Weekend Review: Pushing a Thread and All Her Other Buttons

Pushing a Thread & All her other buttons / Rich Wehrman
Independently Published, 2019. 55 p.

This little book of humorous essays and anecdotes from the perspective of a sewist's spouse was offered to me by the author. While I don't usually review things by request, this one looked like fun, and fed right into my interests. So I said yes.

Rich Wehrman is a writer who has published various humorous essays, and this collection has 12 short chapters about the overlap between his retirement and his wife's sewing career.

With topics like "Confessions of an S.O.S (Spouse of Sewer)", "A Sewing Husband's Dictionary", or "What do Bigfoot and Fabric Stashes Have in Common?", there are many points that a long-time sewist will recognize.

The humour is based in everyday life -- like adjusting to being the same house all day long -- or having one's wife ask "How does this look?" after finishing a project. What answer to give? (yes, very relatable!)

photo via author: in the chapter on adjusting to retirement

The stories are all brief and remind me a little of Dad jokes -- they make you laugh because of the slightly corny but relatable incidents. Any sewist who has experienced a moment of spouse bewilderment in the face of one's sewing habits and activities will get the joke here!

From projects to fabric stash to ASG activities to county fair entries, he shares many elements of the sewing life and how they interact with interests in a marriage. Despite his gentle mockery of all this, you can tell that he supports his wife's sewing fully and even engages with the sewing world in his own way. That is what makes the book amusing and not off-putting -- even though it focuses on male/female differences it doesn't have any edge to it.

It will probably be enjoyed most by older sewists who've been at this for a while and have years of spousal reactions to compare to these ones. If you're looking for some sewing related light reading, this might just be the ticket. 

photo via author: the author's long-suffering wife in a beautiful blouse
 she entered into a county fair