The Good Body. Mine. Yours.

Favourite Handyman's latest great project: edging the cactus corner with shell and bricks. You can see it half done here. The (relatively) tall cactus in the front is one we bought at the Fox River market when we had only been living on the Coast ten days. I think of it as "our" oldest plant of our West Coast life.

A pink tutu apron confection, sewn up tonight and now hiding until Brighid turns four next week. I cut and sewed this in less than half an hour! I never imagined I would raise a daughter so keen on pink and fluffy stuff. My only consolation is to know that she will be stomping around in this and her gumboots most of the year, not flitting around in ballet shoes. The skirt/apron is standing unaided in the photo, which is apparently what tutus should be able to do. Many thanks to Kristy of Lower Your Presser Foot for her very helpful instructions.

Sewing for myself, and reading endlessly about sewing for oneself, has been a very interesting project from the point of view of body acceptance. If you can alter a pattern, you can make something fit well for your shape right now. This is much less the case for fitting shop bought clothes. The plus size message board on Pattern Review has been particularly illuminating, putting me on to the trail of some fantastic blogs and explaining how pattern altering works so I no longer feel so enormous as I used to. Just in need of getting very good at doing something called an FBA.

Last year I started to read about fat acceptance. While some of the ideas were initially obvious, others took me a while longer to come on board with. I like this more recent article by Lady News on the arrogance and wrongness of assuming that only slender people can wear certain clothes. 'Fat shaming' is a new phrase in my vocabulary, but now I am on board, I notice it all the time. (For the record, I also like Lady News on pinkification)

My favourite blog post find of this week so far comes from Gertie's New Blog for Better Sewing. Drawing on some quotations from her yoga teacher (initially belonging to Eve Ensler), she writes both gently and powerfully about living in the good body, our own good bodies, the only ones we will ever have. If you have a moment, I really really recommend you read We live in the Good Body.

We are in the news again in Greymouth. Many many people in the media have something to say about recent decisions regarding the Pike River mine. I have my own thoughts about the decision to close the rescue operation but they don't matter. What matters to me is that I cannot imagine how I would act if my son died. I hear the pain of Bernie Monk, quoted endlessly in the media, angry at the closure of the operation. I don't recommend that anyone has the arrogance of telling our bereaved families they should 'put a line under it and just move on.'

Oh the kitchen. Of course the kitchen. I made sausage rolls today. Based on the Edmonds version, with their shortcut of bought flakey pastry. If you make sausage rolls yourself, you can sneak kale in to the mixture. They tasted good. Next time I shall make my own pastry, a double recipe and freeze half.

Comments

Megan said…
Have you read 'The Obesity Myth' - explores the lack of a clear scientific link between weight and health exposing a lot of cultural messages as out right descrimination. I found it a real eye opener - especially as I consider(ed) myself very well informed on the issue.
Sandra said…
Hi Megan. Obesity Myth was one of my most important reads of 2010. I've posted the links where I reflected on his ideas below:

http://lettersfromwetville.blogspot.com/2010/08/on-fat.html

http://lettersfromwetville.blogspot.com/2010/08/change-is-around-corner.html

http://lettersfromwetville.blogspot.com/2010/09/politics-of-food-gst.html

Popular posts from this blog

McCalls 7288 & altered Style Arc Barb pants

Livingstone daisies

Heartburn & Paris Etc