Almost on one track....

 I have been mostly just working on the Queen blanket.  That is surprising for me because I am generally all over the place, working on a very large variety of projects.  The blanket has really grabbed my attention and the interest in it doesn't seem to be waning.  I am a little over half done with it, starting to repeat the color bands in reverse.

This is not to say that I have not been playing with other things, I am just not a monogamous crafter😀 LoveCrafts had the small 25gr skeins of Sheepjes Catona on sale last week, so I ordered a nice selection of colors to play with.

I have been wanting to try making a mandala, and many of the patterns on Ravelry call for this yarn.  I had thought of using Maysville 8/4 carpet warp, but I really wanted a mercerized yarn.  The carpet warp would have been very matte looking even though I have a lot in my stash.

I started a mandala the day the yarn came, actually set the blanket aside😀 I told myself that I was only going to do a couple of rows a day and set it aside.  The next day I picked it up and essentially finished it!  So much for a couple of rows a day.  I  ran over to Joann Fabrics, so nice that it is close by, and picked up a couple of brass hoops.  I wasn't sure which size I would need so I grabbed a 10" & 12" hoop.

I had read to clip the mandala to the hoop with stitch markers to hold it in place while attaching it to the hoop.  That worked like a charm!

Once the 12" hoop was clipped on, I just crocheted the last row and attaching it to the hoop as I went.  Instead of doing a ch2 I sc around the hoop.  Then I pulled out my lucet, used 2 of the colors to make a hanging cord and the finished mandala is now hanging on my front door.  My camera behaved bizarrely, the colors look really faded and different hanging on the door then laying on the table.  I don't know if this is because I have a yellow wall in my hall, or because of the lighting by my doorway.  Regardless, it is done and hanging and I am overall pleased with it.  

Another little quick project was making another crochet hook roll.  A friend ordered a set of the Clover Amour hooks and I think she will need a case for it.  I put a 39-end band on the Good Wood mini inkle, and popped the band out in a couple of hours.  

The colors are quiet outside my regular color wheel, but they ended up working well with the fabric that I chose.  The 2 darker colors are Lunatic Fringe 10/2, and the hot pink was in my stash.  I have no idea where that came from, but it worked well for this band.

I did monogram the hook sized on the pockets like I did for my roll.  The monogrammer behaved much nicer this time around, none of the cams gave me grief.  The roll itself gave me loads of trouble.  Silly me did not write down how I made the first roll, so I was just kind of working through it all.  I sewed it together, discovered that I sewed the band on in the wrong direction, sewed the cover flap on wrong too.  I had to take it all apart, trim the edges, and reassemble.  I did get it to come together but it was a bigger PITA than I had planned.

I also created a Bingo card of crafting for this year.  It has on it some projects that I am working on, projects that have stalled on me, and projects that I would like to make in the future.  I want to use it as a guild line for my crafting this year.  It will be interesting to see if I get any Bingos!

Stay tuned to see how this goes!  LOL

The strange appeal of sewing

As a young girl and a younger woman, I never enjoyed sewing.  I did not even like sewing a button back on.  My mom sewed my entire life, she took tailoring classes and was a marvel on her Singer 15-91 that she purchased brand new.  She sewed most of hers and my clothes as I was growing up.  She tried with an amazing amount of patience to teach me good sewing skills, but it just never took.

She learned to sew on my grandma's treadle Singer machine.  I remember that machine in grandma's dining room covered with growing plants.  My mom just rolled her eyes in disbelief when I dragged a Singer 15-88 treadle home.  She told me that the minute she had enough money to buy an electric machine, she bought her Singer.  She cannot believe that I actually bought a treadle machine and actually use it.  Actually she is quite shocked that I ended up collecting quite a few vintage Singers and that I use them.

I have been giving some thought to thinning the herd of machines.  I am amazed at how hard it is to pick one or two or three to sell.  They all have something that interests me and I have been lucky enough to find all of them in really nice condition.  But really, do I need 6 straight stitch Singers?

This past week I cleaned and oiled the 401a.  This is my original sewing machine.  Years ago when I first started to weave, I had bought a new, plastic machine with built in zz but it was a noisy, wimpy machine that did not like handwoven fabrics.  I sold it and found the Singer 401a as a Craigslist find.

It is in a blonde Copenhagen cabinet with the bench and all of the attachments.  I have picked up a couple of top hat cams, a walking foot, and a 1/4" seam foot for it.  Other than new oil and lube, that is about all it has cost me and it always sews like a dream.  It should be and it was plenty of machine for me, doing everything that I asked it to.  I hadn't sewed on it in ages, and after a little oil it was just humming along.  It should be enough, but today when I decided I needed another fabric box I promptly put the 401a away and used the treadle.  I quite like the cabinet that the 401a is in for my steam press, it fits nice on it and it keeps it in the sewing (was a dining room) room and handy to the cutting table.

The 15-88 is pretty much always out and ready to go so for months now, if I need or want to sew something, there it is just ready to treadle that pretty straight stitch.

Now that leads to a strange phenomenon for me - I want to sew!  How the heck has that happened?  I have found it to be so satisfying to have a need for a pouch or a box or whatever, and I just sit down and sew it.

In the last month alone, I have made a few new coasters for my house, a set of orange coasters for a friend, and a set of blue ones for my mom.  Those silly little coasters are so much fun to make, amazing - fun with a sewing machine.  It is such a shocking concept for me.

I have been spending time on my front porch knitting and crocheting this summer.  My porch is up on the 2nd floor and I have on occasion gave a pull to the skein of yarn and the blasted thing would end up rolling under the railing and falling downstairs.  Then I have to go down, go outside, throw the yarn back up to the porch, and untangle it from the railing.  So last weekend, I made a yarn box to stop that nonsense ....and what did I do, I sewed it!

I had the fabric and interfacing in my stash, so some time at the treadle sewing machine and tada, a yarn box.  Last night I started spinning a new braid of fiber.  I have been keeping the fiber on the floor next to me in a plastic shoe box and today, I decided that just will not do.  Again, the magic of sewing strikes again:-)

Here is my custom made fiber box, perfect for holding the nests of fiber next to the wheel.  It is so darn cool to be able to decide to make something like this and to do it and enjoy doing it.  Here is a nicer shot of both fabric boxes:

Fun, easy, useful, and good looking.  What more can one want?

I am still no closer to deciding which machines should go.  I do want to keep either the 221 or the 301 for sure.  I plan to join a quilting guild when I retire next year and either of those machines will be sweet travel machines.  The 401a will stay too.  I was thinking of letting the treadle go, but that would be just silly concidering everytime I go to sew something lately, that is the machine that I use.  Oh well, I don't have to decide now so I will just enjoy my bounty:-)

Time for a little catch up...

I have not been keeping up with writing here, so I am going to try to rectify that.  I am still actively playing with thread and yarns.  I will have to admit that when it comes to projects, sometimes I have the attention span of a gnat.

I have not touched my big looms in weeks.  I go up to the loft for something and I give them a caress as I walk by but I have not been throwing shuttles.  Actually the 120cm Glimakra Standard has been nekked since I cut the first drawloom warp off of it, but I will come back to that.

I have been working on small looms, I have a lovely band on the Gilmore mini wave on complementary warp pickup that has been a joy to weave.  The grand plan is for that band to be straps on a bag made with drawloom fabric.

I also participated in Tour de Fleece 2019.  I finished spinning up a braid of Haunui NZ Halfbred/silk, plied it and started another braid of Cheviot.   I primarily buy my fiber from an indy dyer that I found on Ravelry.   Allons-y-fiber arts has such spectacular colored braids and the fiber prep is just top-notch.  It just flows out of my fingers as I spin, there are not mats or neps, just beautifully prepared and dyed fiber.  Here is what is on the Lendrum right now:  the color called Autumn on Cheviot

I am spinning it as a 3-ply and hoping that it doesn't get all muddy because of my inexperience in spinning.  I am hoping to get a pair of shorty socks and a pair of fingerless gloves from it.

A few weeks ago I had gone antiquing with a friend and we came across a bucket full of Paternayan tapestry yarn,  so I grabbed quite a few skeins and pulled out the Hokett tapestry loom.   I am experimenting with Wedge-weave which really caught my eye when I went to Convergence a number of years ago.  The plans are for a series of small tapestries to hang on the wall outside of the staircase going up to the loft.  It is a large, plain looking space and the tapestries would give it some interest.  These are the yarns that are being used:

There is a good selection to play with and it weaves fairly quickly being that it is on the little Hokett loom.

I have taken up hand knitting and crocheting as well.  I have done some knitting with my handspun yarns and it is a kick using them.  I do not care all that much to weave with wool, so knitting it is.  I am still working out what type of needles I am most comfortable using.  There is a sweater on circlular needles, a pair of socks on 6" dpn's, a vest on 9.75" dpn's using a knitting belt, and a pair of mittens on dpn's as well.  All of the needles are wood or bamboo, I know I prefer that over aluminum or any metals.

I am also crocheting a cross-body bag.  I was looking at a website that sells Omega Sinfonia cotton yarns and a couple of bag patterns caught my eye.  It is been years since I crocheted, so long I had to Google a couple of stitches😃

The sewing machines have not been being neglected either.  I found a fast & fun mug rug pattern that comes out great.  I made my mom a new set the other day:

All from fabrics in the stash which is always satisfying to do.

I know I will get back to the big looms on of these days, but I am having so much fun with all of the little projects in the living room:-)