Patchwork: A Sewist’s Diary

Ballard debuts with a charming account of the conception and construction of 17 projects she sewed during Covid lockdowns in New Zealand. Between musings about fabric color and thread count, she weaves in life lessons, relationship recaps, and memories of her sewing-obsessed grandmother in prose that ranges from brisk and conversational to melancholy and poetic. Ballard’s first garment is a Demeter dress, for which she selects a soft gray fabric that reflects her initial timidity as a sewer. When her interest in cooking grows, she constructs a Tessuti-style apron with a whimsical pink dachshund print. Gradually, Ballard becomes obsessed with using every inch of fabric she buys, tucking stray scraps into seams and corners until she’s made “something that can hold a person.” Meanwhile, small dramas, like a moth invasion, parallel bigger ones, like the straining of her long-term relationship during lockdown (“In the darkness of our closets, I set traps that grow furred with bodies”). With the last project, a quilt (the quintessential “patchwork”), Ballard endeavors to sew something that “marks all the changes since Covid.” This gently captivating memoir does just that, finding poignant resonance in the ups and downs of a single person’s life during a tumultuous historical moment. It’s a delight. Illus. (Oct.)