The Fabric Haul

My Sew Expo trip is an excellent time to stock up on fabric, especially apparel fabric. I didn’t go nuts, but I did buy a few yards.

I found this sweater knit at a Walmart.

The Walmart remnant racks started out strong but have fizzled over the past year. When the stores do stock fabric, it’s just plain ugly and in colors I wouldn’t wear, so finding something like this is unusual. This sweater knit will become some kind of pullover for next winter.

I did some damage at the Quilting Bee in Spokane. I needed some yardage for the Tamarack Jacket—which I will be making up this weekend—and chose the black with dots. The gray will be the lining:

And, of course, I got the Yellow installment of the Tim Holtz Palette line. I skipped the Orange installment. Orange is not a color I use. I also got that fat quarter bundle at the bottom right, which I think is leftovers from a variety of previous Tim Holtz lines. They play nicely together, though, and I may have most of them in the stash.

I had a couple of gift cards and used them at Pacific Fabrics, where I indulged myself:

From left to right:

• Three yards of red Kaufman Brussels Washer Linen, destined to be a summer dress.

• Two yards of a new Fableism print for a woven top.

• Two yards of Anna Maria for Free Spirit rayon woven, also for a top.

• Two yards of a Cloud 9 rayon woven for a top.

• One yard of Rifle and Paper canvas from the Alice in Wonderland line for either a bag or an apron.

I definitely had a red and blue vibe going here.

I’ll post photos of my Sew Expo purchases tomorrow.

******

Yesterday was an errand-running day, so I stopped in at Joann Fabrics. Our store is much cleaner and less of a free-for-all than the stores in Seattle. The patterns were still in the drawers and all $1.99 (or $4.99 for the Vogue patterns). I wonder if the decision to pull all the patterns from the drawers and put them in boxes at 30% off was a Seattle-area decision made by someone who knows nothing about sewing, in which case those stores are going to be sitting on disorganized mountains of patterns at the end of the liquidation. Dumb.

I stocked up on some elastic and other notions. I did not recognize any of the employees, which makes me wonder if the ones who were working there jumped ship—who could blame them?—and the store is being staffed by Great American employees.

I’ve seen lots of comments around the internet that the discounts are less than expected. I’m not surprised that things aren’t at fire sale prices yet. GA paid a chunk of money for the opportunity to oversee the liquidation. They are looking for a return on that investment and counting on a certain level of panic buying. Someone on the Joann subreddit commented that prices won’t start coming down until traffic slows in the stores.

I’ve said this before and it’s still true. Sewing—and most especially quilting—is predominantly a wealthy retired white woman hobby. That certainly was the demographic of attendees at Sew Expo. I am curious to see how the death of Joanns affects the quilting industry going forward. This article on the Modern Retail website does a fairly good postmortem and quotes Abby Glassenberg, head of the Craft Industry Alliance.

Back from Sew Expo 2025

Whew! the past 10 days have been a whirlwind! I left last Monday and ended up driving the entire way to Seattle in one day. My original plan had been to spend Monday night in Spokane, but after looking at the weather forecast and seeing what was heading onshore, I chose to power through. That was a good decision even though I did drive through a bit of snow at the top of Snoqualmie Pass. A big windstorm came through Seattle Monday night and I would have been driving through that all across the state of Washington on Tuesday had I stuck with the original plan.

Bonus: I had all of Tuesday to do some fabric shopping in Seattle and Tacoma. More on that in a moment.

The sad news is that the day I left, the husband came home from getting straw bales from our farmer friend and found Dave dead in the chicken yard. There were no signs of foul play. I was not surprised. Dave was almost five years old and that is getting way up there in rooster years. As much as I will miss Dave, Little Roo now can step up and be the rooster in charge. I think he will do a good job. He was trained by his daddy, who was trained by his daddy.

RIP, Dave. You were the best rooster ever. May your genes live on.

After breakfast at the hotel on Tuesday morning, I headed to the nearest Joann Fabrics. To say that this store liquidation is a disaster is an understatement. The liquidation company, Great American (oh, the irony), put everything out on the sales floor. Literally. Some bolts were still wrapped in plastic, stacked randomly everywhere. All of the patterns had been pulled out of the pattern drawers and haphazardly plopped into cardboard boxes placed on top of the pattern drawers. (WHY?). The patterns were no longer sorted by brand or number, so it was impossible to find specific patterns. I threw out my list, because all the stores I went to were the same way.

[I hate stupidity and lack of common sense. If they had left all the patterns organized in the drawers, no doubt they would have been snapped up by shoppers.]

None of the sewing notions were left. No needles, nothing. All gone, and they had only been marked down by 25%. I said to the husband that this looked like a Joanns apocalypse. It reminded me of the run on toilet paper at Costco during the pandemic.

You know what was left in all the stores I visited? All the plastic crap from China that NO ONE WANTED. If Joanns had stuck to being a fabric (and yarn) store, they might have survived.

I did buy some bottomweight fabrics for some summer pants, but that was about it. Lines were long at both the cut counter and checkout. I feel for those poor employees.

I also made a stop at Pacific Fabrics. What a joy that was after the soul-sucking disappointment of Joann Fabrics. I’ll show photos of the fabrics I bought after I unpack everything and get organized.

Late Tuesday afternoon, I checked into the Airbnb near the fairgrounds and organized my class supplies for Wednesday’s class on sweater drafting. I have lots of thoughts about Sew Expo, too, but I’ll save those for tomorrow’s post.

Joann's Is Gone

This was posted on the Joanns subreddit when I got up this morning. The author’s handle is rianadawn and I think she was watching the court hearing over Zoom.

The auction started at 4pm yesterday with lots of back and fourth between Gordon Brothers. Finally as of about 6:30PM tonight this is the outcome.

Gordon Brothers doesn’t have any new bids. Great American has successfully won. Great American said that they know this is not the outcome we all wanted and they were hoping for the employees and for the customers to be able to keep the stores going. They said they’ve had a long standing relationship with JoAnns. They helped close 370 of JoAnns stores while helping them to be expanded. They have a multi million dollar retention plan for the employees they will be rolling out after the court approves this. They said it’s frankly not enough and 90% is going into the stores. They want the employees to know they will help them through the transition. They said they will help with time out. They said they’ll help organize job fairs. They said most stores are stay open until end of May. They said they’re helping with payroll and wind down. They’re saying for the customers, as soon as they get settled all stores will be going on discount and the merchandise will be rolling out as soon as possible. They said they had nothing to do with the bankruptcy and they’re going to help with as much empathy as they can. Auction over and now it needs to be approved by a judge.

It’s over folks. Joann’s is gone.

I’ve had people say to me, “No one sews anymore!” After I pick myself up off the floor from laughing so hard, I point out that the five-billion-dollar-a-year quilting industry indicates otherwise. I am sure the demise of Joann Fabrics will provide plenty of fodder for graduate business school classes for years to come. This didn’t have to happen. The sheer stupidity of human beings stuns me anew every morning.

******

I needed a mindless sewing project yesterday, so I pulled out the bag of red scraps. The bag also contains some pink, purple, and orange scraps. Most of the scraps are in the form of “strings,” or strips of fabric at least 1-1/2" wide. Larger scraps get turned into 5" squares. I spent the afternoon making these half log cabin blocks.

The pattern originally came from the book Sunday Morning Quilts under the name “Scrapper’s Delight.” We have a mulitcolored version on our bed. I’ve also done a couple of white and cream versions. This version is fairly retina-burning, but I need to use up the bag of scraps. Honestly, I think I could make two king-size versions of this quilt and still have scraps left over. I didn’t think I used a lot of red fabric but the scraps say otherwise.

I’ve found it’s easiest to make four blocks at the same time and chain piece them through the machine. They finish at 12-1/2". Some logs are a bit wonky, but that adds to the charm. This likely will be a long-term project.

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I was reading through the teacher guidelines from Sew Expo yesterday as I was gathering supplies. I found it interesting that they had to put a reminder in there for teachers to dress professionally. Really? Do some teachers show up in jeans and hoodies? (You can tell I’m old.) Not only do I dress up, I put on makeup. 😮

I was happy to see that some of my feedback from last year has been acted upon. I suggested that they set aside an area as a teacher lounge. Teachers had no quiet place to sit down for a few minutes, get a snack and something to drink, or meet and visit with other teachers.

Totes Adorbs

We had such fun in the tote bag class yesterday. Five students registered but one couldn’t make it due to sickness. Two students were new, one of whom had taken up sewing again after a long hiatus. And each finished tote was very different.

Ardyce made one with a waxed canvas base and wool for the body:

Jenny made hers with waxed canvas for the base and a Sevenberry canvas for the body:

Nancy, the lady who has rediscovered sewing, made hers with Kaufman Brussels Washer Linen for the base (nice) and canvas for the body. We all loved how she made her lining peek over the top edge:

And Jennifer made hers with a waxed canvas base and a bee print canvas for the body.

All of the students had Bernina machines, so I was able to introduce them to the wonders of the #10 edgestitch foot for topstitching. I think that’s my favorite presser foot, no lie.

Over our lunch break, I checked on the status of the Joanns auction. As of close of business, nothing had yet been decided. It sounds like one of the bidders asked for additional financial information. I guess we won’t know anything definitive until next week.

******

One of the patterns I picked up last week was this older McCall’s pattern:

I bought it because View C has that shawl collar detail and this saves me from having to draft it from scratch.

******

The weather is about to get very messy. There is an atmospheric river coming in to the west coast. We are supposed to get rain beginning this afternoon and we’re under a flood watch. (We live on the side of a mountain, so flooding is one thing we don’t have to worry about, but other areas in the valley do.) Temps have warmed up enough that the two feet of snow piled up on the roof is sliding off, which makes it sound like we’re under attack.

Seattle may get a windstorm tomorrow night and into Monday. That won’t affect my drive over, but the forecast is making it look worse than the windstorm that happened in November. That one knocked out power to some of the suburbs for almost a week.

What Remains of Joann Fabrics?

I suspect we may know by the end of business today what will happen to the remaining Joann Fabrics stores. If I am understanding posts in the Joanns subreddit correctly, there is an auction scheduled this morning to sell what’s left, but all three registered bidders are liquidation companies. When I stopped in at our store yesterday afternoon—I can’t stay away from that pattern sale—the manager said that what she is being told changes from minute to minute.

What.A.Mess.

My ruler class on Wednesday was a lot of fun. I very rarely teach a class I don’t enjoy. We were using the circle and curve rulers. Here is my friend Jenny using one of the circle rulers to quilt a flower. (Jenny is also on the board of the Homestead Foundation.)

I talked to the class coordinator from the store in Missoula yesterday afternoon. When I finished making that pink Riley Blake quilted jacket—the one that had so many problems—I sent an e-mail to the store owner and suggested we consider a different project. The class coordinator and I talked about it and decided on the Tamarack Jacket from Grainline Studio. We also moved the class to next fall. I’ll make the sample when I get back from Sew Expo.

I’ve had enough extra time this week to eke out two tops. The first is the Burda 6315. (I think I keep saying 9315 and that’s the wrong pattern number.) This is the French terry from KnitFabric.com. I absolutely love it. I wore it to my class on Wednesday.

The second one is Yet Another Toaster Sweater from the third chunk of cable knit that I got from Joann Fabrics last year.

This is such a lovely fabric. It’s a blend with rayon in it and it wears beautifully. The color selection could have been better (could I please have some hot pink or emerald green?), but I’m okay with reds as long as they lean toward the blue end of the spectrum. These Toaster Sweaters are great to throw on with a pair of jeans.

I timed myself while making this Toaster Sweater. It took an hour and a half to make—about 30 minutes to cut it out and an hour to run it up on the serger. Gotta love these instant gratification projects.

Today is my Wool and Wax Tote class.

I am so itching for a road trip. It has been three months since I’ve gone anywhere and that’s a long time for me to be home. The weather, although rainy, should be okay for getting over the passes.

Getting Ready for Sew Expo

My Wool and Wax Tote Bag class is on Friday. I still hadn’t finished the blue and gray version—the top edge needed to be topstitched—so I did that yesterday. The husband put the new light up over the Juki 1541, the machine affectionately known as “The Beast.”

We need to raise the light a bit; the thread coming from the thread stand is too close to it, but otherwise, it is lovely to have so much task lighting right where I need it.

The topstitching took 10 minutes but now it’s done. I hand sewed the opening for turning in the lining closed last night. Yes, I could have done that by machine but I don’t mind the hand sewing.

Now all I have to do with that bag is attach the handles. I will do that in class. I am taking the rivet press with me so students can use it, and attaching the handles will be a good demonstration of how to use the press.

I also found some time to cut out a Toaster Sweater and a Burda 9315 (heavily hacked). For the Toaster Sweater, I used a burgundy cabled knit that I bought at Joanns a year or two ago. I already have two other Toasters in that same fabric in light blue and navy blue, and they are in regular rotation. I wanted to sew it together, but I don’t have the correct serger thread color. Sometimes, I am willing to use a non-matching thread, but not with that fabric. I’ll get the thread I need today when I am teaching my ruler class.

I thought about making a Jalee Nathalie top with the other fabric—the French terry I ordered from KnitFabric.com when I ordered the fabric for the boys’ tops—but I only had two yards and need almost three for the Nathalie. It worked perfectly for the Burda 9315. I was able to put that one together. I just need to hem it on the coverstitch machine.

I always like to wear me-mades when I teach and now I’ll have a couple of new tops for Sew Expo. No, it is not lost on me that I’ll be teaching knitting classes while wearing sweaters that I sewed.

The pile of Sew Expo supplies in the living room is growing. That is where I put everything so I don’t forget it when I am packing the car.

I have a shopping list for Sew Expo. (I also have one for Joanns clearance sales, although I suspect the pickings may be slim by the time I get to those stores.) One of my favorite vendors at Sew Expo is Amanda’s Bundles. They have a great selection of knits, and this year, they are supposed to have some sewing-themed knits. I noticed that the Sew Expo organizers have consolidated all of the vendors into the larger of the two buildings; I wonder if that is because the number of vendors is down or if it was done for convenience. That main vendor building had plenty of room, so I think it’s a good move regardless.

Ellie Lum of Klum House is teaching a new waxed canvas bag pattern and the pattern will be released at Sew Expo. I’m looking forward to seeing what she has designed. Billie’s Designer Fabrics is another great apparel fabric vendor. I’ve gotten a lot of fabric for the little boys’ shirts from them. I’m hoping to pick up some nice gabardines or other trouser fabric (wool?) so I can get started on making pants for myself.

Joy in Snow

It has been a very snowy (and cold) February and the snow is still coming down. This was the view out the kitchen door yesterday afternoon:

We have a bucket for both the forklift and the track loader, so the husband can move the snow into huge piles. They made great sledding hills when the girls were little.

Snow falls off the metal roof and piles up along the edge of the porch. The winter of 1996-97, we had so much snow that it was up to the porch roof. Walking from the driveway to the kitchen door was like walking through a tunnel.

The chicken coop:

The chickens won’t go out in the snow, so they get quite cranky at this time of year.

It’s hard to see, but there is a platform on the fencepost just to the left of the coop. It acts as our snow gauge. The husband must have cleared it off Sunday, because just before I left for church, it had over a foot of snow on it. When I looked out this morning, it was up to about 10".

The herb garden:

We need the moisture, so I will not complain about the snow. And it’s pretty.

*******

I finished all my class prep, so now it’s a matter of collecting and packing supplies. I’m glad I can drive to Sew Expo; I don’t know how I would manage if I had to fly. The class coordinators are making a point of telling teachers that some students will show up unprepared, without the requisite class supplies, so we should bring extras. 🙄 I have found that many students think that all they have to do is show up for the class and everything will be provided for them. When Tera and I went to Sew Expo two years ago, each of us had a rolling tote full of all the supplies we thought we might need for our classes.

It’s a fine line. Sometimes it is easier to tell students that a kit of supplies will be provided (and charged for accordingly). I do that when I want students to have specific supplies. My thread class comes with a thread kit—put together by Wonderfil—and I provide 5" squares of light-colored fabric backed with a lightweight interfacing. (I fuse interfacing to a large piece of fabric and cut the squares on my Accuquilt cutter.) When it comes to basic supplies, though, such as scissors and marking tools, students should come prepared.

I finished sewing down the binding on the Correspondence quilt last night. That one has been crossed off the list. I’m kicking around the idea of starting a scrap quilt because my bag of red strips is absolutely overflowing. Sewing strips together is a good mindless activity. I can’t decide if I want to take a sewing machine with me to Sew Expo or not. I could sew in the evenings, but after a day of teaching, I like to vegetate.

Dreaming of Tomatoes

Seeds are beginning to arrive.

I started my seed ordering at Victory Seeds, where I’ve been a customer for over a decade. They moved from Oregon to Texas a few years ago, though, and I think the quality of their seeds took a hit. They were also sold out of quite a few things this year, so I had to go looking for alternative suppliers. (I do have some seed saved, but I like to have backups.) Victory Seeds did not have my beloved Orgeon Star paste tomato. However, TomtatoFest did. While I was there, I got sucked into looking around and ordered a few new varieties. I am particularly excited about Cherokee Chocolate and Cherokee Green, because Cherokee Purple is a staple in my garden. We’ll see how those two do this year. (Sarah, I will make sure to save a couple for you if you want them.)

I know, I said I wasn’t going to plant 40 tomato plants again this year but I lied. 😇

*****

I am making progress on my to-do list. My last class handout is almost done. I’ve made copies of the other ones and put each set of handouts into its own folder with the date and time of the class on the front. I am teaching six classes next week and I need to keep them straight.

The binding has been sewn down on the jelly roll quilt. Yesterday afternoon, I made and attached binding to the Correspondence quilt. I began sewing it down last night. I lost my favorite binding needle and have not been able to find a replacement. The quilting betweens are close, but they are shorter than the one I was using for binding. I think I need a sharp, but I have to find the correct size.

This week’s podcast episode is going to be on interfacing, and wow, has that been a tour of a bunch of rabbit holes. I now know more about interfacing than I thought I needed to. Oh well, I am just adding to the base of knowledge I can pull out when I am teaching.

I spent an hour before dinner yesterday cutting the last group of 5" squares from my pile of scraps. I’ll give the tote to Pat this morning at church. The husband spent his day moving snow. It has been snowing off and on for the past couple of days and now we’re under a winter storm watch for another system moving in. Mid-week, though, it is supposed to warm up —into the 40s!—which is going to turn everything into a sloppy mess. That bodes well for my trip to Sew Expo, however.

*******

Reddit, for all that it has a dubious reputation in the social media world, has been a great source of information about that MTHFR mutation and my discovery that extra riboflavin is helping some of my health issues. I have been researching this issue for a long time—long before a lot of this information was readily available—and Reddit seems to be the repository for what Tom Naughton refers to as “the wisdom of crowds.” There is a lot of anecdata there that would be dismissed by conventional practitioners, but if you’re willing to be persistent and sift through it, you can find a lot of great information. One poster in the MTHFR forum is particularly knowledgable and helpful. He developed a road map of treatment for people with the same mutation that I have. I was amused to discover that I had developed a similar road map for myself—through a great deal of trial and error, because the information wasn’t available five or ten years ago—except that he starts with riboflavin and I am finally adding it in as the last piece of the puzzle. I think that’s because I uncovered that mutation as a result of a folate deficiency, so the focus has always been on folate. Also, the riboflavin information has come to light more recently.

In any case, I find it fascinating how scientific research meanders down the path of discovery.

In the Land of Class Prep

I like deadlines. I find them very motivating. I am up against a couple of deadlines in the next week, so it’s been nonstop nose to the grindstone here. The Correspondence top has been quilted and is awaiting trimming and binding. I should be able to finish sewing down the binding on the jelly roll quilt this evening. The Bernina Event class sample is done. The class sample for my rulerwork class next Wednesday is done. My class handouts, save one, are complete. Finishing the last one is today’s task. I have been making lists of things I need to take with me to Sew Expo so I don’t forget anything. I have a few open days on the schedule this week but I don’t like leaving anything until the last minute if I can avoid it. I’ve also got one eye on the weather forecast in case I have to leave a day early to avoid a storm.

I stopped in at Joann Fabrics on Thursday and they are indeed putting all of their patterns on sale every weekend now. Vogue Patterns are $4.99 and everything else is $1.99. I picked up half a dozen new ones—none that I intend to make immediately, but patterns to have in the library in case I need them. I would like to try Vogue V9325 sooner rather than later, though:

I had a dress like this a few years ago and wore the heck out of it until it got a stain on the front. I have several sheath dress patterns but none with linings. This one is lined. I would like guidance on making a dress with a lining.

Apparently, the Joann Fabrics stores that are closing are going to begin their clearance sales this weekend. I plan to stay in Spokane overnight on my way to Sew Expo and will check out the stores there to see what is left. 😢

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I need a jumpstart for my embroidery projects because I haven’t felt like working on them. The quilt store had Nichole Vogelsinger’s books on display the other day, so I picked up Needles Out:

It is a stunningly beautiful book—even the cover is embossed and full of texture. When Sew Expo is over, I plan to sit down and study this.

If I get everything crossed off today’s list, I might reward myself by sewing up that new French terry I got from KnitFabric.com.

RIP Joann Fabrics

I am sure that by now, those of you who care have heard that Joann Fabrics is closing 500+ stores around the country. The ones on the chopping block can be found here. Amazingly, the stores in Kalispell and Missoula are not on the list. (The store in Kalispell has so little inventory, though, that they might as well close it.) Most of the Seattle stores are closing, as well as two of the three Spokane stores. It makes sense that they would close the most-expensive-to-operate stores first.

I hope that enough of this company is left that something good can grow out of the stump. I have heard a few rumors that Joanns will transition to online-only sales, but it is way too difficult to buy fabric online on a regular basis. (That idea sounds to me like it came from bean counters who don’t sew and don’t understand the purchasing habits of their customers.) Perhaps Hobby Lobby and/or Michaels will up their game in the sewing department to help fill in the gaps.

******

I have mostly finished the sample for the Bernina event at the end of March. I can’t show the entire project, but here is a teaser:

This is decorative chainstitching done on the coverstitch machine with Spagetti 12 wt thread. (That’s not a typo—that is the correct spelling.) The fabric is part of a Kaffe Fassett line from Free Spirit.

This project has a lot going on. I first had to do the decorative stitching on the coverstitch machine. I then moved to the serger to piece the units and assemble them. Finally, I went to the 880 to do some quilting, both decorative—using the built-in stitches—and free motion. Normally, I would do my quilting on the Q20, but this project specified the use of domestic machines with the Bernina Stitch Regulator. I haven’t ever used mine, so that was a good learning experience. (The BSR is a foot assembly for free motion quilting that attaches to the machine and plugs into the back of it.) All that’s left is to do some quilting using the embroidery hoop and program.

I didn’t receive the second part of the instructions for this project until just before lunchtime yesterday. Fortunately—and this is why I have the equivalent of a Joann Fabrics store in my house—I had the threads that were specified in the instructions and didn’t have to wait until my next trip to town to get them.

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I do buy fabric online occasionally. I placed an order with KnitFabric.com for some material to make shirts for Susan’s grandsons—the boys requested them and were very specific about what they want—and the order arrived yesterday. This tag was on one of the pieces:

I love that they do this. Fabric.com used to do this, too.

While I was shopping, I ordered some fabric for myself, too:

This is a French terry and I think it’s probably destined for a Jalie Nathalie top.

I Love Loops

The binding is on the jelly roll quilt. I’ll be sewing that down over the next couple of evenings. I basted the Correspondence top together with its backing and batting and it is on the Q20. I had only a few minutes last night to try out some quilting on it. I’ve decided to do a double loop pattern—what I am calling “double bubbles”—and I like it so far:

It’s a loop meander with a twist, and it will go quickly.

I started the class sample—a table runner—for the Bernina event. This one is a bit tricky, because I don’t have the same machines that we’ll be using for the event. For example, the instructions call for decorative chainstitching to be done using the L890 serger/coverstitch combo machine. I have the L860, which is a serger only, and I have a Janome 3000cpx coverstitch machine, so I’ll be doing the decorative chainstitching on my Janome. I’ve used the L890 machines so frequently at the store, though, that I know how to set them up for what we’ll be doing in class.

Once the table runner is constructed, it needs to be quilted. The class will use the Bernina 770 or 990 machines with the embroidery module for the quilting portion. I have a Bernina 880 and it does have an embroidery module, but I need to get a quick tutorial on using it from the store owner. I don’t want my first attempt at using my embroidery module to be on a class sample.

In any case, the end result will look the same. What is important is that I can teach the concepts. I am reminded of the interview with Marianne Fons and Liz Porter where they talked about the first quilting classes they taught. The store gave them the topics they wanted covered, so Marianne and Liz went home and taught themselves how to do those techniques.

I’ve had some conversations this week with the class coordinator at Sew Expo. She said that last year, the knitting and other non-sewing classes were really popular, but this year, they are struggling to fill them. Go figure. I think that next year, I’ll submit proposals for a mix of both sewing and knitting.

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Apparently, Joanns had a big sale on patterns last weekend. I wondered why nothing was on sale last Thursday when I stopped in. They usually put one brand of patterns on sale every Thursday-Sunday. One week, the McCall’s patterns will be on sale, the next week Butterick, etc. It sounds like all of the Big 4 patterns were on sale last Friday-Sunday, but I don’t go to town on the weekends so I missed it.

I wonder if this will be the sales tactic going forward?

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It’s been cold here, albeit with brilliant sunshine every day. We’ve been waking up to temps in the negative teens. The husband doesn’t work outside when it’s this cold. Machinery doesn’t like to function at these temps, even if he’s willing to tolerate the conditions. He did a concrete cutting job up at the hospital last week and the general contractor wants him to come back and do a bit more work there, but he can’t do it until after 5 pm today because the equipment makes a lot of noise and vibration.

He put an extra heat lamp in the chicken coop because there was some jockeying by the roosters to see who got to sleep under it. He claims that the two of them behave themselves when he is in there, but when I go out to feed them and collect eggs, Dave chases Little Roo around the coop. Thankfully, no bloodshed yet. I hope it stays that way.

This Quilt Needs Some Binding

I finished quilting the jelly roll top. The border was done in ribbon candy and I used Amanda Murphy’s Every Daisy ruler set to quilt flowers in each corner:

I stopped in at the quilt store yesterday morning to get thread to finish the hexie wallhanging—I found the color I needed—and binding fabric for this quilt. I also came out with fabric to make the sample for the Bernina event scheduled at the end of March. Bernina dealers have at least one or two “events” every year, which are day-long classes designed to allow people to come in and use the machines to make something. It’s a great way to try out a machine you might be thinking of purchasing.

Stores have the option of bringing in a Bernina educator for these events or having someone from the store teach them. I taught the serger event a couple of years ago, and last September, I was a class angel for the Bernina educator who came in to teach it. I’m teaching the event at the end of March. The pattern is for a table runner. I don’t think it will take me long to put it together.

In between the quilt store and a Costco run, I stopped at the farm store to get some bales of pine shavings. We use those in the nesting boxes. I also picked up a copy of this year’s chick schedule. Apparently, designer chickens are all the rage. The chick schedule has several pages full of fancy chicken breeds. I had to look to find the dates for the New Hampshire Reds and Brown Leghorns. I guess the more common breeds are no longer popular. 🙄 We’re aiming to get chicks around the third week of March.

I’m not ready to think about planting, but people are asking me if I’ve started seeds yet. Even if we could get to the greenhouse easily—which we can’t—the amount of daylight isn’t yet sufficient.

And I still have so much sewing to do between now and spring planting. I’m putting my nose to the grindstone this week and trying to knock out all of my to-do list. At some point, I’m also going to have to think about what clothes I need to make for spring. I have a distinct lack of dresses in my closet, which I notice every Sunday when I get dressed for church. I know what I’d like to make, but some of those items require pattern drafting. I need a solid chunk of uninterrupted time to tackle that, and I also have to be in the right mood.

I suspect I will come back from my Sew Expo trip with some fabric. I plan to stop at Pacific Fabrics in Seattle and I know there will be a some apparel fabric vendors at the show. And from the “Too Little, Too Late” department, I see that Joann Fabrics is carrying a new line called Draper James. This line actually has quite a few really nice apparel fabrics in it. Why did they wait so long??????

Sewing and Growing

I taught a sewing class at the community center yesterday morning. I do these periodically and donate the class fee to the homestead foundation. They are always a lot of fun. I set up a couple of sewing machines and my ironing board and bring all the fabric and supplies. Yesterday’s class had three students: a woman about my age and two 20-something girls. Each of them made two pillowcases during the three-hour class.

We make the pillowcases using the burrito method, which is always rather magical. Along the way, I try to teach good sewing and pressing habits.

Halfway through the class, the older lady mentioned that she had a sewing machine and had brought it with her, so I asked her if I could look it over. It turned out to be a serger! All she could tell me was that she had bought it at an estate sale. I threaded it up and got it to make a serger chain, but I’d need to tinker with it a bit more to get it to stitch properly.

The pillowcases turned out well. We do simple ones without the flange between the header and body because I’ve found that beginning sewists have enough trouble keeping three layers of fabric together (even with pins), let alone five.

After class, I packed up my supplies and came home. The husband is doing some concrete work at the hospital and went to work yesterday with a couple of our employees. He said it was much easier to work on the weekend when fewer people were there.

I was going to finish quilting the hexie wallhanging, but I don’t have the correct thread color for the border. I’ll get some this week. I started working on the jelly roll quilt, instead:

This one is getting a loopy meander in the center. I know that’s my default free motion quilting pattern, but it’s fast and relaxing. I don’t want to take the time to do rulerwork or custom quilting on this top.

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The husband has been queuing up seed starting and garden planning videos for our evening viewing, but I’m not ready to think about planting yet. He found an interesting channel called Montana Mid-Valley Farm, which is produced by a young couple living somewhere near Helena. We watched their videos about building a root cellar. The husband says that building one here is on his to-do list for this summer. We’re using a spot in our basement as a root cellar, but it would be nice to have a larger one for more storage. He also said it would make a good fire shelter in the event of a wildfire, although I don’t like to think about that.

In any case, it’s going to be about six weeks before I can get into the greenhouse to do anything. The lettuce in the basement is about ready to cut, and I need to start the next round in the rooting plugs.

Hexie Quilting and a Puzzle

I spent yesterday making quilt backings. I couldn’t find any 108" wide fabrics that I liked at the quilt store, so I bought 44" wide yardage and pieced the backings. Then I basted them to the tops and batting. After lunch, I worked on quilting the EPP hexie wallhanging:

I’m stitching in the ditch around all the units. I’ll do something fun in the border. I’m just happy to be moving some of these projects through the pipeline.

Anna at Noodlehead released a new pattern, the Trail Tote:

I bought the pattern (of course), although I probably won’t make it immediately. I do love the piping detail. I carry a ton of stuff around with me—if we’re ever shopping together and you need a tape measure, I have one—so I would make the larger version. I think it would be great in a waxed canvas. I might order some of the waxed canvas that Sailrite sells just to see how it compares to the AL Frances canvas and the Klum House canvas.

So many things to make.

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I don’t talk about medical stuff very often here on the blog, because I am not a doctor and I don’t give medical advice, but I am living a medical puzzle and one of the pieces dropped into place this week. I am sharing in case it helps anyone else.

I am homozygous for the C677T mutation in the MTHFR gene. That means I got one copy from each of my parents. Maybe you’ve heard of MTHFR, maybe not. It has become more notorious thanks to DNA testing. (There is also a mutation known as A1298C, which I do not have.) The MTHFR gene codes for methylenetetrahydrofolate reductase, an enzyme involved in one of the metabolic pathways in our bodies. Because I am homozygous for that mutation, I have about 75% less methylenetetrahydrofolate reductase. The lack of that enzyme can lead to a laundry list of problems, and the fact that I got one copy of that gene from each of my parents means that it is running rampant on both sides of my family. We’ve done enough DNA testing that I know who has it and it what form.

Our first baby was born without a brain, a birth defect which falls under the category of neural tube defects and is directly attributable to that MTHFR mutation. It’s why pregnant women are now told to take folic acid. In my case, I don’t metabolize folate properly. You might think I could fix that by taking a folic acid supplement, but it’s more complicated than that. The folic acid that is available now is synthetic, and it actually causes more problems for people with MTHFR than it solves. A lot of doctors recommend methylfolate as an alternative, but I can’t take that, either, because it causes violent mood swings. I can tolerate folinic acid, which is a precursor to methylfolate, so I take that.

My mother has a B12 deficiency, also known as pernicious anemia. For most of her life, doctors told her to take more iron. 🙄 Pernicious anemia cannot be fixed by taking more iron. She requires B12 supplementation. That’s another manifestation of the MTHFR mutation.

That mutation can also cause elevated homocysteine which, in turn, leads to inflammation in the blood vessels. Blood clots, strokes, and heart attacks feature prominently in our medical history on both sides.

I want my girls to be armed with as much knowledge about this and how it affects them as possible, so I’ve done a ton of research. Thankfully, I have a naturopath as my primary care doctor who is also fairly knowledgeable about MTHFR. Most conventional doctors don’t have a clue.

I happened to be surfing Pinterest the other night when I ran across an article entitled, “Your ‘MTHFR’ is Just a Riboflavin Deficiency.” That led me to Chris Masterjohn, who has a PhD in Nutritional Sciences and a Substack account where he writes about this stuff. (The Substack account has a free version and a subscription version.) He argues that because the MTHFR mutations are so common—something like 75% of the population has a version of them—they’ve only become a problem for some people because the quality of our diets have deteriorated so much. I do know that I’d be happy to live on a diet of beans, rice, and leafy greens, all of which happen to be foods high in folate. My body knows what it needs.

Every so often, I get cracking and redness around my mouth. It’s more than just chapped lips. The dentist also told me in December that my tongue looked swollen and red. I had read somewhere a few years ago that that could be due to a B vitamin deficiency. I take the Seeking Health B-Minus complex every day, which is a formulation from Dr. Ben Lynch that doesn’t have any methylfolate or folic acid in it. (I take the folinic acid separately.) That B-complex has 20 mg of riboflavin in it. The dietary recommendation is something like 1.5 mg per day, so I thought I was getting plenty of riboflavin, but I still had this cracking and redness issue. According to Chris Masterjohn, some people with the MTHFR mutation may need up to 400 mg of riboflavin a day. I started taking 100 mg capsules in addition to my B-complex and guess what?—the redness around my mouth is resolving. I am working my way up to 400 mg a day. Riboflavin is a water-soluble vitamin and any excess is eliminated from the body, so I don’t need to worry about toxicity.

I haven’t solved the entire puzzle yet, but I have way more information than I had 35 years ago. Comprehensive metabolic testing is available, although it’s expensive. I’m going to ask my naturopath about it on my next visit.

I’m not a doctor and I don’t give medical advice. Please don’t ask me. I present this for informational purposes only. If you have questions, ask your doctor.

Toward the Finish Line

I’m still in the midst of cleaning up and organizing my sewing area. I have a stack of quilts I’ve made that I want to keep, but finding a place to store them has been an issue. I got the brilliant idea to stack them, opened, on the spare bed, in the manner of a bed turning. Once the top quilt is on, the quilts underneath are (mostly) hidden. It works, and it keeps the quilts from getting damaged by fold lines.

Because I need to get backing fabric for the Correspondence quilt, I decided to figure out what other projects need backings. I might as well buy everything at once. That English paper piecing hexie wallhanging needs one. I also unearthed a jelly roll quilt with a chunk of yardage intended for borders, so I went ahead and put the borders on it yesterday:

I think this is a fabric line from Laundry Basket Quilts. I remember buying the jelly roll to take with me to Alaska a couple of years ago. When I visit DD#1, I usually take a project to work on while I am there. I left a Janome Hello Kitty sewing machine at her house on my first visit.

I’ll see what backings I can find at the quilt store today. I also need to get lining fabric for the blue quilted Hobby Lobby fabric. I love that fabric and want to get it made into a jacket, but I am beginning to wish I hadn’t bought it. For some reason, I didn’t notice that the reverse side of the fabric is a scrim-type batting, so the jacket will need to be lined no matter which pattern I use. Or—I’ve been kicking this around as an idea—I could cut lining pieces to match each pattern piece, then baste the lining fabric to the fashion fabric and treat them as a single piece. If I did that, I’d probably want to bind the inside seams, even if I finish the edges on the serger.

It will be a minor miracle if I ever get this Hobby Lobby fabric made into a jacket.

Class handouts are almost complete. One class still needs a handout, and for that one, I need to knit some samples so I can take photos.

I’m teaching a beginning sewing class (pillowcases) for the homestead foundation this weekend. That’s always a lot of fun. We’re supposed to get more snow, too, followed by another deep freeze. It’s February in Montana.

Snow and Scraps

I think the National Weather Service has revised its guidelines for issuing warnings, but I am not sure those changes were for the better. We’ve lived here for almost 32 years. It seems to me that we only used to get winter storm warnings when something serious was going to happen. Now we get winter storm warnings for typical, average snowfall events. That’s like warning people that it’s going to be hot in July. 😑

I worked on class handouts yesterday morning. The first one I tackled was for a four-hour class on sweater drafting. I opened up my class template file and began writing down everything I could think of that I want to cover. That class is scheduled for the first day of Sew Expo, from 8 am to noon. I’ll have to be careful not to come in like a shining supernova and overwhelm people who haven’t finished drinking their coffee.

After lunch, I cut scraps. I keep my 5" scrap squares in a clear tote, and when it gets full, I take it to church and give it to my friend, Pat. She sews the squares into comforter tops that get tied and finished to donate to Mennonite Central Committee. It’s a very efficient system. She gave me the empty tote on Sunday and said she could use more scraps. I’ve been going through my bins and pulling out smaller remnants and cutting them into 5" squares. I have all this fabric and it’s not doing anyone any good sitting in bins.

That dark blue print, interestingly, is some old Joann Fabrics yardage. (It must have come in a shipment from my mother.) The fabric says “Richloom” on the selvedge, which is not something Joanns has carried for a long time. The quality is also nicer than what is being sold currently.

My Accuquilt Studio cutter can cut eighty 5" squares in one pass, so it didn’t take long to amass a pile of squares:

I also cut a bunch of tumbler units.

I have a bin of tumblers, too, and I’ve been using the brown ones as leaders and enders as I sew the Tim Holtz quilt top together. Some people begin sewing on a piece of scrap fabric, then follow it with the quilt block or unit without cutting the thread. It’s a way to save thread. If you make your leader (and ender) out of another quilt unit instead of a piece of scrap fabric, it’s possible to sew units for a second quilt simultaneously. When I can’t chain piece, for whatever reason, I try to use leaders and enders, and now I’ve got a nice stack of rows sewn together for a brown tumbler quilt.

The Tim Holtz Correspondence top is finished.

I need to get a backing for it. Our quilt store carries Tim Holtz yardage and I know they have something that will coordinate with this line.

More class handout work and some sewing is on the schedule for today. I’m in no hurry for spring to get here.

Two More Months of Winter (At Least)

Last week was insanely busy, with lots of meetings. I have to chair a fundraising committee tonight, but other than that, this week’s schedule is clear. (I’m whispering again so the universe doesn’t hear me.) This week will be devoted to class prep for Sew Expo. I’m teaching seven classes. A few of the classes are new and need handouts. The rest are classes I taught last year, but I need to pare down the handouts a bit to reflect the shortened class time. Classes are 2-1/2 hours, which is so awkward. I wish the organizers would make them three-hour classes.

Don’t laugh, but I think I’ve found the jacket pattern I want to use for the blue quilted Hobby Lobby fabric:

I will never have to buy another jacket pattern ever again—I now own them all. 🤪 I like the pink zipper version on the left. I will make it with the lower welt pockets but I’ll leave off the upper patch pockets. I’ll probably lengthen it a bit, too, but I’ll determine that when I make a muslin of the pattern. Alissah, the designer, has a YouTube video on constructing the jacket. That will come in handy when I do the welt pockets, because—of course—I couldn’t visualize how to put them together from reading the instructions.

I am sure we’ll all be happy when I stop dithering and finally make a quilted jacket with that Hobby Lobby fabric.

One of my followers suggested the Megan Nielsen Hovea Jacket pattern—that one is full of value for the money because it has five different variations. Maybe for a future jacket.

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The husband asked me yesterday if I’ve ordered seeds yet. I haven’t, but I need to get on that soon. When we first moved here, I was very optimistic and thought that spring began in March. 🤣🤣🤣 It took a couple of years, but I finally had that beaten out of me. Even with a greenhouse, I don’t usually start seeds until the middle of March at the earliest, and only for some crops. Beans and squash don’t take long to germinate, so they get started later in the spring.

I’ll make a list, though, and get the order in this week. I’m growing for us and for the plant sale, so it’s usually a substantial list.

The lettuce is coming along nicely:

My container of Texas Tomato Food was out in the greenhouse, so I stopped by on the way home from town one day and retrieved it. I use the TTF to feed the lettuce. It will grow without it, but the TTF provides some extra nutrients.

We were under a winter storm watch until Wednesday morning, but that’s been changed to a winter weather advisory. Cold air is coming down from the Arctic and moisture is coming up from the south, but it looks like those two things will collide over Missoula. We’ll get the cold air but likely not much snow.

Hello, February

I finished making the blocks for the Tim Holtz Correspondence quilt:

It looks very denim-y to me. This isn’t my favorite Tim Holtz line but I like how this quilt turned out and I am happy to have used up some stash. Now I just have to sew the blocks together. The pattern called for 32 blocks and a border; I had enough fabric to make 45 blocks (5 rows by 9 columns) and I am going to leave off the border. This is a generously-sized lap quilt.

I’m sure I’ll use that Fat Eights Flapjacks pattern again. It was easy to piece.

We’ll see if this has scratched my quilting itch for a while. I am ready to work on some clothing projects again. I did all that work last fall to get a pants sloper that fits me and I really need to put it to use.

The husband and I were eating dinner last night when I heard the UPS truck pull in. We have a great UPS guy—he’s here so often that I make him a batch of chocolate chip cookies every so often as a thank you. He brought a package addressed to me, which was odd because I hadn’t ordered anything recently. Inside was a very special gift!

My friends Robert and Deana came to visit in September. At the time, Deana was shopping for an embroidery machine. She makes and sells items at local craft fairs. I put her in touch with one of the ladies from our Thursday sewing group who does a lot of embroidery. Later in the fall, she bought a new machine and has been embroidering up a storm. She made me this custom-embroidered hoodie and all the letters are made up of sewing motifs! She said she used her brightest thread colors because she knows I don’t like muddy earth tones, LOL.

I will get a lot of use out of this. Thank you, Deana! 😘

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We have a gathering here this morning for our semi-annual church conference meeting. I’ve hosted this gathering every year for the past several years. A group of us used to attend the meeting in person, but traveling to Portland was always dicey in February. During the pandemic, the conference organizers moved the meeting to Zoom and have continued that tradition. I’m a bit bummed not to have a reason to go to Portland in February, but a Zoom meeting is better than nothing. This year, the focus of the meeting is on the 500th anniversary of Anabaptism.

I hook the computer up to the television so everyone can see the meeting and it works nicely. We’ll have soup for lunch and lots of other treats to snack on.

Good Stuff But Not Much Sewing

The grant meeting I went to Tuesday morning was very interesting. The Whitefish Community Foundation exists to give money to local Flathead Valley nonprofit organizations. Our local volunteer fire department’s support organization participates in the Great Fish Challenge every summer, which is a five-week event during which each group has to raise at least $25,000. Those funds are then matched in part by the Community Foundation. Our homestead foundation is not big enough to participate in the Great Fish Challenge, but they have some smaller grant programs for which we qualify.

Being a small community organization is both a blessing and a curse. We have a lot of community support, but we don’t have the infrastructure that larger organizations do. Many of the organizations attending the meeting on Tuesday have paid staff. The Whitefish Community Foundation wants all of their participating nonprofits to use QuickBooks, which our organization does not—yet, but we’ll be moving to that shortly. I’ve been on several nonprofit boards and they tend to be filled with people who want to do good work in their communities but who don’t always have a solid understanding of basic business principles. When I joined the board of the homestead foundation and built the new website, I included features that allow for passive income streams. We have business sponsors, we can take payment for memberships and events online, and I am in the process of setting up a merchandise store where we can sell things like T-shirts, aprons, and tote bags with our logo and other artwork on them.

After the grant meeting, I went to one of the assisted living facilities in town. Several members of our congregation live there and they invited us to a hymn sing at 11 am. We ended up with a group of 12 people from our church. Half of us stayed for lunch. The food in their dining room is very good and we all had a lovely visit.

[I am not kidding about the Mennonite singing thing. All you have to do is mention singing and a bunch of Mennonites will show up.]

Ruler class yesterday was a lot of fun. It is so gratifying to witness those “A-ha!” moments in a class when students understand a concept or master a skill. I also had a good chat with the store owner’s daughter, who runs their website and social media. She has some intriguing ideas about the podcast and ways we might work together.

As predicted, the only sewing that is happening this week has been on the Tim Holtz Correspondence quilt.

I finished sewing thirty-two of these units together. They need to have another rectangle sewn to the ends and then I can assemble the top. This has gone together quickly.

This is What I Do All Day

Let’s revisit that question of what I do all day, because this week is a good example of everything I do rolled into one.

My number one priority is the Schuster-Szabo empire. I run the business end of the construction company. We have 4-5 employees, depending on the time of year. I do all the paperwork and bookkeeping—basically, anything that doesn’t involve the actual pouring of concrete. The husband often says that if it weren’t for me, he’d be part of the underground economy. He has no interest in any of that stuff. And I am OCD about tracking every last penny. I reconcile the bank statement every month and our accountant has everything he needs to prepare our tax returns by the end of January. Have I mentioned how much I hate QuickBooks?

I am on the board of the Mountain Brook Homestead Foundation. That is our local community organization. The Foundation owns the property on which stands the original 1927 schoolhouse as well as our community center where the sewing group meets on Thursdays.

I built and manage the Foundation website, produce the quarterly newsletter, and I am the chairman of the Fundraising Committee which meets once a month. I am also the chairman of the annual plant sale. Last year, the Fundraising Committee set a goal of raising $25,000. We beat that by over a thousand dollars. That sounds like a lot of money, but half of that is earmarked just for keeping the lights on and the doors open. Our insurance premiums alone are $6000 a year. This morning, I’m going to a presentation by the Whitefish Community Foundation to see about possible grant opportunities for our organization because we would like to renovate and improve the 1927 schoolhouse building.

I produce a weekly podcast. (Yes, I am going back to a weekly schedule.) That isn’t generating much income at the moment, but I enjoy it and will keep doing it. I have met a lot of very fascinating people.

I teach sewing (and knitting). I have a class on ruler quilting scheduled for tomorrow afternoon at the quilt store south of town. I’ll be teaching at Sew Expo in Puyallup, WA, at the end of February. I enjoy teaching and probably would travel more except that I promised the husband that I would confine my roaming around to the Pacific Northwest. Traveling does take a lot of time and it’s very disruptive.

I am the pianist at the Mennonite Church. Every Sunday. As part of that position, I’m on the worship planning team. I am also currently the chairman of the pastor search team. Our previous pastor retired in the fall of 2022 and we are searching for another pastor. There are five very devoted people on the committee with me. I enjoy working with them, although that position comes with a lot of expectations and pressure.

The daily chicken chores are partly my responsibility and I do 90% of the work in the garden. The husband helps with the heavy lifting, but starting and growing all of our crops—as well as half the plants for the Homestead Foundation plant sale in May—falls under my purview. All of the food canning and preservation is my responsibility.

In short, I am not sitting around doing nothing. I know that people look at me and think, “Well, she doesn’t have a real job so she must have all the time in the world.” Ha. (The husband reminds me frequently that I do have a real job as the CFO of the construction company.) Most of the time, I enjoy the way my schedule is set up. It’s only when people assume that I am their paid staff and treat me as such that I get annoyed.

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Recording today’s podcast interview was a lot of fun. I got an e-mail from a woman in the Netherlands a few weeks ago. She asked if I would be interested in visiting with her about how she created her own custom dress form. She had a local company do a 3D scan of her body, then sent the files to another company to have them make a foam copy of her body. She set up a website to help other sewists do the same thing for themselves. I finished that interview thinking what a shame is is that we’re on opposite side of the planet, because she would make a great sewing buddy. And I am kicking around the idea of making myself a custom dress form.