continued...

I don't know why but Blogger is not behaving normally today.  It would be doing that since I'm so busy I don't have time to think!

Do you love craft fairs?  I do and I don't. 

Let me explain.  Since I do lots of crafts such as sewing, beading, embroidery, knitting, and on and on, I go to craft fairs and I find a gazillion things I love and I think "I could make that".  Then I don't necessarily buy the thing, but I want one, so I try to remember what it was and I look for patterns.  I may or may not actually make one.  Who am I kidding, I usually don't!

Then I think "I should be in a craft fair sometime and sell the stuff I make".  Hmmm, but could I stand to make the same thing over and over so there's enough merchandise?  Probably not.

But last year, I actually made and sold some doll clothes for the 18" dolls to a couple of people and that was fun.  Granted, it was not a lot of people and it wasn't an organized thing, so it wasn't like work.

This year, I convinced myself that I could make enough stuff to take a table at our church's craft fair.  I think I've done it in a rather painless manner.  I've been knitting and sewing various items for several months, stashing them in a couple of boxes out of sight of little girls who might appropriate them for their own dolls.

The craft fair is a week from Saturday -- November 2.  I've partnered up with a friend from work, and we're going to share a table.  She's made some awesome jewelry including some very cool crocheted necklaces using ladder yarn.

I pulled my boxes out, and I am amazed at the number of items I have finished!  I guess I have to fool myself into thinking I'm just making a few things and it works.

Of course they're all one of a kind items, because as I've said before, if I had to make a dozen of the same thing I might abandon the project by items number four.

If you're in New Berlin, WI, next weekend, stop in at Peace Lutheran Church and check us out.  There's a Scholastic Book Fair going on at the same time,  There's lots to see at the craft fair, food is available and we'll be selling doll clothes and other hand made items at the table for Susan Sews.

Sew on!



Craft Fairs

Samantha is getting ready to model for the craft fair...

So What's A Gusset Anyway??

There is not much I hate more in clothing than tight sleeves.  Maybe a tight waistband, but it's a near thing.

I have had occasion recently to apply gussets in two garments that were ready-made but didn't fit well.  My cousin Sharon's granddaughter had a Halloween costume with a jacket, and the jacket was too tight in the armholes and sleeves.  She asked if I could figure out a way to make the jacket more comfortable so she could avoid returning it to the catalog store where she'd ordered it.

I immediately thought of a gusset insert, which would enlarge the armscye without distorting the fit in other places in the jacket.

The term gusset in sewing is used to define a piece of fabric, sometimes diamond shaped, sometimes a triangle, that is inserted in a sewn to provide either expansion or reinforcement.

It also means the triangle that is sewn into the bottom of a bag or pillow to square the corners. I knew you did that, I just didn't realize it was a gusset!

The Miriam Webster dictionary says the word gusset comes from a Middle English term for a piece of armour covering the joints in a suite of armor, from the Anglo-French word gouseete, first used around the year 1570.

When we actually got together and I saw the jacket on Evie, I realized that the arm was too tight all the way down to the wrist. So technically I suppose the piece I inserted doesn't really conform to the true definition of gusset, but regardless, I am calling it a gusset, like the ones shown above

Of course I didn't take any pictures of the costume transformation, so I have tried to do an illustration of what I actually did.  Here goes:
 

 

So last week when the occasion to insert another gusset came up I was totally prepared!  And guess what, so was Sharon...  who is going on a cruise and bought the perfect dress and jacket except -- you guessed it, sleeves too tight!

 

This time the unsewing took longer than the sewing.  The jacket is polyester organza, so sheer and light.  The seams were serged, and in order not the shred them, I took my time (about an hour it turned out!!) to remove the serged seam which included a reinforcing chain stitch.  In hindsight, I don't know why I didn't just cut the seam off completely, because that quarter inch really would not have made a difference.  But then you know what they say about hindsight!

 

When Sharon put the jacket on to show me the fit, it was SO tight she almost could not move her arms.  The addition of a three inch underarm gusset going down to about an inch at the sleeve end gave her just enough room that she can move and breathe but not so much that you could even see it when she put it on again.  Of course she found a really close match in fabric so that helped.

 

I had the same tight feeling in a sweater last week, but instead of a gusset, I just enlarged the armscye using my serger.  I trimmed off about a half inch from where the front notch would be in a pattern, under the arm across the side seam ending where the back notch would be in a pattern.

 

Ahhh.  The fit is so much better.

 

Sew on!

Girlfriends

Last night I had dinner with my three 'best girlfriends'... which we do regularly but not regularly enough.  It was a night to catch up on grandchildren and husbands and knee surgeries (past and scheduled) and all the other stuff girlfriends do.

Pam has a new hairdresser so she had a new, shorter hairstyle.  She looked pretty cute, and we told her so.  That's what girlfriends do. 

Kathy was the last to arrive and we called her to find out where she was.  "I'm in my car"... oh yeah, but WHERE IS YOUR CAR??  LOL!!  Then the hostess didn't know we were waiting for her so we had to stand up and wave.  That was a good moment for a big laugh.  That's what girlfriends do.

Of course we had coupons -- free appetizer, with lots of gooey Wisconsin cheese on top.  Nobody mentioned diets or health-consciousness or the effects of cheese on our cholesterol... at least not last night!

We laughed about how Kathy had told her husband that she had to hurry or Marian would be at the bar getting sloshed and someone had to be there early to stop her -- haha, Kathy, the last to arrive, and Marian, the LAST person ever to either sit at the bar or get sloshed!  That's what girlfriends do.

We laughed about how long we've known each other... we worked together at a national fabric chain store in 1987 and 1988, bonding over hand written fabric receipts and figuring out the fractions for 3/8 and 7/8 of a yard.  (for the record, .375 and .875 and we had to do the math using a chart and a calculator!!)

So after we updated our phones with everyone's proper emails and phone numbers, we sat over dinner and chatted until they started turning off lights in the restaurant and sweeping the floor, still telling more stories and laughing.  That's what girlfriends do.

Dinner, $22.50 each.  Catching up with friends, priceless.

Girlfriends, absolutely worth their weight in gold!!

Thanks, ladies.  I love you all from the bottom of my heart.

Sew on...

Just Got Back From The Windy City...

"I just blew in from the windy city
The windy city is mighty pretty
But they ain't got what we got
I'm tellin' ya, boys
We got more life in Deadwood City
Than in all of Illinois!"

So seriously, I was in Chicago for four days for a big engineering conference and now I'm playing catch-up on emails, projects, work and grandchildren and sewing and SLEEP!

I love Chicago... the energy is crazy, there are a gazillion things to do, and they never seem to go the bed there!  The L runs all night long, and I could hear the rumbles from my hotel room on Adams Street, that is until I fell into a coma in bed from all the late night dinners.



This is the carrot cake at Gibson's!  Lucky for me I was sharing it with seven other people...

I rode in more taxis this week than in the rest of my entire life, I think.  The taxi drivers are sick.  They zoom around and honk at each other like mad.  Although I'm told it's nothing compared to New York, I'll believe it when I see it.

 And I WOULD love to go to New York, at least once in my life.  But not alone, and I can tell you right now DH does not want to go there.  I'll have to work that out somehow.

Also they have these bike rental stations where you can put in your credit card and take a bike over to a location, leave it there, and grab another to ride back.  Oh yeah, I did that -- not!  But one of our engineers did, and got his workout.  Riding off the carrot cake?

OK, back to the grind. 5 million emails, the expense reports...  thank goodness it's Friday!

Sew on!

Happy New Year!! Fiscal, that is...

Each age had deemed the new-born year
The fittest time for festal cheer.
-Walter Scott

This week started the fiscal year of 2014 at our firm.  Being the first week of the new year means that some things are working, and others are not.  The things that are working are doing OK, mostly.  The things that are not working are horrendous.

My grandmother used to quote a poem, I have no idea who wrote it or where it came from.  Here it is for your reading pleasure:

There was a little girl who had a little curl

Right in the middle of her forehead.

When she was good, she was very, very good

And when she was bad, she was horrid.

So our new fiscal year is starting out horrid.  Finance closed all the projects and task we were using and opened new ones.  AAAAKKK!  You can't do that to engineers.  They can't cope with change in small ways, big ones throw them for a loop!!

Here's a quote from Eleanor Roosevelt that I love so much I have it hanging on the wall in my sewing room:

A woman is like a tea bag -- you can't tell how strong she is until you put her in hot water.

I'm not in trouble kind of hot water, but I'm trying to cope with life that's running too fast for me.  I'm working on coordinating four meetings at a conference in Chicago starting Sunday, I'm on a committee for improvement of morale at work,

I'm getting ready to show at a craft fair in November



and I guess I just need to learn to relax and enjoy the chaos!!

 

Sew on...

Finally Friday!

Yay!!  It's been a long couple of weeks, but today is the last day for posting/charging/entering info for the end of our fiscal year.   Then we have a one week blackout during which we madly rush around reorganizing ourselves.  Again.  It's a perpetual cycle. 

Change,

change,

change.

The new fiscal year holds such potential.  A clean slate, all brand spanking new!

For me it's a new department, a new boss, and new assignments.  I will now be supporting five, yikes! -- five senior vice presidents, three of them brand new to the company.  We'll have new budgets, new rules, new procedures.

It's like getting a new job without having to do an interview and get all dressed up and selling myself!

Alright!!  Let's get going...

Sew on.
Sue

Unintentional Hiatus...

Life is what happens while you were making other plans... or soemthing like that!

I took two non-consecutive weeks of vacation in August so I could get some projects finished before fiscal year-end started at my job.  Well, you know what they say about the best laid plans going awry, and they did.

List of things I intended to do:

• Visit Cedarburg quilt museum
• Go to Downtown Books so the girls could meet the book cats (real kitties who live in the bookstore)
• Finish a portion of the UFO bin
• Clean up and organize garment fabric/patterns
• Sew doll clothes
• Sew some stuff for me
• Sew anything!

List of things I actually did:

• Cleaned linen closet because I couldn't find the fall blankets
• Scrubbed out fridge because something smelled funny in there
• Entertained Grands because they were bored
• Went grocery shopping because the hubby didn't want to...
• Kinda/sorta organized the mess in my sewing room because I couldn't find anything or sew in there with all the mess
• Finished one flimsy -- yay!!

 

So now I just have to get the cash together to buy a backing and have this quilted.  It's big enough to drape over the edges of a queen sized mattress, so BIG!

 

Other little things I did:

 

Knitted up some doll clothes that I'll be selling at a craft fair at church in November...

 

So, it's not like I did nothing.  It just feels like that sometimes!

 

Sew on...



Project Runway -- He Did WHAT??

OK I've seen divas and bride-zillas and just plain queens but last Thursday's Project Runway just blew me away!

If you watched, you know what I mean.  Sandro, the contestant who's originally from Russia, had an absolute hissy fit, gave the middle finger nearly everyone, was bleeped more times than I can count, lashed out physically at a camera and stalked off after he was SAFE for another week!  Yes, ladies and gentlemen, he blew up and took himself right out of the running.  Wow... really?  Because he doesn't know what they want from him.  How about original designs buddy?

You were safe, you moron, and you threw a fit, screamed at everyone and QUIT??

Well, nothing he designed really thrilled anyone, he was sort of mediocre in a flamboyant kind of way, but still, if you worked so hard to get anywhere would you just quit?  He was arrogant, misogynistic and of course he felt threatened by the talent and misunderstood by the judges.  His body language just screamed -- angry man!  Best gone.

And later, when he came back and pseudo-apologized, well, I guess I can't say I'm sorry to see him leave.  Still when you read the comments, there are people who loved him and will miss him.  Oh well, as my mom used to say, there's no accounting for taste.

I've been watching with interest the two designers from Milwaukee.  Timothy went to school in Syracuse NY, and Miranda attended the University of Wisconsin.  I don't know, neither one did a thing to make me go oooh... He's gone, and she is just a mean girl.


The two from Milwaukee -- and this is what they came up with.  Ugh!

I know, it makes for good TV, right?

My money is on Braden, Kate and Jeremy  making it to the end.I like Dom's work too.  I think Ken is so-so and it wouldn't surprise me to see him go.


Didn't you love this, made by Kate and Helen from straw hats of all things?



Jeremy's dress from the carnival materials.

OMG I am hooked again!  You know I stopped watching in Season 8 when the judges were all whacked out.  I swore I was done!!

And that's why my mom always said you shouldn't swear.

Sew on!

The Twins!

I work in an office that is dominated by testosterone.  Yes, it's mainly men... with a smattering of women thrown in for spice.

This summer, three of the ladies who sit within 25 feet of my cubicle are having babies.  The mood swings and snack and potty breaks are kind of on overload right now, but that's another story.

One of the moms-to-be is a third-timer.  She quietly went off to have her third son in summer, without much more than a few complaints about a tired back.  We expect her back any time.

The other two are having respectively:  twins in August and a boy in November.  I'm working with the mom of twins on getting her paperwork caught up before she goes, because she could go any time.  Both babies are over five pounds, and she's ready.  If you've had a baby, you KNOW what I mean!!

So I'm sitting in my sewing studio thinking about baby quilts the other day.  I blogged about making the jacks blocks a bit ago.  I had lots of help from the girls and we made a big stack of blocks.

I sorted the blocks into 'boy' and 'girl' colors.  Had enough for two boy quilts and one girl... must be my fixation with the color blue.  Anyway, pulled from my stash some fabric for an inner border, and also made a second border of those four patch blocks I make with my 2 inch strip bin periodically.  I have bags of those, sorted by color.

What to do for a final border??  The pink in the inner border of the girl's quilt wasn't quite true pink, it was more peachy than anything in my stash.  So off to the fabric store -- I know, poor me!  I found a great stripe from the Jennifer Chiavarini collection from the Union Quilters book.  I also picked up a backing/binding fabric for each quilt.

The result is what I'm calling Fraternal Twins:

Same pattern, different fabrics.  I apologize for the lighting, this was on my kitchen table and the patio doors are to the right...  some of the whites look kind of yellow on Baby Girl, but we decided it might be because some of the white-on-white prints really reflected the light, and the solids not so much.

I gave them to the new mom early in the week.  She cried.  I asked why she was crying and she said 'Because I'm pregnant'...  good enough!  But she and her hubby really liked them.  I'm hoping the babies do too!

These quilts were almost entirely from my stash, done at the last minute because I build those pieces as I go...  I cut anything smaller than a fat quarter or straight quarter yard into units, either strips or squares.  When I want to sew but have nothing in mind, or want to do mindless sewing, or I'm sewing with kids around, I make strip sets and four patches.  Need a gift in a hurry?  Pull out the ziplocs, find stuff and viola!!  Instant or almost instant finish.

I did quilt this by machine, stitch in the ditch in the interior and on the edges of the borders.  Boring but necessary...  I feel quite virtuous for two finishes in one week.

Sew on!

Columbus Antique Mall

DH and I had a nice day at the Columbus (Wisconsin) Antique Mall last week, while I was on vacation and he had a day off from Grampa's Day Care Center.

The drive takes about 90 minutes from our home in Waukesha County.  He tried to avoid the freeway and round-abouts (a peculiar traffic configuration he just hates!) but we ended up on the expressway anyway.  At one point his Tomtom -- why is it called Tom when it's a woman's voice??  -- had us turning off at "Highway 16, next right".  We made the turn right into a round-about.  She directed us to the left, to the left, to the left, to the left... right back onto the highway we just exited.  Oh well, we had a good laugh.

The CAM is a bunch of old buildings connected by common walls, and it houses a Christopher Columbus Museum in addition to three floors of individual booth spaces, filled with - well - junk.  OK, not ALL of it is junk.  There are shelves full of collectibles like old toys, dishes, linens, signs, jars of marbles, furniture, hats, dresses, kitchen gadgets, advertising signs, on and on and on.

I collect depression glass dishes.  I have a full set of amber colored glassware in a pattern called Sharon or Cabbage Rose.  I really wanted to collect green, but 20 years ago when I started, you couldn't find green.  My first piece was a pink cookie jar in a pattern called Princess given to me by my mom.  I liked pink but it was also hard to find.

I saw a ton of green and pink depression glass in Columbus.  So where was all that green glass when I was looking for it??  I also saw a shelf of yellow, which I had never seen anywhere before.  I had to take a picture.

 

I posted this pic to my FB page... a floor space full of dolls, some of which were kind of creepy... note the front row far left.  And my DH complains because my shelf of beautifully dressed and coiffed dolls look at him from the shelf in my sewing room!!

 

 

None of these lovelies came home with me...  the naked 11" fashion doll in the center is a molded Barbie-wannabee, maybe one of those dolls made for the center of a wedding cake???

 



Saw but did not purchase a black beaded evening bag of some sort.  It was rather small, probably three inches by 8 inches or so.  Nice, but no.

On the way home we ran into the typical Wisconsin scenery.  Beautiful green grass and trees, farms, old brick houses.  If I won the lottery and could live anywhere, I'd move to central Wisconsin.

 

 

And of course, construction. 

We do call our short summer the Orange Barrel season. 

Sew on!

Sewing Expo in Platteville WI

This weekend my oldest granddaughter and I were lucky enough to spend two days in Platteville, WI at the Sewing Expo held there at the University of Wisconsin.  It's a small show but packed with fun and information.

This year, the organizers received a grant from  the Wisconsin Association of Family and Consumer Sciences. For a $15 fee kids over the age of 8 could take up to four classes, and the fee included lunch, snacks, and all kit costs.  Miss E was able to have the benefit of professional teachers, the use of great sewing machines, and had some fun doing it.


Projects for kids included a fleece pillow, some pet toys appropriate for her dog, a pair of slippers, a very cool cuff bracelet complete with embellishments, and a lovely pillowcase.  She also made a Green Bay Packer throw pillow for her spot on the couch when she watches Clay Matthews.  :-)

We stayed in the dorms in Southwest Hall.  These were nothing like the dorm rooms my son lived in when he went to UW Madison!  Each suite had four bedrooms, two shared bathrooms, a big kitchen area and a living room.  Our other two roommates, my friends Judy and Marlene, said they were the best dorms they'd ever seen.  Later we found out they were for Platteville senior classmen.  But still!  Wow!

The adult program includes classes in sewing, quilting, and even knitting.  The kids' program included hand and machine quilting, card making and other crafts.

It's a two day program.  If you have the chance to take half or full day classes on Friday you can score some great education from top notch teachers in a small class setting.  If I could have gotten more time off from work I might have taken Anne St. Claire's bra making class.  One of these years I will... I'm promising myself!

I took four Saturday classes in the adult program while E was enjoying herself.  I got some great inspiration and learned a few dozen things.  One of the classes was kind of a snooze, you know -- been there, seen it before -- but even in that one I learned what I didn't like about something so it was worth it.

My favorite class was lead by Lorraine Torrence, a fiber artist of the first form.  I have a number of her patterns, both her self-named line and Grain Line Gear, which she also owns.  It was wonderful seeing the garments made up in various fabrications and colors.  Seeing the 3D as opposed to 2D is always most instructive.  Her website is beautiful even in 2D so you can visit here if you like:
http://www.lorrainetorrence.com/

Lorraine moved to Wisconsin from Oregon a while ago.  I'm sure it's because our weather is so lovely in winter -- as she joked during class.  We're so lucky to have her teaching in the Madison area.  I'm looking forward to seeing her at Gayfeathers Fabrics in Madison on future trips.

Speaking of Gayfeathers Fabrics, they had a vendor booth with fabrics you just can't find at the chains.  I generously supported them, and also made my economic contribution at Fabrications, Great Copy patterns, and several other booths.  So much for stash control!  Miss E found a gorgeous pair of hand knitted fingerless gloves with beads and a lace pattern that she only took off to take a shower!  And she did buy a nice little gift for her little sister -- a pretty beaded hair accessory.

The expo is a great value and it's so wonderful to have it in our area.  I hope more sewists discover it and support it in the future.  It's very well run, the facilities are beautiful, and the people are great.  The food was good, and it's prepared by the UW culinary students.  They did a beautiful job on the banquet and the lunches.  Mark your calendar for August 1-2, 2014.

Sew on!

Friday Night Sewing

The aunties and cousins and I get together almost every Friday night for sewing night.  If you visit me often you probably already read about Becca's project.  She's nine, and she does a bang-up job!

Last Friday there was no sewing, and it was kind of a mystery as to why for a while.  But our hostess was off doing some other stuff.  I had taken off early in the afternoon because I knew I was hosting the two next door grands until later in the evening.  So we had our own sewing night.

Of course Miss A organized us all and laid out the dolls who were also attending.  She set up her 'desk' with doctor's office things and took care of several broken appendages with colorful bandages.  She had us all read our contracts and sign them to admit our injured babies.  Boy, does that girl's mind go a million miles an hour!  She's like a Philadelphia lawyer...

The babies with their leg injuries...

I have a system with scraps that provides instant materials for times such as this.  Face it, with two adolescents in the sewing room, I'm not actually going to get any serious work done!  But I have my two inch strip drawer and my 2 1/2 inch drawer and my 'scraps to cut into usable pieces' basket, so I was all set.

Previously I had assembled some quilt blocks using the 2 inch strips.  I made the block that is sometimes called Jacks in various kiddie prints and whites.  Miss A decided that she was going to do the sorting and snipping of threads and Miss E would do the pressing.

Surprisingly, well actually surprising to no one BUT me, Miss E decided that she would press, and she wasn't one bit afraid of the iron.  Her mom later said that in her Girl Scout group she was the only one who knew how to use the iron.  Goes to show they're growing up while I'm not looking again.

Anyway, Miss E pressed all the blocks I had done, then was looking for more.  So I started sewing my 'sorted' two inch strips together with the whites, and made more sets, which then turned into more blocks.  Miss A reacted in amazement when the blocks were pressed open -- where did that pattern come from??!!  Really, those strips turned into that pretty design??  WOW!

This is how so many new quilters react when those intricate patterns turn out to be nothing more than strips and squares when you break them down.  I have a pretty large pile now, I should be able to put some flimsies together this weekend.

Unless, of course, the girls decide we need another 'sewing night'!!  Then I'll have to wait for direction from Miss A.  :-)

Sew on...

The Reading Room

Just finished a book by what to me is a new author -- Kate Atkinson.  The book is called "Started Early, Took My Dog".  I picked it up at the local used book store because the title was interesting.

I started reading it, and the character name sounded familiar.  Jackson Brodie.  Hmmm, where have I heard that name before??  Well, as it turns out, this book is not the first by Kate Atkinson, nor is it the first about Jackson Brodie, although it's the first I've read.  There was a Masterpiece Mysteries series on PBS a couple of years ago.  Seems that someone in the UK turned her earlier book, Case Histories, into a made for TV movie.  Oh, I think I made a mental note to look up Kate Atkinson in the bookstore after I'd seen the credits.  So much for mental notes!

Well, if the author didn't stick in my head long, it didn't hurt that the yummy Jason Isaacs played Jackson Brodie, and that's what remained in the back of my mind.

Does he look familiar??  Way back when I was watching, I remember I was trying to remember where I've seen him before and suddenly it hit me!

 

Lucius Malfoy!!

 

For the uninitiated, or if you've been on Mars for the last 10 years, he's one of the villains from the Harry Potter movies.

 

Actually he's been in some other big things, Black Hawk Down, Armageddon, in 2004 he was on The West Wing.  How did he slip by me in those roles?  Must have been the white hair that made his face so memorable.

 

Anyway, I'm going back to the bookstore for more Kate Atkinson.

 

Sew on!

Project Runway 2013

A couple of seasons ago, when the contest was won by another nincompoop who couldn't sew or design anything original, I swore off Project Runway for good.  I said I would never, ever, go back and watch that group of know-it-alls make such poor decisions, especially knowing how hard some people work and NEVER get the chance for that much recognition.

Well, my mother used to say you shouldn't swear.

I have to tell you I really like Tim Gunn.  He's the voice of calm in a mad world out there in Lala Land.  And I don't hate Heidi Klum.

So, Thursday night, with nothing else on TV worth spitting at and not really being in the mood for anything I recorded, I switched on PR and watched the first 20 minutes of the new season.  If you watched it, did you love the way they took the designers to the airport runway and had the jumpers come down with colorful parachutes?  Those guys were worth watching, and I was holding my breath!

The idea of making a fashion statement from a parachute was interesting.  And two of the designers are from Milwaukee.  So I pressed record, went to be, and hoped for the best.

Today I watched the taping.  I watched the runway show twice.  How cool were the designs?  The winner and runner up were awesome.  I really liked both equally well, and I think the judges made a good decision.  And hey, I even liked one of the lowest designs, but the Russian guy has to learn to fit better so parts that should remain unseen actually do.

And what the heck is up with eco-guy, doesn't believe in hair products and makeup, and then HE comes out in a pair of glitzy high heals??  Duh.

So I'm hooked again for a little while, anyway.  This season the judges are going to chat with Tim Gunn before deciding, and they're going to look at the garments close up.

All I can say is THANK GOODNESS Michael Kors is doing something else this year.  And I'm actually starting to like Nina Garcia.

OMG this could be fun!

Sew on...

Becca Sews

I've talked before about my Friday night sewing sisters... actually they're aunties and cousins and such.  We meet lots of Fridays at one of the aunties' homes, and sometimes we sew, other times we plan or talk or eat or comfort each other as needed.

Last Friday, one of the little girls decided to come to "sewing", and she had a project to complete.  She's 9, so she can reach the petal of the machine and she isn't afraid of the actual act of machine stitching.  This is always a plus!

She wanted to make a quilt for a baby gift for someone in the family.  I'm not saying who, so you can be surprised.  Anyway, she came with her little project bag and asked if we would help her sew.

Nancy showed her how to use a rotary cutter, and helped her even out the edges of the panel she had found.  They cut some border pieces from her other fabric.  She pinned the borders on with Nancy and Grandma helping.  Then she sat down to sew.  With the aid of a quarter inch sewing machine foot, she added the borders.  Grandma turned the speed down to low so she had time in the sewing for adjusting the fabric feeding in.  I showed her how to press, but she did most of the pressing herself.

Grandma and others then helped her layer backing, batting and top for sewing together using the Eleanor Burns 'birthing' method.  She sewed the layers together with only a bit of help.  After she turned it, Aunt Amy did a little free motion quilting around the fairy to hold the layers together. 

Here she is with her finished product.  Can you think of the last itme you've seen a bigger smile?

She says even when she gets to be a teenager and the other girls want to go do other things, she will STILL want to come to sewing night!

I believe that this little girl has the bug, and I'll bet she goes on to wonderful things!

Sew on, Becca!