Caught at Last

My beginning serger class at the quilt store north of town on Tuesday went very well. It went so well that at the end of the class, the store owner came back to the classroom, pulled up the schedule on the computer, and said, “What else do you want to teach? Let’s get it on the calendar.” I’ll be doing the baby beanies and blankets class next month, and we scheduled a home dec serger class —placemats, napkins, pillows, etc.—for the end of September. One of the students is also interested in fitting classes.

Teaching the classes isn’t difficult, but coming up with the class outline, handouts, and class/display samples takes some time. I can’t just pull class ideas out of my head and schedule them. I’ve got to be prepared to teach the techniques. The stores also want the display samples to be made from fabric they carry, which is understandable, but all of that takes time to develop.

[The student who wants the fitting classes came with an old Riccar serger circa 1980s (?) or so. It was threaded and she said she had used it, although she acknowledged that it had been a while. She did not have a manual. I always suggest that students learn to thread their machines rather than just tying on new threads, because sooner or later, the thread is going to break and they will have to learn to thread it anyway. Better to learn with some guidance than at midnight when trying to finish a project. I looked up the manual on my phone. The illustrations would have been awful even in an original copy of the manual, but they were pretty much useless on the phone. We were persistent, however, and managed to get it working. It helped that its design was very similar to my Juki. I did suggest, though, that if she plans to do any significant amount of serging, she should consider a newer machine. I am all for vintage, as you know, but those old sergers are tricky and temperamental.]

I was looking forward to my T-shirt class yesterday, but I ended up canceling it. Except for feeling punky for a day or two after I got back from Spokane in January, I have pretty much managed to miss all the bugs going around for over two years. (Yes, I got a flu shot last fall.) I haven’t been sick—cold or flu sick—since the fall of 2019, but I woke up yesterday morning with something. No one wants to take a class from a teacher who is coughing and sneezing, so I canceled it.

I don’t feel awful; the husband asked me if I had spent the day on the couch, which is where I was when he got home last night. I said that no, I’d actually had a fairly productive day, but I took frequent breaks and drank lots of hot tea. I got the Sunbonnet Sue top all put together. I love the way it looks. I had to order a bit more fabric for the borders and that should be here next week.

I also made a stack of chicks:

These just need to be stuffed and sewn closed. I’ll probably do that today as I think it’s going to be another day of taking it easy. I might also play around with some new serger techniques.