Okay, that was pretty cheesy but hear me out.
When I was a kid, I don't think I was truly ever exposed to embroidery. I remember doing a "craft kit" where you had to stitch felt pieces together to make a stuffed animal. There were pre-punched holes in the felt, it used a plastic needle and I loved it; but that's not embroidery. The only embroidery I ever saw was the machine done embroidery on clothes, and I never thought much about it.
But one day I was walking around Shum Shui Po and of course all the craft supplies intrigued me. I randomly decided to buy an embroidery hoop. I think I already had some thread from making friendship bracelets and some weird old lady fabric for god knows what reason. So off I was on a new project.
It was so hard! My lines weren't straight, the needle was so hard to push through the fabric, and the thread looked all wonky and twisted; but I persevered and wanted to finish it. I finished it alright, and it was a sight to see (not in a good way) but I was sooooo proud of it. I posted it on instagram and captioned it as so...
"Just sayin': It's okay to be bad at what you do because the people who work hard, get better. It's okay to suck as long as you keep trying, keep creating and keep progressing. One day, you'll be better...better than you were yesterday, last week, or last year. The important thing is that you don't stop doing the things you want to do, or the things you love to do. With that being said, here's my first ever (shitty) hand embroidery."
And man was I fuckin' proud of it! I only wrote that because I was so happy that I was being creative, and doing something new. I didn't think that I'd continue doing hand embroidery for as long as I have. I knew that it didn't look great, but I also knew that the next time I did it...it would look way better.
I've learnt so much since that piece and I really have improved so much. I never thought in that moment that I would create the things I've created, let alone continue hand embroidery for so long. Since then, I've taken a few embroidery classes, watched YouTube tutorials, studied stitches, borrowed books, followed different artists and really immersed myself into hand embroidery crafting.
It's crazy to think that that moment and that feeling would lead me to where I am now.
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