Pattern Books, Pattern Cutting and the Value of Waiting

We have been out and about today so I have not really done any work on my skirt, that will be my finishing off job for tomorrow.  We had a look around the charity shops but nothing jumped out at me but I did overhear a young woman beside me talking to the lady serving in St Luke's shop.  She was telling her she had wanted to buy the Handa's Surprise book for her daughter from the schoolbook fair catalogue, it was £5.99 she said but she left it too late so there was going to be a late order charge on top so she told them no, leave it then.  She had the book in her hand in the charity shop for £1.50 and was really pleased then the lady said all those books are half price!  She went over and picked out a couple more.  Good for you I thought, how often do we rush into buying things and then have second thoughts later or wish we had hunted down a better bargain?

I think the reason for these choices a lot of the time is that everything is so instant now, we have accounts and passwords for everything and anytime we have a need or whim we only have to turn on the computer, click a button and items are there  within hours sometimes.  So that is not always a good thing.

This whole incident got me thinking about my own list on Amazon, now I have a list but it is very changeable and the reason for that is that I use it as  a holding place for wants.  I only occasionally buy things from this list but throughout the year many items make their way onto it and then later get deleted.    The latest being  this book...

Now I have looked at this book on there before and wondered about buying it,  it is supposed to be the book that tells you all you need to know about pattern cutting, professionally. The thing is, it is £28 and that is a lot of money for a book that yes I am sure I will learn from but I am not ready to commit that amount to it at this time.  So it left my list after a few days, the reason being that I don't want my husband to rush in and buy it for me for Christmas when I am not sure if it will be worth the investment. 

There was another book on there a few weeks ago with patterns to trace, a Burda one and that has also been removed.  You see on further inspection on a new day I had a better look at the 'look inside tab' and found that the items I liked I could already make and have already done so in the past.  The trousers I didn't like but would have been able to figure out anyway had I wanted to.  Maybe I just like the idea of the books because I enjoy sewing and browsing the ideas, but I have the internet for that. 

One book that I have mentioned before and that is inexpensive and very useful is Sew What! Skirts, I have recommended this to a friend who has bought it and used it.  There are no complicated illustrations just some common sense calculations and ideas for variations on what is a basic shape.

I will continue to use my list as it gives me thinking time, for me that is a valuable tool to store things that interest me without committing just yet.  I will keep my eyes open on ebay, in charity shops and look on the library catalogue to see if there is something similar to the book above but I'm in no rush.

If I have been making clothes all these years without knowing the technical aspects of pattern making I'm sure I can wait a bit longer.