Dearest needleworker friends,

Following on from my recent post on my first ever underwear - you can see that here - this is my updated garment! She fits beautifully!

It has taken me several days to complete this wee detailed bra-style garment; working intuitively and spontaneously, just following how the material wanted to work, experimentally cutting into the form of the previous blouse (see below), and not always trying the work-in-progress on between alterations...!

...the finished result is very comfortable, and it feels like a beautiful deconstruction not just of the former blouse but also of the concept of 'bra': the unhealthy 'norm' of how conventional bras are constructed to objectify rather than compliment our breasts - as well as to cut off the circulation and musculature, and to block the lymphatic system.

Whilst sewing I was also thinking-feeling-knowing around how the dreamspell of the numbness of our rooted and activated spiritual vision; how our very vital power is kept dormant in plain sight, by the use of manufactured clothing, which literally sit on our most sacred-powerful body areas, and resonate the literal energy of slavery to us: many cheap underwears will be toxic through and through, from the overly-sprayed cotton to the process of cleaning and carding the plant into material, the dyes and antifungicides, etc, the mechanical mass-production of uniform things styled to make us feel our sacred parts of separate from us, and not least, the sweatshop modern slavery of beautiful souls in 'poorer' cultures, who are manipulated to acting like machinery in return for less-than-crumbs.

A reminder of the blouse that began this project - and from which I am now also going to make a nice pair of silk knickers:

Most of us don't want to think about such things as where the clothing we wear comes from - though obviously not in this community! - and few folks who only buy ready-made items of all kinds can appreciate the empowerment that comes through making our own things.

The domestic alchemy of every stitch; even just the fact of sitting cosily for hours on end in a favourite chair or under the duvet: this has true healing and transformative power. The calming of the mind with every stitch, and the resting of the whole (bodymindspirit) into the quiet rhythm of repetition of movement - this has such a potent capacity to bring us into alignment.

I'd say too, that working on such an intimate item like underwear, and doing it ever-so-slowly and attentively, rather than churning something out to a pattern or even to a previsioned concept... working so intimately with all of our presence, brings additional riches to our spirit, and it brings that spirit-full presence into the actual clothing; repairing our aura, bringing us back into feeling and pleasure.

The side panels sit a tad loosely; this is a feature that might bother me if I were seeking perfection or norm, but I love the silk loosely moving around in these quirky seams that I constructed (after cutting too much out of the blouse that it barely covered half a breast!) I look forward to feeling how this will sit, once it is under other clothing, and as I wander around town in it... I really want to make the knickers to go out - I sense that they will make me feel like a mystical super-hero :-D Heheheh!

Though seriously, the feeling of stepping into Gift, stepping into handmaking of everything that I possible can make by hand, growing my own food and tilling the land sacredly - this really does change the physical reality of my identity: in my lifetime I have struggled very much to find my place in the world, and have had some significant health challenges - and this project marks a gorgeous new phase of being much more fully present in all that I am, of being proud and comfortable in my holistic biodiversity - in being completely, fully, happily very, very different.

LOve! # to YOu AlL!

Clare.