Those interested in sewing can share ideas and learn from each other
By Ashley Reams
News Editor
PASCO COUNTY — When Caroline de Fontaine-Stratton was 8 years old, she pointed to a dress in a picture and told her grandmother that she wanted it.
Within a few days, de Fontaine-Stratton had the dress, but it didn’t come from a store. Her grandmother had made it for her.
“I just thought it was neat that you could just do it yourself,” de Fontaine-Stratton said.
Since then, de Fontaine-Stratton, now 35, had always wanted to learn how to sew. The only problem was she never had the opportunity. That changed about a year ago, when a sewing club formed in Pasco County.
The club, which is sponsored by the Pasco County Extension Family & Consumer Sciences program, meets on the second and fourth Saturdays of the month from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. in the Women’s Building at the Pasco County Fairgrounds in Dade City. It’s not a structured class; instead it offers people of all ages the chance to spend time with others who like to sew and learn from each other.
“It’s open to anybody who has an interest in sewing,” said Betsy Crisp, Pasco’s Family & Consumer Sciences extension agent.
The Extension Office recently bought seven new sewing machines with donations from the community, and this equipment is available for use during the club meetings. Participants can also bring their own machines, Crisp said. There is no fee to join the group.
The club has about 14 members of various ages, and an average of six to eight people show up to the meetings. They practice sewing and other fiber arts, including: knitting; crocheting; quilting; cross stitching; felting; loom weaving; fabric painting and dying; and more.
“This group tries to address them all,” said Jim Dennison, who leads the group with Amy Greif. “We’re a fiber arts club, not just a sewing club.”
Dennison and Greif came up with the idea for the club while working together in the Pasco County Property Appraiser’s Office. They both shared a common interest in fiber arts, and people would ask them how to sew.
“We said, ‘Wouldn’t it be great if we had a club that taught people how to do these things?’” said Dennison, who is now retired.
“There’s something about being together in a group where you can mentor one another,” Greif said.
Dennison got into sewing when he was 9 years old. To keep him out of trouble, his grandmother would make him sit with her, balling up flour sack string or cutting out patches for quilts.
Eventually, Dennison’s grandmother showed him how to single crochet and double crochet. Once you learn those stitches, he said, you can make just about anything.
Dennison acknowledged that he is the only man in the sewing group, and he said he hopes that more men will join the club.
“People forget that all sewing — aside from decorative sewing — was done by men before the Industrial Revolution,” he said, pointing out that gender roles associated with the craft have switched throughout history.
Caroline de Fontaine-Stratton joined the group soon after it formed. She went from knowing absolutely nothing about sewing to threading and running a sewing machine, choosing the proper width of stitches depending on the material, using a serger to finish off ends so they don’t unravel, cutting and measuring, matching different fabrics, and quilting.
“From the first day, there was a woman there that showed me how to thread the machine,” she said.
de Fontaine-Stratton is now putting the skills she’s learned to practical use. She’s made pillowcases from hand-embroidered fabrics from the 1940s and 50s, and she’s started making quilts.
She said the best part about being in the group is sharing concepts with other members.
“There’s always an exchange of information and ideas from people,” she said. “We have a lot of fun.”
If you go
What: Pasco Extension Family and Consumer Sciences program’s sewing club
Where: Women’s Building, Pasco County Fairgrounds, 36702 SR 52, Dade City
When: second and fourth Saturdays of the month from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.
More information: Betsy Crisp, (352) 521-4288
