Snow Days

We had a little dusting of snow back in November and then nothing for months. Over the past four weeks we've had a LOT of snow and school has been closed for a total of five days. I can't remember when they've had a full week of school!

There is a funny story about these odd tracks in our backyard:

My 14 year old son managed to lock himself out of the house! Why he was barefoot, in the garage, at night, with no jacket, no cell phone, and wouldn't ring the doorbell to wake us up is beyond me! The barefoot tracks where when he went to look for the spare key that we USED to keep in the back. It wasn't there. Our son survived and has quite a silly story to tell now, about the night he spent in the garage and walking barefoot in the snow!

This last snow did not kill off the daffodils though! They are still blooming like crazy out there in the back yard.

With so many snow days, I've been busy. I finally took the time to get photographs together to put here on my blog!

The first thing I want to talk about is my favorite all around sewing machine. I recently had to move it and set it up in a different place. When I went to pull the power cord out, the receptacle for the plug, inside the sewing machine, came out in pieces! Oh NO!!!

For the past month I've been searching for a replacement. I had won that one on eBay, but as you saw in a previous posting, it arrived in pieces. I contacted several places to see about getting a part to replace the broken one with. The machine is pushing 15 years of age, and parts are not easy to get. It looked like I had a completely unrepairable machine and would have to continue looking for a new one.

With nothing else to lose, my husband took a look at it the other night...while we were snowed in. Oh the wonderful joys of being married to a Mechanical Test Engineer who used to be an Electronic Engineering Technician!!! He was able to fix my Pfaff sewing machine, that otherwise would have become a boat anchor.

Here she is, ready to go back to work!

The plug receptacle on the right was the broken one. The fix involved redesigning (kinda) and solder and teeny tiny screws and precision workmanship. He even fixed the three buttons on the stitch selector pad that weren't working before. I vacuumed out the dust bunnies, since it was opened up. She's as good as new now! Woohoo!!! How will I ever repay him? I am sure I can think of something.

Around the studio you might find this new kitty in my pineapple plant. I could not resist the poor little thing, tucked away in a pile of markdowns at a local store.

It doesn't really look like it, but the studio has shrunk. It weighs a lot less than it did. I got rid of so much stuff!!! Here is a before photo:

That is the table in the foreground, with all the stuff piled high.

This corner is piled high. I was standing with the table at my back, taking a shot of the same angle. 

Here is the studio, picked up and the load lightened!

That messy corner is now filled with my new Sweet 16 quilting machine!

Lancaster BOM - Block One

Lancaster BOM - Center Medallion in progress

My Mom's 1950-1960-ish vintage sewing machine. 

Her machine is mounted in a Franklin treadle cabinet. We found the places where the treadle used to be attached inside. I don't know the history of this as to how Mom got it, but it might have been my Grandmother's on Mom's side of the family.

Here is the new girl on the block, my Sweetie. She sat for over a month without being used. I tested her just enough to check the tension and then didn't get back to her until today. At first I was intimidated by her size and potential. Then I was afraid...what if I did not like her, after spending all that money??? I also needed a quilt to quilt with!

Today I made myself sit down with the bobbin winder. I got it all hooked up, figured out how to get a bobbin on it and wound my first bobbin! It went without a hitch too. I think I can wind regular bobbins on it too! MUCH better than those cheap plastic stand-alone bobbin winders!

Oh look! A quilt that needs quilting!

And, the results are in! She does quilt! I love how long the bobbin lasted before changing. There is definitely a learning curve with this machine. I am so used to quilting with my Juki that I will need to take time to re-learn with this new machine. I already miss my automatic thread cutter though.

The quilt is a calendar quilt that was 2014's BOM through my quilting guild.

Last, but not least, the next block for the BOM "My Favorite Things" is in. This one will be a sewing machine! I have it cut out and ready to sew down.

Sew that's it from these parts! I wonder how many of you have read all the way through this LONG blog posting! I think we are done with snow for the rest of this year. Today it was in the 50's and the sun was shining SO bright! It was all good.

Hope to see you back here again sometime soon! Until then, happy sewing y'all!