Rage Sewing - Knitting in the Park

Like Rage Knitting…It’s a Thing

And I do it. Yup, you read that right. Last night I was rage sewing a baby sleep sack for my son Fynn. It’s starting to get cold at night here in Western Pennsylvania and these sleep sacks are what we use to make sure Fynn is both safe and warm.

Just like knitting, I couldn’t be bothered to follow someone else’s pattern and thought that I could make my own. You can read more about the iterations and process here.

The last one was too big, so I adjusted the pattern for the third time. And with this version, I thought I would try snaps instead of a zipper.

Watch the video or keep reading:

Rage Sewing: The Result

So this third sleep sack is almost the goldilocks of the three. It could be a little more tailored but he has some room to wiggle around in it. The cut wasn’t perfect but it was pretty good so I went with it. At least this time all of my pattern pieces were cut with the pattern going the right way!

Confession: I did cut one of the front pieces out wrong but quickly noticed and remedied this.

The sewing was relatively smooth sailing. The closure, was not.

Zippers and I aren’t on speaking terms

I didn’t want to do another zipper. Instead, I’ve been toying with the idea of making one with snap closures. So I grabbed my handy dandy snap tool. Its essentially a fancy pair of pliers that crimps the two sides of the snaps onto your fabric.

It had been working like a dream before this. But I had taken a break after using it quite a bit. I got the whole first side of the snaps affixed to the sleep sack, which is surprising because its thicker fabric than I’ve ever used with this tool.

Rage sewing the zipper on Fynn's sleep sack.

When it came time to do the other side…nothing. I couldn’t get it to work to save my life. I tried and I tried. And went through so many “backs” to the snaps trying to make thiss work.

Rage Sewing a Zipper

Totally defeated, I gave up on the snaps and grabbed a zipper from my stash of zippers that I optimistically bulk ordered at the start of my sewing journey. (Not an affiliate link).

The first time I started sewing the zipper, I realized it was backwards. So I had to rip it out. That was terrible. White thread on exactly the same color zipper…I’m not resolved to get a better light for my sewing desk.

Take two went much better, and I figured out how the actual process of sewing a zipper works with top stitching and everything. But because I was rage sewing, I wasn’t the most patient and there were most definitely mistakes.

The moral of this story:

I realize now that I have an unrealistic expectation for sewing to be as easy as knitting is. I fail to look back and see how many years of knitting it took me to get to where I am right now. 2020 is part of it, my being extremely inpatient is most of it. I did finish the project, and did get the catharsis I was looking for…but I maybe should have walked away and saved finishing this project for another day.