I have finally updated our website and integrated my blog with it!
I am over here now!
This site has been set to re-direct you to the NEW site after 10 seconds --- come on over, we are waiting for you!
I am writing again!! Ohhhh, I almost forgot how much I love it! 8 pages into a little project and I am on cloud nine :)
What are you up to? I am going blog surfing to find out but you can tell me here too if you want!
Here's her note to me:
"I had a table and used the Sam's table to extend my space. It is so great and spacious. I am marking a quilt now to begin stitching. I am so excited that this set-up will control a lot of problems I was having, i.e. the weight of the quilt pulling against the needle, jerky movement of the quilt.....well these and other difficulties are now in the past. I just can't thank you enough."I talked her into sending me a pic - isn't it great!
It's queen size (do you believe that - she's new to quilting!) for her son Brad.
She and I have been emailing and chatting, sharing stories and ideas, and I think I am going to try and talk her into blogging.... (I am SO bad - I do that to *so many* quilters - -but when they blog I can keep up with them and their projects and their lives and I LOVE it!!!)
So, Diannia (prounounced Diana) lives in California, works for a University, has a son named Brad and she's learning to love quilting. Now, don't you want to know more? I do!
UPDATE!! - Diannia has a blog http://dianniashouse.blogspot.com/ Let's go check it out!
Do you ever get up from sewing and quilting and stretch, creak and groan, feeling uncomfortable and tired? It's very possible that it isn't from your project, it's your sewing table and chair!
Being comfortable while sewing and quilting is more important than your sewing machine, tools, fabrics or threads because you can have the best equipment in the world but if you are in pain or straining when using them you won't be able to sew or quilt for very long! Your body may be sending messages to your brain saying "no more sewing" because of that strain and yet you want to sew!
Ergonomic comfort is often completely overlooked, especially when we don't have a dedicated sewing area. I often hear or read about a quilter "taking over the dining room table" and it makes *my* back hurt just reading those words!
The important ergonomic factors of sewing in comfort are:
1. Height of your sewing table. A dining room table average height is 29-30 inches high, which by itself is too high for comfortable sewing, and when you add the base of the sewing machine, about another 3 inches (bringing the height up to 33") , the proportions are totally wrong. Just that small bit of difference can create strain and pain throughout your body. Here's what OSHA (US Gov't Occupational Safety & Health Administration) has to say about Sewing Stations.
2. Notice that number one on their list is height of the chair. I put it at number two because it can be easier to change than table height. An adjustable chair is a must for sewing! Here's what the Center for Disease Control has to say about chairs:
"Contrary to popular belief, sitting, which most people believe is relaxing, is hard on the back."3. Position of the sewing machine. Many sewing cabinets (if your machine is in one) position the machine too close to the body, and the sewing head is "off center" to your body, putting shoulders and arm muscles in a strained and awkward position.
My friend Judy Wedemeyer is a quilt artist. She's also one of the nicest people I've ever met. I was a newbie to quilt pattern designing, about fifteen years ago, and she went out of her way to give me tips, business contacts, advice and encouragement when I thought I'd created "the next hot thing" in quilting. How nice is that!?
I want to be like her.
I also want to be a quilt artist someday and so I follow her around like a puppy, soaking up her art and her enthusiasm and pulling out my old attempts at quilt art and wondering if maybe I can do something really unique like she is.
Take a peek at her Art Cards, her studio, and her techniques on her blog and pull out your scraps and doo-dads and let's follow her inspiration!
Barbara Fons used my foam insulation and clear vinyl ideas to make a "Faux Longarm" as she calls it - I might have to give this a try!
Today I went to my local library, after posting notices at the grocery stores, library bulletin board and on my local online newspaper, to teach anyone who showed up the basics of a sewing machine - for free.
I've given lectures about quilting before and was surprised at how many of the attendees had never threaded a sewing machine and were afraid to! Yikes! We can't let these gals be afraid of sewing!!
I set aside 2 hours, wrote up some notes (which I would be happy to share with you) and made arrangements to use the meeting room at the library (also free to non-profits!).
I had several people tell me that they were excited to attend, but who turned up was two young girls, sisters, who's mom had seen the posting and suggested that they attend. What a treat!! I LOVE teaching kids! We had the whole room to ourselves and they felt free to ask any question that they thought of - and boy did they!
I explained and then demonstrated: how a needle and bobbin work together to make a stitch; how to test bobbin tension; how to clean the bobbin and race area and what the parts are and how they are used; how to thread the machine and the major differences between the three machines that I carted down there.
They were enthralled! And then they got to sew! Straight stitch, decorative stitch and free motion! They had a great time. They enjoyed the quilts I brought along and the handled all the parts, checked out the machines with a flashlight and watched the gears in motion - - these two will never be afraid to change their bobbin tension!
I talked about threads (my favorite subject) and had them touch and then break many samples so that the understood how different threads can be. All in all, a great time was had by we three, and I am SO glad that I did this and that they patiently and then eagerly listened, learned and then tried for themselves.
Would you consider doing the same? For your local Girl Scout troup? Your after school program? Anyone who shows up for a Library gig? I can and will do all I can to help, you only have to ask - - and the reward of a new sewing enthusiast's smile is payment in full.
I love inspiration! I get it from quilt shows, group chats and PEOPLE! I meet a lot of people online and I love that so much - I *love* getting emails from new and old friends :)
I also read a lot of books (paper and and electronic). I've read Jack Canfield's books The Aladdin Factor, Goals, The Success Principles. They gave me great inspiration and I re-read them regularly, but on the recommendation of a friend, I bought Book Yourself Solid.
I am hoping to do some traveling and teaching in the future and this book is helping me in that goal as well as sparking some great ideas! (I'm also reading online A Brief Guide to World Domination.)
Alaskans in my area are keeping a weather eye on our erupting volcano, Mt. Redoubt. This is a webcam aimed at the building lava dome.
Redoubt is a pain in the neck. She's disrupting air travel and making everyone up here nervous about ash and winds and more ash. {I was very tempted to call her a pain in the ash!} But, I never argue with Mother Nature, she gives me the best inspiration of all! What inspires you? What do you read for inspiration?
Right now my studio is a 9' x 11' bedroom and I share it with a very spoiled pet rabbit. The rabbit doesn't live in a cage, he goes wherever he wants in the house and he believes that the room belongs to him. He lets me in for a while but if I stay too long he nips at me. Then I lock him out :) {See that wire gate behind him?} After about half an hour, I let him back in again and he settles down and lays on the carpet by my feet. This wall has my pegboard with rulers, patterns and anything else I can get to stay on a hook. You can see my cutting table and the storage bins under it, my folding table and some old ironing boards. I used to use them to prop up big quilts before I "invented" my cheap sewing table :)
In this photo you see my lighting and tripod and backdrop for videotaping. Behind the quilt top {Sarahs} are the shelves we built into the closet, after taking the closet doors off. For lighting on the ceiling I have a couple of 4' long florescent fixtures with daylight rated bulbs and I love that. When lighting for video, I use the portable closet rack that you see here, with some clamp lamps that have daylight rated bulbs in them. The brown sewing desk is a recent purchase that houses a vintage Kenmore - and what a find it was! Fantastic stitching and cams that I can't wait to try out.
On this wall are my buckets of scraps, color sorted, and a couple of small tables with threads, bobbins, old Kenmore and bobbin winder among the clutter. In here we have stripped out the old carpet and I primed and painted the floor with a gorgeous milk-chocolate color floor paint. This room is eventually going to become a spare bedroom {Audrey's Room when she visits grandma?} with maybe some of the coloring and drawing supplies on the shelf. Then she will have to share it with Bunny. Won't that be fun?!
On the next wall I have a small design wall stapled to the drywall. I have a few small tops pinned to it, reminding me that they need to be quilted. The bins have my threads, sorted by color and by thread type, the rayons are in the top bins and the cottons in the small bottom bins and in the lowest bins are ribbons, interfacing and other miscellaneous sewing items. My cutting table is covered with stuff and the bins below it have unfinished projects or else fabrics (there are 4 bins total under there).
Next we make a trip upstairs, to the top of the garage, which has been unheated and partially insulated. I've stored rolls of batting up there and other miscellaneous odds and ends, and Tom used it for all of the boat soft gear (sleeping bags, raingear, etc.) as well as years of accumulated family clutter.
Now he's working hard on fixing some problems up there, adding walls, and I've been cleaning, sorting, moving stuff and painting. Here's what one wall looked like before we got started. We work on it between other tasks around the house. When this project is complete I hope to move all my sewing and quilting things up here!
So, there you have it! I invite you to check out some other sewing studios using the link at the top right of my blog and also at Quilt Videos.
If you see anything in the photos that you are curious about, just post a comment or email me and I'd be happy to tell you what it is or why it's there. Also, there are a few things missing - -my sewing table is in the living room right now, along with the machine that I use the most, my Bernina 180. Thank you very much for reading my blog :)
I met Susan through a Yahoo group that I belong to (Stashbusters) and I liked her from the first few lines of her post:
"I just wanted to share what I've been doing with some of the scraps members have been sending me. This Quilt of Valor has scraps from New York, Louisiana, Montana, Indiana and Ohio! How cool is that--put together for one Soldier."
I just about peed my pants when I saw this! I need some imaginary friends - doesn't everyone?
Friend Feed is the "new" place to be, and if I can create imaginary friends there, well, why write another novel?
I find some interesting stuff on this internet - and I *love* the stuff that makes me laugh, makes me think and teaches me something new. I'll share a few favorites with you in the upcoming weeks.
Meanwhile, I'll be over on Friend Feed having some tea and scones with my imaginary friends :)
Come join us, won't you?
Sarah Vanderburgh and Delys are the two lucky winners of Kay's Book Easy Applique Blocks. Don't give up if you didn't win, just hop over to Kay's blog and follow her Book Tour because today she's with quilter extraordinaire Gina Halliday and Gina is giving away a book too!
Thank you for signing up for this great book giveaway and stay tuned for more!
We are at it again! This is part of the ongoing saga of a small (poorly insulated) house in Alaska and my never ending love of changing things. It is only slightly quilting related because I *may* be moving my quilting stuff to another part of the house soon (as in: out of the living room, bedroom and garage :)
We started with a "sort out" of stuff that's been untouched since dinosaurs roamed Alaska, and have moved on to insulating. Have I ever mentioned how much I hate fiberglass insulation? I love the foamboard insulation (as you might have seen in my Cheap Sewing & Quilting Table Tutorial) but oh how I hate fiberglass! I start itching the minute I even *think* about fiberglass!
I've insulated before, helping friends, then insulated my two cabins that I bought (and sold) here in Seward, and slowly we've been insulating Tom's old house. See me covered head to toe when I was doing one of the cabins? LOL! A (former) friend had promised to come help me and never showed, so I did it all myself, from ceiling to walls, and vapor barrier too. The folks at the local home improvement store know me by name! I propped my little camera up on a stump and put the self timer on to take this pic - I was so proud of myself for getting that job done!
Have you gotten the spring cleaning bug?
My pal Kay Mackenzie asked if I would like to be included in her internet Book Tour and I jumped at the chance!
What is so cool about going to Quilt Market and meeting other designers and authors is learning that they are just nice quilters, like every other quilter :)
Kay sent me a peek inside and an autographed book to give away! All you have to do to enter is [Contest ended April 4th - check back soon for the next one] I'll announce the winner here on April 4th and I will email the winner too :) {you won't be getting spam from me, I promise!}
Her book has the wonderful applique designs that you see here and also has a CD! As I flipped through her book the first thing that came to my mind was "homey". Her designs and her quilts have that comforting feel that just says "home". You'll love this book :)
You. You know who you are!
Can. Able, capable, willing, knowledgeable.
Do. Accomplish, achieve, attain, succeed.
It. Everything, anything, exactly what you want.
Yes, this is spring in Alaska. See the pretty flowers; the sunshine? Me neither! LOL Someone please remind me why I live here?
If you look closely you can see Tan Bunny just to the right of the feeder that Tom built. It sits across the alley from his house, on Barb's property. She loves rabbits too, so she said it was okay to put the feeder there. Bunnies love her big trees :)
Here they are! I went with the two-part format because I felt that there was just too much information that I had to cut in order to meet the 10 minute limit for YouTube (not criticizing, just explaining) so:
Part One - - -
Part Two - - -
I would love to know what you think!! So far I have only remembered one thing that I should have said - and that is "don't buy cheap pins". I did this once and totally regret it, it was a waste of time and money because I had to go BACK to the store and buy the good (expensive) ones just to get them to go through 2 layers of fabric and a needled batting. Better to just buy the good ones up front and avoid the frustration and waste of having a bag full of useless pins.
Please let me know what you think of the videos and of quilting a large quilt at home on your sewing machine. Do you stitch-in-the-ditch? Do you do things differently than me?
If you found this useful, please share it with your friends :)
I just love that word - DONE! Whoooo Hoooo! This will be another donation quilt, even though I love it with all my heart, the thought that it might make a person happy and benefit a child is also one of the reasons I love it.
BUT, until the CASA auction it is going to hang in Seams Like Home Quilt Shoppe in Anchorage! Yay!!
I can't wait to make another one! LOL :)
BTW, I had a really cool webcam chat with Linda last night. She was working on her binding and we chatted a bit about technique. Tonight, as I was working on one of the corners of this quilt's binding, I took a short video on how I like to make the corners. It is uploading to YouTube now. It says it's for Linda but you can peek too if you want :)
I want to make this quilt! Made by Liz Harvatine, she calls it "Confetti" and I *love* it! Here's her tutorial, which I found very understandable and I have TONS of scraps. This is right up my alley! Thank you Liz for my next project :)
Today I am putting the sashing on my funky, fuzzy quilt. I hope to have it finished by tonight.
I started quilting a 90" x 90"quilt on my home sewing machine, and doing a "tutorial documentary" on it. Now I am stuck!
I am a long winded teacher (and writer - you have probably noticed) and YouTube, my host of choice for now, allows 10 minute video length. You would think I could get the basics down into 10 minutes.... but no .......... I yap on too long and personally, I don't like to watch videos (or TV shows) where the speaker talks too fast - -it frustrates me - and I am a naturally slow talker.
So, do I break the video into two parts? Or cut out stuff that I think needs to be said? Meh!! I don't really know what to do. I think that people don't really like watching videos in two parts - -but then again, on my "build a cheap sewing or quilting table" I was playing around and made it in two parts and each one has about 7,000 views now. So maybe it's okay?
I was really hoping to get this all on one 10 minute video! I edited it hard (more than I wanted to) and still have 14 minutes. What do you think? Take more out or make it "part 1" and "part 2"? Oh, here's the quilt - isn't it wild? I just love it!
I wrote a quilt book (with my daughter as co-author). That's not the secret :) I have also written a novel, and after letting it sit for several months and re-reading, I realize it's crappy. BUT! I can do better! This summer, if all goes well (knock on a fat quarter) I will write a second novel (and try to write better). I already have the outline. But that's not the secret either.
The secret is: I have always wanted to write a screenplay. I figured that writing a non-fiction book, like a quilt book, would be a good start to writing (it was) and I read a lot about the process of writing and the discipline it takes but I know almost zip about writing a screenplay, so I don't feel like I am ready for it yet- -I put myself in the "I am still learning how" category.
So, here's one way I am trying to learn. I make videos on YouTube. Now, I used to think that people just stood in front of their cameras, yapped a bit, uploaded and *boom* they are YouTube stars. Not so - at least not the good videos (and I am not talking about vloggers here - - the whole point of vlogging is to be spontaneous).
For a loooooooong time I have wanted to teach a few things and I would like to reach a wide audience, so I chose YouTube. I have a few vids up and have learned quite a bit along the way and gotten some good feedback from great people who take the time to tell me what they think would make my videos better - - and I listen very closely to every one who emails me. I learn as I go.
For weeks I've been planning a video just on doing Stitch in the Ditch quilting. It sounds easy - -but it is quite a challenge!! Writing the script! There is *so much* to remember!! Yikes! If you watch my videos, I hope that you will consider giving me your impression and telling me what I should have done differently. I really, really appreciate every single person who emails me and listen closely to what they have to say. Now I am off to work on that SID script some more :)
Let me know if you want the "behind the scenes details" or if you just want to see the film version when it's released - - LOL :) {I want to know - - are you a writer with a secret dream?}
Stolen: half a month's bandwidth at $65/month!!
Sarah, Audrey and I keep trying to find easier ways to stay in touch. We bought webcams and have tried Yahoo!, Google Talk and then Skype. Then Tom got the monthly cable bill and we were charged for a humungous amount of usage. We went looking and found that the day I downloaded Skype, our bandwidth was maxed out. Not by the download or usage, but because they routed their traffic through our router & computers!!
Theft is what I call it, plain and simple and stupid me for letting it happen. I knew Skype's reputation (bad) but had been reading about all those free calls (free because Tom is paying for our bandwidth - which they steal and give away!)
I had no idea that their business operation was funded on stolen bandwidth! The jerks! I don't support P2P, pirating music, copyright theft and now I don't support bandwidth theft either.
Link to research #1 Link to article #2 Link to article #3
We decided, on the spur of the moment, to go to Anchorage for the weekend so that Tom could play in the Fur Rondy Pool Tournament. First, for anyone not in Alaska, Fur Rondy has its traditions in the old fur trade (furs are still traded today) and as a break in the monotony of the tremendously long arctic winters.
When Sarah and her cousins were growing up, it was the highlight of our winters. I'd bundle up the kids and we would go to the carnivals (outdoors rides like ferris wheel, tilt-a-whirl) then go see the snow sculptures, maybe stay late enough for the fireworks. Then we would do the indoor stuff. Craft fairs, face painting for the kids, whatever sounded interesting :)
That kind of stuff waned as they became teenagers, so I haven't really participated in any of the Rondy events in years. In the past I had visited one of the local pool halls, in the basement of a popular bar, just to see what it looked like, but you could cut the cigarrette smoke with a knife and I can't stand the smell of it, so I quickly left (besides it was intimidating with all the guys concentrating on their shots and games).
Anchorage banned smoking in restaurants and bars a few years ago and the pool hall moved to a new location so I was in for quite the surprise.
Anchorage Billiard Palace was an exceptional treat. So much so that I gave up the chance to shop for fabric, poke around for a few antiques and all the other errands that I put on my list when I heard "two whole days in Anchorage".
Tom taught me to play pool and he's very, very good at both playing and teaching. He placed on both Saturday and Sunday, in 8 Ball and 9 Ball, and I thoroughly enjoyed watching him and the other players in the tourney. Most of all, the staff at the Billiard Palace was outstanding. Polite, friendly, warmly meeting the needs of all the players and spectators, allowing me to take video of the room, they are the reason I'd go again. I am shy by nature and a hermit in my old age, so it takes a *lot* to get me out of the house, but I'm thinking about putting in the practice hours on the table so that I don't embarrass myself if I ever play at the Billiard Palace. I put up a poll on the right hand side of the blog, at the top, because I am curious - do you play?
Some of the things I loved the best: 12 nine foot tables, good lighting, great staff, dress code for men and women, no children allowed, central location in Anchorage and the nicest, most interesting people I've chatted with since I came back from Quilt Market.
I did get to see Sarah and Audrey for breakfast and some fabric shopping, but afterward I couldn't wait to get back to the games! If you have never been inside, here's what it looked like for most of Saturday and Sunday:
