Friday, December 21, 2012

Good vs. Perfect

 I sewed a little this morning and then we ran around first to the eye doctor  for Jack's last post op visit and then to Lenscrafters for new glasses. Jack is so funny with his new glasses. He is looking all around at everything like it is all new to him. After his cataract surgery neither of the lenses in his glasses were right and it was too soon until today for a new prescription. While we were waiting the hour for his  new glasses home I walked around the mall until I was tired and then we sat and people watched. We stopped at home for a short time and then went out to dinner for my birthday.
 After dinner I sewed a little more. It is good that the sewing today was on and off as that gave me a little time to settle my thinking. When I was still working ( hard to believe it was 16 years ago) I worked with someone who said "the enemy of good is perfect". I should remember that. I guess I do remember it but not when I am trying over and over to make something perfect.  I was working on and off today on my black and white challenge piece. I am down to the last long seam; I started the day with 3 seams to sew and', as I often do when I am almost finished,I got compulsive about making my points perfect. I guess in the back of my mind there is the thought that I don't want to slack off and become sloppy about my workmanship just because I want to finish.
I will not tell you how many times (double digits)I reworked the points at the top and lower right in the photo on the left.I started fussing about a difference of one or two thread widths that were not quite perfect. Every time I took out the stitches it looked worse. I finally settled for what I probably had to begin with and used my black Pigma pen to fix it. It was probably better before I did that too but none of it is going to show at all once this is quilted.
 
These next two photos are of a section I did a couple of weeks ago. I was in a more sensible frame of mind and while I could see that the points did not come together perfectly, they were good and did not matter in the overall picture as, you can see in the second shot below that is not such a close up shot.
Tomorrow (I guess that is really today but until I go to bed and sleep and then get up it is still Thursday and not yet tomorrow) I will sew the last seam and then I will put this to rest for a while. It will probably stay up on my wall so I can look at it and agonize about the quilting.
 

3 comments:

Lori said...

Very nice. I guess we're all up late tonight.

Ramona said...

That is a good saying. I too have ripped out many a seam and am trying to lighten up a bit without becoming a total mess!

kathyf said...

Happy Birthday to an almost perfect person who taught me about fixing things with a pigma pen...