My Ankara Dreams

I should have been in the needles and threads community by now. I should have been among those with skillful craftsmanship and possibly would have made a good sum of income for myself.
My speciality on needles and threads was fascinating, especially being that it isn't that common in this part of our world. Unlike others, am not a tailor and have never sat behind the wheels of a sewing machine before. All it took at that very moment I got the scope was just one look at my idea giver and that was it.

Boom! The crafty girl in me experimented on my first-sighted idea two years after the encounter. My major was on Ankara material, where instead of sewing directly, I partly used it in making a complete outfit set which begins with a headband if necessary, to earrings and necklaces down to a certain design of Ankara on a normal T-shirt to pants and all-round up In shoes. It was perfect 💯

I learned these skills at the time two years into finishing high school, it didn't help that it had to be a bordering school too and I never got the chance not that it even crossed my thoughts to experiment on my “Ankara Complete Fits Skills “. Until an urgency called for it.

Image by freepik

A certain competition among district zones in my church came up on short notice to my branch which happens to be the least prepared (that's what we believed) among other branches. The only good news that came from being shortly notified was that the competitors gets to pick their own special skills with a representative who gets to explain in detail. This happens to be the period I just began familiarizing myself with people from church, it was needed since my family and I were new to the district at that time too.
During planning, suggestions of all kinds like drawings, paintings, cooking, cartons building architecture, and some others came on board, my Ankara craftsman skill too was added to the suggestions least and I was so surprised when it was among the two selected picks from the admins in charge. Honestly, I was a little unsure of myself by the time I was called upon to explain my knowledge about it and it was funny because I logically gave a smooth talk on something I’d never done before but a little part of me was adamant on the picture stored in my memory. It however became serious at the time I got home that day and almost regretted my already too-late choice of giving suggestions in the first place.

But then I shew back my words because I was proven wrong by my fears. After going to the market to get the necessities of what I thought would be of use, I began my own making alongside a team that was assigned my way while the other half settled on creating a carton moving car, of course, there was a genius in their midst. We only had two days to finish up our designs for the competition.In two days my team and I were able to wrap up a complete outfit for ourselves with a matching handbag to it and extras for the judges.

Long story short, a skill I never experimented on landed us second in position even if not first place it was more than a big deal for me. Still, at that point, I got different congratulatory responses with phone numbers of people who wanted to discuss prices on getting a perfect pair for themselves. I honestly enjoyed it all. The attention, fulfillment, and satisfied looks on the faces of my church district admins but that was it. I knew it wasn’t for me, aside from the income that would generate from it, I felt too relaxed which was something I wouldn’t do, I knew then that there was no passion trait attached to it and that was a gap my young self couldn’t feel. It’s been a long while since I went on that road but thinking about it brought a smile to my face tonight just maybe would stitch on a full combo outfit for myself, and serve as my could Christmas cloth for the year.. haha