Is It Contagious?

Happy New Year!

Thank you all for the get well wishes! I think I'm on the mend. I got up this morning and could breathe through both nostrils and I'm not freezing anymore.

My sons were actually helpful, despite my whines in my last post — making store runs for more drugs and a load of tissues, and jumping in for odd jobs around the house to keep things going (dogs out, making a couple of dinners, etc.). DH was working very full days so he was off the hook. It's not that they aren't generally helpful in all situations, but like most men, they aren't good at "mothering," which is what I was whining for in my last post. When you're the mama, it's hard to get good mothering when the resident mama is down for the count and the biological one is a thousand miles north. ;-)

So, while I seem to be getting better, I must've breathed too hard on my D1 and it's now sick. I was all set to sew the binding onto my mom's table runner last night. I loaded an empty bobbin into the winder and … clack-clack-clack-crash! Ayiiiiiiiiii!

I shouldn't admit this in public, but here goes. I've been sewing without a reverse or lights on my D1 for a few years. The fix stitch button also doesn't work, but I can get around that with other methods. The part that's most inconvenient is not being able to turn it OFF when I *don't* want a knot at the beginning of a seam. Reverse can had by turning the fabric 180, which has been easy enough. It does suck that I can't use some of my utility stitches without the Reverse button, but it's been so long I can't even remember which ones anymore. The lights I really don't miss. I just have a table lamp shining directly onto the bed which is more than bright enough.

But not being able to wind bobbins? That's a show-stopper. And no, the Sidewinder bobbin winding thing doesn't work for Viking D1 bobbins so that's not an option even if I wanted one, which I don't.

I've avoided taking the machine in for repairs all this time because at first I just couldn't bear being without a sewing machine. It used to be my only one. I didn't count my Kenmore back then but I've since dusted it off and it's now part of the herd as my buttonhole station.

I've avoided the repair shop lately because, frankly, I'm pretty sure they're going to tell me I need a new motherboard and I just plain can't afford to drop hundreds and hundreds of dollars on that, after the year of $$ house repairs we've had. And after all this time, I'm just used to being without and something else always seems to take precedence in the budget. But no bobbin winding means it's time for the D1 to be hospitalized. She's going in with a list of all that's wrong and the instruction to not fix anything without giving me an estimate for each item first. I know the bobbin winder problem is not related to the motherboard and hopefully that won't be an arm and two legs. If I'm right and I need a new motherboard for the other things, unless it's a LOT cheaper than I think, I'll still have to pass on those other repairs for a while longer and continue with my workarounds for no reverse and the fix stitch. But at least I'll know how much to save towards it.

On the bright side, having some of these convenience features gone from my D1 taught me that I really didn't need them to sew and made me look at vintage and mechanical machines in a new light. Which is why I have the Featherweight and the treadle and dusted off the Kenmore. Hmmm. Blessing or curse? LOL! I even dug out the manual for the Kenmore last night and realized it does a lot more than I thought it did. When I bought it, I didn't really sew. It was for mending and Boy Scout patches, and I was more interested in price than features. I'm going to try finishing mom's table runner and napkins with it this afternoon. If all goes well, I'll start on my sister's scrubs next.

Coverstitch: Serging Bound Neckline at Shoulder Seam

So, you've bound your neckline "in the flat" and now one shoulder seam is unfinished. What to do? (Don't cut those binding ends off just yet!)

I serge my bound neckline shoulder seams like this:

1. Raise the serger knife to its highest position.

2. Before you put the pieces under the knife, slide the bottom layer back a smidge. The machine's differential feed will grab this bottom layer first and that slight grab will put it even with the top layer for the first stitch. (At least on my serger!)

3. Lift the front of the serger foot (with your fingertips, not with the lift lever) and put the fabric all the way under and against the knife.

4. Release the tip of the foot back on top of the fabric, which is now in position against the knife. (You see a ripple here because I was juggling fabric with one hand and the camera with the other!)

Grab the binding tails and gently guide them (and your shoulder seam) toward the knife as you step on the pedal and slowly start serging over "the lump."

5. Press the seam toward the back and, Voila!

6. After running the serger thread tail back through the stitching, sometimes a stitch or two will show at the neckline edge. When this happens, I get out my permanent fabric markers and color those threads to match or blend. I won't tell if you won't. ;-)

Coverstitch: "Lazy" Coverstitch Hem

Most of my hems I do "by eye," thus the "lazy" method.

First, I press up a hem.

With the hem pressed, I bring the item to the CS machine and place it raw edge side UP under the needles so that the left-most needle is just at the inside of the raw edge. Most of the time my edge does not line up right next to one of the guidelines because those guidelines are more regularly incremental than my "by eye" amount.

So, out comes my handy-dandy "hem guide." Yes, a little pad of Post-It notes. (Thanks to a PR member for this tip.) I butt it up next to the folded edge and press down so the whole pad is temporarily stuck in place.

Then I turn the fabric over so the wrong side is facing down and I'm ready to start stitching.

Voila! The underside of the hem is encased in coverstitching with no raw edges to trim. (Please pardon the stitch quality of the off-grain hastily made sample.)

Boo on the Flu

I wish I could say I've finished my mom's table runner or that I've been sewing at all. But this guy looks like how I feel and it's been all I can do to drag myself to work in the morning and get the daily must-do's done. Then I drag myself back to bed … after a stop at the Dayquil/Nyquil bottles.

Am I whining? YES! Do I want pity? YES! You try being sick in a house with 3 (cave)men and you'd be sucking up for some sick pity too. ;-) I even had to drag out the crock pot and make my own turkey soup from the Christmas Day turkey leftovers today. Wahhhh. But it felt so nice and warm going down my sore throat it was (almost) worth having to do it myself.

I hope I'm better by the time 2010 rolls in so I can take good advantage of my days off. If not, toast the bubbly for me, will you?

And Now For Something Completely Different

I'm a little late on the Christmas gifts this year, but my mom and sister understand and will be happy with their gifts … whenEVER they arrive. ;-)

First up for mom, a combination housewarming and Christmas present. A table runner for her new house in her colors. I'm also going to make a set of coordinating napkins from the leftover fabrics.

The pattern I'm using is this one. It's a quilt-as-you kind of pattern but I nixed that part. It seemed like overkill and a good way to make mistakes. I'm not sure if I should review this pattern on Pattern Review. Do people actually read and/or reference quilt patterns?



I cut and pieced it today. It's really easy, trust me. Here's the top, pinned to the batting and the backing, ready for quilting. I used my Featherweight for all the piecing, which was fun.



For the quilting, all eleven straight rows of it — LOL! — I moved back to my D1 since I have a stitch in the ditch foot for it and the harp space is bigger. The quilting took all of 30 minutes, tops. I might have to make one of these for me.

Before I started on this project, I scanned swatches of the fabrics and used it to make a mock-up on paper to be sure it wasn't going to look too funky. These are so not my colors and picking out the fabrics was the hardest part.



Here it is quilted and trimmed and awaiting binding. I'm taking a dinner break right now but will finish the binding later tonight and it will be done. Definitely a one-day project even for non-quilters like me.



Next up will be scrubs for my sister.