Podcast Transcript

Sarai
I'm Sarai.

Haley
And I'm Haley.

Sarai
And this is Seamwork Radio. Welcome back to Seamwork Radio, where we share practical ideas for building a creative process so you can sew with intention and joy.

Today we're talking about setting up a sewing ritual. We're going to cover some of the benefits of setting up a ritual, and then we'll show you how to create a creative ritual that fits your mood and attention each time you sew.

Let's start with our icebreaker for today. Haley, our icebreaker comes from Twist, and Twist says, “What fabric reminds you of someone else? I was on Emma One Sock’s website today and saw rib knits. I immediately thought of you, Sarai, sharing your love for them in the recent episode about designing a capsule wardrobe.”

That is so incredibly sweet. I love that. I love that rib knits make her think of me because it's such a cool fabric.
Haley
It is. You are a rib-knit kind of a gal, though.

Sarai
Rib knits are amazing. That's my favorite knit to sew with right now. I just bought a whole bunch of them because I See Fabric was having a sale, and I bought, I don't know, four different rib knits, I think, hoping I actually use them all.

Haley
I believe in you.

Sarai
All right, but back to Twist’s question: what fabric reminds you of someone else? Do you have any?

Haley
Yeah, I mean, I love styling people, and it's something that I think I have a talent for—picking out things that are very, like, I don't know, intrinsically someone’s style. My Sarai fabric, things that make me think of Sarai always, like a good neutral linen. Every time I'm at Mill End and I see some kind of peachy tan linen, I'm like, that looks like something Sarai would like. Or a dark, moody floral.

Sarai
Yes. My favorite.

Haley
When I see something with rainbow speckles in it, I always think of Meg.

Sarai
Meg, yeah.

Haley
And window pane checks, like a plaid, always make me think of my friend Rachel, because she's like, every time I feel like we go to a fabric store, if there's a good one of those, she's like, I want that. So I feel like I have a lot of fabric associations. There's not one that stands out.

Sarai
Yeah, I have a few, too. The ones you mentioned, for sure. There's a lot of prints, like the abstract, kind of, like, cool, modern, matisse-looking prints always making me think of Sienna, our video producer, that kind of style. Like, you can spot a Sienna print in a Sienna colorway. Those earthy tones that she loves. I feel like that really stands out to me.

I feel like there are definitely prints I've seen and thought, Wallis, who used to be our pattern maker. I feel like I've definitely seen some bright, fun prints that remind me of Wallis when I see them.

Haley
Yeah. She is a good taste and fun kind of campy, kitschy things.

Sarai
Yeah, for sure. I feel like there's so many.

Haley
I know.

Sarai
That's kind of fun to think about. I know it's fun when you have sewing buddies, because when you go to the fabric store, you can kind of pick things out in your mind for other people.

Haley
We actually have a channel we use Slack at work, and we have a channel called I think it's called Fabric Chat.

Sarai
Yeah.

Haley
And we just, like, share fabrics with each other there.

Sarai
Yeah. I think I started that channel for this very reason that I kept coming across fabrics that reminded me of other people.

Haley
Yeah. And I have used it often. I guess I didn't share it in Fabric Chat, but I should have. I saw this jumpsuit that had a Sopranos….

Sarai
…Oh, my gosh. Yes.

Haley
Toile print on it. And I think that some of the people who aren't Sopranos people were like, yeah, cool jumpsuit, Haley. And I was like, no, look at it. Look closely. Look at Tony in the pool with the ducks. Look at it.

Sarai
We should link that in the show notes. It was a Rachel Antonoff design, right? It was amazing. Just to describe it to you guys, it was like a traditional toile, so like a white background with blue, very kind of intricate scenes. They're usually pastoral scenes, but in this case, it was scenes from The Sopranos.

Haley
Yeah. That fabric made me think of me.

Sarai
It was pretty amazing. I wish we could buy that fabric.

Haley
I looked for it. I was like, I'm going to go to Spoonflower. I wonder if Spoonflower has Soprano's themed fabric. And it was like, there's nothing. If that one's a fabric designer, please do that, and I will buy all of it.

Sarai
I wonder if she had to license that in any way.

Haley
I don’t know. That's a good question.

Sarai
Yeah. Anyway, this was an awesome question. Twist. Thank you so much for sending that in.

And if you have an icebreaker for us for a future episode, you can leave it for us. If you're a Seamwork member, just go to seamwork.com/go/icebreakers and you can leave it there.

All right, so today we're talking about rituals. Rituals add structure, and they add reliability to your everyday life. And in sewing, or really in any creative pursuit where you have just kind of boundless options, framing that big creative expanse with some kind of routine or ritual can be really grounding.

And being grounded by a routine makes it easier to get started. And that's always the hardest part, at least for me, getting started is always the hardest part. What are your favorite routines just in your day-to-day life? Haley.

What are your favorite routines?

Haley
I think that I have a couple of favorite routines. After dinner time, Eric always just the dishes because I cook, so I'm not cleaning up my own mess.

Sarai
Yeah, same in my house.

Haley
And Charley and I always sit down on the couch and snuggle up under a blanket, and I put on a show of her choosing, and it's just like it feels like such, like, a beautiful pause in my day. It's always really relaxing, and, I mean, it's not always really relaxing. She just is not always very relaxing, but 90% of the time it's relaxing.

And I feel like I get off work, and there's always, like, a to-do list. I got to make dinner or work out or something that I have on my mind. And that's like the first time I really get to sit down, and it really divides my active part of my day from my restful part of my day. And that is one of my favorite rituals.

Sarai
Wow, that's nice. That's really sweet. I'll bet she'll remember that for a long time, too, that special time with mom.

Haley
Yeah, maybe. Or she'll just remember that she got to watch her favorite TV.

Sarai
Yeah, maybe she's more focused on the TV. You're right. I probably would have been.

Haley
I'll remember it, though.

Sarai
I think for me, I have a lot of routines in my life. I live off routine. My favorite ones are my morning routines because I find it really important to kind of set the tone for my day in the morning.

So I start work usually between nine and ten. So not that early, but I I get up pretty early and have a lot of things that I do to get prepared for my day.

I always start my day with reading. Lately, since it's been cold, we turn on the fireplace and snuggle up with a blanket. And usually Duke, because he loves the fireplace, he's very happy about the fireplace being on and read for, like, an hour, which is just such a luxury to be able to just, like, sit and sip your coffee and read for an hour. It's kind of a long time.

That's part of why I get up early, so I can do that. And then I meditate every morning, and I used to go for a walk every morning before starting work, which I really liked. And I think it's so important for me to get outside during the day, but lately I've been switching it up and trying to do that at lunchtime so I have a little bit more time in the mornings for other stuff.

And that's been really nice, too. I kind of like that break in the middle of the day, which I'm usually not very good at taking. So those are my really important morning rituals and my evening ritual, I work out after work, and that's really helpful to me to kind of reset after sitting at a desk all day long or most of the day, most days. So those are the things that kind of punctuate my day-to-day life.

Haley
Yeah, I feel like those rituals that create separation between the different paths we all have to wear really feel the most vital and impactful.

Sarai
Yeah, definitely. I think that's a good way to put it, that I think it's one of the functions of a ritual or a routine is to make those transitions easier.

When do you like to have a routine, and when do you like to be spontaneous?

Haley
When do you like having a routine the most in your life? And when do you like being more spontaneous?

Sarai
I like routine in a lot of things, or at least some planning in a lot of things.

I think times where I enjoy being spontaneous would be more like, for example, when I'm out for a hike or out for a walk, or when it's important for me to feel just very present and not focused on anything else. I think that's when spontaneity is the most important to me, that's like within the context of a specific activity like that. Spontaneity in general is important to incorporate. I think maybe that's more around like, relationships and being spontaneous with other people as opposed to the things that are a little bit more me-focused. What do you think?

Haley
Yeah, I was going to say that I think that the majority of the spontaneity in my life tends to be in more social settings. I mean that more like is in socializing not just with my friends, but also, like, with my husband or with Charley. Just like I like having dedicated time with people and spending some of it on a pre-planned activity and sometimes just, like, you know, go into the movies because you drove by theater and you think it looks fun. It's like definitely the move sometimes.

Sarai
Yeah.

Haley
So I think that's where spontaneity comes in the picture for me. I'm trying to incorporate it more in my creative time and just setting aside creative time and then kind of doing what I want with that, whether that's drawing or sewing or just kind of like feeling what my brain wants me to do in that moment.

Sarai
That's interesting. Yeah. I think with other people also there's an inbuilt spontaneity because you have to respond to their preferences and their needs. It's not just all about you.

Haley
Totally.

Sarai
With a routine or ritual, you can kind of build it the way you want it to be and you can afford to be a little bit rigid. But when other people enter the picture, you kind of have to be more responsive. So that's an interesting dichotomy, I think.

Haley
What about in sewing? What areas do you like to keep spontaneous versus routine?

When do you like routines and spontaneity in sewing?

Sarai
Oh, that's a good question. I think, I don't know if I would say routine, but I do like to plan out a lot of my sewing just because it keeps me more motivated and helps me to get started. I think otherwise, if I feel like I'm just going to do some spontaneous sewing, that happens sometimes, but a lot of times I just will choose to do something that's not as fun because I feel like I should, which is kind of weird. It's sort of like, you have all these fun things you could be doing around the house or outside, but you're like, well, I'm going to put that off because I have all of these activities I have to do or need to do.

I feel like I try to plan things as much as feels good to me.

I think the areas where I like to feel more spontaneous when it comes to sewing are more kind of the early stages of planning and thinking through ideas and just having fun in the design process or picking out details I want to add. I feel like that's where the fun and the spontaneity come in a little bit more for me.

What about you?

Haley
I feel like I go through phases. I've talked about this a little bit where I'm very drawn to planning and having all of my projects queued up and planned, and then there's times where I just kind of want to go with the flow a little bit. As a designer, I feel like so much of my time spent about thinking about sewing is thinking of plans. And so right now, I'm in a season where I'm very much into just flying by the seat of my pants when it comes to sewing.

So just for me, I don't know if there's like, one situation where I like being spontaneous or like being more methodical. It's just more responding to what I think I need for my creative practice in that moment in time.

Sarai
Yeah. I think another area that just came to mind from what you said is also with fabric. I feel like that's an area where that brings spontaneity into sewing. Like, you come across a fabric that you didn't know you would fall in love with. Like the Soprano's. Fabric.

Haley
Yes.

Sarai
I mean, if that you could buy that. But, you know, you see something and it just screams out to you to make something with it. I think that introduces some spontaneity naturally into the sewing process.

I just bought, like, a few different rayon challis that had that I saw on Etsy that had such pretty prints on them, and I'm still not sure exactly what I'm going to do with them, but it wasn't in my sewing plan, and that's okay. I have room for that. But I feel like that brings some spontaneity to the whole planning process.

Haley
You got to have wild cards.

Sarai
Yeah, it's part of the process.

All right, well, I'm going to talk a little bit more about the benefits of having sewing rituals, and then Haley is going to walk through some tips and ideas for you.

Why set up a sewing ritual?

Sarai

So just to kind of set the groundwork here. The reason that we wanted to talk about sewing rituals today is I think it really helps you to make the most of the time that you do have to sew.

And one of the ways it does that is it creates a reliable starting point for you. We were talking about the rituals we have in our daily lives and how those kind of create this transition period between two different activities that might require different mindsets—a sewing ritual can do the same thing for you.

Building in some very specific rituals around your sewing time can help you to transition your mindset and get you into that creative place so that you can just get started.

It really helps to remove those barriers you have to doing that—to just starting. It helps to get you where you need to be mentally, maybe even physically, if that's part of it.

Another thing I wanted to mention is that I wrote an article called 5 Ways to Just Get Started. And that can also help you out if you have trouble getting started. I definitely have some tips and tricks that I've learned over time, constantly relearning it, but we'll link to that below in the show notes.

And then another thing that I think rituals really help with is boosting your confidence. Because confidence means that you trust yourself.

Having a reliable ritual helps to build that kind of trust in yourself just because it helps you to show up.

And if you want to hear more about that, you can listen to episode 132 of the podcast, which is called Where to look for Confidence in Your Sewing Practice. I think this is something that people don't consciously think about a ton, is how to build confidence in their hobbies and their creative pursuits, including sewing. So I think it's really undervalued for a lot of us, or we might think about it obliquely, but we don't really intentionally think about building our confidence so that we can do the things that we want to do.

And then the last thing that I think it really helps with is encouraging your self-expression. I think having a creative routine gives you that outlet that you need to express yourself and really allows you to explore your thoughts and your feelings and do that in conjunction with your creative ideas. So I feel like having a routine can really help with that aspect as well.

So those are some of the reasons you might want to think about building a sewing ritual. And then Haley has some tips for you about how to actually do that.

Tips for Building a Sewing Ritual

Haley
So I think that one of the things that maybe get in people's way of building this kind of ritual is that they overthink it or think that it needs to be this really big, complex thing.

And what I would like to encourage you to do is to build a minimal sewing ritual.

Build a minimal sewing ritual

Haley

So this is something that can be kind of your groundwork. And you can add to this if you're feeling in a mood where you feel like you need to be supported additionally. But I think to start, if you're new to building a kind of ritual into your day, that keeping it simple is always going to be the way to go.

Create bookends for your ritual

Haley

So my formula for creating a ritual when it comes to sewing is that you're always going to have it book-ended with your setup and your cleanup, and what you want to do is build some kind of sensory experience into that.

I'm going to give you some examples of what those sensory experiences can kind of be.

• 
  The first one can be setting an intention for yourself, sitting down and making a plan. You can do this kind of mentally. You can write it out. I love writing as a tool for intention setting. I think it's really powerful and you don't need to make it about what you want to accomplish. In fact, I would encourage you to make it not about what you want to accomplish. Focus on how do you want to feel, what kind of project do you want to work on. It could even be something as concrete as your time limit or your time minimum. But just setting the tone for what you want from this experience is like a really lovely way to start.


• 
  My next tips will be more in that sensory line. So choose music or entertainment. You can listen to a podcast like this one—hey! A TV show? A movie? You can listen to an audiobook. Go make a kitchen run. Grab some snacks, drinks, definitely water, hydrate. Always light a candle or use some essential oils. If you are anti open flame in your sewing space.


• 
  Take breaks. I think this is a really underrated one. It stops feeling like fun. If you feel like you're on the clock, celebrate your progress. So take moments to pause. Snap a picture, admire what you're doing. Send a picture to a friend who also sews. If you don't have a friend who also sews, then you can go to the Seamwork community and we're all your friends who sew. So I want to see your progress.


• 
  You can share with someone, like I said, or you can even just journal it. If you're not like a big sharer, you can journal about it.


• 
  And then of course, at the end, I'm a big advocate of always having good space hygiene. So taking a moment in time to break down your space and just reflect a little bit on what you accomplished and what you're proud of.

Sarai
Yeah, I think that bookending part of it has been really transformative for me, because I think one of my big barriers to sewing is often like, I don't want to create a mess and I don't want to clean up a mess. And I think recognizing that it actually just takes about five minutes to set up and tear down totally has helped me tremendously to just get started.

Haley
Definitely. I think that, at the bare minimum, just having like a simple set up and breakdown and then a nice little gift in the middle. Or maybe the gift can be incorporated into the set up or the breakdown, but a little special gift for yourself so that it's not just like fully tactical.

Sarai
Yeah, I always like to make a nice tea before I get started, either like a chai or a nice herbal tea. And it's so calming at the same time. And that's how I want to feel when I'm sewing, just calm and enjoying the process.

Haley
Something about a beverage always feels like a gift. I ran my errands so I got to stop at the coffee shop because I need my little treat. It’s my motivation.

Sarai
If I could drink coffee all day long, I would. I would be having coffee and stuff.

Haley
I wish. I can't anymore, but.

Sarai
It's probably not great for you anyway, even if it's a decaf to drink all the time.

But I think these are some really awesome ideas. I'd like the idea of keeping it very flexible for yourself as well. And maybe there are a few ideas that you could use most of the time, but maybe there's a couple that are kind of your non-negotiables that you always do.

Haley
That's definitely what I think is the best strategy, because the thing is your ritual cannot be a barrier to getting started. It's supposed to be an aid in getting started.

If you make it too complicated, it's going to become a barrier. So just create something that's a really simple baseline, and then if you need additional support, then you can add those fun things in.

Sarai
Yeah, I think the other thing that helps me in terms of having a ritual and getting started is when you have a ritual, first of all, it takes away some of the thinking that you have to do in order to just begin. You can just kind of do it out of habit. This is what I do when I start, and you can make it as short as you need to.

That's what's really helpful to me when I'm having trouble getting started on something, any kind of project is making it as quick and easy as possible. So doing kind of the bare minimum, that will just get me going. People do this a lot with working out too. If I can just get my running shoes on, or whatever it is for you, and get out the door, and the rest takes care of itself.

Haley
Totally.

Sarai
So I feel like it's the same with sewing. And I think it's interesting because I think there's a lot of parallels there because at least for me, I enjoy exercise a lot, but it's still hard to get moving. Sometimes you just want to lay down and watch The Office or something instead. Especially when it's cold.

Haley
I'm like, I don't want to change. I don't want to change my clothes.

Sarai
I know.
Haley
It’s too cold for that. It requires taking clothes off and I just can't I do that with myself. When I work out a lot, I'm like, all I have to do is do a warm up. If I don't feel it after I warm up, then I have permission. And like 90% of the time I'm like, woo, let's go.

Sarai
Yeah, exactly. Well, that's why I think it's such a good parallel, because it's something that I enjoy. I enjoy working out, I enjoy sewing. But it's still hard to motivate myself because it's not easy. And I think the easy choice is often the sit in front of the TV or eat a cookie or whatever it is. Eating a cookie is—that’s an easy choice. That's always an easy choice. You could do that while you sew.

But I feel like with creative stuff, stuff that fills a deeper need than that kind of immediate gratification—which, nothing wrong with immediate gratification once in a while—then that's where it can be hard to get yourself motivated even though it feels good to do it.

Haley
Yeah. And I think that having like a really like yummy feeling ritual gives you that immediate, like, gratification, that little dopamine hit that you need right at the beginning when you're getting started before you've sewn or pressed anything.

Sarai
Yeah. And also I feel like it's a good reminder that you actually enjoy this. It's not work. Sometimes you need something concrete to remind you of that when everything feels hard. 

Well, this is awesome to talk about today. I think I'm going to try and work on a few more of these things. And I have a couple of these built into my rituals, but I feel like I could work a couple more in and make it even better.

So I'm just going to recap really quick what we talked about.

Recap

Sarai

We talked about the reasons why you might want to construct a sewing ritual for yourself. And the three main reasons I talked about were:

• It really just helps you have a starting point that's reliable for yourself.


• It helps to boost your confidence and trust in yourself.


• And it also helps to encourage self-expression.

And then we talked about some of the ideas that you could use to build your own sewing ritual. I'll just run through those real quick, which are:

• First of all, bookending it with setup and teardowns, setting up your space and then cleaning up after you're done.


• And in between, some of the rituals you could incorporate are setting an intention for yourself, particularly around how you want to feel as you sew.


• Choosing your music or your entertainment while you sew.


• Snacks and drinks, lighting candles, or just creating a nice sensory environment for yourself.


• Make sure to take breaks. So you could build in a break into your sewing ritual.


• Celebrate progress and share with somebody when you're done.


• Or even just journal it to kind of seal in the lessons learned when you're finished, which I think we could do a whole episode on journaling for sewing or journaling for creative activities generally. I think that would be really fun to talk about.

So what's your big takeaway from this episode, Haley?

Haley
It's funny that you lingered on the journaling because I was going to say that is definitely my big takeaway is I do keep a little journal that's hybrid sketchbook journal, and I like, kind of, I don't know why I don't really use it. I plan on sewing things in there, but I don't really document a lot of sewing stuff in there, and so that's kind of inspiring me to try that out and incorporate that into my sewing ritual next time.

Sarai
Yeah, that's an interesting idea. I tried to start a sewing journal earlier this year or maybe late last year, and it didn't really take, but it's something that I would like. I already have two other journals, so I think it was just journal overload. But I do think, like, having some kind of a process for that would be really cool and helpful, even if it was very lightweight.

Haley
Totally.

Sarai
I think my big takeaway from this episode is more about the importance of the sensory experience around sewing and making that really pleasant for yourself. Yesterday while I was sewing, I was sewing all day and the sun came out, and my office gets really hot, like really hot when the sun is out. And I was sweating. I was so hot. I was filming too, and I was really shiny on camera, and then my machine got a snag in the thread and started jamming up.

Haley
Oh no.

Sarai
And I was so hot, and I got so angry all of a sudden.

I was just like, “of course!” You know when you do that. I got so angry for a second and then I calmed myself down. I was like, I'm just hot. Anyway, long-winded way of saying that I think the way you feel physically has such a bearing on what you're able to accomplish and how you feel about what you're doing. So I think paying a little more attention to that would be really helpful for me.

And speaking of which, if you are thinking about doing anything new with your own sewing space well, I constantly am, so if you're like me, you probably are too. We have a free download called the Ultimate Guide to Setting Up Your Sewing Space. And it's a free mini-guide and it has tons of tips and ideas for creating a better and more functional sewing area. No matter how much space you have, whether. You have a big, dedicated space or you have just a little corner of your house that you use and have to tear down every time, no matter what, there's some really great tips in there for you.

So if you're interested in that, you can download it at Seamwork.com/go/sewingspaces, and we'll link that in the show notes as well on our website. And if you liked this episode, we would love it if you would leave a review for us. We have a review today that I'm going to read, which is hilarious, and it's from Putcastle. And this person first of all, it's titled “I'm a Real Nerd.”

Me too.

This person writes, “When I first joined Seamark and found out they had a podcast, I thought, what kind of total sewing NERD”—that’s in all caps—“Would listen to a sewing podcast? Well, three weeks later, and I'm making steady progress on the backlog of delightful episodes, I caught the sewing bug, and I love having this to listen to when I can't be at my machine.”

I'm glad we can convert you into a nerd.

Haley
I love the slightly backhanded compliment nature of this review.

Sarai
That's kind of a compliment.

Haley
It is. I'm here for it. Thank you, Putcastle.

Sarai
I mean, 100% compliment is nice, but this one made me laugh.

Haley
Yeah.

Sarai
So it's much better.

Haley
Funny compliment is always superior.

Sarai
Yeah. Thank you so much for that. And we super appreciate your reviews and your ratings. So if you have a moment, whether you're using Apple podcasts or Spotify or any other app, if you could just take a moment, leave us a rating or a review, we would love to appreciate it. We would love to appreciate it. We would love it and appreciate it and love to appreciate it. So go ahead and do that, and we might read it on the show.

And that does it for us this week. I'm Sarai.

Haley
And I'm Haley.

Sarai
And this is Seamwork Radio.