This is the post that almost wasn’t.

I have never raged so loudly. I have never sworn so passionately. I have never took to Twitter with such vehemence over a machine.

I have never spit gravel up as I torn out of the driveway in a sewing-filled rage as I did today.

Remember this?

Well, today was the day. I bought, washed, pressed, cut, ironed and prepared 10 squares of fabric last night. This morning, I made breakfast and then hauled my sewing machine out of its dusting corner. I diligently read the instructions and followed every one.

And it jammed. Over and over and over and over and over until all I saw was red hatred.

And then I had a temper tantrum and told Twitter that they could have my stupid, non-magical sewing machine for $100, with a free helping of crushed hopes and dreams.

Me? Dramatic? Never.

Then my Gramma called me. Through picture messages and her 70+ years of sewing experience, she tried to walk me through. We did everything right, and it still didn’t work. So, out of sheer love and compassion, she told me to do this:

To Gramma:
Please sew my fabric squares together and make them look pretty?
Love,
Magz

Gramma fixes everything, even if you have to mail it to her for her to sew and send back to you because you are an embarrassment to the 21st century sewing establishment…

With the stuffed envelope in hand, I went to buy groceries. You know, instead of continuing to rage at any living or inanimate thing that crossed my path… While I was out, I decided that this ongoing sewing debacle had earned me the right to a DQ Blizzard and some wine. I walked into the liquor store and immediate saw three bottles:

I bought the first two.

When my mom found out that I was ridiculously sewing impaired, she was overcome with grief, resulting from her utter failure at raising a competent woman for the 21st century. Can’t cook, can’t sew, can’t manage her budget, can’t keep her house clean, has demon children… She was so overwhelmed and distraught by her wavering reputation that she actually drove all the way out to the boonies to school me in the ways of my Singer sewing machine.

And school me she did.

With minimal cursing, she figured out what was wrong with the blasted machine. And for the record? There WAS something wrong with the machine, and it WASN’T my fault. Stupid machine. She got it working, sewed some lines, and stayed until I could prove my worth as a shaky, newbie seamstress.

After she left, I did this:

Then, I did this:

I attached a bit of velcro:

And finally, I had these:

The white one ended up with a little flap, instead of velcro all the way across the top. I ran out of velcro strips and only had dots, so I improvised! I’ll be using this one for dog food, which is only a once-a-month purchase, so I won’t need to worry about containing coins

Pay day is this coming Friday, so now that I have OWNED MY SEWING MACHINE AND MADE IT MY SLAVE, we are ready to start our cash-only spending!

And my mom is less embarrassed by me.

Win.