eyes were always drawn first:
our home -
and remember you.

Autumn, she’s a gift to me
(and always my favourite season)
that soft sun,
slow golden unleaving -

she is the mandarin
I’m peeling with my hands
by the back door
(and all the pips I find
under my boys’ beds)
the sound of bees
about the verbena bush

she’s the morning frost,
the late afternoon walks,
sandpit tunnels, the birds
in the trees:
cockatoos, galahs,
magpies, crows, kookaburras,
goshawks, willy wagtails fanning -
and the two black swans
that appeared one morning
in the dam

she’s the velvet ears
of freshly born calves,
the green spear-tips
of daffodil bulbs
the brownest, driest, heat-bleached earth
soaked with longed-for rain
and the burst of bright bright green -

she’s birthdays and busyness
chickens, eggs, children, dishes -
the dance of wants and needs and jobs
the first boxes packed, virus caught,
windows thrust open, weeds pulled -

she’s the steam of morning, midday,
afternoon, late afternoon and evening tea -

she’s the season of letting
what must fall away, go -
of sitting gently with old shadows,
speaking kind words to fresh fears
but finding beauty there -

and oh, in all those golden leaves… ​