Art Doesn't Exclude

For me I always felt excluded or second choice. Due to learning disabilities, I didn't really excel in school like most of my friends or "friends" did. I also sucked at sport, so gym wasn't my favorite subject. Even if I had friends or "friends", I always hated doing partner projects because I always felt left out, since I was never their first choice. I was always that person who spend the weekend alone, since her friends forgot to invited her to their weekend plans, unless if they needed a ride.

So I spend a lot of my free time doing artwork, watching T.V, and when I was young playing with my barbies. For me I always love T.V shows that centered around female characters especially shows like Sex and The City, Pretty Little Lairs, and Gossip Girl. I guess is because of the fashion. I always had a passion for fashion, I used to love making clothes for my own barbies and doing fashion shows. However, during my Middle School years, I didn't know how to dress myself. I was 14 and still buying my clothes from Justice, since I didn't know where to shop at. The coolest stores that people shop at in my school was Abercombie or Hot Topic. They weren't really my style plus I couldn't afford many of their clothes. That one of the many reason why I was made fun of for.

However, seeing Pretty Little Lairs and falling in love with their fashion. That when I started to get my own style and started shopping at stores that carry similar clothes and were actually affordable to me. The more into I got to Gossip Girl, Sex and The City, and Pretty Little Lairs, the more I started to design my own clothes. Like clothes that I think the characters would wear. That how I started getting to costume designing for school plays. I didn't do not much, just organzing the dressing room and making sure the actors had the right costumes for each scene they had. As well as handsewing if there was button lose. Even try to make a couple items for costumes like accessories.

I was really disappointed when they remove the fashion class in my school due to budget cuts. However, I still try my best to teach myself basic sewing by watching youtube videos. Cutting up my old shirts and trying to design new shirt. Try to make clothes for my Build A Bear Workshop, Bunny. Did not turn out how I wanted but I tried. However I got more into fashion design in college. I started to learn how to sew more professional. I worked with teachers who actually did work for fashion companies and are considered as fashion designer.

I started designing clothes that people could wear not just not my stuff animals or barbies. When I am walking down the hallway with the clothes I made on campus, I did get a lot of complimets by strangers on the designing. I don't get laugh at or get told that I suck like I did in gym class. I also don't feel like a failer like I did when I fail my chemistry test after spending hours of studying. Plus I can used my talent to help people. Like when my sister found a pair of overalls that were a large, instead of medium, I tailot it to her. Then when Covid 19, and supplies were limited which included face mask. I was able to make face mask for my family and donated a lot to a local hospital.

This pandemic it was hard to advance my sewing skills. My job went to shutdown for about 2 months, so I was on a budget. We all know how expensive fabric is. Plus, many stores that I usually buy my fabric from were closed and fabric was limited, due to people buying it, to make face mask. Plus most important classes went from in person to online for me twice. It was nice since I didn't have to spend the gas money and drive in the snow. However, fashion is a hand on class, like my 5th grade teacher told me before " There are things that you can't learn behind a screen.,"

It was hard to know if I was making my pattern the right way without having my teacher to show me what I was doing wrong. If I was sewing the material the right way. Most important to try to pay attention on zoom, since I get distracted easily especially in my own home. However, I made it work. I still passed my classes with a B or higher.