Stitching in the Barn

Below is the one tool I cannot sew without, the bobbin winder. My vintage machines don't always wind bobbins or wind them oddly. This little gadget is a must have in those situations and it will do all my bobbins no matter the type. The power plug input doesn't work, or maybe it's the plug itself, but it runs just fine on battery power. My daughter also uses vintage machines and borrowed it the one day. Late that night it was still in her room when I needed it. I had other sewing things I could do but now I see I might need to get another. I'd like to find one in purple like I saw online somewhere. That would be fun and this one is so old the white is getting discolored.

I shouldn't have started this project on a day I wasn't feeling the best but I thought it would help spur me on to get something done. I started with the X-men symbol block because it was the simplest. I thought I knew what colors went where without looking at my notes and sewed on the wrong color. There were only supposed to be the medium blue and yellow up to this point, not the dark blue. I jumped the gun on the last color. I reprinted my block out & started over because I just didn't want to rip out what I had done and it wasn't much anyway. Then I set it aside until I felt better.

Recently I've done a lot of my sewing on this baby She's a nice green tea colored Sears Kenmore model #158.15160.

I had a fun and busy weekend. Saturday, me and the husband went to the Dallas Quilt Show . There were many amazing quilts. The artistry and craftsmanship was a big step up from the last one I went to . Unfortunately, I can't post photos but there are a couple at the link. I came away with a lot of inspiration and motivation. We also saw a quilt my husband would like me to make for the bed. It was a lovely french braid quilt with Poppy fabric and black and white prints. So I'm scrapping all my other ideas and I'm going to focus on that one. We were both completely quilted out by the end.  I did find and buy this Our Lady of Guadalupe fabric panel. It's folded in half, the other half is the same. Sorry for the blurry picture. I'm sure I'll post clearer ones some other time. I'm not sure if I want to make one quilt or 8 individual wall quilts for my friends and family. I had a pattern for a rose that would go great with it but I couldn't find it....

Sorry for whining but I've been hemming jeans. It's a necessary bother. I've hemmed one pair for myself that I've had for literally years. They were a pair I bought on clearance for $4 about 4 years ago. They were regular and I'm a petite and they were very flared at the bottom. I totally messed up the hem on them when I took out most of the flare so they sat for a long time. Then last year I finally pinned up a hem, last  month I basted it in, and yesterday I let out the one side that looked too high and finally hemmed them. So $4 and 4 years later I've got a nice pair of jeans. Sometimes I don't know if it's worth saving the money if you have to do so much work on them or they sit around forever, unable to be worn. I've got another pair of pants for myself I have to hem. Regular pants are always about 4 inches too long on me. At least they are pants and not jeans so it should be easier (knock on wood). And I've got a pair of jorts (jean sh...

I've worked on my hexies and I've gotten them all basted. Here are the next ones I've worked on: And here they are all together, I think that's a nickle in there: I've tried placing them into matching rows but it looks too uniform: Then I tried flowers which I like but they don't really sing to me: I'm working on them tomorrow at my son's music class so I'll sew them into flowers but I think I'm going to make a garland out of them for my sewing room. I don't know if I'll attach them end to end or maybe on a fake vine. Either way, I'm going to back them and either stuff them or batt and quilt them, most likely by hand. BTW my husband came home with a Necchi type 565 yesterday from the charity store for $15! We believe it was one of the first to be made in Japan since I believe the 555 was still made in Italy and this one doesn't say "Made in Italy" anywhere, though the motor and bobbin hook say ...

These are my two wonderful machines that I do my piecing and quilting on: