It's not going to fit

Well I've spent nearly a week moving things from the garargio into the new studio and I've come to the conclusion that there is no way even half of it is going to fit. All I can do is move the stuff I use the most and leave the less used stuff out in the garargio along with the finished quilts, backing fabrics, other fabrics, batting and more general sewing odds and ends. This is about a third of the fabric stash and you can't really see where its come from. So rather than moving the studio I think I've just acquired another one :]

flat-packed frustration

What is it about flat-packed furniture that can turn a normally sane, rational, logical, reasonably intelligent person into a frustrated, raving, tearing her hair out, lunatic? Could it be the instruction sheet written by someone whose only knowledge of english is via an asian/english dictionary? Could it be the bits they fail to mention have a right or wrong way up until you have numerous other bits connected to them? Arrrghh! Two shelving units took about 2 hours and several glasses of wine. Perhaps it was the wine :]
What brought about this exercise in frustration you may ask. Well, for about the last 20 years my studio had been located in a converted garage, known affectionately as 'the garargio' (garage/studio). It's 9'6" x 18'6" with a fairly low ceiling and is absolutely crammed with stuff. My constant complaint has been that because it is separate from the house I am less inclined to go out there in the summer (because the house has air-conditioning) or in winter (because I have to go out in the cold/rain etc). Also, it meant leaving husband and kids inside when I wanted to sew (yes, I know this could be seen as an advantage). But time moves on and so do husbands and kids. Now with an ex and kids grown up, I've been thinking an inside studio, in the 2nd bedroom, would be much more enticing and conducive to creativity. I know its not all going to fit - 16sq mtrs into 10sq mtrs just doesn't go - but the fabric and some of the machines will and the garargio can still be used for storage. So the great studio relocation is underway. This has also necessitated the puter relocation from the 2nd bedroom into the dining room.

junk junkie

Just been across the road at the school to vote and it looks like lots of people have taken advantage of the day to have garage sales around here. I bought a big cardboard box full of quilt fabric for $10 (like I really need more fabric :]) but I sure wasn't going to pass it up at that price. Some bits more useful than others. Rather a nice bit of batik style with gold printing. Bought a few other bits and bobs (non quilty) and a VCR for $5 that she assured me worked the last time it was used. Haven't tried it yet. Boy I'm a sucker for other peoples junk :]
Yesterday afternoon was spent screen printing. No, nothing very arty I'm sorry. Just dozens of the fabric labels I use in my business. It was getting a bit warm and the ink was drying in the screen but I'd run out so I needed to do it.

mandala paintings

The first time I heard the word 'mandala' was in 1984. We were on holiday in Beechworth and called into a quilt shop. Katie Pasquini's book Mandala had just arrived from the US. Fabulous quilts based on mandalas. I immediately had to buy a sketch pad/compass/ruler and start designing my own. Mandalas are found in different forms all over the world. For thousands of years different cultures have created designs in this circular/symetrical format. From Tibetan Buddhist sand paintings to designs on Islamic mosques. After a few mandala style quilts I moved on to other things. About four or five years ago this format started coming to my attention again and I started doing mandala paintings using acrylic paint. I use a lot of gold metallic and gold dimentional paint. Think this style appeals to my obsessive/'can't stand to be messy' nature :] This one is 80cm sq. I haven't done any painting for about six months. I've been getting back to quilting.

Bendigo Swap

I've been getting myself ready for days. The annual pilgrimage to the Bendigo Swap Meet this weekend. The biggest swap meet in Australia. Thousands of stalls in the Bendigo Show Grounds. This is the sixth year I have had a stall there for my business (not quilt related). I hook up my little caravan and camp on-site along with most of the other stall holders. They're queueing up at the gates when they open at 6am Saturday morning and if doesn't ease up till nearly 7 at night. Then Sunday morning it starts all over again. It's often hot and dry and dusty and by the time I drive the 2 1/2 hours home Sunday night I'm exhausted and I hardly have any voice left. It's hard work and I'm there on my own but it brings in a lot of business over the following year. Swap Meets are like huge 'trash & treasure' markets/garage sales where individuals or businesses can have a stall selling whatever they like. It's usually fairly blokey stuff, car parts, tools and assorted junk. It used to take me about 8 hours to walk around and see everything but since I've had the stall I don't get to do that anymore.

dyeing the rejects

Even after so many years of hand dyeing fabric I still sometimes end up with pieces that don't quite look as good as I would have liked. They might be a bit pale and wishy washy or a blah colour or for what ever reason end up in the pile I mentally label 'don't think I'd use that in a million years'. I've been looking at this pile of rejects recently and thinking 'overdye'. Why waste perfectly good fabric if I can turn it into something I could see myself more likely to use. So every now and then when I get the urge I toss a bunch of them into small buckets and play. This urge came upon me at about midnight last night. I've just washed them out and hung them on the line but it looks as if we're about to get a storm here very soon so I might have to dash out and grab them.

.......more sewing machines

Seems like I spent a large chunk of yesterday fiddling with sewing machines. Gave a couple of them a thorough grease and oil change and set up the 2 Singer industrials specifically for machine quilting. The 12" throat straight sewer I set up for free-hand quilting - removed the feed dog and made a new cover plate with a single small hole for the needle. Industrials may not have a lot of the fancy bells and whistles but they are infinitely adjustable and totally unkillable. The 2 Singers normally take long shank feet but I can loosen a screw and drop the whole shaft down to take short shank or even up to take the longer pfaff feet. Also I can get the MR (multi-range) needles for them. These are the needles that the long arm quilting machines take. They are designed to avoid skipped stitches when stitching in any direction. (Normal needles are really only designed for stitching forward)
This machine actually cost me nothing. We were having the bi-annual neighbourhood hard rubbish collection and I was driving home this particular day just as a lady was dragging it out onto the foot path. Slammed on the brakes and backed up. 'You throwing it out? Can I have it?' 'Doesn't work' she said 'Don't care' I think to myself 'It can be fixed'. As it turned out it was only a short in the motor where some of the insulation had broken away. It ended up costing me $17 for a new pulley and belt to gear it down because it just went too fast even for me.
The other Singer machine (a 20u) does a 9mm wide zig-zag which is unusual for an industrial. I've set this up for machine quilting with the foot on. Adjusted the foot height and pressure so that I don't need a walking foot and tweeked a few other things. So now I all I need to do is quilt something on them. This one still has a bit to do in the border.

Sewing machines

Sewing machines. They just seem to accumulate around here. Turn around and ..... woops ..... there's another one. Well perhaps not quite that fast. It's just that I was trying to total them up recently and I think there's 18 at last count. Now, there's 4 vintage hand-crank ones and there are my 2 (yes 2) prized featherweights (a 221 & a 222). I have some industrial machines too. Two industrial zig-zags and two industrial straight sewers (+ another one in pieces) and an industrial 3 thread overlocker. Plus my domestic overlocker. Now there's a few modern domestic machines as well. My trusty Pfaff 1473, an Elna Lotus sp, another Elna that belonged to Mum and then there's a lovely old Bernina 720 that I couldn't help myself from buying at a garage sale down the street for $20 last year. How many's that....... 17........ I think I've forgotten one. Oh thats right, the other one is the Seiko compound feed (walking foot + needle feed) industrial. I's a really heavy duty sewing machine. It will sew through 16 layers of vinyl (and fingers) like a hot knife through butter and takes a size 24 needle! that looks like a 3 inch nail with an eye. I run a business from home so I use the industrial ones most days.

The two Featherweights

and a lovely time was had by all (except Daniel)

Went along today to the Scquilters meeting (on- line quilt group) in Carrum. I haven't been before. Well not quite true, I got there quite late one other time (after class) and everyone was packing up to go. What a lovely bunch of about 30 very friendly ladies. Made me feel most welcome. Its a shame I can't get there on a regular basis but it clashes with a class I teach and it was just that through various injury and illhealth (theirs not mine) that I decided we'd all have a week off. I spent a productive day sewing the binding on the wagga (see previous post) after spending a substantial chunk of the previous evening unpicking the quilting in the border of it. The evening came to an unhappy end when DS Daniel came home from work at 11.30pm. His car had been vandalised at work. Only his second day at his new job. The rotten little @%#*&% s had sprayed styrofoam filler into the front grill of the car and the exhaust pipe. So we spent the next hour with a kitchen knife each trying scrape it out. And to top it of - today his girlfriend dumps him.

A word on the Wagga and gratuitous cat photo

For those who may not know - a Wagga (pron. wogga) is
a traditional kind of Australian quilt made from whatever could be found, scraps of clothing or blankets, tailors samples, flour bags etc. Simple, rustic, functional..... you get the idea. Anyhow, a couple of months ago at the Waverley Patchworkers meeting, the club had been given a lot of wool/alpaca samples which were being handed out to anyone who wanted to make something from them. I've never been one to pass up free fabric. It was beautiful quality fabric but a bugger to sew. All soft and wiggly. Those who know me will be aware that I'm just a wee bit obssesive, compulsive, neat, precise, careful. I have trouble being messy. It took me years to even create something that wasn't symetrical. So as waggas go this is as rustic as I get! Not quite finished....still have to finish the binding.

This is Charlie. He thinks he's human and he sits in my lap when I'm at the sewing machine or the computer.

Dipping my toe into cyberspace

Welcome to my blog. Well, the self confessed luddite has gone over to the dark side :] I'd never even heard of blogs 2 months ago and now here I am dipping my own little toe into cyberspace.
Over the past few years my quilt making and other creative activities have been put on the back burner while I dealt with a few life altering events - divorce (and resultant poverty!), relationship breakup, death, chronic illness/pain. I feel a bit like I'm emerging from a long dark creative black hole. I've got ideas for quilts buzzing round in my head. Lots of ideas....and I haven't felt like that in a long time.

This is a quilt I made a few months ago after being inspired by Louisa L. Smith's book Strips 'n Curves. I don't usually make quilts so similar to something I've seen. I almost feel like apologising that it's not my own original design idea.