It's one of those things ... you know - makers, writers, musicians, lots of us have those little entry rituals that get us rolling - the traditions, or superstitions or obsessions - the things that help us enter into the process of making. For me it's getting my hands moving - not sewing, but folding or cutting paper or even just writing a list for the day. But it can't be any paper. Limp printer paper doesn't do it. It has to be heavy card stock, thick, unforgiving, sturdy. I need to feel the weight of it in my hands. So today I cut a dress out of thick gray letterpress stock, a favorite, wrote some ideas and sketches on it, and I'm off, into the wilds ...
For a long time I wanted to make up a ritual that would work for me - the favorite black-inked pen and square notebook for writing, the perfect cup of coffee before commencing - and I think a lot of people get stuck there, in the blank book aisle, panicked and wanting to attach the magic pre-emptively. But now that I've done this for a while I get that you don't choose it. You find your ritual by trying things, through flailing crazy trial and error, then you figure out what works and keep it. You do it backwards.
