Winter on the Way

Back in the spring, when Joann Fabrics was going out of business, I loaded up on apparel fabrics. I managed to score three yards of a black rayon cable sweater knit—the same fabric I already had purchased in burgundy, navy blue, and light blue. (Hot pink, where art thou?) Those first three fabrics were made into Toaster Sweaters and I wore the heck out of them last winter. That cabled sweater knit ranks as one of the nicest fabrics ever purchased from Joanns. It wears like iron. I hadn’t ever seen it in black, which makes me think I ran across a bolt that had been unearthed in a warehouse and sent to Missoula for the liquidation.

In any case, a black turtleneck will be a great addition to the wardrobe, although I am trying not to overload my closet with black. (Hot pink . . . ) I pulled out that fabric the other day and made Yet Another Toaster Sweater. I also pulled out a length of black and gray abstract print ponte, which will become some Linda pants that will coordinate nicely with it.

No photo, because it’s a simple black turtleneck sweater.

I have other sweater knits in brighter colors. Some of those may become Toaster Sweaters, too.

Yesterday, I cut out a Geranium Dress in pink printed flannel. I am using the expansion pack to make one with long sleeves and a collar, like the one on the right:

This will be a store sample. I made the original Geranium dress as a store sample over the summer using some Kaffe Fassett Collective fabric. This second version should go together quickly.

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My Squash Squad block is coming along nicely. The pattern specified a couching stitch around the perimeter of the squash, but I couldn’t find a combination of yarn and thread that I liked. I’ve got a ton of bits and bobs that I inherited from my mother and my MIL, so I poked around in the stash until I found some baby rick rack and used that. I love the effect:

When I get tired of working on this, I’ll switch to embroidering the chicken.

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We are going to get weather whiplash here this weekend. It is supposed to be 71 and sunny today. I have to get out to the garden and finish cleaning up. Tomorrow, we will only be in the 50s and it is supposed to start raining later in the day. On Sunday and Monday, we are under a winter storm watch, which could include snow in the valleys. That might be hype, although the meteorologist who did the NWS Missoula weather briefing on YouTube yesterday said that every time they run the forecast models, it gets worse. And even if it doesn’t snow in the valley, our elevation is high enough that we might get some. This will be the week that everyone panics and tries to get their snow tires on their cars.

The barn spider is still hanging out in the kitchen. We have had an influx of flies—and big ones—so when I whack one with the flyswatter, I pick it up with a long pair of tweezers and deposit it in the web. I feel like I am Uber Eats for the spider. The husband has taken to calling me Morticia Addams. Perhaps I should make myself a long black dress and put on some goth makeup.

Squash and Urban Chickens

My college friend, Audra, who lives in Colorado, sent me this note after reading yesterday’s blog post:

The "glass balls and rubber balls" concept originates from a 1991 Georgia Tech commencement speech by former Coca-Cola CEO Brian Dyson, who described life as juggling five balls: work, family, health, friends, and spirit. The idea is that work is a rubber ball—it bounces back if dropped—while the other four are glass balls, which can be irreparably damaged if they fall. The analogy encourages prioritizing the glass balls (family, health, friends, spirit) to maintain balance and avoid long-term consequences, as dropping them can lead to lasting harm, whereas dropping the rubber ball (work) is less impactful.  

Thank you, Audra. I appreciate knowing the origin of that analogy.

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I spent yesterday cleaning and organizing the sewing room. I didn’t do a complete teardown, but I did file all the loose pieces of fabric into their respective containers, cut leftover chunks of quilt cotton into squares and strips—now the scrap bags are really overflowing—and rearranged storage bins so that the winter fabrics are within easy reach. I “shopped my stash” for upcoming projects. I have some very nice fabrics in my stash and it’s time to get them out and use them.

Once everything was cleaned up, I got out my embroidery supplies and prepped a new Squash Squad block and a new Urban Chickens block:

On the left is #4 of 9 in the Sue Spargo Squash Squad series. I am averaging one squash per winter so I should probably speed it up a bit. I’m not following the directions slavishly; I embroider until I think it’s done. The block on the right is the “Sylvia” Urban Chicken. (This pattern doesn’t seem to be available any longer.) I’ve already done the “Charm” chicken block. The pattern also has nine blocks.

I prep these blocks by adhering bits of wool felt to a piece of Steam-A-Seam, cutting the pieces, then fusing the pieces to the base. The fuse is temporary, so I have to whipstitch around each piece with a matching thread color. Once that’s done, I can start embellishing.

The husband and I sit every night after dinner and watch YouTube videos, so this gives my hands something to do.

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Sunday morning, before I left Spokane, I stopped at the Walmart in Spokane Valley. That store—and Missoula—have the only two decent remnant racks left, and even that isn’t saying much. Still, I went to look. As I was standing there, looking through the fabric, a mom and her young son walked through the fabric department. They were discussing his Halloween costume. I heard her say, rather wistfully, “I wish Mommy knew how to sew.” I almost went over and said something to her but I try very hard not to accost strangers in stores because I don’t want to be that person. I taught myself how to sew (mostly) by making my kids’ Halloween costumes. That bar is pretty low, so it’s a good place to start.

What a stupid society we were to take home ec and shop class out of the curriculum. I am glad to see those classes are coming back.

Letting the Rubber Balls Bounce

We finally got a hard freeze. I need to get out to the garden this week and clean up the tomato patch. I thought I might do it on Saturday, but it looks like rain that day. Nothing is worse than working in the garden in a cold rain. I need to pull out the vines, stack them, and stack the tomato cages.

I read something yesterday—I wish I could find it again so I could give credit—about juggling balls. The author said her garden fended for itself this year because she was trying to keep too many balls in the air. She decided to drop the balls that could bounce and concentrate on juggling the balls that would shatter if they fell. I thought that was a great analogy. The world will not come to an end if the garden has to fend for itself for a season.

I don’t have a podcast episode today. I still sound a bit like a rusty gate, and between getting the tomatoes out of the freezer and making them into sauce, taking a trip to Ritzville, picking up pork orders, and teaching yesterday, something had to give. The podcast was a ball that could bounce last week, so I let it.

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I took the Suzy Furrer book with me to Spokane and spent some time looking through it. I am very glad to have it in my patternmaking library. The book is comprehensive and laid out in a logical manner. As I told Ashlee, though, it’s not really a beginner book. The information makes sense to me because I’ve made slopers before and numbers and math don’t scare me. I’d like to try some of the pattern drafts this winter.

A friend of mine asked me to look at her serger to see if I could get it up and running. It’s a 90s-era Pfaff. I had to find a foot pedal for it, which I did, so I am going to tinker with it this week. I suspect it just needs a good cleaning and oiling. I’d like to get it operational for her because I know she will use it if it runs well.

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Yesterday’s machine mastery class was a bit challenging. Customers who purchase a machine have a year to take the mastery class every month, so I never know who is going to show up, with what machine, or where that person is in her sewing journey. Some women came with machines they bought last week. Others brought machines they have owned for a few months but are scared to use. My goal is to get everyone comfortable enough by the end of class that they go home and use their machines.

While I was at the store, Marianne asked if I would teach a class using the Accuquilt cutter. Accuquilt offers a lot of free patterns on their website, so I’ve been looking through them to find one that would make a good class. I really like this one, using the Enigma Star die:

I could use my vast stash of Kona to make up the sample. 😇 Or maybe even some Tim Holtz. Or Grunge. The possibilities are endless.

Today, though, I am going to clean and reorganize the sewing space. I need to pull out and stack patterns and fabric for upcoming projects. I also need to prep some embroidery projects so I have things to work on in the evening.

This Year's Mennonite Country Auction

Many years ago, when I was not even a teenager, our family took a day trip to Amish country in Ohio. We somehow ended up at Lehman’s Hardware on the same day that Mennonite Central Committee was holding its relief sale. All I remember from that day were the clotheslines strung with beautiful quilts, but it is a sight that has stayed with me. And because life is funny that way, now I belong to a Mennonite church and I help out at the relief sale in Ritzville, WA.

I headed over to Spokane on Friday morning. Tourist season is (mostly) over and traffic was light. I met a friend of mine at Pink Thread Fabric in Couer d’Alene, Idaho. This is a new store and both of us wanted to check it out. The store is small, with only one line of quilting fabric, but they had quite a bit of apparel fabric. I bought two yards of a very pretty hot pink rayon Swiss dot-type fabric. I want to support fledgling businesses, especially ones carrying apparel fabric. I hope the owner is able to make a go of it.

After that, I headed to the Quilting Bee in Spokane, where I did not buy fabric. I am trying to put a moratorium on fabric purchases. I need to sew up the stash, first. It is not a bad thing that Joanns is out of business and Walmart has eliminated most of its remnant racks. I did buy some machine embroidery supplies and bag hardware.

On Saturday, I drove out to Menno Mennonite church, which literally sits in the middle of acres of potato fields. Two of the members of our church own a processing company here in Kalispell that makes products under the label Redneck Sausage. (If you’re in the Pacific Northwest, many of the grocery stores like Super 1 and Albertson’s carry it.) They bring ham, bacon, and a special apple German sausage to sell at the sale to help raise money. I run one of the cash registers. People start lining up around 8:30 to be able to buy from us as well as the cheese people whose booth is right next to us. It’s very hectic for about an hour but it is great fun.

After lunch—sausage on a stick and some New Year’s cookies—I went into the tent for the auction portion of the day.

The big attraction is the quilts, of course. In between selling the quilts, the auctioneers also auction off other items. My family will be interested to know that one poppyseed kolache sold for $1800. (That is not a typo.)

Sadly, the sale is dwindling in size. I am hearing rumors that it may not continue after another couple of years. The organizers are getting older and no one is stepping up to take their place. Hand-quilted quilts are getting hard to come by, so most are machine quilted. Many of the quilts in this year’s sale were quilted in Ohio or Pennsylvania and sent out for this sale. I donated a quilt, but it got there too late to make it into this year’s sale so they will keep it for next year’s sale. I will try to donate a few more. The quilts that were in the sale were lovely:

I was back on the road to Spokane by 3 pm. Margaret and Elaine, you were remembered fondly and we wished you could have been there with us.

On Sunday, I drove back to Kalispell via the alternate route, through north Idaho, and stopped at the processor to pick up part of our pork order to deliver to customers. I was home by 3 pm. The processor is still working on the smoked items and they will drive them down here next week so we can deliver the hams and bacon. I will be glad to have that done.

I’m teaching a machine mastery class today. The quilt store is going to be closed on Mondays from now through the spring, but the Monday classes that were already scheduled in October and November will be held as usual. I think it is a good thing for the owner and the staff to have a day off. They have been working very hard. And I should have some time to sew this week. The binding I ordered from Sailrite came over the weekend, so I’ll finish that Retro Sling Bag and see what new projects float to the top of the queue.

Sauce Week is Over

I ended up with a grand total of 42 jars of tomato sauce—plenty for this year. I still have some bags of tomatoes in another freezer, so when things ease up a bit, I may make salsa.

I have gotten in the habit of checking on my pet spider when I come downstairs in the morning. Yesterday, I looked up at the web above the sink and it was empty. Oh, no! Where is my spider? I walked around the kitchen and found it above the cabinet where it had been originally. When the husband came down for breakfast, I was going to show him, but when I pointed to that spot, the spider wasn’t there. Oh, no! Where is my spider? I found it again on the other side of the kitchen door, above the hall tree. It had made a web there. That’s a good spot for it. I think it’s already snacked on some flies.

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Ashlee ordered a book and asked me to evaluate carrying it in the store:

I haven’t done a deep dive yet, but on the surface, this looks like it’s right up my alley. This is a drafting-style manual so everything is based on math—think slopers and beyond. The author is no lightweight, either. She’s is a professional clothing designer and has done Craftsy classes.

Would this appeal to other customers in the store? I’m not sure. My sense, from my own students, is that they would prefer not to have to draft from scratch. I do have one potential quibble and it’s admittedly a very subjective one: I am always suspicious of thin clothing designers who don’t appear to have any fitting issues. It’s one thing to write patternmaking guides for “perfect” bodies; it’s another thing to write patternmaking guides for women in the real world. But I need to look more deeply into the information presented here—and test the instructions on myself—before I make that judgment.

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No sewing got done this week. Honestly, I am not sure how much sewing will get done this month. This is not unusual for October. Between canning and traveling and getting things buttoned up before the snow flies, sewing sometimes takes a back seat. I am teaching three classes in the next 10 days, too. I’ll do what I can and let the rest go until November.

We got a letter last month that the company that underwrites the husband’s liability insurance is not going to continue in that market, so our agent has been searching for another carrier. I’m beginning to wonder how any construction is going to happen in the next couple of years because it is getting so difficult to find coverage. We’re down to two potential carriers and waiting to hear if one or the other will cover us—and how much it’s going to cost us.

I’ve been watching quite a few YouTube videos on the Washington Policy Center’s website about what’s going on in that state. I have two kids living there, after all. Washington state is not only killing the golden goose, its legislature is slaughtering it in dramatic fashion. It’s a cautionary tale about allowing people with zero economic literacy to make financial decisions. Washington’s business and occupation tax is based on gross receipts, not net revenue. Imagine a business pulling in 1.5 million a year with $500,000 in net revenue. (I’m spitballing numbers here.) They would be taxed on the 1.5 million, not $500,000. Is it any wonder that small businesses are fleeing the state in droves?

And according to the WPC, the state legislature took the pandemic stimulus money and baked it into the budget going forward rather than treating it as one-time, non-budgeted income. That’s just irresponsible management.

The minimum wage in Seattle is set to go up. Beginning on January 1, 2026, all employers in Seattle must pay a minimum wage of $21.30, regardless of business size, and cannot count tips or medical benefit payments toward minimum compensation. How many people do you know who are willing to spend $95 on a simple lunch for two people? (That number is not made up—I eat out in Seattle every time I’m there and am always prepared for a bit of sticker shock.)

If we ran our construction company the way some of these states run themselves, we’d be out of business in short order. I just shake my head.

What Came in the Mail

Today’s post is a long one. I didn’t think I had anything to say, and then I started typing . . .

I was the first customer at the tire place when it opened yesterday morning. They got the Jeep in right away and I was out of there in just under an hour. That business still has the “small town Montana” feel that we’re losing—their internet was down so they had no way to process credit cards. I didn’t have the checkbook or enough cash with me. They sent me on my way and said, “We’ll call you later to get your credit card number.”

I came home, dropped off the tires, then headed back to do a Costco run and get chicken feed. I was in the Costco parking lot when I got a text from the tire place saying their internet was back up but their phones weren’t and would I please call them with my credit card number. I did, and now that bit of winter prep is off the list.

Our new Costco is supposed to open in late November. This is the third Costco—hopefully the last?—since we moved to Montana. The problem with the current Costco isn’t the size of the store; it’s the size of the parking lot. The new Costco will be located about a mile north of the existing one.

I hit up the case sale at one of the local grocery stores. The store holds this sale every September and every March. I stock up on things like brown sugar, rice, canned pineapple, and evaporated milk. The store honors the case sale price on single cans of items, so even if you don’t need 12 cans of enchilada sauce, it’s still a good time to buy.

I also dropped off the quilt to go to Ritzville and stopped by the quilt store, where I bought a backing for the Kaffe quilt. I got a tone-on-tone print in acid green that matches several of the same shades in the front of the quilt. The front is such a riot of color that I thought the back needed to be plain and quiet.

All in all, a very productive day.

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Two packages came in the mail Monday. The first was from Cali Fabrics. I’ve bought some beautiful deadstock fabrics from them in the past and I am on their e-mail list. For a few years now, I’ve had it in my head to make a simple long, lined coat using a herringbone fabric—I can see in my head exactly what I want, which is a rare—but I could not find the right fabric. A few weeks ago, Cali Fabrics’ weekly e-mail blast featured some wool herringbone deadstock they had just received. I saw the photo and thought, “That’s the fabric!” They had it in navy and black. I bought the black, but I am showing the navy because it’s easier to see the herringbone pattern:

It’s even more stunning in person. I’m going to have the length of fabric dry cleaned before I use it, just to factor in any possible shrinkage.

I also received my wholesale order from Wonderfil:

We sewists almost have too many choices, but some of the choices fly under the radar. Isacord is probably the most popular quilting/embroidery thread available. It is in every store I visit. Floriani may be the second most popular. Wonderfil makes a thread called Polyfast, for machine embroidery, but I have never seen it in stores. (Wonderfil is a Canadian company, so Canadian stores probably carry it.) I bought some to try on the 700 PRO. I also got a spool of the new variegated Softloc wooly polyester. I know Ashlee ordered this at Bernina University, but it hasn’t arrived yet. Softloc makes great rolled hem edges on linen napkins and I think the variegated will be very pretty. And lastly, I got some Fabulux. Fabulux is a trilobal polyester thread—just like Isacord and Floriani—but the difference is that it’s a three-ply thread, not a two-ply. You may wonder why that matters. A three-ply thread is rounder in cross-section, and that makes it sit up off the surface of the fabric. Fabulux is one of the six threads featured in my thread class, and everyone who tries it loves it. I used it to quilt my BU jacket.

[I could go on and on about the technical details of thread construction, but most of you probably don’t care.]

I also bought a sample pack of Wonderfil’s new stabilizers.

Wonderfil is going head-to-head with OESD in this area; Ashlee and I attended a presentation at BU by Andrew, the owner of Wonderfil, on these products. I am curious to see how they compare.

I have a lot of “studying” to do. Today, though, it’s back to the tomato trenches for another batch (or two) of sauce. If you read this far (Beth H and Sarah, LOL), thank you!

Sauce Production

I put 28 gallon bags of tomatoes into the freezer in September. Yesterday morning, I emptied 14 of the bags into big pots on the stove and cooked tomatoes down into sauce. Charlie kept me company while I worked. The husband said the spider needed a name. I said that Charlotte was the obvious choice, but I didn’t want to call a male spider Charlotte. Charlie is gender-neutral enough that it works either way, so Charlie it is.

[I am aware that the spider doesn’t care.]

I did paperwork and tidied up while the tomatoes cooked. Just after lunch, I ran them through the food mill and began filling jars. I had enough sauce for about 17 jars, but the canner only holds 14. The rest of the sauce will get mixed in with the next batch.

It feels good to get that done, at least partly. I need to get the rest of the sauce made this week. I’m going to Ritzville, Washington this weekend to help with the Mennonite Central Committee Relief Sale and I plan to stop at the processor on the way back to pick up part of the pork order. The freezer has to be empty.

I’m meeting a friend of mine in Coeur d’Alene on the way to Ritzville. We are going to check out a new fabric store there called Pink Thread. They carry apparel fabric. The big quilt store in Spokane—the Quilting Bee—has also expanded its selection of apparel fabric. I suspected this might happen after Joanns went out of business. While I miss Joanns, I also know that the quality of apparel fabric carried by independent stores is going to be much higher than what Joanns had. (Now, if they will just carry something other than muddy earth tones . . . )

I found a photo of Kaffe and me on the store’s social media page. I think Ashlee was sneaking around taking pictures during class. Kaffe and I were shopping for the fabric to use in the 5" blocks:

Kaffe and Brandon wore shirts made from their fabrics every day. I am wearing my top made from a wideback cotton sateen in the Millefiore print. I have that same print in a lovely grass green.

Snow tires are going on this morning. The tire place doesn’t do appointments, but if you call, they put you on a list and then it’s first come, first served. I don’t usually have to wait more than an hour or two. I take a book and my knitting. The people who wait until the first snow to switch over their tires are the ones who have issues, because then everyone panics.

The husband’s concrete pour went well yesterday. He says he doesn’t feel that bad and thinks I had a worse time of it. Thankfully, whatever I had didn’t last long. I felt much better even by yesterday morning.

I don’t think there is going to be much sewing this week. I do need to organize my embroidery and English paper piecing projects, though, so I have things to work on in the evening.

The mail brought two boxes of goodies yesterday. I’ll show you in tomorrow’s blog post. One box contained thread and one box contained fabric. 🧐

Down for the Weekend

I ended up with more days of respite than I intended because I was felled by a virus Thursday evening. I woke up Friday feeling pretty punky and had to skip helping out at the craft co-op sale. I spent most of Saturday lying around doing nothing. If you know me at all, you know that “doing nothing” is almost the worst kind of torture imaginable.

And now the husband has it. He will power through because he has a big concrete pour scheduled for today. I will make sure to have a pot of soup waiting for him when he gets home.

I managed to finish my Kaffe quilt top before I started feeling really awful. I am so happy with it.

The next time I am at the store, I will get a backing for it so I can baste and quilt it.

Yesterday afternoon, while watching the coverage of the awful event at the LDS church in Michigan, I started putting together another scrap quilt. My bag of white, beige, and gray scraps is overflowing, so I decided to make a Sunday Morning quilt from the book Sunday Morning Quilts by Amanda Jean Nyberg and Cheryl Arkinson:

I have lost count of the number of scrap quilts I’ve made from this book. The total has to be well over a dozen. Sunday Morning, Candy Coated, and Scrapper’s Delight are my three favorite designs and the ones I make most often.

It did not escape me that I went from retina-burning yellows to calm neutrals. That may have been my subconscious looking for a safe harbor. I’ll probably set these aside until the next time I need some mindless sewing.

This week is going to be devoted to tomatoes. I have to get them out of the freezer before the pork shows up. I also need to get the snow tires put on the Jeep. As predicted, the weather pattern is changing and it looks like we will finally have a frost. I’m going to be traveling over mountain passes in October and I don’t want to wait for the rush to get the tires changed.

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The spider that has been living above the cabinet in the kitchen moved to a spot over the sink. I am not opposed to it being there—our ceilings are 8' high, so neither of us is likely to walk into the web—but it anchored its web on the towel bar so I’ve had to put a towel in a different spot. Sarah, I tried to get a photo of it but I can’t get one that is in focus. I did determine that it is a barn spider.

The husband laughs because I talk to it while I am cooking. I also expressed concern that it wasn’t getting enough to eat and suggested that we leave the door open so bugs could fly in. We’ll see how long it stays in its present location.

A Moment of Calm

I’ve about reached my limit of social interaction this week. I think I am going to lay low today. I plan to help at the craft co-op sale tomorrow and Saturday and that will involve more people-ing. I don’t have anything in the sale because I haven’t been in production mode this year, but I enjoy being there.

I was home for a bit yesterday morning, so I nudged the sling bag project along to the point where I am about to sew the three main pieces together. I probably will sew the first two pieces together today, but I am waiting on binding to arrive from Sailrite. I can’t sew everything together until I get the binding because the seams have to be bound in a specific sequence. I am a bit surprised at how quickly the bag came together, although this is not my first bag rodeo.

The center of the Economy Block quilt from Tuesday’s class is in its final form:

I put the 11" and 8" blocks back together the same way I had done them in class—thank goodness for phone cameras—then played around with the 5" center squares. The quilt really wanted those pops of black. I ran back to the store in the middle of the afternoon to get a few more pieces of fabric so I could fussy-cut the remaining 5" blocks. I could have gone softer and less dramatic, but I love the contrast. Putting this together might be today’s project.

Matchy-matchy quilts have never been my thing—I adore scrappy—but this one pushed the envelope. Will I make another? Perhaps. I certainly learned a lot from Kaffe and Brandon about how color and fabrics play together.

While I was at the store yesterday, I was seduced by this fabric (Ammonite), designed by Phillip Jacobs. He is the third member of the Kaffe Fassett Collective, along with Kaffe and Brandon.

I bought enough to make another quilted jacket. Hot pink has always been a signature color for me and this fabric is even more spectacular in person. I won’t piece this; I’ll simply quilt the yardage together with a lining fabric, then cut out the pieces and assemble it the same way I did my BU jacket. Sometimes the fabric needs to be the star of the show.

Brandon asked me on Tuesday about my area of sewing, because I think he believed I was mostly a garment sewist. (Half a dozen pieces I made were hanging in the store.) I laughed and said I dabbled in everything. Back in my knitting days, I was very focused on stitches and texture. That was fine for that time in my life, but now I want to try it all.

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I need to sort potatoes today, too. That will be a good project for this afternoon when I can sit on the porch and enjoy the sunshine. It looks like today will be our last warmish day; temps are dropping into the 60s and 70s from here on out. We did get down to about 32F the other morning, but I haven’t gone out to the garden to see how the tomatoes are doing.

Anna came over last night and got a few squash. I showed her what I was planning to use and told her the rest was up for grabs.

I love this cooler weather for cooking, too. I make a lot of soups and stews during the colder months. A nice batch of curried butternut squash soup sounds delicious.

The Kaffe Fassett Event

Kaffe Fassett had his first knitting pattern published in Vogue Knitting in 1986. At the time, I was a junior in college, happily knitting my way through All Sweaters in Every Gauge and Great Knitting in Vogue, the only two knitting books I owned. I made sweaters for many of my friends; in fact, one of them recently shared a photo of hers on Facebook. She has kept it for all these years. Kaffe entered the scene during those years and nothing in the knitting world has ever been the same since. And now he quilts.

If you had told me back in 1986 that some 40 years later, I would be in a quilt class taught by Kaffe Fassett—in Montana—I doubt I would have believed you, for lots of reasons. And yet here I am, because life is funny that way.

On Monday afternoon, I went to Flathead High School and helped to set up for the Kaffe lecture. The store put up a pop-up shop in the commons area outside the auditorium, so we unpacked boxes of quilts for display and bolts of Kaffe Fassett Collective fabric to sell. I wore one of my Kaffe wideback tops. Marianne told us later that they had cut and sold 307 yards of fabric before and after the lecture.

And then, the big event:

(We were asked not to take photos during the actual lecture.)

Brandon Mably, who has worked with Kaffe since 1990, came out and got the audience warmed up. He and Ashlee handed out door prizes. And then Kaffe came out and walked us through the most fascinating story about learning to knit and learning to quilt. He took questions from the audience afterward. Both he and Brandon are very engaging and entertaining.

Yesterday morning, I packed up my sewing supplies and headed to the store. Twenty lucky women—including me—had been able to get into one of the two classes. I chose the Economy Quilt class. The Economy quilt block is an old block pattern.

When I arrived, Brandon asked what fabrics I had brought, which weren’t many. First, I wasn’t entirely sure what kinds of fabrics to pull. Second, my stash is a bit light on the kinds of fabrics we ended up using—big, bright florals. Brandon assigned Kaffe to go shopping with me in the store. Kaffe asked me what color I wanted to use and I said, without hesitation, “Yellow.” I love yellow and I can’t wear it because I look like death warmed over.

I think Kaffe took that as a challenge. We went through the store and he picked out about 14 bolts of fabric—both conventional prints and batiks—in yellows as well as yellows leaning to both green and orange. I had stripes. I had prints. I had a huge variety of fabrics and I had no idea what to do with them. He told me to get half a yard of each.

The store had put up individual flannel design walls for each student. We were instructed to cut 11" blocks from our fabrics and arrange them in checkerboard fashion, alternating lights and darks. I happened to be stationed closest to the door from the classroom into the store, so the store staff kept coming in and suggesting other fabrics to add. I joked that we were designing my quilt by committee. Brandon and Kaffe walked around and made comments and suggestions, some of which were conflicting. 🤪

By lunchtime, I had this:

We put 8" squares on point on top of the 11" squares, then put a 5" square in the center. I should mention that I had the only yellow quilt in the bunch. Everyone else stuck to blues, earth tones, or pinks and reds.

We were not allowed in the classroom during lunch. The day was beautiful, so we sat outside in the parking lot. At the end of lunch, Kaffe and Brandon walked around and looked at each quilt and conferred with each other before they allowed us back into the classroom.

Those 5" squares were the ones giving me trouble. Kaffe wanted those blocks to be florals. Ashlee suggested some graphic prints, some of which I liked. Kaffe wanted some pops of black florals. Brandon disagreed with him. I know what I want, which will go into the final design, LOL.

I added another column of blocks, and then we went shopping for border fabrics. I love love love the border fabrics for my quilt.

At that point in the class, everyone was being so generous and sharing fabrics. We were fussy cutting bold prints and that gets costly after a while. Some of the extra black florals that I had cut for my quilt ended up in other people’s designs, and I took a few contributions from my tablemates. During the conversation, it turned out that the husband had done concrete work for the lady sitting next to me. Life in a small town.

At the end of class, Kaffe walked around the room and stopped at each design board to critique each quilt. (This is a bad photo because I was getting so much backlighting.)

His comments were so helpful. I am excited to finish this quilt. It is so beyond anything I have ever done before.

I was invited to dinner with the store staff and Brandon and Kaffe. We sat outside and enjoyed a delicious meal cooked by Ashlee’s husband and talked for two hours about fabric and teaching and life in general.

Kaffe and Brandon are teaching another class today—a diamond quilt pattern—before heading off to Utah for their next commitment. I told the husband that I think these last few days were the high point of 2025 for me. We owe Marianne and Ashlee so many thanks for making this event happen.

And 20 year-old Janet would be very surprised to find out where she ended up in 2025. 😊

Squash, Spuds, and Apples

I’m posting today because I may not have time to get posts up this week. Yesterday, while the husband was working in the morning, I brought in the squash:

This is the wagon from my John Deere tractor. The golf cart has a hitch on the back so I can pull the wagon with it because the golf cart is easier to maneuver around the garden than the tractor. As I was coming back to the house with this haul, however, the golf cart started malfunctioning. I was barely able to get it back over to the garage. When the husband got home, he looked at it and said it needs a new choke cable. Being the wizard that he is, he was able to rig it to work again, at least for the rest of the afternoon.

The squash are now curing in the garage. Anna, our neighbor, asked for the Georgia Roasters for her catering business. She may also take some of the butternut squash. Those were the Burpee’s Butterbush that were supposed to ripen in 75 days—eh. I may go back to Waltham. The Red Kuri are a variety that Sarah likes, which did well. I am trying the buttercup this year although I am also underwhelmed with that one. Hopefully, they taste good. I got three lovely Winter Luxury pumpkins that will be perfect for pie filling.

After lunch, we went out to the garden and pulled up the black plastic where the squash had been. That was where the potatoes were last year and we had quite a few volunteer plants come up through some of the holes. (Someone doesn’t like to dig potatoes and tends to leave a few behind.) I had to relocate a confused little garter snake. We dug all of that bonus crop and put the black plastic back in place for the winter. That part of the garden cleanup is done.

We moved over to the main potato bed and started digging that one. This was a good potato year:

There are a lot of Red Pontiacs on the bottom because we dug those first. Some of these potatoes are huge. One would make a meal for the two of us. We’ll let them dry out for a few days and then I’ll sort them into burlap bags to go into the root cellar. The bucket is full of fingerlings that were another bonus crop from a volunteer elsewhere in the garden. (Elysian, I think that’s your bucket—send WS over for it some time.)

I need to cut a few cabbages and then we’ll pull a billboard tarp over that half of the garden. The only plants left are the tomatoes. I won’t pull out that patch until after a killing frost, in case anyone else still wants some.

I also cleaned off the two Honeycrisp trees. Such beautiful apples with very little insect damage. Honeycrisps aren’t my favorite variety—too sweet for me—but I ate one just because it looked so good. It was tasty.

I’m calling an end to the 2025 growing season. I’m also glad we got most of it done yesterday because rain is in the forecast for today. Some dirt work still needs to happen with the track loader, but that may be better done in the spring.

Tomorrow is the Kaffe Fassett lecture! I dug out my Glorious Knits book to have him autograph. I know he’s here to do a quilt workshop, but I’ve had that book since I was in college and I’d like him to sign that one.

Friday Afternoon at the Show

I went to the Flathead Quilters’ Guild show yesterday afternoon. So inspiring! So many quilts, so many ideas, so much visiting. I ran into Karla, Barb, Dawn, Arlene, Carol B, Carol E, Genia, Jenny, Ashlee, Marianne, Sammie, and probably a few other people I’m forgetting.

Becky, who works at the store and went to Bernina University with us, had this beautiful quilt in the show:

The pattern is Halo by Jen Kingwell. The quilt was so calm and peaceful. (Sorry about the lighting—we were in the very hot and stuffy Expo Building at the fairgrounds.) Becky has a wonderful eye for color and has helped me in the past with choosing fabrics for class samples.

Marianne did a presentation at 1 pm on rulers for cutting and how she uses them with striped fabrics to create interesting patterns. She showed us one of the the new Glow Rulers from Carolina Moore and a collective gasp went up from the audience.

These are rulers with internal lights that can be recharged using a USB-C cord. Wonderful for older eyes! Marianne said they sell out as soon as they store gets a new shipment.

After I got home and did chicken chores, I worked on the Sling Bag a bit. The back of the bag is complete and I have almost finished making the strap:

I had to move over to the Juki. I am so glad I have that machine, beast that it is.

I don’t think there will be any sewing happening for the foreseeable future. We are cleaning up the garden this weekend and next week is Kaffe Fassett’s visit to the store as well as the co-op sale. I told the husband he’ll probably be eating frozen pizzas for dinner. I have to order grosgrain binding from Sailrite for the inside of the sling bag, so I wouldn’t be able to finish it even if I had time to sew.

Hanging Out in Bagland

I finally settled on a sewing project. I can’t seem to get out of Bagland, so I have decided to make the Kandou Patterns Retro Sling Bag. This one has been on my list for a while. I’ve watched the OklaRoots YT video about five times already.

I’m making mine out of a rich red waxed canvas with a black bonded nylon lining. I have not seen bonded nylon used for a lining anywhere, but I think it will work well. Hardware will be antique gold.

Yesterday, I cut out all the pieces:

And I got as far as making the zipper opening on the back piece:

(Yes, my work area is kind of messy.)

I will sew as much as I can using the industrial Necchi, then switch to the Juki 1541. The Necchi does a good job sewing waxed canvas but it doesn’t like bulky seams. This waxed canvas is from Sailrite. I like it a lot. Sailrite has really upped its game over the past year and is carrying a wider range of tools and materials. They also have a YouTube channel with some really good tutorials.

I made another embroidery project incorporating some of Marianne’s suggestions, with definite improvements. I also subscribed to OESD’s YouTube channel. They have some good videos explaining the use of many of their stabilizers. I’m still experimenting with needle types and sizes. And the Bernina embroidery book has been helpful. I just have to remember that I cannot become an expert overnight. (Part of my brain is saying, “Why not?”)

Garment sewing has been postponed until the weather changes—which it looks like it will, soon—but I did copy and alter my StyleArc Linda pants pattern into a pair of wide-leg culottes or gauchos or whatever they are calling them these days. I have been taking a good look at my closet and what I’ve been wearing and I feel like those would be useful for the fall and winter.

********

Garden cleanup has to happen this weekend. We may get a frost Monday morning, and all the regional forecasters are predicting the arrival of a strong storm system at the end of September. Next week’s schedule is jam packed, so I want to get as much done now as possible. The husband is working Saturday morning but has promised to help me dig potatoes in the afternoon. Once the garden is put to bed and the canning is done, I can sew with abandon. Yay, winter!

You Don’t Know What You Don’t Know

Part of what makes learning a new skill so frustrating is that sometimes, the information given is either incomplete or inaccurate. And if you don’t know what questions to ask—because why would you? you’re new to this—you bob along thinking that you’ve been told what you need to know.

[I once took a class at a quilt store (not local to me) where the instructor specified “needles” on the supply list. The class was a hand embroidery class. There are probably half a dozen different kinds of hand embroidery needles—sharps, milliners, chenille, etc.—in different sizes. I asked an employee at the store which needles I should get and she said, “The teacher will tell you in class.” The teacher did not, in fact, tell us in class. And why put that on a supply list to get ahead of class if you’re going to tell students in class? Given the choice, I would rather provide a kit of needed supplies to students when I teach. That cuts down frustration for everyone.]

I got an embroidery machine and everything I’ve seen—from the documentation to online projects—indicated that I should use an embroidery needle. The machine came with embroidery needles. The first two projects I did specified to use an embroidery needle. (Do you see where I am going with this?) I dutifully used an embroidery needle, but I wasn’t happy with the sounds I was hearing from the machine. I probably have keener ears than most when it comes to machines. I know when my machine needs oil, needs a new needle, or is about to run out of bobbin thread. What I was hearing sounded like a dull needle punching fabric.

Embroidery needles have a slightly rounded point, although it is not as rounded as a ball point or jersey needle. That makes sense, because a lot of embroidery is done on knit fabrics. Some of the stabilizers are also non-woven substrates. However, I was not embroidering on knit fabrics. I was embroidering on quilting cotton. Out of curiosity, I changed to a Microtex needle, which has a very sharp point. Hmmm. The stitch quality was better and the dull punching sound went away.

I taught a class yesterday, so while I was at the store, I asked Marianne for some advice. She had lots of it, most of which I have not yet heard. And some of it conflicted with what I have been hearing and seeing online, but she does beautiful machine embroidery. I am inclined to follow her lead. She said that yes, sometimes she uses Microtex needles. Have I seen Microtex needles recommended for embroidery? No, I have not.

[I even saw an embroidery needle recommended in an online tutorial for embroidering on waxed canvas. That makes zero sense to me—that seems to be the perfect place to use a Microtex needle.]

I came home with this:

Bernina puts out several of these books on various topics. They are comprehensive guides containing a ton of information. I like that much of the information is presented in table form, which saves me from having to hunt though several paragraphs to find what I need.

I may be in a position, eventually, to have to teach this stuff in class. The machine settings are easy—I can figure out how to edit designs, use pinpoint placement, etc. What is harder to get a handle on is the information that comes with experience, such as what stabilizers or combination of stabilizers will give the best result. I don’t mind practicing, but having a place to start is helpful.

Writing documentation, patterns, and guides is not easy. The person doing the writing often assumes or takes for granted a certain level of knowledge or expertise. As Jean Lampe. my TKGA mentor, used to tell me, “Try writing directions, without using any illustrations or photos, on how to tie your shoes.” I don’t allows follow my own rules—someone asked me in a beginning serger class what a looper was and I realized that I was guilty, in that moment, of using terminology without defining it—but as much as I can, I try to put myself in the shoes of someone encountering a new skill for the first time. I ask a lot of questions at the beginning of my classes because I need to know where students are in their journeys.

/sermon

*******

We are T-minus five days until Kaffe Fassett’s lecture on Monday evening. My Kaffe tops are ready. Sammie, one of the store staff, made Kaffe fabric hair scrunchies for all of us. (My hair is long enough to put in a ponytail, albeit a small one.) I will be helping with the setup for the lecture. Can you tell I am excited? 🤩🤩🤩

Too Much Excitement For One Afternoon

Yesterday was interesting. After Mike and Kathy left, I headed to town to run errands. About halfway there, however, I had this niggling feeling that I should turn around and go home.

I do not ever ignore my gut instinct about something. I may not have an explanation for why it’s happening, but I’ve learned to pay attention. I circled around and went home.

I was working on some sewing projects and stopped to check Facebook around 2 pm. Someone further up our road had just posted on the Kalispell 411 group that the cops were chasing someone and had deployed spike strips in front of her house. (I did not know the exact location.) A few minutes later, three sheriff’s deputies sped past our house.

Five minutes after that, one of our neighbors texted me and asked me if I knew what was happening because the helicopter was circling over our houses. I told him what I knew. A few minutes later, he called and said that he had found out that the cops had surrounded a house about a mile south of us and closed the road. The helicopter was still circling.

He and I started calling around to make sure everyone knew something was happening and to stay inside. We have a solid communication network in our neighborhood because of wildfire risk. I was listening to the police channel on the scanner. It got a bit tense because we were hearing that someone was on the loose and another neighbor came home to find a door open. That turned out not to be the problem—the suspect was still barricaded in the house. The police brought the SWAT vehicles out. The husband had to come home from work the long way around because the road was still closed.

We finally heard, around 6 pm, that the suspect had been taken into custody. Apparently, it was someone from elsewhere in Montana who had violated probation and panicked when the cops tried to stop him for a traffic violation.

Whew. I am not sure why I felt like I needed to be home while all of this was happening, but I am glad I was there.

*******

I sewed, but not on anything that required great focus. I made another star patch:

I still don’t have my color selection and placement quite right. I am using scraps and perhaps need to be more thoughtful about my choices instead of grabbing what is handy. I am learning more about the machine, though.

I also finished one of my Kaffe tops that needed hemming. I want to wear it next week.

I’m still at loose ends about the next big sewing project, which tells me I need to wait for things to settle down a bit. These are the times when I focus on finishing and organizing.

Prepping for Fall Sewing

I attacked a mountain of scraps and leftovers on Saturday afternoon. I keep a bin under my cutting table and everything gets chucked in there. That bin was overflowing.

My scrap management system is fairly simple. Anything less than a fat quarter or quarter yard goes into the bin. I cut 5" squares out of the larger pieces using my Accuquilt cutter. The squares will be pieced into comforter tops to be tied and donated to Mennonite Central Committee. Sometimes, depending on the size of the leftovers, I might cut them into tumbler blocks. Strips get sorted into bags by color. Right now, I have overflowing bags of white/gray/cream and red/pink/orange/purple. I will package those into smaller zip bags to take to the Mennonite relief sale on the first weekend in October. They have a “yard sale” of craft items and those can be donated there. The trick is to take things and not come home with other things . . .

I’ve been going through my fabric stash, too, and dealing with the pile of fabric I bought when Joanns was going out of business—mostly bottom-weight fabrics for pants and skirts.

Although I miss the convenience of having a Joanns, I am grateful for the fact that temptation has been removed from my life. I have to work a lot harder now to find good garment fabric, so I am more selective about what I get. I could sew entirely from my stash for the rest of my life and be happy. I did find out, though, that Mood Fabrics is going to have a booth at Sew Expo in February! I fairly swooned when I heard that. I doubt that I would ever get to New York City to shop at their store in person, so this is the next best thing.

This also makes me optimistic that garment sewing is going to get more emphasis at Sew Expo in the coming years. It’s not that I dislike quilting—I don’t! Quilting has been a bit of a juggernaut, though, and has rolled over all other kinds of sewing for many years.

Scrap sorting was about the only thing I accomplished this weekend because I had friends, Mike and Kathy, visiting from Tacoma. Mike gave the sermon at church yesterday morning and we had about a dozen people come over for dinner and visiting last night.

I still haven’t settled on a sewing project. The contenders include bags and dresses. I am not much of a backpack person—although I love my Slabtown Backpack—but I am intrigued by the Chickadee Backpack by Sew Sweetness:

I’m wondering if this might make a good alternative to my travel tote. I like that it has an internal frame at the top so that it opens and stays open.

A friend of mine stopped over last evening and asked if I would look at her Pfaff serger. I’ll get it cleaned up and threaded for her this week. Hopefully, whatever is wrong with it is minor.

*******

A line of thunderstorms came through while we were having dinner. I think we’re supposed to have lingering showers this morning. I am surprised that we haven’t yet had a frost. The husband had to repair part of the garden fence yesterday because a couple of deer got over it and snacked on some little apple trees I planted in the back. The forest animals all seem to believe the garden exists for their benefit.

Stitching a Star

There was a full moon last Sunday. I have learned to minimize my social media use during full moons because it seems like the online world loses its collective mind for a few days. And then we had the tragic events of Wednesday afternoon. All I am going to say here is that these types of events bring out both the best and the worst in people, and I’ve seen both in the past couple of days. If you have the chance to spread love or hate in the world, I hope you will choose love. We have enough hate.

******

I tried out the Sawtooth Star quilt patch embroidery project. It was a lot of fun:

I grabbed scraps that were handy to my cutting table. These are from the crazy quilt pillow project. I think I need to be a bit more deliberate in choosing fabrics with better contrast, but I like this a lot. The finished patch is about 3" square.

I did no sewing Thursday or yesterday. Thursday involved a whole bunch of running around and a lot of paperwork. I dropped in to sewing group for about 30 minutes to attend a planning meeting for the sale that is happening in two weeks. Yesterday, we took the pigs to the processor. That took most of the day—it’s 91 miles one way, but we were driving conservatively with the trailer hooked up to the truck. When we got to the processor, we visited with the owner for about 45 minutes. He’s a great guy but he’s retiring in November. Fortunately, he was able to sell the business to someone who plans to keep it going, so we will be able to raise pigs again next year.

I enjoy our trip to the processor every fall because I get the husband to myself in the truck for five hours and we have time to catch up and do some long-range planning. The weather was stellar and driving through Montana is never a hardship. However, I am getting really itchy for an actual road trip—one where I am driving—so I may have to come up with something.

The husband is working today on a big concrete cutting job. I was thinking I might start cleaning up the garden, but we got rain last night. I won’t work out there if it’s too soggy. We’ll see. Now that the pigs are gone, I can open the gate between the garden and the pig pasture now and make a pile in the pasture for burning next month. At the very least, I could cut back the lavenders and start putting hoses away.

As for what to sew next, I have lots of projects in the queue. The stash needs a good reorganization, though. I’ll probably start there.

Produce and Pincushions

I hauled in another wagon load of produce yesterday morning:

I think I am close to what I need to make sauce and salsa. I’ve put about 20 gallon bags of tomatoes in the freezer, and what is here in the wagon will add another 6-8 bags. If any of my Kalispell peeps are in need of tomatoes, please come and help yourself to the bounty in my garden.

And still no frost on the horizon . . .

Some of these tomatoes—the Aunt Gladys and Mortgage Lifters, in particular—are well over a pound apiece.

The zucchini plants are just about spent. I think I am going to bring in the Georgia Roasters, the butttercups, and the Red Kuri squash this weekend. I might leave the butternuts out there until an actual frost. I have one very large, ripe Winter Luxury pumpkin, which is all I need for pie filling this year. In any case, garden work is on the schedule for Saturday.

After lunch, I played with the 700 PRO again. I made the pincushion project from Bernina’s We All Sew website. Bernina makes the embroidery files for these projects available for free. I have a USB drive that is traveling back and forth from my computer to the 700. I downloaded the files from the Bernina website, then inserted the USB drive into the 700. The machine read the embroidery file (.exp) from the USB drive. The designer of the embroidery file digitized the design and has broken it down into steps, so I stitched the first pass, removed the hoop as needed to add fabric, stitched the second step—wash, rinse, repeat.

Everything was done on the 700, including the final step of stitching the whole pincushion together with an opening for turning.

I would have finished this last night, but my container of crushed walnut shells has gone on walkabout. It isn’t where I had been keeping it, although I am sure I saw it about a week ago; I just can’t remember where. Hmmmm. It will resurface.

Right after I finished that project, Bernina posted a new one on the website:

Aren’t these Sawtooth Star patches adorable? And what a great use of little scraps. This one is next up in the embroidery queue.

The 700 is on a table in the room with my cutting table and my serger, so I can start a project and work on something else at the same time. Bernina also offers a phone stitchout app that works over wi-fi and allows you to keep an eye on a project remotely, but I am having trouble getting it to connect to the machine. The wi-fi signal in that room is a bit faint as it is at the opposite end of the house from the router.

Machine embroidery is fun, but I don’t think I am in danger of becoming obsessed with it. I like everything about sewing and want to continue to explore all of it.

Embroidery Experiments

My two goals yesterday were to finish the serger table runner and to experiment with embroidering on the 700 PRO. I finished quilting the table runner yesterday morning—after I tackled the mountain of paper on my desk—and made and attached the binding. I sat down at the 700 mid-afternoon. Right away, I ran into a problem. The machine and the embroidery module appeared unable to communicate with each other.

The embroidery module looks like this:

Those pins at the bottom attach to slots on the left side of the machine. The crossbar has a flange that holds the embroidery hoop. The crossbar moves the hoop in all directions underneath the needle as the machine stitches out the design. It is a very clever design but also a bit terrifying to see it in action, LOL.

I called the store to get some advice. Bernina issued firmware updates to all their machines in July and I had dutifully updated the 880. However, I had not had the embroidery module attached to the machine during the update. I’ve never actually used the embroidery module with the 880. (I have to completely re-jigger the cabinet setup in order to do so because I have the 880 set up as a flatbed machine and it sits down inside the cabinet.) The tech suggested I attach the embroidery module to the 880 to make sure that machine could communicate with it.

After re-jiggering the cabinet setup to accommodate the module, I attached the module to the 880 and turned on the machine. Immediately, a screen flashed up saying, “Embroidery module updating.” Apparently, the module needed a firmware update, too. I need to remember that because we sometimes do firmware updates in the mastery class. (I did wonder why the 700 didn’t apply the firmware update to the module when I attached it to that machine . . .)

After that, the module and the 700 had no trouble communicating. I got a piece of fabric and stabilizer that I had prepared for Monday’s mastery class and pulled out a spool of Isacord thread. Just for fun, I tried some alphabet letters:

Fun—but as I said, a bit terrifying. The module moves very quickly. We were told at Bernina University that the machines are designed and engineered to embroider at very high speeds and we shouldn’t be afraid to set the speed control to the highest setting. I’m not there yet.

I have some actual project instructions printed and may try one of them today. Bernina has lots of small project tutorials on their We All Sew website, including embroidered pincushions.

After dinner, I sewed down the binding on the table runner. It’s finished and will go to the store tomorrow. I love how it turned out:

The binding is a silver glittery Christmas fabric.

******

I know there has been a lot of discussion around the topic of tariffs. I am not going to offer an opinion here. I am going to suggest that you all listen to the latest episode of the Stitching Tales podcast. Johanna Lundstrom and Malena Hjerpe live in Norway and Sweden, respectively. I give them mad props for doing a podcast in English, because I certainly couldn’t do a podcast in a foreign language. Johanna used to be a journalist and she did a wonderful job explaining tariffs and their impact on sewing from the standpoint of someone living in another country. I think it would do all of us good to get out of our US-centric headspaces and hear from people living elsewhere in the world. My takeaway, after listening to her commentary, is that rarely is there a situation when government intervention—on either side—makes something less costly or more efficient. 🫤

The Take a Stand Bag

I had an entire blog post written this morning, but before I could hit “publish,” it disappeared. That’s why I am late posting today.

I finished the byAnnie Take a Stand bag sample for the store. They are selling this as a kit with the Glacier batik fabric:

I wish I had positioned the motifs a bit differently, but this is a directional fabric and I was limited to the fabric that was in the kit. I do like that fabric, though. I have some yardage in the light blue colorway. Now that I have made one of these, it would be fairly simple to make another one. I still have quilted fabric left from the Place for Everything tote project.

I teach a machine mastery class at the store on the first Monday of every month, so that’s where I was yesterday. I had five students. We spent the morning on machine basics and did embroidery after lunch. I am learning along with the students. We embroidered an ice cream cone using one of the built-in machine motifs:

I really need to get my embroidery machine up and running. I have some non-sewing work to do this morning, but perhaps I can play with it after lunch. Or I may finish the Amanda Murphy table runner. I bought more thread yesterday when I was in the store. I also got binding fabric.

I think the universe heard my comment about editing sewing patterns . Marianne designed a quilt with a line of fabric that is coming out in a few months and it’s hanging at the store. I offered to write up the pattern for it. I enjoy writing patterns. I actually enjoy writing up class handouts, too. Writing up this quilt pattern has given me a reason to get back to playing with Electric Quilt 8.

I feel like I have finally wrested control of my schedule back from other people. My days going forward will be mostly filled with Schuster-Szabo empire management (LOL) and sewing. Making the first batch of spaghetti sauce is on the schedule for tomorrow.

The days are still up in the 70s but it was 40F when I woke up this morning. Some of the squash vines look like they may have been kissed by frost. The squash are in a low spot in the garden, so I won’t be surprised if they call it quits soon. I am going to try very hard to get as much garden cleanup done this fall as I can. Future me will be very thankful next spring if there is less to do.

******

DSIL finally got his exit orders from the Coast Guard, so he and DD#1 will be moving back to the lower 48 at the end of the month. I am excited, because this means that when I go to Washington state, I get to see all the kids. The two of them are looking for a house to buy, but inventory is tight where they plan to live. It may take a few months to find something. They’ll live with his parents in the meantime.