Bernina Woe!

I was zipping through the Bricks & Stepping Stones quilt when I noticed something odd: the straight stitch on my Bernina 1530 had metamorphosed. It was still a straight stitch, but instead of the usual 12 stitches per inch, it was churning out about 24!

When I tested the other stitches, the machine behaved very erratically. Sometimes they were sewn out properly. Other times the machine attempted to sew them backwards. And frequently it stitches nothing but gibberish. Since it's a computerized machine, I assume it's a problem with the board. Woe!

When my beloved 1090 suffered a disaster two years ago, I could not afford to get it fixed. Now that the 1530 has Alzheimer's (which is sure to be a pricey repair), I've fallen back on the 1130 which my sister gave me when she was cleaning out her garage. I'm scheduled to take a class in heirloom sewing techniques this Friday, so I've been trying to familiarize myself with the 1130 and making sure that all the stitches work properly.

Unfortunately, the guide lines on the stitch plate seem to be metric so I can't get an accurate 1/4" seam.* Though I've discovered that by adjusting the needle position one click to the left, I can approximate a 5/8" seam. I called in an order for an American stitch plate (relatively inexpensive), but until it's delivered I'll have to content myself with garment sewing.

----------------

*Yes, I do have a #37 foot, but I get better results by using the guidelines on the stitch plate.

Got My Fabric

None of the quilt stores around here carry much in the way of Civil War prints, so when I went back to my old stomping grounds see my tax guy, I stopped in at the Quilt Emporium in Woodland Hills. They have a good selection of repro prints, and I was finally able to get the rest of the fabric I need for my Double Delight quilt. The two browns and the cheddar which I bought are in the lower left hand corner of the photo. The shirting prints are from my stash. So are the blues -- which are not authentic, but I'm going to try them out in an effort to bust some stash.

I see that I haven't posted in over a month. What is that in blog-years? A century? Unfortunately, fast and furious quilting has not been the reason for my absence. In fact, I've accomplished almost nothing creative except for some sporadic work on my string pieced stars. (I'm still trying to work out the best way to construct these. I used a Jo-Ann's coupon to buy an EZ 45° Diamond and I'm going back to Harriet Hargrave's construction method.)

Back From the Dead!

I see that I haven't posted in over a month. What is that in blog-years? A century?

Fast and furious quilting has not been the reason for my absence. In fact, I've accomplished almost nothing creative except for some sporadic work on my string pieced stars. (I'm still trying to work out the best way to construct them. Recently, I used a Jo-Ann's coupon to buy an EZ 45° Diamond, and I'm going back to Harriet Hargrave's construction method.)

Unfortunately, my elbow still bothers me off and on. The physical therapist says it probably won't be completely healed until June. Every now and then I feel a sharp burning pain in it similar to what I felt in original injury, though not quite as intense. Then I have to take care how I move, apply cold or heat, and take plenty of Advil. The most recent incident was this past Saturday and Sunday. Sigh!

What else have I been doing? Working at the library, grading student papers, helping my mom who just had minor surgery, making a daily visit to my aunt who has Alzheimer's Disease, and hanging out on the American Diabetes Association's forum for adults with Type 2 diabetes.

Yes, the shoe has finally dropped. Diabetes runs in my dad's family, so this is not a total surprise. Fortunately, I seem to be in the early stages and hope that a proactive approach will delay or prevent the complications that frequently go with the Big D.

Cats and Quilts

Like many quilters, I have a quilt loving cat. Her name is Priscilla. Originally, she was my daughter's cat. But, as is too often the case, my daughter went first to college and then to grad school, and most recently to a job in the Pacific Northwest. And everyone knows that cats don't travel well. So now the cat is mine. (Or perhaps, I am hers.) She seems to have become very fond of me. When I return home after an absence of many hours, Priscilla meets me with emphatic meowing even if my son Fillius has been home all day with her. It's as if she's saying, "Where have you been, girlfriend? I have so much to talk about!" When I go to bed, she meows insistently outside my bedroom door until I open it a crack so that she can "tuck me in." (This consists of hopping onto my abdomen and kneading it; I think of it as a cat massage.) Then she settles down at the foot of my bed to sleep.

Priscilla is the reason I don't currently use any of my antique quilts on my bed. It's not just the cat fur; Priscilla loves to knead even when I'm not in bed. And I don't want tiny pinprick holes in my antique Dresden Plate or Double Wedding Ring. When daughter Fillia lived at home, I always kept my bedroom door shut. But Priscilla seems so lonely since Fillia left for good . . .

And it's not like you can train cats to stay off the bed. They'll do what they want to do even if they have to have to wait until you're not looking. Witness my ironing board this morning. Last night I ironed a yard and a half of "snow" Kona Cotton. I folded the yardage and left it on my ironing board so that it would be ready for cutting out the background patches for my string pieced stars this morning. And what did I find when I got up? Little cat footprints pressed into the fabric. I can actually see her trail where she leapt up and strolled about. Well, I suppose it hardly matters since Priscilla will be walking over the finished quilt someday. I've decided that a brand new utility quilt is just what a cat loving quilter needs on her bed.

All's Well That Ends Well

I was able to finish and mail the dresses on Wednesday, December 17th. Then I sat back and waited for them to arrive at their destination. And waited . . . and waited . . . and waited. But the package didn't arrive. Other packages which we'd mailed later showed up, but not the one with the dresses. I was afraid it was lost or had been delivered to the wrong house. I felt so sad because I had worked so hard to get them done in time.

I even I prayed to St. Anthony (the patron of lost items) though without much hope, because by that time my faith was feeling much smaller than the proverbial grain of mustard. (On the other hand, I did have enough faith to pray even though I felt hopeless about the whole thing. Does that count?)

Finally, on Christmas Eve, my son phoned with the welcome news: the dresses had arrived! They took a picture for me so that I could see how they fit.

World Alzheimer's Day, September 21

The phone rang while I was cooking dinner tonight.

"How do I get Helen's phone number?" The abrupt inquiry was not prefaced by any greeting or introduction, but I recognized my aunt's voice.

"You want to call your sister?" I asked, stalling for time.

"How do I get her number?" Her voice is insistent, but not yet angry.

Well, I don't have it, Aunty. But my Mom does. I can get it for you." Then I casually add, "Why do you want to call her?" Meanwhile my mind is racing. Aunt Helen is a long distance call. Can we afford the expense? Would talking with her sister cheer my aunt, or is Aunt Dora likely to spout angry abuse today, leaving poor Aunt Helen in tears?

"I want her to bring back my car! I'm leaving tomorrow and I need my car."

My aunt has Alzheimer's Disease. The hours between 1:00 and 5:00 p.m. are her personal witching hour. She's been living in a guest home for the past four years, and has been unable to drive for even longer. But every afternoon she gets restless and decides to go home. Sometimes she packs her belongings and strips the linen from her bed. She demands her car -- which she no longer owns. When it isn't forthcoming, she assumes that the attendants at the guest home have stolen it.

"Oh, Aunt Helen doesn't have your car, Aunty."

"Then who does?"

"You asked your cousin Peter to take care of it because you can't drive right now."

"Well, I hope he's being careful with it!"

"Oh, I'm sure he is."

Actually, Peter owns the car. He took over the payments for us when my Aunt had to enter the home. But my aunt has forgotten about that, and it comforts her to think that her beloved car is being carefully maintained for her until she's well enough to drive again.

Because she really doesn't know where she is or why she's there. Sometimes she thinks she's in a hotel. Other times she believes she's in a hospital recovering from an illness, and that soon she'll be able to do without the walker or wheel chair.

"I'm going to be leaving tomorrow," she reminds me.

"Oh, really?" I say respectfully. "I was planning to visit you tomorrow. I hope you'll still be there when I come." (Actually, I visit her most days, usually during her restless period. It calms her and distracts her from her plans to escape. But I wasn't able to make it today.)

"Well, that's nice."

"I'll see you tomorrow then."

"All right," she says graciously. She hangs up, and I wonder how long she'll remain mollified. I hope that she hasn't given the caregivers too hard a time today. I regret not having squeezed in a visit.

In a recent blog post, Ami Simms wrote,

This Sunday, September 21, 2008, is World Alzheimer’s Day. It is a day to remember the 26.6 million people worldwide who have this vile disease that will eventually rob them of the ability to remember and to reason. It will take from them every skill they ever learned and every relationship they ever held dear.

Having a relative with Alzheimer's is like watching a beloved quilt deteriorate. It's as if the connecting threads which hold the quilt together have begun to unravel. The seams begin to come apart. A lifetime's worth of elaborate quilting begins to disappear as the threads snap and small bits begin to work loose from the body of the quilt.

We've all seen antique quilts where certain bits of fabric have simply rotted away, usually as a result of corrosive dyes. For an Alzheimer's patient, patches of one's mental landscape are also disintegrating as a result of this corrosive disease.

Ami Simms, who also founded the Alzheimer's Art Quilt Initiative, designed a Virtual Quilt Patch in honor of her mother who has been battling Alzheimer's for seven years. She's invited all of us quilting bloggers to make a similar patch in honor of our afflicted friends and relatives, and has asked us to share how this disease has touched our lives. She's also asked that we link to her Alzheimer's Art Quilt Initiative which raises money for Alzheimer's research. (Since January 2006 they have raised more than $157,000, one quilt at a time.)

I never know what to expect when I go to visit my Aunt Dora. Most of the time she knows who I am, though sometimes she thinks I'm one of her sisters. During one unsettling visit to the hospital, she lost all sense of time and place. She thought I was one of the nurses, that her father was still alive, and that the hospital was located in her old childhood neighborhood.

We chat together during our afternoon visits. I try to calm her anger or sooth her paranoia, depending on what mood is uppermost that day. I bring her little treats or take her out for coffee in an effort to cheer or distract her. As the threads of her mind continue to unravel, I know that someday even these efforts will be unavailing. I try not to look too far into the future because if Altzheimer's has taught me anything, it's to live in the present -- just one day at a time.

It Finally Happened!

My mom and her sister love to prowl thrift stores. So do I. When the three of us hit a thrift store together, we split up and keep our eyes open for things on each other's want list. For instance, last Thursday I found some of the Correlle mugs my aunt has been looking for, and my mom has has sometimes spotted pieces of my aunt's cut glass pattern and has snatched them up for her. (You have to act fast in our favorite thrift store. Some of the women who shop there are like sharks. They circle the workers who are bringing out new merchandise from the back, darting forward to snatch hot items from the carts before the employees can even put them on the shelves. Others use more devious techniques, chumming up to the workers in hopes that they'd covertly slip new items to them.)

Most recently, my aunt discovered a handmade quilt and passed it to my mother with instructions to show it to me in case I might be interested. I was in another part of the store working my way through old sheets, curtains, and lengths of fabric. I always hope that someday I'll get lucky and discover some vintage fabric or maybe even an old quilt top. Suddenly, it was my lucky day. I found first one, then another quilt top made from fabrics that were pretty clearly from the the '30s and '40s. They were very homey pieces of work, and I was admiring them both when it occurred to me that I'd better work my way through the rest of the section as quickly as possible because There Might Be More!!!!

And there were! I sped through the racks pulling top after top into my cart. I didn't dare stop to examine them closely lest our thrift store nemesis, a woman whom we suspect of owning an antique store, nip ahead of me to snatch up a yet unseen treasure. At last, when I'd been through the whole section, I paused to catch my breath and examine my loot. My mother finally found me as I was weighing the merits of each top.

"Look what Aunt Gloria found," she said. "Do you think it's handmade?" I gasped and began to hyperventilate.

"Yes, Mom," I said, "This is definitely hand quilted. This is exquisitely hand quilted. Look at the technique! Look at these incredible prints! Where did you find this?"

"With the bedspreads. There were more, but this was the best one. Of course, this is too expensive to buy, but I thought you'd like to see it."

I put the quilt firmly into my cart and said, "Show me the rest!"

It seemed to take forever as I followed her to the other side of the store. Yes, there were more quilts. Yes, this was the best one. But I wish I could have taken them all home. Most of them were damaged in some way -- split seams or particular fabric patches that had disintegrated over the years --and were overpriced for their condition. But what wonderful fabric prints they had! Alas, for the beautiful Double Wedding Ring that had been used (and loved) to death! With judicious folding, it and its companions might still have had a second career as decorative objects in a quilt lover's home. But the thrift store doesn't accept credit cards. (In fact, I strongly suspect that they require even God to pay cash.) I hadn't brought much money with me, but my mom loaned me the contents of her wallet (selflessly returning her intended purchases to the shelves) and I withdrew the maximum allowed from the in-store ATM. I thought it would be enough.

But at the register we discovered that I'd forgotten to include sales tax in my mental estimate of the total. My aunt loaned me a fiver while my mom and I dug frantically through our purses for loose change. But I was still short. Finally, my mom volunteered to withdraw an additional $20.00 from the ATM.

Whew!

Still shaking with adrenaline, I bore my new treasures to the car. Then I took my mom and aunt out to lunch at the local Thai restaurant -- using my credit card.

(Tomorrow I'll post pictures!)

1130 -- Wow!

In a previous post, I wrote about my beloved Bernina 1090 which accidentally crashed to the floor when my leg became entangled in the sewing machine's cord as I jumped up to answer the telephone. Alas! The repair estimate, and the dealer's dark hints about likelihood of the machine's being irreparable, caused me to put my poor 1090 back into the closet.

Recently, my sister, who has been cleaning out her closets and garage, came across her old Bernina 1130. At first she planned to sell it on eBay. But one day -- without warning -- she brought it over to my house and just gave it to me! She said she knew I'd like to have it and that I'd actually get some use out of it. (She used the 1130 quite a bit the first year she had it, but has hardly touched it since.) Well, I was positively flabbergasted! But after thanking her profusely, I rushed the poor neglected baby to the dealership to be serviced. I can hardly wait for the call to come and pick it up.

In the meantime, I've been cleaning the snap-on gadget box and the collection of basic feet that came with it. I think they're all there except for the zipper foot. Unfortunately, my sister has misplaced the manual. She thinks it was accidentally put "in storage." So I should probably try to find a copy on my own since there's no telling when hers will turn up. And the manual for the 1130 does not seem to be one of those which Bernina has posted online.

Still Working

Bet you thought I'd fallen off the face of the earth! Well, I haven't done much sewing lately, so I haven't had much to write about.

The past few days have been particularly busy. On Thursday I drove my mother to a funeral. On Friday I drove both parents to a wedding. Nothing was scheduled for Saturday, but my mom and I ended up taking my aunt to the Urgent Care because she was experiencing pain every time she took a deep breath. So today I was more than ready for some R&R. I decided to turn on the air conditioning, put on some music, and settle down for some serious work on my Carolina Crossroads quilt.

I've cut and pinned the pieces for thirty more Step 3 Nine-patches! Then I had to stop to cut some more blue strips. Seeking more variety, I was digging through my drawer of blues when it occurred to me that some of my smaller scraps could be used for the 2 5/8 inch squares in Step 4. So I had to stop and cut some of those and then sub-cut them into teensy quarter-square triangles. Whew! Those guys are tiny! And then, of course, I had to put one of the Little Pieced Triangles together just to make sure that my cutting and measuring was accurate.

I guess that's one of the advantages of finishing this quilt after the mystery is complete -- if I get tired of working on one step, I can refresh myself with a brief digression to another. I expect to finish the 30 Nine-patches tonight, having told Fillius Minor to fix his own dinner tonight.

The fabric underneath the CC parts is the gingham I bought to make summer dresses for my three little granddaughters, a.k.a "The Wild Girls." They may be rowdy, but they love to wear dresses. (The white eyelet is for the collars.)

Election Day

And I have some really cool batik fabric that I bought for half price at the local quilt store with which I'm planning to make aprons. (I figure the batik will disguise the spills which are bound to happen when I cook. (I'm thinking a double layer of fabric because I'm afraid stains will go right though otherwise.)

The picture is from Kitchen Madonna who is promoting National Wear Your Apron Day. As she says on her website:

After your funeral, do you think your granddaughter will bury her face in your professional looking briefcase or in your treasured apron? When a woman puts on an apron, it makes no less of a statement than a fine leather briefcase. It announces she is on duty to be receptive to whatever happens in her home and everyone that encompasses. And that is a wider sphere of influence than many would allow.

Go read the rest of it. I need to sew my apron, and then I need to get back to sewing my quilt. (But I'll go vote too.)

Ironing Board Fantasies.

The other day I decided I needed a greater variety of blues for my Carolina Crossroads quilt. I was using so many dark blues that I was afraid they were beginning to run together. So I rummaged through my stash and came up with some that were bright but not light. They've been sitting on my ironing board waiting for me to press and cut them.

I was in Costco recently and saw a fancy new ironing board. The brand name was Polder. It had a holder at the end for your iron, and it was very wide -- an advantage for a quilter!

My own ironing board is practically an antique. I bought it soon after I got married, taking the bus to a shopping center in the next town. I bought it at JC Pennys and had them hold it until my husband could pick it up on his way home from work. After all these years it's got a slight dip in the center and it's getting a little wobbly. That's why I've never considered the Big Board as an addition to it -- I'm afraid it would topple over. While at the quilt show last month I saw a really nice ironing set up, a Big Board set on a couple of drawer units which gives you storage and ironing in the same footprint. Except I don't really have the room here for that kind of thing.

And I don't have money for either of these options, so I guess my fantasies will remain just that.

RTC, Day 3

Darn! I missed out on using my 50% off coupons at JoAnn's. They expired on Saturday. (I'd thought they were good through Sunday.)

I was actually planning to pop over to JoAnn's on Saturday, but then I decided to visit the quilt show first and ended up staying until 6:00 p.m. By that time it was dark, and I decided I'd better go straight home. I spent most of my time at the show browsing through the vendors' booths again and even bought a couple of things. In one booth I saw a very interesting demo on how to sew a circle of fabric into a round cut-out using only four pins. The demonstrator used a pair of tweezers to move the edge of the upper fabric into place as she sewed. One of those things that is hard to explain but once you see it you wonder why you never thought of it before.

And I spent more time drooling over the Tin Lizzie 18 (a long arm machine) and the Juki TL-98Q. Sigh!

As I left the show and headed across the street to the parking lot, I realized that it was very dark and that the parking lot was going to be pretty deserted. Suddenly, I remembered that when I entered the lot I'd had the window on the passenger side rolled down. Had I remembered to roll it back up when I parked? If not, would my car still be there? Would my still unrepaired Bernina, which I'd picked up from the shop that morning, still be in the back seat? Would someone be crouched inside my car? I endeavored to walk confidently.

Well, the window was down, but the car was still there. So was the Bernina. And no one was crouched inside my car. My husband used to say that God looks out for dogs and fools -- to which list I think I'd also add absent-minded, middle-aged women.

When I got home I felt fired up to work some more on Carolina Crossroads, but I needed to cut more strips and my feet were just too tired for it. Today was taken up with family stuff, but tomorrow will be a quilting day!

Quilt Show Damage:

1 set Wheel of Mystery acrylic templates
1 pocket curve template (for garment sewing)
applique stilleto
1 pair Machingers (gloves for machine quilting)
1 spool thread
1 pk. Ultimate Applique Template Paper
1 DVD "Applique Techniques With Pearl P. Peretra"
1 stencil brush
1 pair tiny scissors
1 Identi-pen
1 pk. applique needles
1 pk. needle threaders
1 chalk marking pencil
1 bottle Arlene's OK To Wash glue
1 Aunt Becky's Finger Protector

That should do me for the year. I feel very inspired by all the gorgeous quilts, and I'm looking forward to busting a lot of stash in the months to come.

RTC, Day 2

I'm rushing off to an 8:30 a.m. class this morning, but I just wanted to mention that I met two Carolina Crossroads quilters at Road to California yesterday. The first was named Robin (I believe she said that her online name was Turbotyper). She noticed my Nine Patch badge as I was trying out the Juki TL-98Q at the Sew Unbelievable booth (right next to Superior Threads).

I think the other was named Cheryl. (I have a brain like a sieve, so I wrote it down as soon as possible, but I don't guarantee that I remembered it correctly.) She was selling tickets for the Whittier guild's opportunity quilt when she noticed my block and excitedly brought forth her print-out of Bonnie's directions. She is just about to start the quilt.

By the way, I am so impressed with the Juki TL-98Q that I am sorely tempted to buy one.

Wow!

I am so tired!

I went to Road to Californian yesterday, arriving around 10:00. First mistake! The parking lots were full. But the convention center personnel directed us down the street, through a u-turn, and eventually into a gravelly strip of land near the freeway. It was quite a trek back to the convention center, but on the other hand, there was no charge for the parking.

It was huge! I'd been to this show last year, but this year's seemed even larger. I worked my way through the enormous exhibit hall only to discover the doorway which led to a second hall of quilts and vendors. And I was really only looking at the vendors. Today I'll go back to see the quilts. The quilts I saw in passing were stunning, and I look forward to examining them more closely today.

I made a little badge out of one of my little Nine-Patch blocks and wore it, but in such a crowd I didn't expect to encounter any of the other Mystery Quilters. However, when I ate my sack lunch, I sat next to two ladies from Sacramento, one of whom was a regular visitor to Bonnie's website. It's really funny. I'm normally a very shy person, but I don't feel any self consciousness about talking to unknown quilters at a show. Perhaps it's because we are all members of a great sisterhood with a common passion.

I test drove a couple of long arm quilting machines and now have a better appreciation of what Bonnie does. The one I liked best was the Tin Lizzie 18. It was "only"$6,000. Should I buy one? In my dreams!

I thought of the online Stashbusters group at one booth where someone was demonstrating how to make Aunt Philly's Toothbrush rugs from strips of fabric. Personally, I felt that quilt fabric is too expensive to waste on such a project. But some of the Stashbuster ladies have impossibly hugh stashes of fabrics they no longer like. A project like this would really use it up.

I also got to see the Flynn Multi-Frame System in action. There aren't that many guy quilters, but they certainly come up with some interesting gizmos.

The Juki TL-98 Q looked like a good machine for home quilting, 15,00 stitches per minute and I like the fact that the machine sits low on the table. I would think that help prevent the quilt from dragging as you machine quilt.

And, and . . . I gotta get going! Wish me luck in finding a parking space!

California or Bust!

Well, the problem with the Nine Patch blocks being too large was not as bad as I'd feared. I was a little worried when I measured them against the ruler, but the next morning I measured them against the other 3.5 inch blocks and they were only off by 1/16th of an inch on each side. I can live with that. Now, having used up the precut pieces and adjusted to the change in sewing machine, my Nine Patches are coming out right on the money.

Tomorrow I'll be visiting Road to California in Ontario, California. It's a huge quilt show with an enormous number of vendors. I've only been twice in my life, but one advantage of my recent move is that I'm relatively close to it now. In fact, I bought an unlimited pass so that I can visit it more than once and have a nice leisurely look at everything.

I'm planning to pin one of the 3.5 inch blocks from my Carolina Crossroads mystery quilt on my shirt when I attend the show. I thought that one of the Nine Patches with the accent color in the corner would be distinctive. So if any of you other Quiltville Mystery Quilters you see me there, be sure to say hello! (I'll be there on Saturday too.)

Besides the quilts and the vendors, I'm also looking forward to the special exhibit of vintage aprons displayed by Ellyn Anne Geisel, owner of Apron Memories and author of The Apron Book. I now have a heightened awareness of aprons thanks to Kitchen Madonna who not only sews and sells aprons here, but blogs about everything from recipes to John Paul II's Theology of the Body. Plus she's now got a neat-o job working in a museum where she gets to do such fun stuff as spinning wool and learning to weave. (How do people manage to get jobs like that? I wish I knew.)

I've always been an apron wearer in the kitchen because I am such an energetic cook. But my aprons tend to be strictly utilitarian ones. Thanks to Kitchen Madona, I'm beginning to appreciate pretty, though still functional, aprons. In fact, I even bought some batik fabric which the local quilt store marked down 50%, which I plan to make into an old fashioned apron with a bib.

My So Called Quilt Studio

One of the reasons I feel so enthusiastic about this project is that I am firmly resolved to use up more stash this year. Over the past two years I've been in "no buy" mode, but my stash is still as large as ever -- which is not surprising since I haven't done much sewing.

Not that I didn't want to! But these past few years have been a tumultous time in our family as I nursed my husband through his final illness; dealt with the paperwork that widows are heir to; and then moved to a much smaller house in order to be near my elderly parents. I've been in the new house for nine months now, and my sewing room is only now being unpacked and set in order.

Actually, to say that I have a sewing room is a bit of an overstatement. I'd hoped that the second downstairs bedroom would be my sewing room, but it's become the library annex. it also houses my quilting stash, my quilting books, and a flock of rolling, plastic chest of drawers which are filled with scraps and quilting supplies. I can barely sidle around the cutting table, so my quilting studio has had to overflow into the living room.

That's okay. I own neither a couch nor a TV, so there's plenty of room for my 6 foot banquet table where the two Berninas and the serger live. Well, only one Bernina, now that the 1090 is in the shop. (In case you've never been to my other blog, I'll just briefly mention that the main portion of my library resides in what was originally suposed to be a master bedroom. You can see a picture of it here.)

My stash is stored in stacking baskets sorted according to color or special collection (such as '30s repro prints, plaids, or Christmas fabrics). Scraps (i.e. anything smaller than a 10 inch square) are sorted by color and stored in some of plastic chest of drawers.

Anyway, the really great thing about making one of Bonnie's scrap quilts is that you never have to worry about running out of fabric. When you run out of one blue, all you have to do is grab another one from your stash. If there are enough blues in a quilt, they'll all go together nicely.

Disaster Strikes!

See my lovely sewing machine pictured in the sidebar? It's a Bernina 1090S. It is among that class of machines that quilters are fond of calling "a real workhorse." Last night I was sewing merrily along, just finishing up the last few blocks of Step 1, when the telephone rang. I leapt to my feet and started across the room to the kitchen. But before I got very far, I felt a jerrk, heard a thud behind me, and turned to find my cherished Bernina sprawled on the floor! Somehow or other the cord must have gotten caught around my leg. Berninas are heavy machines. It made several dents in my hardwood floor. Thank goodness it didn't fall on my foot!

I was so stunned that I felt no emotion at all. I lifted the 1090 back onto the table. I turned off the power switch and removed the knee lift which was now badly bent. The knob which lowers the feed dogs was loose. When I tried to turn the handwheel, the needle got stuck and would not come back up. So something inside may be off kilter.

The next morning I took my beloved Bernina to the local dealer. (I've just recently moved to this city so I can't even take my poor baby to her regular tech guy!) They estimate that repairs will cost at least $400, possibly more. If it can be repaired at all -- the extent of the damage is still uncertain.

I'll still be able to finish the Bonnie's mystery quilt; I do have other sewing machines. But the 1o90 and I had bonded. She is my first love, and I just didn't have the heart to set up the other machine today.

A Taste of Summer

It's been cold and rainy here in Southern California. But yesterday I looked out the back window and noticed some bright red spots in the drippy landscape. My cherry tomato plant, which seems determined to survive the winter, has produced some fruit. I went out and harvested the little fellows and brought them into the warm kitchen to redden up a bit more. I thought I'd post a picture for those of you who are mired in snow. I wish I could send you a taste.