The Saga of the Baptismal Garment

I don't sew. Ever. Ask my husband, who is still waiting for a button to be sewn onto a dress shirt from almost 2 years ago. My aversion to the domestic world of sewing is almost humorous at times, as my last encounter with a sewing machine is still the cause of great amusement among my husband and sister-in-law Angela. Angela has determined I was not in Girl Scouts long enough; I remember sewing bean-bags for a fundraiser once, and it was terrible. I was way more interested in the outdoors and being more like my brothers at the time, and had no time for silly activities... like sewing. So how did I come to the decision to make our God Daughter Rachael's Baptismal garment? (NOT the gown, just the little simple cloth to drape over her!)




I blame Alexis. She, as Godmother to Isabella made a beautiful garment, with cross-stitching. (sorry, Alexis, I am not going to put a picture on here and shame my humble attempts ;-p) I had never considered that people actually made these little garments; they just appeared on the table in the church for the Baptism, right? So in the back of my mind since then has been the thought of how awesome it is for these things to be handmade. ggrrr.....


This admiration of Alexis was not enough to push me over the edge, though. Oh no. I was thinking, given my aforementioned history of sewing projects, that I would simply find a nice little all-white bib and at least buy Rachael something special. Do you have any idea how hard this turned out to be? Ridiculous! I tried calling every Christian store around, but to no avail. Nobody had sweet, plain little white bibs. I could get gowns. I could get candles. I could not get a simple all-white cloth anything. So...


Next I blame the very nice, helpful lady at the Catholic bookstore in Frederick, who after we chatted for a few minutes casually, enthusiastically, mentioned I could make one. WHAT? Who does she think she's talking to??? HAHAHAHAHAHAhahahahahaha......



So I'm standing in Wal-Mart material/sewing/area-I-never-go section. Why are there 50 choices for white cotton? Why is the sales-lady laughing at me as I pathetically tell her I need material but I don't know how much and I have NO idea what I'm doing? Why am I here? I then have to ask Angela to borrow her sewing machine, which evokes a suspicious and amused "Why?" and I tell her I have jumped into a realm of insanity and need white thread and a beer. I was happy to accept some guidance from her, which means that the end result was not nearly as bad as it could have been. No, no, it was good. Not great, and to all the seamstresses out there, stop laughing! This was a big deal to me! After engaging in a staring contest with the machine, and a comment from Patrick about it not doing all the work itself no matter how hard I tried to intimidate it, I was on my way. You know, despite my confidence with the speed connected to a gas pedal, I cannot say the same about the darn sewing pedal. That is just out of control! Scary!

And there it is. Dare to be impressed - not with my mad sewing skills, but rather with the insane determination that consumed me :) The embroidery was done by another sister-in-law Jennifer, with a fancy machine :) Father John was so impressed with the fact that it was hand-made he pointed it out to the whole congregation, suggesting the same thing for future Godparents.

Now, for the shirt button....