My Quilting

Adventures in March

2011-03-26T12:33:00.002-04:00

A year and a half ago, someone offered me an embroidery sewing machine. Although I have two sewing machines neither are that great so I accepted. It took another 7 months or so to actually get the machine. By this time my enthusiasm had waned. I used to do a fair amount of sewing but then I started working full-time. A month or so after I got the machine I took it out of the box to try it out. It was then that I realized that I had no power cord or foot pedal. So the donor said that she'd mail it to me. When I received it, I lugged it out again and it was not the correct power cord/foot pedal. I returned the power cord to her as it may be needed some day.

More time passed and my husband decided to help me out. He ordered the power cord/foot pedal online. When it arrived I thought that the package was way too small. It was the power cord but no foot pedal. It turns out that on this model they are two separate items. By that time I was thoroughly disgusted. The power cord had cost $18 plus s&h.

I'm a bit of a procrastinator. A friend of mine started to make purses. They are gorgeous. I was telling her about the above. It turned out I had told my sad story before. I decided it was time to take action. I went the website to order the foot pedal. If I hadn't been sitting in a recliner, I'd have fallen off my chair. The foot pedal was $49 plus s&h. Ouch! My husband graciously said go ahead and get it.

The power cord arrived this week. My husband said to me, "What are you going to do this weekend?" I replied that I was going to try out the sewing machine. So this morning, I pulled it out of the packaging yet again. Attached the power cord and foot pedal. After rearranging it on the table a few times to enable the cord to reach the outlet, I was ready to give it a go. My husband (who does know how to sew) had sat down and put in the material and lowered the pressure foot and gave it a go. The material was hopping all over the place. Well, it turned out he had lowered the arm where the pressure foot should be. There was NO pressure foot. By this time I was about to pull out my hair.

I do realize that pressure feet are NOT always interchangeable. However, the only way I was going to get to see if this machine worked was to find a pressure foot. As I previously mentioned, I have two other sewing machines. The first I obtained after my mother died. It appears that my mother had told everyone but me that she wanted me to have one of her sewing machines. I do not remember how many she had but I believe it was 3. I have no idea why I chose the one I did. I picked one and it came home with me. I also took what I thought was the accessories. Well, it turned out that the sewing machine did work, but the tension was off. My mother's #1 sewing rule (other than do no sew your fingers--- that is another story) was NEVER TOUCH THE TENSION. NEVER UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES! Well, my husband broke my mother's rule. He did try to help me adjust it, but I never could get it right.

So about 4? years ago, I heard that Kmart had cheap sewing machines. All I could afford was a cheap machine. I do not remember how much I paid but I believe it was $50 or less. Now any of you who sew alot know that unless I had gotten the deal of the century, I was going to get what I paid for. Well, I did do quite a lot of sewing on the machine. I do not know why I stopped sewing other than beginning to work full-time.

Thinking that I needed to make a trip to Jo-Ann Fabrics, I called my friend who I hoped I could pick up along the way. It turned out she had other plans, but we had a nice chat. Getting back to my situation I still needed a pressure foot.

I looked in our storage area for sewing machine accessories. I was unable to find any. So I stole the pressure foot from my Kmart machine. Ready to give it ago once again. Went to try it out and now the needle is broken. My husband stated that it had not been broken earlier. Well now it is broken. I knew I had needles around. I looked and then gave up. It was about this time I remembered that there is a small quilting shop not too far from my house.

I hopped into my car. I had to go to the store first. There I got ripped off on cookies but that is another story. Go to the quilting shop. The nice store lady asked if she can help me. I asked about sewing machine needles. I wanted to blab the whole long but funny story, but decided she probably didn't want to hear my woes. Really though by this time it was getting absurd. It was either laugh or cry and I wasn't going to cry over a sewing machine. Ok, so the saleslady showed me two kinds and I took the cheaper set because I know I have needles. I was certain that once I got home that I'd find the other needles rather quickly. They would have no more reason to hide.

Thinking that I deserved to look at material after all the frustration I had been through, I looked around. Wow, beautiful fabric surrounded me. She had some purse samples hanging here and there. Yummy! Patterns, material in many colors, what more could a person ask for. Well, I had decided to get 2 yards of fabric (I will explain later). The lady asked me if I was looking for anything in particular and out spilled my whole story. She didn't burst out laughing as I expected. Maybe she understood my plight, or maybe she was being polite. So I found a pink print and a deep pink/red. I did check with the saleslady to see if they matched.

Small digression. My first husband had told me many a time I had no fashion sense. So I have little confidence in picking out anything with colors. The lady assured me that was a perfect match. She quickly cut a yard. Again my mouth opens and I tell her what I just stated about my first husband. She stated she'd lived with one of those types for awhile. I really think she was quite a sympathetic soul.

To cut to the chase (before you get bored), I came home tried to sew and the thread broke. I have no idea how to thread this machine. No manual came with it. I do have 2 cds. My husband says you need to put the cd in your computer and find out how to thread it and while you are at it, you may want to ready about how to use it. What strange advice from a man. I thought men were supposed to hate instructions? I rethreaded it the way I imagined it should go. I tried to finish the seam I had started. Voila! It worked! It appears that it does work. Yeah! Then I realized that it was threaded with red thread as was the bobbin red thread. The bobbin ... oh yea, I think I need more bobbins. Well after all the above that seems like a small thing. If not, I'll have to add to this with the rest of the story.

Been a while

2011-03-19T08:30:00.003-04:00

It's been a while since I've posted OR done any quilting. I did not realize. When I went to work full-time, I was exhausted for a long time. Years later, I am not much closer to finishing the quilts I started some years ago.
So please bear with me and I will get back to business.

QWF - Secret Santa

2007-12-17T14:28:00.000-05:00

I received my QWF Secret Santa package today. Wow! There is a bear figurine. A cute card, a piece of flannel material, 2 packages of needles, a towel with a bear in a teacup peeking out of it, 4 fqs, a pattern, a pin with a tractor on it and a town in GA, and a thimble from Georgia (GA), and two panels (see top two pics). One is a tree skirt, and the other for a wall hanging.

I think I mentioned everything.

CQS- Christmas Exchange

2007-12-17T14:05:00.000-05:00

I received my CQS Christmas Exchange today. I received a
-container which had 3 fqs in it
-and a set of embroidery shears
-in each fq was colored thread
-Mint M Ms... my favorite
-a wrapped gift - (I did peek, it is a quilt pattern calendar) but I'm not going to unwrap it until Christmas -- then I'll take a good look at it.

Third fq received

2007-12-03T20:23:00.000-05:00

I received my 3rd fq from TQS Fq and recipe swap. The sender included an ornament.

CQ SS Swap

2007-11-30T18:42:00.000-05:00

Here is a picture of what I received from the CQ SS Swap. A sent me a pretty stocking, some Choxie candy, 3 large pieces of fabric, some buttons (are great for crazy quilting that I do), mixes for cider, an angel ornament, a cross stitch ornament to make, thread, basting pins, cookies and socks.

It was so much fun to look through everything and oooh and aah! I really wanted to wait until Christmas to open all my swaps, but that wasn't very realistic on my part.

So I have decided to put away some of the goodies after looking at them, so that by Christmas, I'll have new things to use.

Thanks A!

TQS-FQ swap #2

2007-11-20T10:26:00.000-05:00

D sent me cookie recipe and an fq, and a christmasy list.

TQS-FQ swap

2007-11-20T10:23:00.001-05:00

J sent me a lovely santa fq and 2 cookies. I ate one before taking the pic.

2007-11-10T10:11:00.001-05:00

Here are pics of the front and back of my finished boot. The pics are a bit dark, I may try to take better photos later.

There is a pucker at the sole along the heel. I guess it isn't bad for my first attempt. My husband thinks it puckered because there were too many stitches there. He used to be an upholsterer so he may be right.

2007-11-09T17:39:00.000-05:00

These are two pics of one side of the victorian boot I am making for a swap on one of my yahoogroups. This is the side I embellished. I'm a newbie so I am hoping that whomever gets my boot isn't disappointed. I have decided not to embellish the other side, largely due to the fact that it needs to be mailed very soon.

I plan to put it together tomorrow, and will post more pics at that time.

2007-09-27T06:31:00.000-04:00

The picture on the top is the backing on my great grandmothers crazy quilt. The second picture is another part of it a little closer up.

I thought I would record what I remember of my great grandmother Mary, which isn't much.

I do remember going to her house as a small girl. She had huge sugar cookies.

Also she had a little basket that she kept scrap paper for us kids to draw on.

The other thing I remember is that she and my mother would go into the garden if it was spring or summer. Her rhubarb was the biggest I had ever seen (before or since). Often she would give my mother various vegetables.

My great-aunt Grace lived in part of the house. Her apartment was more modern. It was almost like it was in color and the rest of the house was in black and white. She had panelling and carpet. Aunt Grace had lived just across the road in a brand new house. My mother was the first houseguest. However, that night the house was struck by lightning and burned down. My mother was always afraid of houses burning down after that. Oh, when they tried to call the fire department, someone else was on the line (they had party lines back then) and wouldn't get off the phone so they could call.

I remember when I was older, my extended family went camping on the land across from great grandmas. Much later, I came to be friends with one of the people who ended up buying that land.

2007-09-26T06:35:00.000-04:00

This is a pic of a crazy quilt that my great grandmother, Mary Flint Childs made. My mother thought that it was made around 1891. Mary was 6 at that time. Her mother Angeline helped her.

At sometime, Mary gave the quilt to my mother.

After my mother died, I got a quilt or two of hers, and put them away. Recently (as you can see on my blog) I've gotten bitten by the quilting bug and have started a crazy quilt. One day, I thought.... I had a crazy quilt from one of my ancestors. Then I thought, no that was the one that my brother received. That one was made by my great-grandfather (paternal).

Anyhow, I decided to go look and found this quilt.

The materials are rather plain as crazy quilts go. However, I just love it. I love to look at the different kind of stitches, and other things that are emboidered on it.

I particularly like this one that is of a tree. I am re-reading the Lord of the Ring series. I started that after we recently watched the series again. It is the first pic. I really have to figure out how to arrange pics on a blog entry the way I want them.

2007-09-25T15:51:00.000-04:00

Well, I haven't committed to do the boot swap yet, but I did get a start on my boot, if I do. I figure this is the easy part anyhow. It's the embellishing that I find tedious.

2007-09-25T15:42:00.000-04:00

This is a pic of the first crazy quilt block I've finished. The only one so far. It's a 6" block, and this was done before I found out that you can use all types of fabrics. It only has cotton.

2007-09-03T17:29:00.000-04:00

Well, I'm finally doing it.

I am making log cabin and crazy quilt blocks.

I just dove in and am definitely hooked. Funny that a crocheter should get hooked on quilting...

Anyhow, here's a pic of a log cabin quilt block that I've finished.

I am using up fabric from sample books, so it will be the 'scrappy' look.