Let's meet Susie Gay (Part 2)

 

 Today we conclude our interview with Susie Gay.

13. What other hobbies, interests, do you have?

I love making jams, preserves and relishes. I give most of it away to friends and family. (I have a standing request from our son’s best friend for shipments, especially the Brandied Peach Jam.) There’s something about seeing all of those gorgeous, colorful jars stacked up in my pantry just waiting to be enjoyed! I also do a lot of gardening because we have a very big yard with “old forest” trees, some well over 100 years old. I sing in our church choir and occasionally do solos, and have always participated in choirs wherever we were stationed. And I read: history, autobiographies, biographies, embroidery and sewing books and magazines…anything to keep my mind active and learning.

14. How often do you travel to teach?

I travel about 4-6 times a year to teach. I enjoy travel (after all that we did during my husband’s Army career, and after living overseas for nine years). But when I get home, I take a day to recuperate.

15. Have you a favourite location where you most enjoy teaching?

I very much enjoy wherever I teach. It’s always fascinating to meet new people and see their town (city, etc.) from their own perspective. I always learn so much. So many Guilds/Chapters have wonderful venues where they arrange the workshops. And of course, there is the food: interesting restaurants, great potlucks….you can’t stitch on an empty stomach! And I’ve always been hosted by kind, wonderful, talented and interesting ladies who don’t mind showing their sewing rooms. I’ve picked up quite a few ideas from their sewing spaces.

16. Where can we see your projects?

My classes are posted on my website, www.berryhillheirlooms.com. My blog showcases many other projects, techniques and ideas (along with a few recipes) at http://berryhillheirlooms.blogspot.com More of my ideas are posted on my Berryhill Heirlooms Pinterest board. I’ve been published in Creative Needle, Sew Beautiful, Classic Sewing and our own wonderful SAGANews.

Susie's Doll Opera Cape featured in SAGANews, Volume 36 Issue 2

                                            

17. What do you do with your completed projects?

Most of my completed projects I have to keep because they are samples for classes. My grandchildren are too old now for me to sew clothing for them, and they live in Dallas: too far for me to do regular fittings. I give some items away as hostess gifts, and others go to friends.

18. Do you have favourite colors that you tend to use more than others?

I tend to use more of the warmer colors for clothing that I make for myself. A favorite color is a warm red, which is the color of the Army Field Artillery, my husband’s initial Army Branch. When I’m designing I try to keep in mind what other people might prefer and will work with the cooler colors.

19. Have you had another type of career other than in the sewing area?

I have always worked (for pay) in some way or other. But it was difficult “having a career” with my husband’s military career. Someone had to be home to run the house and raise the children because he worked extremely long hours, and was often gone for long periods of time. From 1981 to 1985 I taught heirloom arts (smocking, shadow work, fine embroidery) and construction classes. When we shipped overseas the first time in ’85, spouses were not allowed to have a home business because the government paid for the living quarters one way or another. Spouses were also not allowed to use the Military Postal System to ship business items. And you definitely could not use the German Bundespost for business…that was verboten. So I signed up with Civil Service and worked at various jobs for several years. My most enjoyable CS job was as Food Service Manager of five Day Care Centers in Germany. I had to completely revamp the entire menu, kitchens, train the cooks and also work with the Family Day Care providers. Our Division won an award as the best in Europe, but I was not there to receive it because we had shipped back to the States…story of my life!

20. How do you see the future of your sewing career?

I plan to continue designing and teaching as long as possible. I love the challenge, which keeps me young. I would love to publish a book of some of my designs and projects, but I’m too busy to put it all down on paper right now. Submitting projects to magazines is always fun because I don’t necessarily have to design to be a teachable class. 

                                                           

Susie's scissor case- a class at Winston-Salem 

                                                            
21. What do you do to recharge your creative spark?

Teaching workshops will definitely recharge me because I see other sewing rooms, new ideas, different items people have made, and participate in sewing discussions when on the job. Browsing through my sewing and embroidery books will get my mind going, as does the internet. Sometimes the best way for me to recharge is to clean up my sewing room after finishing a big project or deadline, and just sit at the table with a cup of coffee or tea and dream about the next thing(s) I want to make.

Susie teaching at a SAGA Convention

22. What technique still can’t you get the hang of….

Most of the techniques I learn I figure out pretty quickly. But the one that really stops me are those darned “twisted” bullions with umpteen wraps that Kari Mecca taught years ago…still can’t get that!

23. What accomplishments are you most proud of?

Well, where do I start? I guess #1 is surviving my husband’s 27-year Army career and we’re still married! We did 17 moves in 26 years...not easy. And today’s young military careerists have it even worse: my prayers go out to them and their families. #2 are our children. They learned so much from the different places we lived, became fluent in German, love to travel the world, have successful careers and both are married to wonderful spouses. #3 are the grand children who are precious and way too full of energy and enthusiasm! #4 is my sewing and designing career and business, something I wanted to do for a very long time and is now a reality.

24. What is the biggest enemy to your creativity?

Me, plain and simple. I can get distracted too easily so I set specific goals for each day. I even set timers on my phone to limit certain chores or projects so I don’t ‘go down the rabbit hole’ spending too much time on one thing. I’m much happier and creative if I know I’m getting everything done, or at least working a little on each sewing/stitching project, every day. And don’t even begin to mention the house chores….that shuts the creative juices down way too easily.

Thank you so much for this interview, Susie! See you in Winston-Salem!

More Christmas Angels

These two angels were made using a pattern from an old Creative Needle magazine. 

The design appeared twice in issues of Creative Needle, both September/October issues and one dated 1997. The designer was Martha Parker.

I used left over scraps of fabric and lace to make them and the wings are made from vintage doilies that have seen better days. The hair is perle cotton. The wreaths are buttons.

Enjoy!

Let's Meet Barbara Meger!

Barbara Meger is a SAGA approved teacher and at present is leading a Smock-Along for SAGA which is available to Members Only, through the SAGA website (www.smocking.org). In this blog, Barbara gives us a little insight into her life and her smocking.

Thoughts on Smocking

My eyes have been opened in recent years to the depth and variety of expression that smocking can provide.  Research for the lecture “Smocking—Yesterday and Today,” which I presented at the March 2014 opening of the exhibition “Smocking—Fabric Manipulation and Beyond” at the Lacis Museum of Lace and Textiles in Berkeley, California, turned up so much more than little girls’ smocked dresses.  For hundreds of years stitchery has been used to control fabric fullness in decorative as well as utilitarian (19^th Century shepherds’ smocks, for example) ways.  Today, we see smocking on television, in mail order catalog offerings and used as a purely creative art form.

I have adopted a mission to open stitchers’ eyes to these many possibilities and get them to think “outside the box” (yes, that is the name of one of my classes!) when it comes to smocking.  I also encourage stitchers to not stitch in a vacuum, but to broaden their exposure with other types of needlework.  It is amazing how one medium can transform and enrich another.

For a complete listing of my classes, go to www.classiccreationssmocking.com

 

 

Background

We all start somewhere:  I must have started sewing when I was 5 or 6 or whenever my legs were long enough for the old treadle sewing machine we had.  I grew up on a farm in southwestern Missouri where sewing was an integral part of nearly every woman’s life—you made it (curtains, slipcovers, pajamas, evening gowns, patches for the men’s overalls, etc.) or you did without.  An aunt was my inspiration—she won all sorts of awards for her sewing through the 4-H organization where we all learned the correct way to do everything or ripped it out!  Eventually my mother got a new Singer and we didn’t have to go to Grandma’s anymore to get buttonholes made.  I just figured I’d become a Home Ec (that’s what it was called then) teacher but tossed out that notion after 10 weeks in junior high with an incompetent teacher.  We had moved to central New York by that time.  I sewed all through high school and college, even once designing and making a set of wrestling cheerleaders’ uniforms!

Going Green-inner detail

 

Hand sewing came later; though I vaguely remember my great-grandmother showing me how to do stamped cross stitch when I was really little.  I ordered and stitched numerous needlework kits from The Stitchery—never allowing myself to get a new one until the current project was completed.  (Whatever happened to that discipline!)  We moved to Crofton in suburban Maryland in the late 1970’s.  There was a wonderful needlework shop where I started taking classes:  quilting, crochet, knitting, needlepoint, hardanger, etc.  I actually avoided the smocking classes because I had an idea that since smocking went so well with all of the sewing I had always done, I might not want to ever do anything else if I learned to smock!

Starburst Evening Bag

 

Shortly before our daughter was born, though, I took my first smocking class, and I was hooked!  I made all of her dresses—the pre-school teachers couldn’t wait to see what Sarah would wear next!  I incorporated smocking into my own clothing as well, something that I still love and continue to do.  I had begun teaching a variety of classes at that same local needlework shop and even seriously considered buying it when the owner retired.  I had discovered SAGA along the way and attended my first seminar in Baltimore in 1984 and then that huge Atlanta convention in 1985 and many others that followed.  I was so fortunate to be able to take classes with many of the early influential SAGA teachers.

In the early 1990’s several things happened simultaneously.  By then I wasn’t allowed to make Sarah’s dresses anymore, and I began teaching SAGA-approved classes.  I developed a series of designs for Christmas ornament kits stitched with metallic threads to sell through my business, Classic Creations (www.classiccreationssmocking.com).   My earlier exposure to other types of needlework had introduced me to threads that were not all that common for smocking, and I offer them as well as other needlework accessories.

                                                        Galaxy Smocked Ornament, #1

The Smocking Horizons series for Creative Needle Magazine began in 1993.  This series of articles, as well as A Smocking Primer and the Smocking Essentials series which followed, gave me the opportunity to experiment with and try out some of the “what if’s” I’d always wondered about.  I’m basically a very practical/frugal person (Midwest upbringing?) and could never bring myself to make something unless it had a specific objective which the magazine articles provided.

Inflamed, a Scarf

 

I love teaching, though, and am so grateful that SAGA has allowed me the opportunity to travel across the country to share with its members.  Nothing warms my heart more than when I see the light go on and a student says, “Now I understand!”  Even better is when a student from a previous class returns to show me a completed project and/or what she was able to develop of her own based on that earlier class.

                                                              Mother of the Groom

I do have a life beyond stitching which centers around my love of history and passion for textiles.  As a long-time docent at an 18^th Century historic house in Annapolis, Maryland, I have researched and participated in the creation of period clothing and needlework installations.  I am also a volunteer curatorial assistant at the Maryland Historical Society where I am able to apply my knowledge and skills to furthering the understanding of its collections.  This all meshes nicely with my keen interest in genealogy research.  As it turns out, I come from a long line of needle workers, one of whom may also have been named Barbara!

Barbara at a Teacher Showcase, SAGA Convention