Is it OK to mourn your sewing machine?

      I'm sitting here feeling kind of lost at the moment. My Bernina had a bad weekend and is in the shop for a while. I was free motion quilting and it started whistling. Not good. I googled "whistling sewing machine" and the best suggestion was to oil it. Well, Bernina users know that isn't possible except around the bobbin area so that's what I did. I took it apart, cleaned any visible lint and put a drop of oil. I ran the machine to spread the oil (that's what you're supposed to do) and then realized the thread had sucked in and was wrapped around the drive shaft thingy many many times. It was impossible to get it out. I ran it to see what would happen and now it whistles and clunks. So I had to stop immediately.
     To  make it worse I do have another machine that has been stored in Mitch's basement. Over the years I have looked for it and can't find it! Mitch is looking now also. But even if I do find it I will have to replace the foot pedal. It's electronic and has a problem--it has two speeds, off and zoom!
      There is another machine in my house. Emma's grandma gave it to her when she tried sewing but I tried to use it and it doesn't work. It's old and appears the major gear is shot so it is going bye-bye.
      And I may as well mention my Coeur d'Alene machine. It was a great machine and I'd use it when I was there. Last summer I packed up a project to work on and went to get the machine and it wasn't there. Mom said, "I must have given it away". Really?!!!! She has no memory of where my $500 machine went without asking me!
      I sent out an SOS to my quilt guild and a couple other friends and did get a referral to a guy who will come to your home but since I have been a very bad girl and haven't had it serviced in more years than I am willing to admit I felt it needed to go to the actual Bernina service center. That place is BUSY and it could be 2 weeks! I'm in mourning and wondering what to do with all my free time. I guess that binding will get done, huh? Or maybe I'll get more embroidery done on my crazy quilt? Or, heaven forbid, I might clean the house? (Nah...) or the crafting room?  So at the moment I sit and blog and pout. Hopefully tomorrow will be a better day and the machine will get fixed sooner rather than later! I have a deadline looming...

Threads=Inspiration

I just got home from an interesting Sunday afternoon activity. The owner of the Aurofil thread company was in town for a presentation at Emma's Quilt Cupboard.  http://www.aurifil.com/ I'm a sucker for anything that teaches how something is  made so I loved the video showing the factory and every step of the process. I will never take thread for granted again! I am definitely not a thread snob unless I am doing a decorative technique. I love my variegated threads for machine quilting and my fine threads for some machine quilting, but now I am wanting to upgrade! The trunk show of beautiful projects was so inspiring. I am briefly coveting an embroidery machine or longarm. Plus we all left with a sample pack of each weight of thread and a color card so now I will be dreaming of threads. Something tells me Aurofil will be on my wish list next Christmas!

You never know where inspiration will come from.

Nov. 15,2015 (That's the date  I started this entry).

#1 Diagonal

      You never know where inspiration will come from. The other day I was awakened at 6:25 by the phone. It was a town emergency call about a lost wandering elderly woman in my part of town. The call interrupted a strange dream in which I was designing a quilt. I woke up and immediately drew a diagram of the quilt I had dreamed up so I wouldn't forget it. My idea was a "rainbow" effect using different sampler blocks.  I have spent the week making a huge mess of a rainbow of colors of fabrics. I have dug into every tote, strip, triangle and square storage box digging out just the little pieces I need. This project has been a fun diversion from the other projects that were heading into "Boring Land".
       It is now four months later to the day (3-15-16). Many other projects have been started and finished, there are new UFO piles for later and I finally finished the blocks for this one. When I started I cut all the pieces for each block and pinned them together to sew later. I got to the end and had 2 yellow/yellow-orange blocks left over with no idea how they were supposed to go together! I took them to a Social night and had the girls play with them and they all threw up their hands too. Next morning I was brushing my teeth and BINGO a lightbulb went off. I ran out and drew the diagrams of the two blocks I came up with and got them sewn later in the day.

     Now I can't figure out which layout I like best. My original "dream" was basically a rainbow from yellow to green. Then I started playing around and can't decide so I took pictures of a few layouts and now I'm asking for opinions. So this is a plea for help from my talented quilter friends.
(For the life of me I can't figure out how to place the pictures in a logical arrangement!)

#2 Double yellow Diagonal

#3 Rotated, blues center

#6 straight rainbow

#4 Rotated. yellow middle

#5 Rotated red middle

The Needle--Does it make a difference?

    This weekend we had a workshop at our Runamok Modern Quilt Guild meeting. We were trying an improv technique and I brought my machine for a group to use. It was quite an interesting hour! I sew beautifully on my Bernina usually. It had a brand new needle in it and right off the bat the needle broke (my fault, I forgot to switch the needle back to the center after doing piping). The only spare needle in the room was a Schmetz universal size 80. That's the needle almost everyone uses and I put it in. (My usual needle is a Schmetz Jean size 80). The first person who sat at the machine was sewing really crooked. I'm thinking "wow, she does not sew very well". The next person was even more crooked, the stitches were different lengths, and she was freaked out because the machine was too fast. ( I slowed it down for her, but she was still freaking out). Stitches were different lengths and crooked. So I sat down and sewed and it was really strange. The machine was not acting like my machine at all. It almost felt like the fabric was swimming around under the presser foot. When I got home I realized I had broken  my last jeans 80 needle and all I had was a 70 which is good for piecing but not really heavy enough for machine quilting. I put it in to continue with the project and MAGIC it was back to normal!
     I had taken a workshop at one time that taught about different needles and what they are best for. My take-away was the knowledge that a jeans needle is awesome!
     There are a lot of different needles out there for different uses. The difference is the way they pierce the fabrics and it makes a difference in how the seam appears. A jeans needle is very sharp and pierces straight down plowing through everything, making a straight seam. A ball point has a rounded tip, which keeps the needle from snagging the knit or making a hole. A universal is in between. A ballpoint or universal tries to slip between the fibers, rather than piercing, so the seam is less straight.

Our group's improve section--not really my thing
but I'm sure the whole thing will be interesting

These are the ones in my collection and what they are used for:
     Universal: general sewing, mending, garments, wovens
      Jeans; piecing and quilting
      Quilting-also sharp and recommended for quilting
      Ball Point: knits
      Embroidery: using specialty threads
      Microtex: precise topstitching
This is a good site to compare needles

It is probably a good time to remind people that needles get dull quickly, so as soon as you feel it snagging or acting dull--change it! After this experience I will never piece with anything but a jeans or quilting needle again!

Now really--we're quilters! This seam was done
during the meeting. The seams at the top were
done by me at home.

There's no Crying in Quilting---Right?

        Oh my gosh! All I can think right now is my favorite quote from "League of their Own"--"there's no crying in baseball". I had two days off this week and was off today. I spent all my quilting time working on a Row By Row block from Bear Paw Quilts in Coeur d'Alene. I just can't believe how many mistakes I made. I made the stupid tree trunks 3 times! I tore out as many seams as I sewed and made more stupid mistakes than I care to remember. When I'd get frustrated I'd do a little on something else just to get my mind straightened out. I wear a t-shirt every weekend that says "A bad day of quilting is better than a good day at work". I think today I would rather have been at work!.
         Then to top it off I set up the big table to layer a couple quilts.I managed to get the backs made in the midst of the chaos. I got out the giant roll of batting and spent a hot hour bent over the table pinning one of the quilts. As I put in the last row of pins I realized I had put the wrong top on that back!!! I wanted to cry, I really did. I just took out every pin and now I have to start over! Three days of quilting and all I have to show for it is one Row! I'm not going to show it here till the whole project is done because I am kind of excited about my plan.
       I will show my cute little block I made at Runamuck Quilters. It is a technique we learned called Sketch Stitch Applique. I'm going to use this block as the label on the quilt I attempted to layer today. It's the same colors. Well, I want to put the picture of the block I made but for some reason I can't get it off my phone. Boo hoo..black cloud again!! Just took me forever to get this picture--I had to get out the digital camera and find the cord and download...Can I just start this day over!!!  (Do you think I just used enough exclamation points in one blog?)

Sketch stitch block

Spokane Shop Hop #2 is in the books

      My friend Susie Long and I had a fun day of quilt shop hopping in Spokane! Last year's was such fun we had to do it again. A couple shops have closed and one has moved and another has opened up so we hit different parts of Spokane this time. We even tried out a new chicken place and explored the Hobby Lobby. We also wandered around the north side looking for a shop that had moved and came across an accident involving a deer. So sad. It was just sitting there in the road looking around.
      The first thing you have to do when you do a shop hop is to have a list. Then you have to accept that the list is a joke and just go with the flow. This was my list: Row by Row patterns, Moda fabric to finish my jellyroll quilts from Christmas, and 2 jellyrolls. Actually I did pretty well. I came home with 7 patterns which are giving me anxiety about doing them. I got 2 jellyrolls which I have already used and wish I had bought more. I took a picture of a quilt in a shop which I made with one jellyroll and want to do again in a different color scheme. I also found Tweety eyes fabric which made me so happy! I had just used up my last little piece of it and I love it so much in kids' quilts.
      You know you had a fun day of shopping when you get home and you feel like a kid the day after Christmas! So many new toys!
       I can't wait for next year. Sherri says she's in and I'm holding her to it!

     

A Row By Row--something to aspire to!

Add caption

We each bought a roll of Aunt Grace scraps to add to the stash.

Delicious

Tweety!

Thanks Susie for the pictures! Love ya!

The Quilter Bucket List--#1 is crossed off!

       Holy crap! I can't believe I never posted that last one. Oh well, I got a few pictures taken and added today so off it goes into the internet cloud. So today you lucky readers get two posts.
       It is now officially spring in New England. Driving around I failed to see a single snow pile so I think we can say now the winter from hell is finally over.
        I am happy to say I am no longer such a "lonequilter". I joined a local quilt guild called Runamuck Modern Quilt Guild. Runamuck Modern Quilt Guild Blog They are coming up on their 1st anniversary and I have enjoyed the 2 meetings and socials I have attended. I really am not a "modern quilter" but they are open minded so I was welcomed anyway (ha ha). Last week's social gave me a new catch phrase. "It's the canary's fault". One woman new to quilting was trying to put together the block of the month and it was quite frankly a disaster. At one point she stood up and was so exasperated and she blurted out "it's the canary's fault!" Apparently the canary was loose in her sewing room and was distracting. (For the record, she never did complete the block--just too many canaries I guess).
         The last week and a half I tackled the project on the top of my "Quilting Bucket List." It is a very large two sided Ocean Waves/Apple Core Charm quilt that I made before Emma was born. The black squares in the middle of the Ocean Waves needed hand quilting. I had machine quilted the  whole thing, quilted the border, quilted a lot of squares and setting triangles and put on the binding and then slept under it in its half finished state for a long time. I pulled it out for one of Emma's friends to sleep under and decided to try to finish it. I had quit before because I did not have enough light. But I discovered that if I sit in the chair in front of the windows in Emma's room during a sunny day I can see!!  Then I realized that the overhead light is good enough to see also. Who knew? All I did in my spare time for a week and a half was sit and hand quilt and watch "Top Chef". One episode of "Top Chef" = 1 block. In my mind all these years I had the number 8 in my mind as the number of squares I had to do.  WRONG! It was more like 28 including a couple setting triangles I had missed. It just went on forever! When I started what I hoped was the last square I realized I was almost out of thread and needles.. Luckily for me it WAS the last square and I had about 12" of thread and 2 unbent needles left over! I realized it had been close to 20 years since I hand quilted and it came right back to me like riding a bike. Yay, #1 on the bucket list is crossed off!