A Swing and a Miss and a New Tool

A lot was happening behind the scenes over the summer. One of those secret projects was my application to become a Bernina Ambassador. The open call went out in June. The submission deadline was the end of July. The submission had to include a proposal, photos of a sewing project, a sample tutorial, and an optional video. There were two categories: Social Media Influencer or Educator. Obviously, I chose Educator.

I wrote the proposal, leaning heavily on the fact that I own four Bernina machines and teach extensively. I had lots of photos of sewing projects, I have produced many tutorials in the form of class handouts and patterns. The weak link, for me, was the video. Even though the video was optional, I felt it was important to include one, so I spent most of my time working on that part of the submission. Video is the reason I don’t have a YouTube channel. I have the equipment. I know how to make and edit videos. I don’t enjoy doing it. I did it anyway, for this submission, and when it was done, I was very proud of how it turned out. I chose to video one of the techniques I teach in my serger cording foot class. Maybe I will post the video in a future blog post.

I submitted my entry a week before the deadline so it wouldn’t run up against bike tour. Candidates were supposed to be notified some time in early September. Early September came and went with no word from Bernina. I accepted the fact that I probably hadn’t made the cut, and earlier this week I got the e-mail confirming that fact.

I don’t often not succeed at what I attempt. (I will not use the word fail here, because failing implies I didn’t even try.) Bernina was looking for something—someone—specific and I didn’t meet their criteria. But that opened up space for me to go ahead with the sewing classes, and those have been a success by every metric I consider important. The possibility of a YouTube channel is still on the table, too, although if I really wanted to have a YouTube channel, there would be one already.

I think it’s important to talk about the efforts that don’t produce the desired results just as much as it’s important to talk about the ones that do. I could have chosen not to mention my Ambassador application and none of you would have been the wiser. However, this isn’t Instagram. You don’t get only the polished, perfect image. You get it all.

*****

It is a bit of a joke here at Chez Schuster-Szabo that the husband has never met a tool he didn’t like. I didn’t think there was a tool he didn’t own, but then I found one.

We have been sweeping out our respective garages using push brooms. For him, that’s not a big deal. His shop has a beautifully smooth concrete floor because it was poured by a professional (him). My garage has a very rough floor with no level spots and a lot of patching over cracks. It takes me a good hour and a lot of elbow grease to get the dirt out of the garage, and I have to sweep it periodically or the dirt ends up in the car and the house. Recently, an ad for a manual sweeper popped up on Facebook. I ordered one. It arrived Monday afternoon, so yesterday morning, I assembled it and went to work:

This thing is amazing. It took me fifteen minutes to sweep the floor. Everything goes into a hopper in the middle, which lifts out for emptying. I dumped at least a pound of dirt and rocks out in the driveway.

They make even fancier versions of these sweepers that are battery powered, but when your husband is a firefighter and you spend your evenings watching videos of fire departments battling structure fires caused by tool and car batteries that malfunction and end up in thermal runaway, you develop an aversion to things with batteries. 😳

I told the husband he could borrow my sweeper if he wants.

The Students Want to Learn

One of the young women who came to the Beginning Sewing class yesterday drove from a town an hour and a half away. Almost all of my students are telling me that they have been wanting to learn to sew but couldn’t find any classes locally. I have some thoughts about that. Why didn’t Joann Fabrics have a corporate policy of offering beginning sewing classes in their stores? That is almost a no-brainer to me. If you want customers—and an ongoing revenue stream—sometimes you have to create them.

[Joanns had a whole host of problems that went way beyond offering classes, but we’ve been over that before.]

These students aren’t looking to quilt stores for instruction. Most of them either assume quilt stores are only for quilters or they are afraid to go in looking uninformed. I make a point of telling my students that even teachers were beginners once. Heck, I didn’t spring forth as an accomplished church pianist. (If only.)

Several of my students are also asking for knitting classes, so I may have to add some of those at some point. And maybe more canning classes next summer. The desire to learn those skills is there.

The husband asked me how I like teaching Home Ec. Ha ha.

Speaking of Home Ec, I need some aprons. Some of mine are wearing out, and aprons are one of those things that I am loath to buy because I can make them. I am a bit particular about my aprons, though, and I am quickly reaching that place where it may make more sense to buy some than to make them. T-shirts are the same way. If I can buy basic Gildan T-shirts at Michaels for less than it would cost me to make them (in both time and money), I am probably going to buy the T-shirts.

I could justify this by buying apron blanks and practicing some machine embroidery on them. 🧐

Salsa production is not going to happen this week. I am aiming for next week. I’m going to clean and organize this morning and do some sewing this afternoon. I also bought myself a new tool and I’d like to try it out today. Stay tuned for photos.

I Almost Forgot to Add a Title

One of the unexpected consequences of starting this new sewing school business is that I have had to get very intentional and organized about advertising, communicating to students, e-mail newsletters, posting on Facebook, etc. Those same things needed to be done for the podcast and I just hadn’t gotten my act together. You might think it would be confusing to have to manage two projects simultaneously, but there are so many similarities that it’s actually been much easier.

I think I am going to need a bigger desk planner, though.

One of my students from Saturday’s class came over yesterday morning to try out some vintage sewing machines. We chose three for her to take home to sew on. The first was a vintage pink-and-gray Japanese machine with a beefy 1.5 amp motor. It’s a beautiful machine and I have been waiting for the right owner to come along. She did like that one. She also took a straight-stitch Necchi Mira and a Singer 401A. She wasn’t sure if she wants zig-zag and decorative stitch capabilities or not. We’ll see which machine she settles on. (She only has room for one.)

Another of my sewing friends (hi, Kim!) came over to get the Cashmerette Concord T-shirt pattern for next Tuesday’s T-shirt class. I set up wholesale accounts with a few indie pattern companies and Cashmerette was one of them. I also tried to set up a wholesale account with Simplicity.com, but I was told that I did not qualify. Oh, well.

And then The Other Janet came over to get more squash (hallelujah). She brought me a jar of spiced pear jam. I tried it after she left and it was all I could do not to eat the entire jar. I’ll stir some into my yogurt this morning.

In between all those visits, I recorded today’s podcast episode and also made the class sample for Saturday’s tote bag class. I am using the Classic Mini Tote pattern purchased from Pin, Cut, Sew Studio. The kits are are all cut and ready to go. This is my version:

I used canvas left over from some other projects with a waxed canvas bottom. The tote is not lined, but it is finished nicely inside. I serged my inside edges and I’ll take my Juki 654 with me to class on Saturday so the students can finish the insides of theirs.

This whole sewing school thing has really been an example of “If you build it . . .” I started by putting a few basic classes on the calendar, but if anyone asked for a class, I scheduled it. And once I scheduled it, other people signed up. I now have four students in the Serger 101 class at the end of the month. I am going to expand my advertising down to Missoula, because I think there are people there who would drive to Kalispell for a class.

I have another Beginning Sewing class this morning, and then I will spend the afternoon in Kalispell running errands. The chickens need need feed and scratch grains.

Connecting the Dots

My beginning sewing class went very well yesterday. The setup worked reasonably well—I am using the church basement, which has quite a bit of room, although perhaps not as many outlets as I would like and even fewer outlets that will accommodate grounded plugs. I put the ironing board and cutting mat in the kitchen and we managed just fine. Capping my classes at six students was a good decision, at least for the moment.

The machines worked beautifully. One of the students brought a machine, which I encourage if the machine is in good working order. I pulled out this machine, a White that I bought for myself in 1991. It was a workhorse which served me well for many years until I bought my Janome 6600P. I sewed all of my girls’ Halloween costumes on it.

I was pretty sure there would be interest in sewing classes here, but I may have underestimated just how much interest. I have five students signed up for next Saturday’s tote bag class. Someone asked about a Serger 101 class, so I put one on the schedule and now I have students signed up for that at the end of October. And I have a couple of Kids Sewing classes scheduled for the week between Christmas and New Year that are filling quickly.

This is a good problem to have. 😊

All four students completed a pillowcase.

I love pillowcases as beginning projects because we use the “burrito” method, which is kind of magical. The students get a lot of practice sewing straight seams. (We do French seams on the inside.) And who doesn’t need a pillowcase?

*****

I am pretty sure I have mentioned the Steve Jobs calligraphy story before. Steve Jobs took a calligraphy course as a college dropout because he found the subject interesting, even though it had no practical application to his life at the time. Later, that calligraphy experience became central to the variety of fonts offered on Macintosh computers.

When relating that story, he said,

Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backward. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

Why was I compelled to buy all those sewing machines? Why was I compelled to accumulate all those Joann remnants? Why was I compelled to sew at all? Maybe it was to get me to this moment. I can’t say for certain, but I am pretty sure that I am where I am supposed to be, doing what I am supposed to be doing, right now.

Home Ec Machines

I am ready for sewing students this morning. I now have four in the Beginning Sewing class. We are going to make pillowcases, so yesterday morning, I spent a few hours prepping pillowcase kits. One of the side effects of teaching classes independently is that I can provide kits. Stores like to have students purchase their class materials at the store, which is completely understandable, but sometimes the stores don’t have exactly what the students need. (I do try to let the store know the needs ahead of time.) Sometimes the students wait until they get to class to purchase supplies, which takes up class time. Even if I give students a list of suggested fabrics, one or two will show up with material that is completely unsuitable, hasn’t been prewashed, etc. Providing a kit means that I know each student will have exactly what is needed for class. The price of the kit is built into the cost of the class. If students want to buy an extra kit for practicing at home, they can.

I bought all of those Joann remnants for a reason, even if I didn’t know it at the time. 😇

I took my tables, chairs, ironing board, iron, and cutting mat up to the church yesterday afternoon. When I got home, I thought I would look over my sewing machines but the husband had come home early from work. He and I went out and did some garden cleanup in anticipation of the bad weather coming in. I looked at my machines after we finished.

I have—ahem—a few sewing machines. Not all are in useable condition. Some just require a good cleaning. Some need parts. I have half a dozen Singer 403s and Rocketeers which eventually will become my class machines. (Thank you, Nancy!) If they were good enough for high school Home Ec classes, they are good enough for me. They all need new foot pedals, though. I always put new electronic foot pedals on any machine I rehab because those old carbon pile foot pedals run the risk of catching on fire. I made a list of what I need to order and will get those on the way. Apple didn’t invent the practice of changing power cords willy-nilly. Singer was doing that back in the 1960s. Some machines (same model) need an integrated power cord/foot pedal and some need a separate power cord and foot pedal.

For today, we will use some of the other machines that have been serviced and are working nicely. And I am looking forward to tinkering with machines again. It has been an age.

I had someone text me and ask about a Serger 101 class, so that’s on the schedule now, too, along with a Kids Sewing class at the end of December. The Kids class was requested by a mom for her two daughters for the week between Christmas and New Year’s.

*****

I am very glad that I am not driving across the passes this weekend, although the Jeep does have its snow tires on. I expect to see snow on the mountains by Sunday morning. We are under a Wind Advisory from 6 pm tonight until 6 am tomorrow. This weather is coming in as a back door cold front, which means we will get that east wind off the mountains.

And after that, who knows? It looks like another ridge of high pressure builds in, but the temps aren’t going to be much above 60F, if that.

Setting in Sleeves

I took in the On Repeat top by 1/2" at each side—changing the 3/8" seam allowance to a 5/8" seam allowance—and I like the fit much better. I will go down a size next time. It seems odd to me that the front pattern pieces of the Scout Tee, the Cadence/Burda mashup, and the On Repeat top were similar in size and shape but the On Repeat top ended up needing to be taken in. (All have 3/8" seam allowances.) I am still puzzling that out.

In any case, I wore the top yesterday. It will stay in the rotation.

And this is how I do my sleeves. I begin by matching the notch at the top of the cap with the shoulder seam and pinning it in place. I also pin the bases of the cap to the bases of the armscye:

That clip is to identify the back of the sleeve cap. I do snip in the single and double notches, but the clip is a more visible reminder.

Then I pin the back of the sleeve cap into the armscye.

The back usually goes in easily as the curve of the sleeve cap and the curve of the armscye are both shallower there and match up well. I also try to make my pins “bite” along the stitching line.

The front requires a bit more finesse because this is where the excess of the cap is being gathered into the tighter curve of the armscye. I usually begin by matching notches and pinning there, first, then going back and doing the rest of the cap. Basically, I am taking up small chunks of the cap as I work. I unpin and move fabric and re-pin until I am happy with it.

The cap side of the seam goes against the feed dogs, which will ease in the extra fabric as I sew. I place my index finger along the stitching line to feel for any pleats or extra fabric and work them out as I go.

When I’ve sewn the seam and verified that there are no pleats or puckers, I finish the seam on the serger and press it toward the sleeve. And this is another reason to have larger seam allowances in garments: When I have to finish a seam on the serger, it helps to be able to cut off a bit of the seam allowance for a neater edge.

That’s it. So much easier (for me) than setting in a sleeve the traditional way.

*****

Salsa production is on the schedule for next week. I’ll can pumpkin/squash, too, if I am motivated enough. I might as well get it all done so I can put the canning supplies away. It’s time to sew.

A Hanger is Not a Body

I finished the On Repeat top yesterday morning.

I have some thoughts. I think this is a well-designed and well-drafted pattern. However, it is not nearly as flared on my body as it appears on the hanger. In fact, when I hung it up to take this photo, I thought it looked like a completely different top. That is the difference between a garment hanging on a hanger and a garment hanging on a body with significant topography. I probably could stand to go down a size, too, even though I made the size indicated by my measurements. The top is designed with relaxed shoulders which are intended to drop off the body a bit. I would probably move the shoulder seam back in on the next iteration. My shoulders are broad enough without having that seam dropping off, making them look wider.

Do I like it? Yes, but I don’t love it, not like I love the Simplicity 8909 raglan top I made. (I need a few more of that one.) Will I wear it? Yes, absolutely. It is the kind of top you throw on and don’t have to think about. I am going to wear it today, in fact. Will I make the pattern again? Probably, although I may want to tinker with it a bit. The linen is heavenly. I was tempted to show the finished top to you wrinkled, because I like my linen a bit rumply, but I pressed it before I took the pic.

[If you have a chance, go listen this this month’s Sewing with Threads podcast episode. It is an interview with Saremy Duffy, author of Fitopedia and a former guest on my podcast. I would love to have her on again if we can get something on the schedule. In the Threads interview, she made so many good points about clothing design and fitting. I have great respect for indie pattern designers because they are trying to please a lot of different body shapes, and I don’t think home sewists always understand that they likely will have to make changes to a pattern to make it fit them well.]

I spent a lot of time yesterday afternoon comparing the Scout Tee, the Cadence/Burda mashup, and this top. It helps me so much to see patterns in front of me and to compare the similarities and differences.

*****

I canned up the second batch of sauerkraut after lunch yesterday. Now I just have to do salsa and some pumpkin/squash for pies. Anna came over in the later afternoon to get tomatoes for soup. Amazingly, they are still going, although some of the plants did get nipped by frost and the turkeys are munching their way through the fruit that is left on the vines. This is the latest in the year that I have ever been harvesting out of the garden. We didn’t cover anything, either. Anna is going to move a bunch of the squash over to her garage and I’ll take what is left to church and the food bank.

I’ve got my first beginning sewing students in a class on Saturday morning. I’ll be taking some tables and machines up to the church tomorrow. I have permission to store a few things there, which is great. I didn’t want to have to be hauling tables, chairs, and machines to the church every time I teach a class.

Winter Approaches

We are enjoying the last golden days of fall before the weather falls off a cliff. Yesterday was sunny and 72F and I drove to Missoula to teach a (very enjoyable) serger mastery class. On the way home, I stopped at the Amish store for a cup of peanut butter chip ice cream, which I ate outside while basking in the late afternoon sun.

By Sunday, highs are supposed to be in the low 40s. It is time to button up the garden and greenhouse. The squash will have to go somewhere. There are flies in my laundry room and I have thought, more than once, of hunting down a barn spider and installing it in my kitchen for the winter. I miss Charlotte.

I’ve put together 3/4 of an On Repeat top. Once again, the lighting is awful.

This linen is lovely despite being wrinkled from handling. You may wonder why I put my sleeves in flat. I have given up trying to set sleeves into finished armscyes. I have been trying for years to do it the traditional way and can’t. I have tried every trick in the book. I set sleeves in flat when I was knitting and I have decided to continue doing it that way because I get a beautifully smooth sleeve cap with no swearing. I will try to take some photos on the next one so you can see my method. I don’t necessarily recommend it as the best way; it is simply the way that works for me.

I also have some thoughts about seam allowances. I am not sure what is leading the charge against 5/8" seam allowances, but I am not in favor of the narrower seam allowances in most garment patterns these days. A 1/2" seam allowance is okay but not ideal; a 3/8" seam allowance is even less so. I have run across one or two patterns with 1/4" seam allowances, which is just ridiculous. We are making clothing, not quilts. I would rather have the wider allowance and trim off any excess with the serger. I may begin adding a bit extra to the seam allowances when I trace my patterns just because I can.

I have not yet decided how to schedule the rest of my week. I have an appointment in town tomorrow at 11, so it makes the most sense to me to wait and run all my errands while I am there despite the fact that the husband is out of the mixed nuts he likes to snack on in the evenings. (He pointed that out to me.) Also—and you did not hear me say this—I am a bit tired of driving. More to the point, I am tired of dodging idiots on the road. I can’t start salsa production until I get some onions and hot peppers, but the second batch of sauerkraut is ready to be canned. I probably will do that today after I finish the On Repeat top.

I watched a YouTube video last week of a sewist in the UK who decided that she needed to reprioritize her schedule to make sewing something she did first every day instead of last. That resonated with me. So often, sewing is the reward I give myself when I finish all my other tasks. The problem is that I am a shining supernova in the morning, which makes morning the best time for me to do focused work that requires a lot of mental energy, like paperwork and writing. Sewing works best for me in the late morning and after lunch. I want to keep that arrangement through the winter but figure out how to put some guardrails around my sewing time so it doesn’t get pushed down the list by something else.

Next to the Last

For the past many years, the first weekend in October has meant a trip to Ritzville, Washington, to help out at the Mennonite Country Auction. Our friends, TS and Holly, own Stampede Packing Company here in Kalispell. One of their products is the Redneck line of sausage. We eat a lot of Redneck Sausage here at Chez Schuster-Szabo despite raising our own pigs, because it is just that good.

TS and Holly make a special applewood smoked sausage to sell at the Mennonite Country Auction along with slab bacon and smoked ham. People line up two hours ahead to be able to purchase these products at the sale. Elaine and I run the cash registers. It’s a mad rush for about an hour until we sell out.

We were set to leave around noon on Friday for the drive to Spokane, where I had reserved a hotel room for two nights. Ritzville is 50 miles west of Spokane and Menno Mennonite—the site of the sale—is another 20 miles west of Ritzville. Just before we were to leave, I got a call from another member of our church who works for TS and also helps out at the sale. There was a load of cheese and a load of sausage to go out to Ritzville. I said I would take the cheese, so after picking up Elaine, we swung by the plant to load the cheese up into the back of the Jeep. Elaine and I were on the road by 1 pm.

I dropped Elaine off at the hotel in Spokane so she could get some work done and continued out to Ritzville. It was a beautiful evening and still quite warm for October. I delivered the cheese and drove back to Spokane as the sun was setting.

On Saturday morning, Elaine and I headed back out to the church, which is a literal oasis in the middle of miles and miles and miles of potato fields. The grounds were abuzz with activity. We walked around, visited with friends, and at 10 am, we were in place and ready to sell bacon, ham, and sausage.

Part of the opening announcements included the sad news that next year will be the 50th—and the last—Mennonite Country Auction. As with so many great events, the volunteer organizers are old and tired and no young people are stepping up to take over. It’s a shame, because this auction typically nets over $100,000 each year for Mennonite Central Committee.

Elaine and were hungry after manning those cash registers. She had a bowl of groundnut stew for lunch and I had a German sausage on a stick with sauerkraut. You would think I have had enough sauerkraut this week but no sir! For dessert, we shared some New Year’s cookies, which are balls of dough fried in lard and dusted with sugar. We watched the quilt auction for a bit until Elaine’s sister, Alice, and her family arrived from Seattle. They had driven out to take Elaine back with them for a visit.

I was too engaged to take pictures (sorry, Margaret) so I don’t have any of the quilts. My sense is that the quilts sold well this year, although there were fewer than there used to be. I always get a kick out of the fact that someone makes and donates poppyseed rolls—kolache—that sell for over $1000 apiece. I am going to try to make and donate a quilt to next year’s sale. We’ll see if I can make that happen.

******

I spent Saturday night in Spokane and drove home yesterday morning. After unpacking and doing a few loads of laundry, I traced the back and sleeve pattern pieces for the On Repeat top and went stash diving for fabric. I am going to use a remnant of lightweight black linen that I got at Pacific Fabrics, which is just large enough.

I have a podcast episode to edit this morning and paperwork to wrangle. Tomorrow, I am teaching a serger mastery class in Missoula, and on Wednesday, I have to start the salsa. After the salsa is done, I will devote myself to sewing for a while. It has been too long.

Sewing Adjacent

I am getting closer to actual sewing. After I finished up the spiced red cabbage yesterday—12 pints—I went to the cutting table to work on the On Repeat woven top pattern. I began by tracing out the front exactly from the pattern:

Sorry, I know that is hard to see because of that late afternoon sun. And I trace in pencil, not marker. That horizontal line is the lengthen/shorten line. The pattern comes in a tall version, but I still had to lengthen it by another inch.

I always find it helpful to lay out patterns side by side to compare them.

From left to right: The Scout Tee; the thing I (erroneously) have been calling my self-drafted pattern for lack of a better description, which is a mashup of a Burda pattern and the Love Notions Cadence top; and the On Repeat Tee. The Scout Tee and the mashup pattern both fit me, but they fit in different ways. The Scout Tee fits closely in the upper bodice—once I get that top on my body, it does not move around AT ALL. You would think that would restrict movement, but I like the fact that I don’t have to worry about it shifting. The darts on both tops are lower than the dart on the On Repeat Tee; on the Scout Tee, they are horizontal and on the mashup tee, they are angled upward. It’s hard to see because those patterns are face down to match the orientation of the On Repeat pattern piece.

After I traced the original On Repeat pattern, I lengthened it by slashing at the lengthen line, spreading it by an inch, then taping an extra piece of paper underneath the opening. The dart was equally easy to adjust. I drew a box around it.

The plus sign indicates the bust apex. The dot indicates the level where I want the dart point to be. I cut the box around the dart, moved it down until the point was where it needed to be, then taped it into place with extra paper covering the hole above.

I really think I prefer the shaping provided when the darts angle upward—as in my mashup tee— rather than horizontally, but I am not going to quibble about it.

Once I had made the needed adjustments, I retraced the pattern:

I can tell, looking at that side seam and comparing it to the other two patterns, that this top is going to fit more loosely below the bust. I won’t know if I like that or not until I sew it up. (I want to avoid anything that screams “maternity top.”) And I can’t sew it up until I trace and alter the back pattern piece and make sure it matches my altered front pattern piece. I am mostly interested in how the armhole fits, as the armscye seems to be in between the tighter shaping of the Scout Tee and the looser shaping of the mashup tee. Will it be a Goldilocks armscye?

[I have some thoughts about that mashup tee armscye, but they will have to wait for another blog post.]

This is why fitting is one of those areas where you can’t just read a bunch of books, understand the theory, and think you know anything. You have to trace and alter and compare and make muslins and see how garments fit on actual human beings. I tell students in my classes that I can teach them basic music theory and how to read music, but I cannot teach them how to play the piano because they have to do that work themselves. Fitting is the same way.

*****

There will be no sewing for a few days 😩 because Elaine and I are going to Spokane this afternoon. We are helping out at the Mennonite Country Auction tomorrow in Ritzville. Her sister and BIL are coming over from Seattle to meet us there, and Elaine will go back with them for a visit. I’ll spend tomorrow night in Spokane and drive home on Sunday. It is hard for both of us to be gone at the same time because she is my backup pianist at church, but we like to travel together. They will manage without us.

A Day of Cabbage

Yesterday’s task was to deal with the cabbage in its various forms. I had one crock of fermented sauerkraut that needed to be canned and processed, another couple of heads of white cabbage that need to be fermented into the next batch of sauerkraut, and a couple of heads of red cabbage that needed to be prepped for a batch of spiced red cabbage. (That recipe is in the Ball canning book.)

I love properly-fermented sauerkraut. It isn’t unpleasant at all. It smells wonderful and the taste is tangy without being overpowering. I moved the finished batch of sauerkraut to a stock pot, cleaned and scalded the crock, then filled it with the two shredded heads of cabbage I brought in from the garden. I added some of the brine from the previous batch to the fresh brine to jump-start the fermentation process. It all sits in a three-gallon crock on my counter while the bacteria do their thing. I’ve done cucumber pickles the same way.

After the second batch of sauerkraut was underway, I shredded and salted the red cabbage. It sat in a second crock overnight. This morning, I will drain and rinse it, after which it has to dry for about six hours. By the time I get home from town, it should be ready to mix with brine and spices and run through the canner.

My cabbage is lovely. The cabbage heads are large and tight and blissfully free of worms thanks to all the garter snakes on bug patrol in the garden.

Finally, I canned and processed the first batch of sauerkraut. I got five quarts.

Sauerkraut was running about $8 a jar last winter at the grocery store, so I just saved us $40. And mine is all organic.

Cooking is not my favorite activity, but we do eat well here.

Anna brought me some roasted blue kuri squash. I had some with lunch yesterday, topped with butter and salt. It’s very good. It tastes like a squash, LOL. I think I will forego growing butternut squash from now on and just grow buttercup and blue kuri.

*****

I turned on the serger again yesterday afternoon and finished the edges of some yardage that needed to be washed. When I was in Missoula last week to drop off my class samples at the store, I noticed they had some bolts of a hemp/silk blend of fabric. The colors weren’t great—a clay red and a muddy sky blue—but I bought two yards of the red anyway because I hadn’t seen this blend before. The fabric on the bolt was pretty stiff. I mentioned that I thought it would soften up when washed and the young woman helping me said no. She told me she had made a pair of pants out of it and didn’t think it would soften up enough for a top. I washed it yesterday and ran it through the dryer on hot. It still has some body to it, but it did soften considerably. The trick with those bast fibers—linen, hemp, ramie, etc.,—is to wash and dry them at high temps to get rid of the gumminess that makes them stiff.

I haven’t decided what it will be yet. It can marinate in the stash.

I also pulled out the Pattern Emporium On Repeat pattern to prep it for tracing. I am curious to see how this one compares to my self-drafted woven top pattern and the Scout Tee pattern, both of which I used quite heavily this summer. The sizing is comparable, but I can already see that I will have to lower the bust darts. I mean, really—I will be using the full bust adjusted pattern piece, and if my bustline were at the level that the pattern thinks it should be, I wouldn’t be able to see over my chest. I sometimes think that most indie pattern designers are young women who haven’t met gravity yet.

A Tsunami of Squash

Rain was in the forecast for today—it’s raining now—so I wanted to clean up the garden yesterday and bring in the rest of the squash. I spent about three hours pulling squash vines and piling them up to decompose. They will just stay there until next spring.

I ended up with four blue hubbard squash. What I thought was a fifth one was a large blue kuri squash.

The husband loaded the hubbards into the wheelbarrow and hauled them to the greenhouse for me. He thought they were about 20 pounds apiece. Two of them are spoken for. I am curious to see how the blue kuri squash taste. I am giving one to Sarah so she can try it, too.

I also ended up with a dozen acorn squash, about a hundred little white decorative pumpkins, a total of 15 blue kuri, and another dozen Georgia Roasters in addition to what Anna and I had already brought in. I am not sure what to do about this one. 🤪

The butternut squash were a disappointment. There were a lot of them but they didn’t ripen in time. It’s always hit or miss with them. I am going to give up on them and just grow the squash that I know do well here in Montana. I have about two dozen Winter Luxury pumpkins, too.

I told Anna I would leave the squash in the greenhouse until the end of the month and she can use what she wants. I’ll put a few of each in storage for us, too. What’s left will go to church so people can take some home, and the remainder will go to the food bank.

I didn’t put in a lot of plants. All of this came from one—or at most, two—plants of each variety. Pig manure is great fertilizer.

And this is very weird. The photo is blurry but it is a Jonagold, one of the Costco apple trees I bought in February when I was visiting DD#1:

I bought four Costco apple trees in the spring, two from the Costco in Sequim and two from our Costco. The husband planted all of them in the garden. The Lodi and the Ambrosia did really well, even after the deer nibbled on them. The other two—this Jonagold and a Fuji—spent the entire summer looking and acting like they were dead. About two weeks ago, I noticed that the Jonagold was leafing out. (This is not the root stock; I checked.) Apparently, it decided that life was worth living after all. How absolutely bizarre. Thankfully, the husband, who is usually very efficient about pulling things he thinks are beyond saving, hadn’t gotten to these trees yet. I am going to leave the Fuji in over the winter even though it still looks dead. Who knows? It might leaf out next spring. If not, I’ll buy something to replace it.

[I believe this has something to do with the trees not breaking dormancy properly or on time. I need to talk to Susan and find out what she knows.]

The tomatoes are still in the garden. The turkeys are feasting on them and actually do a reasonably good job of cleaning up, so I will let them. I also brought in two white cabbages and four red cabbages. The batch of sauerkraut I started two weeks ago is ready to can. That will be today’s project, and I’ll start another batch in the crock using the cabbages from my garden. (Of the two dozen seedlings I planted last spring, only six survived the marauding deer in June.) The red cabbages will become a batch of spiced red cabbage. I also had one celery plant in the garden that produced a ton of leaves, which is fine with me. I will wash them and put them in the freezer to be used when I make stock.

One of the local grocery stores has a case sale every fall and every spring. I stopped there yesterday and loaded up on evaporated milk, mushrooms, and other items I don’t can or don’t want to can. I’ll probably go back again tomorrow.

Happiness is Pushing Boulders Up Hills

I am making headway. I actually turned on the serger yesterday, although I turned it off again after deciding the knit hat project had priority. I am going to have to overcome a bit of inertia after not having sewn for a month. Inertia can be overcome by starting with a small project—an easy win—before jumping back in with a larger one. I see some zipper pouches in the near future.

I also talked to someone locally about doing more Facebook advertising for the sewing school. Trying to navigate ad placements on social media is a full-time job. For a very reasonable amount of money, this person is going to create the ads for me and run them for a month. I am trying a few different avenues to see which ones generate the best response.

Things are happening. I am trying to complete at least one task every day that moves the needle on each of my projects. I will complete more tasks if time allows.

I started following a guy on Twitter named Justin Skycak, and he posts a lot of content about productivity. This recent post resonated with me. When people ask me how I get so much done, it really boils down to this kind of approach:

The husband operates much like this, too. We are two peas in a pod. Someone summed up this post with the phrase, “Imagine Sisyphus happy.” Happy to be pushing those boulders up all those hills.

This is another way of saying the same thing:

These are the things I think about while I am awake, LOL.

*****

We got a very respectable crop of nice-looking apples from the Golden Delicious tree.

I thought I might make another batch of apple pie filling, but I need to get salsa made, first. The husband can take these for lunch.

Fall, Officially

I think we can safely call an end to the 2026 gardening season. The thermometer read 30F when I got up yesterday morning and again this morning. I am not unhappy about this as I am more than ready to hibernate for the winter. The rest of the squash will get put in the greenhouse. The husband rolled up hoses for me and got the last of the apples off the trees.

Our kids were here this weekend along with future SIL’s parents. We had a wonderful time visiting and getting to know them. (I had met his mom a couple of times before in Seattle.) The craft co-op also had its sale this weekend and Sunnie came up from Texas to participate. It was so good to see her again; I missed her visit over the summer because of bike tour.

Things should slow down now, at least for a few weeks. I don’t have as many non-negotiable or time-sensitive projects on the calendar. The items that are on the schedule are all directly tied to sewing classes, the podcast, or stuff here at home, like salsa production.

This was a very educational summer for me. I learned a lot about professional relationships and what some people think passes for acceptable adult behavior. I stopped volunteering with an organization that took my work—hard work that produced spectacular results—for granted. The world does not operate the way I do and I have to stop expecting it to do so. You would think that I would have learned that lesson a long time ago, but perhaps I am perpetually optimistic.

Going forward, my energy is going to be directed at me and at my projects.

*****

I am re-knitting the hat project. I didn’t like the way the other one was going. The new version is much better. No photos of the new one until I decide how I want to shape the top.

I might try to sew this week or I might just wait until October and spend the last few days of September getting ducks lined up.

Kennis, the designer behind Itch to Stitch, just released the Salas Jacket, a wonderful quilted jacket just in time for fall. Once again, she hit it out of the park. I don’t know if I will make this one, but I love all the options:

When I do start sewing again, I am going to finish projects that are already in the pipeline before I start anything else. Some of them just need an afternoon’s worth of work and it is silly to let them languish.

Even More Bears

I went to Missoula yesterday. I didn’t have to go, but I am teaching the Christmas stocking class again at the quilt store there in a few weeks and they asked for the class samples to display. I am hesitant to mail anything anymore because apparently, all mail now goes to the moon (in the name of efficiency) to be individually hand stamped before coming back to Earth to be delivered. I have had several pieces of mail—mailed from the main post office in Kalispell, no less—go astray over the past couple of months. Even when mail does make it to its destination, the journey takes forever.

I also took some boxes of books to The Book Exchange and traded them in for credit. The store had a ton of quilting and knitting books but very few sewing books. I did get a book of canning recipes:

The recipe that roped me in is for Curry Tomatillo Pickles. I didn’t grow tomatillos this year, but I like them a lot and I love curry. That sounds like a winning combo to me. The Other Janet and I may have to have a pickle-making day next summer.

On the way home, I spotted a black bear in someone’s vineyard, happily munching on grapes. The bears are everywhere this year.

******

I need to work on the podcast website soon. That website is still on Squarespace 7.0. In order to take advantage of some new features, I have to upgrade to version 7.1. Squarespace will move everything over automatically, but I will have to spend a few hours cleaning up pages and making sure everything looks and works the way it is supposed to. I don’t have time to do that right now even though I am itching to get it crossed off the list. Hopefully, I can get to it in a week or so.

I’ve got three podcast interviews scheduled today. I don’t usually stack them like that, but it just happened that all of the guests had today free.

Sew Expo teachers got some of their class information this week. I am very excited about the changes the organizers have made. Class descriptions and grids will go up the second week of November, with registration opening in December. This is a change from past years when registration didn’t open until January. It also sounds like the number of class offerings have expanded significantly.

Things are happening.

Overrun with Squash

Our friend Anna lives across the road. She has a catering business and she uses almost exclusively fresh local produce. If I have extra of something, she’ll buy it and plan a menu around it. She loves the Georgia Roasters and any other squash I grow. Squash was one crop that did exceptionally well this year. (The pig manure we spread on the garden might have helped.) Yesterday afternoon, Anna and I brought most of the Georgia Roasters, the spaghetti squash, the blue kuri squash, and the buttercup squash into the greenhouse to cure. The Georgia Roasters are those long orange squash. We picked at least 30 of them.

There are at least another half a dozen Georgia Roasters out in the garden yet, but they were mixed in with the butternut squash—which still need a few days to ripen—and I didn’t want to trample the vines. I thought I had planted red kuri squash, too, but either it was mislabeled or I didn’t plant it after all. We are both excited to try the blue kuri.

Anna will use some of the Georgia Roasters fresh and freeze some. The blue hubbards are still out in the garden, as are the pumpkins, the acorn squash and the butternut squash. The beans are drying on those racks on the far side of the greenhouse. They look good. After I pulled the buttercup and some of the Georgia Roaster vines, I found several cabbages and some pepper plants. The cabbages grew nicely and probably will end up as sauerkraut.

We did not get the potatoes dug because the husband changed the oil in my Jeep after I got home from church. They can wait. I also brought in another wagon load of tomatoes. We have guests coming this week, but after they leave, salsa production begins. I am hoping to have all the canning done by the end of September.

We still haven’t had a frost. Unusual, but not unheard of. And I watched Ryan Hall’s video yesterday about the slight change in the El Nino forecast. This El Nino is still historic, but he noted that the tongue of warm water is closer to Japan than to the US, and when that happens, it’s possible that our part of the country will get more cold coming down from Canada instead of being warmer than average. Theoretically, if some of that cold combines with an atmospheric river, we could get snow and a lot of it.

[This is me praying for a hard winter to clear some of these transplants out of here. 🙏🏻]

The snowiest winter on record in Seattle happened during an El Nino winter (1968-69) when Seattle got 67.5 inches of snow. (Knowing what happens there when all they get is snow flurries makes me think the whole place must have shut down for weeks.) Spokane got 93 inches of snow that winter. An El Nino winter doesn’t guarantee the weather will be warmer and drier than normal.

******

Still no sewing. We’re so close to the end of National Sewing Month that I am not even going to try. I’d rather get all the canning and cleaning done and go into October with a wide open sewing schedule.

No Sewing During National Sewing Month

I had coffee with The Other Janet yesterday morning so we could catch up on what has been happening. She showed me photos of her reorganized sewing room—at least one of us is sewing. 😩

[The irony that it is National Sewing Month is not lost on me, believe me. If I had chosen the month for sewing, it would have been January or February. In my world, September is National Canning Month.]

And it’s not like I am sitting around doing nothing. I am knitting a bit in the evenings again, which I haven’t done in a long while. The hat is coming along nicely:

This is the upper part of the hat; I am going to pick up and work the ribbing later. I would like to make a quieter version, too, but I do not have very much muddy earth tone yarn in my yarn stash. Shocking, I know.

Otherwise, it has been a week of paperwork, of cleaning, of cooking, and not much else. Cabbage was on sale this week at the grocery store, so I have a crock of sauerkraut fermenting on the kitchen counter. I had no other good place to put it where I wouldn’t forget about it. I also need to bring in another wagon load of tomatoes today.

This will pass. Canning season will end, the weather will keep me indoors, and I will have time to sew again.

*****

My friend Robert asked me if the deck at the rental house was done, because he hadn’t seen pictures of it on the blog. He and Deana stayed in the house over the summer when the deck consisted of large sheets of plywood over the joists. I took some photos for him and will share them here:

And the front:

We chose a neutral color of the recycled decking material because at some point, we are going to re-side the house and put on a new metal roof. I like the “beige with a bit a green” combination. It blends nicely with the surroundings.

The Knitting Stash is Deep

My hair is once again under control; I came out of the salon with my head feeling about 10 pounds lighter. Before my appointment, I met with a friend of mine who used to work at the quilt store. We talked about the sewing school and I asked if she would be interested in helping to organize serger retreats and other events and she was very excited. It was good to see her again and hear about what she’s been doing.

When I got home from town, I canned up another 10 quarts of tomato sauce. I think I may call that good and move on to making salsa. We have enough sauce for spaghetti once a week and an occasional pot of chili. I need to put away the canning equipment for a while so I can clean the house for guests.

I bought patterns from two new-to-me companies and had them printed while I was in town. Do I need more patterns? No. Is it helpful for me to sew patterns from different companies so I can give informed recommendations to my students? Yes. (I can rationalize with the best of them.) The first pattern is the On Repeat top from Pattern Emporium:

I haven’t made anything from Pattern Emporium yet, but this one got rave reviews on its release.

The other pattern is the Piper Tunic and Dress from Wardrobe by Me. When I finally nail the ultimate dress pattern, I am going to make about a dozen of them, probably all in linen.

Of course, in order to make anything, I have to actually touch a sewing machine. Perhaps that will happen this weekend, or perhaps I will be rolling up hose in the garden and digging potatoes.

Sew Expo has plenty of sewing-related classes happening the day before Expo opens, so I am going to offer a knitting class, instead. We are going to make a slip-stitch hat—it will lend itself well to scrap knitting and all sorts of fun color play. The pattern is literally only two rows/rounds, which makes it quick and easy enough even for beginners. After an inch or so, the work almost goes on autopilot, which is good for a class where people will want to visit and learn more about knitting in general.

I have to make a sample, so I went to my stash yesterday evening and dove into my totes of beloved Brunswick Germantown. That was one of the first yarns I used when I began knitting and I bought up all I could find when the mill went out of business. Lion Brand Wool was the only other yarn that ever felt to me like Germantown when I was knitting it. I pulled out some partially-used skeins and cast on for a hat after dinner.

I’ll take a photo after I’ve done enough that the color switching shows up.

Sew Something Studio

Today is launch day! The website is live, the Facebook ads are running, and now I wait to see if anyone in the Flathead Valley wants to take sewing classes.

Local peeps, you can help me out by liking or following the page on Facebook. Share it widely. Local sewing peeps, you can go to the website and sign up for the newsletter. If you want a specific kind of class, please let me know. I will get it on the schedule. Right now, I just have the Beginning Sewing classes listed.

I am meeting this morning with someone who has both sewing and event planning experience to see if she would be interested in helping me to plan a serger retreat for next year. I’ve already had someone from California ask me to be on the list to be notified if I schedule one. 😮 Retreats are the “special events” part of what I am offering.

I am juggling a thousand tiny little details and I am sure I missed something, so don’t hesitate to let me know if you see something egregious.

I enjoyed teaching at the quilt store, but that arrangement reached a point this summer where it wasn’t working any longer. The Mountain View Mennonite Church basement wasn’t being used and we had plans to renovate the bathrooms for the bike tour, so I approached our Leadership Team about having classes there. I think it will work well. I can store tables and machines in the space, the entrance is off the lower level parking lot, and the church is only four miles from my house and just a bit more than that from town.

*****

The Sew Expo class coordinator e-mailed me yesterday and asked if I would be interested in teaching a four-hour class on Wednesday, the day before Expo begins. We are discussing possible classes that would fit in that slot. It will make for a long week—I am already scheduled to teach six other classes—but if I am going to be there, I might as well teach. I can manage my stamina level.

I cooked down another batch of tomatoes yesterday. The sauce is waiting in the fridge for me to can it, hopefully this afternoon. It looks like we are in for a stretch of nice—and dry—weather. Still no frost in the forecast, so I’ll keep harvesting tomatoes as long as I can.

I have a lot going on right now, yes, but it’s a good kind of busy.

Rooster Training

As it turns out, the chicken that was camped on the floor of the chicken coop was on her way out. She was not protecting chicks. I found her dead in the corner of the coop yesterday morning. Sometimes, it is hard to tell what the behavior means. I still have several hens sitting on eggs so I remain hopeful that there will be chicks at some point.

And the best way to describe my training program for the baby roosters is that I talk to them. I talk to all the chickens, constantly. I talk about the weather, the deer and the turkeys, what’s in the bags of scraps that my friend Anna brings over for them—it’s basically a running commentary that gets them used to hearing my voice. By the time the baby roosters are old enough to start being aggressive, they have heard me blathering on for six months and don’t see me as a threat. In their minds, I am just the lady that makes a lot of noise and gives them food. Even the year that I had nine juvenile roosters in the coop, I didn’t worry about going in there.

Dave knew his name. I could say, “Dave,” and he would stop what he was doing and come over to me. When I go into the coop in the morning, the rooster is standing by the door to meet me. I say, “Good morning chickens! It’s time to go out! Follow the rooster!” and the rooster trots over to the door to the chicken yard and stands there until I open it. When it’s open, he starts clucking and encouraging the hens to go outside. When I leave the coop, I say, “Okay, ladies, the rooster is in charge!”

Do the roosters actually understand me? Probably not. Their brains are not very big. But we have a routine and they are used to it and I think that keeps the anxiety and drive to protect the hens from me at a minimum.

One of my roosters used to demand to eat scratch grains from my hand.

*****

I canned up the ham stock yesterday afternoon and put a few more bags of tomatoes into the freezer. I’d like to make the second batch of tomato sauce today although I might not can it until tomorrow. The schedule this week is fluid. I do have an appointment tomorrow to get a desperately-needed haircut. I try to get in at least every eight weeks, but it has been more than three months and my hairstyle right now is most charitably described as “poodle meets Newfoundland.” My hair has multiple personalities depending on the humidity level. I have always had thick hair and a lot of it, but it became a lot curlier after I had chemo. Here in Montana, when the humidity level is less than 25%, I can wear it straight if I blow it dry and use the flatiron. Anything more than that and it curls up no matter what I do to it. (I don’t even take my hairdryer to Seattle with me because there is no point.) Thankfully, the woman who cuts my hair knows how to layer it properly to take some of the bulk out of it.

The Jeep has also been loaded with the first batch of donations to take to one of the thrift stores in town. Books are next on the list. I’ve gone through mine and the husband said he will try to cull his collection, too. Those will go to one of the used bookstores, either here or in Missoula.

We moved the nightstands into the spare bedroom at the rental house. They look nice there. The husband installed the lights in the rental house garage, although we still need to get one more fixture. Home Depot only had two in stock. Next weekend, because the weather is supposed to be nice, we have to dig potatoes and put hoses away. I am trying to decide if I should cut the grass around the garden one more time. It would make it cleaner and easier to work out there.