Several years ago while getting ready to have a bunion surgery I learned that the bones of my feet go off to the left/right accordingly, rather than going straight like they should. This creates a bit of swelling on the top of my feet, that sometimes makes standing, and walking annoying, painful, irritating.
Problem is, I love shoes. Shocking I know. I don’t like just any shoes, I like shoes that match my personality, a little quirky and a lot of fun. Wearing knee-length skirts when working makes it nearly impossible to wear socks. So on a trip I picked up these socks that don’t show. Perfect, right? I get said socks on, and after a little while they slip. Seriously. They slip, the shoes come off, allowing me the opportunity to contort to fix them. Then I realized I’m clenching my toes in a futile effort to keep the socks on my heels. When walking, clenching the toes is 1) painful and 2) ridiculous, off with the socks! off with the socks!
With the socks off I’m now walking normally. YAY.
You might be wondering why I’m sharing this tidbit, on a quilting blog. As you no I’m not normal. Everything in life can, and should be related quilting. Everything. From coffee, tea, and wine drinking, to what we wear on our feet whilst walking or sewing. I sew barefoot at home, and will remove shoes to stitch when teaching.
If something isn’t working
change it
Wearing the socks wasn’t working for my feet, so I changed what I was doing, taking the socks off so walking easily and without pain was possible.
If the thread you’re using isn’t working – change it
If you don’t like the fabric – change it
If you don’t like the batting – change it
If your ears and shoulders become one body part – change how you’re sitting
By changing the thing that isn’t working the thing we’re doing becomes easier to do. If a pattern calls for making half-square triangles this way, and you do them that way no one will ever know because the quilt will be done and you will be happy with the process of the quilt.
Hanging onto things with all of our physical strength because this is the way it *should* be done just makes the work painful. Pain-ful. As evidenced by walking around on a concrete floor for two days with slipping socks.
I’m off to figure out some piecing on a quilt.
Happy Stitching,
Teri
PS – check this out: Little Miss Mustard Seed’s post better to create crap than nothing at all.
There are some little socks by Sketchers that have a little bit of clingy stuff on the heel. They don’t slip on me and they are the only ones I have found that don’t. Bought them recently because I thought they were worth a try and they worked for me.
Thanks Paula, I’ll take a look for them.