Revisiting the Toaster Sweater

I did not make pants yesterday, but I might today. We’ll see. Yesterday, I made a Toaster Sweater from that lavender stretch fleece I got at Joanns.

Pros: The top is luxe and warm and very comfortable.

Cons: Stretch fleece is a pain to work with. I didn’t quite get some of the settings correct on the serger. Also, I haven’t made this pattern for over a year and forgot that I intended to lengthen it a couple of inches. This top is fine and will go into the rotation, but I immediately retraced and lengthened the sweater for the next iteration.

You will notice that the cuffs look darker. I was very careful, throughout the process, to make sure the nap was running in the same direction on all the pieces. I thought I double-checked the cuffs before I attached them but apparently not. I will not take them off and reattach them because this fleece disintegrates if you try to remove a seam. I did it wrong on both cuffs so we will just refer to that mistake as a design element.

I have some hot pink stretch fleece (Hobby Lobby) but after working with the purple fabric, I am not in a hurry to cut into the hot pink. I’d also like to frankenpattern the Toaster Sweater with the Nancy Raglan. I like the turtleneck style of the Toaster but would like a tunic style top like the Nancy, which has a cowl neck.

While I was working on the Toaster Sweater, I listened to the replay of the livestream that accompanied the release of Johanna Lundstrom and Malena Hjerpe’s new book Fit For Knits. I am even more excited to get my copy. I am familiar with Johanna’s work but she published her previous books solo. She collaborated on this book with Malena Hjerpe, who is a patternmaker and has worked for companies like H&M. Malena had some excellent tips for working with knits—all included in the book—and I expect to learn a lot. She talked a bit about cutting knit patterns and noted that often, knit fabrics will look like they are off grain. The practice of measuring from the selvage to determine if a woven fabric is on the straight grain doesn’t necessarily work for knits. Hmmmm.

I’m also trying to wrap my head around the top-down, center-out pants fitting method. I have the kit from J Stern Designs and have watched her videos and a few others, but I haven’t yet come across that one piece of information that will enable me to synthesize it all in my head. Jumping in and actually doing it may be the only way that will happen.

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Not much is happening in the neighborhood right now. Our neighbor, Ali, has a friend named Sarah who buzzes in and out of here periodically. Sarah is now our friend. The husband helped her replace the pump in the gas tank on her vehicle, and in return, she offered to stain the greenhouse for us. She’s been working on that for the past couple of days. That was a job that needed to get done and it was lovely of her to offer.

We lost a couple of trees in the pig pasture, which was weird because we haven’t really had any big windstorms. The husband cut those up and fixed the fence, because, of course, the tree couldn’t fall in the middle of the pasture where it wouldn’t damage anything.

And I am packing up and getting ready to head out of here. When people find out that I usually leave the husband alone over Thanksgiving, they react with horror and dismay. Trust me, he doesn’t want to go anywhere. He once had a stretch of 10 years where he never left the state of Montana. His idea of the perfect vacation is being alone in his shop. (He will miss having his morning cup of coffee delivered to him in bed—and before people get their knickers twisted about domestic servitude, I will note that he gets the coffeemaker ready before he comes to bed and sets the timer so that I have hot coffee waiting for me when I come downstairs in the morning.) Why would I want to make him miserable by demanding that he go somewhere with me? After 36 years together, each of us knows what makes the other one tick. We laugh about the fact that he bought me a vacuum cleaner for my birthday one year—because I asked for one. I have no use for jewelry.

So I will be a migratory bird for a few days and he will spend time being productive here. It’s a win-win all around.

Contemplating Crotch Curves

I am a blind squirrel with this fitting thing. Occasionally I stumble across an acorn or two.

I have had reasonably good luck with both the Style Arc Linda pants—once I lengthened the rise—and the yoga pants from New Look 6689, which fit nicely right out of the package. I decided to lay them out on top of each other to see if and how they differed.

This is the New Look back pattern piece on top of the Linda back pattern piece.

You can see that the crotch point of the Linda pants extends much further than the crotch point of the New Look pants.

Conversely, look at the New Look front pattern piece on top of the Linda front pattern piece:

The crotch point of the New Look pants extends further than the crotch point of the Linda pants. (It really does, even though it may not look like it in the photo.)

The crotch curve measurements are the same. The only difference is in where the inseam sits at the crotch. After seeing the difference in the pattern pieces, I had a hunch that the inseam of the Linda pants would sit further forward than the inseam of the New Look pants, so I tried on each pair.

I was correct. The inseam of the Linda pants sits about half an inch forward of the inseam on the New Look pants.

Does this matter? I think it does. For one thing, I find the New Look pants to be a bit more comfortable. Comfort aside, though, having the inseam so far forward on those Linda pants is causing some pulling, with the resultant wrinkles at the backs of my legs. The wrinkles are minor—so minor that the pants would be fine even without me messing with the pattern any further—but because I suspect the location of the inseam is causing them, I decided to explore a bit further. One of the reviewers on the sewingpatternreview.com website said she had to move the inseam back because she has a flat butt (as do I) and felt that was a helpful alteration.

Jennifer Stern has a video on her YouTube channel on how to adjust the inseam if it is too far forward. She has two methods: one adjusts the top of the inseam, at the crotch, and the other adjusts the inseam all the way down the leg (or down to the knee, if you prefer). Deciding which method to use depends somewhat on how the inseam hangs on your body.

I have several tasks on my sewing to-do list today, the first of which is to put on the Linda pants and determine if I just need to move the top of the inseam or if I need to move the entire inseam. Then I need to decide if I should make another pair.

Part of me says I should refrain from any further iterations of either of these patterns—or of a frankenpattern combining the two—until I have my private sewing class next week. The focus of that class is going to be on making myself a pants sloper. I think that once I have the sloper, it is going to answer a lot of questions for me, much as the bodice sloper did for the questions I had about making tops.

This poor teacher has no idea that I am coming into this class with a list of questions five miles long, and class is only for two hours.

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I stopped in at our Joann Fabrics yesterday. It almost looks like a different store. The apparel racks have been stocked and all of the bolts are neatly organized. I did get some luxurious stretch fleece in a lovely deep lavender color (all the other colors were muddy earth tones 🤮) and I think that might end up being a Toaster Sweater.

I can’t help but think this is a stay of execution until after the holidays. I’ll see what other Joann stores are like on my travels.

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I am not going to try to get podcasts recorded and posted while I am traveling. I don’t have a laptop, although I’m kicking around the idea of getting one. My iPad is 6 or 7 years old (at least) and I might need to replace it, too, because it randomly locks me out, requiring me to shut it down and restart it.

I Love My Seam Ripper

I set a record Saturday for the number of times I sewed something together the wrong way. I was making a knot top, the pattern for which was deconstructed from one of my favorite Liz Claiborne tops. Because it was deconstructed from a RTW top—and because I had this mistaken belief that I would remember how it went together—there were no instructions accompanying the pattern pieces. I have made myself a top from this pattern once, but that was right after I deconstructed the original.

The front pattern piece looks like this:

It is cut twice—mirror images—then seamed together before sewing it to the back bodice. I knew that Step 1 was to finish that top curved edge on the serger, but after that, I was mystified.

I sewed various edges together and tried to origami the top into shape. I took out each of those seams. I got very close at one point, only to realize that I couldn’t make a knot because the pieces needed to be seamed together to form some kind of circle and the tops of the pieces were finished but not connected. (Had I known what a circus this was going to be, I would have snapped photos simply for the entertainment value.) I examined the original top and the top I had made. I could see what what happening; I just couldn’t figure out how to get there.

I gave up and went to the baby shower, although part of my brain was busy processing in the background the entire time. By the time I came home, I was pretty sure I had figured out the order of operations so I tackled it again.

Success!

I wrote the numbered steps on the pattern piece for the next time I make this top. What needs to happen is to sew the two front bodice pieces together along that large concave edge (right side in photo). That forms a facing which gets folded down (RS together) and sewn along the bottom of the keyhole opening. The front and facing are turned to the outside. One side of the bodice gets flipped and threaded through the keyhole opening to form the twist. Then the center front seam is sewn, enclosing and anchoring the facing at the same time.

Being head blind is so frustrating.

But I’ll use this pattern again now that I’ve written down the instructions. Of all my knot tops, this style is my favorite.

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The sewing area needs a good cleaning and organizing. I’ve bought quite a few patterns recently and they are strewn hither and yon, waiting to be traced and tested. I’d like to get all of that under control before I start any quilting projects, although I did pull out the bin of previously-cut tumbler units. I am taking those with me to Seattle. I don’t want a project that requires a lot of trimming or squaring up of units.

After testing out the free version, I decided to open a paid Metricool account for managing all my social media accounts. I still have some work to do, but I like the ease of use thus far.

Corralling All the Ponies

I taught a class on Wednesday and worked two mornings at the Gift Festival and now I am thoroughly peopled out. I do have a baby shower to attend today, but I think it will be a low-key event. Next week is unscheduled except for sewing. I am going to do my best to keep it that way, and you can bet I am looking forward to a road trip and the opportunity to spend 10 hours enjoying the peace and quiet inside my own head.

I listened to Nicole Sauce’s livestream Wednesday evening. Her guest was Sue Zoldak, who has been on the podcast before and who is a wealth of great information. Sue owns three companies, one of which is an ad agency. The focus of the Wednesday episode was branding. I will admit to copying Nicole’s branding strategy. She is the “face” of three very different brands—Holler Roast Coffee, Self-Reliance Festival, and the Living Free in Tennessee podcast—and had to come up with some way to manage them coherently. Sue Zoldak suggested she put them all under the umbrella of NicoleSauce.com, a domain Nicole already owned. When I started the podcast, I chose to do something similar and brought everything under JanetSzabo.com.

That has worked nicely, but now I need to corral and organize the various social media platforms. I listened to a panel discussion from the fall workshop hosted by Jack Spirko (The Survival Podcast), and one of the questions that came up was on how to participate in and manage social media. A person could spend 12 hours a day doing nothing but engaging on social media. (That sounds like hell, honestly.) The advice from the panel was to focus on one or two platforms and automate as much of the rest of it as possible. I opened a Metricool account and am hoping that it will help me with that task.

Some days I feel like my life consists of scaling one learning curve after another.

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I ordered this book yesterday—it was released on Tuesday and I am very excited to look it over:

I have Johanna’s book on coverstitch techniques and it is worth its weight in gold. I expect this one to be a keeper, too. Her YouTube channel is an excellent resource.

I still have fabric that needs to be turned into clothing, but I would like to find some balance between clothing production and quilting because I enjoy both.

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Another of Sue Zoldak’s comments on the livestream that really resonated with me was that she also gets asked—constantly—how she manages to get everything done and to be so productive. Her answer was fabulous. She said that she demands distillation; people who would like some of her time have to have distilled their requests down to the essentials. She does not tolerate meetings consisting of endless discussions.

This is something that frustrates me to no end. I cannot stand meetings that are social events or meetings that detour down rabbit trails on unrelated topics. (Or podcasts ostensibly focused on sewing that veer off into discussions about cats or toddlers.) My time is valuable. The word NO worked well as the word of the year for 2023; now I need to find one for 2024.

Winter Evenings Are For Embroidery

I pulled out a few embroidery projects to work on in the evenings. I started the third (of nine) squash for the Squash Squad sampler. I’m in the midst of prepping the second of nine chickens in the Urban Chickens sampler, although it may end up being the first of nine chickens because I cannot locate the finished first chicken. The project I am having the most fun with, though, is this Robert Mahar anatomical embroidery sampler:

I bought this at Monster, a store in the Seattle neighborhood of Ballard. (Apologies for the lousy photo, but it’s 4:13 am in my office.) These aren’t intended—at least from the photos and instructions—to be heavily embroidered, but rather embellished here and there. I’ve done two blackberries and the blue veins so far. I’ll do the red blood vessels, the other berries, and some of the leaves and see what I think. I am enjoying this one so much that I may order the other four in the series.

No cutesie embroidery for me! According to the description on the website: The beautifully macabre imagery is sourced from 19th Century French anatomical teaching charts and botanical illustrations.

Monster has had Robert Mahar as an instructor in the past, and I think it would be fun to take a class with him.

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My classes in Missoula and Spokane next week have been canceled, which is something of a relief. The store in Missoula wants another serger mastery class, but only one person signed up for the T-shirt class so we scrubbed it. That one may be better scheduled in the spring. The students from my August class in Spokane want to take the pants class, but the store owner has some upheaval happening in her personal life, and after visiting with her on the phone last night, we decided to postpone that one.

Building up demand for classes is a process. It takes time to figure out what classes students want and also what times are good for scheduling. Some students can only take classes on weekends or evenings. Some prefer daytime. I’m not local to the stores, so that adds another layer of complexity.

In any case, this gives me another week at home before my travels for Thanksgiving. I’ve got plenty to keep me busy.

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I popped into our Joann Fabrics yesterday. They are closed on Sundays now, and when I walked back to the racks where the apparel fabrics are kept, I thought it was all over because the racks were mostly empty. In other areas of the store, however, I saw several rolling carts stacked with bolts of new, unwrapped fabric, including new apparel fabrics. Perhaps they are getting ready for Black Friday.

I worked yesterday morning at our church’s international fair trade festival. Attendance was good, as it usually is on the first day of the sale. We did some radio advertising for the first time this year and I think that helped. I’m going back to work another shift this morning.

Suck It Up, Buttercup RSS

Tiny Screwdrivers for Sewists

I keep forgetting to share this set of Wiha micro screwdrivers. It came in the most recent Tool Crate—the husband’s quarterly tool subscription—and he said I could have it.

I am forever in need of tiny screwdrivers for my sewing machines, sergers, and coverstitch machines. Each brand requires a different kind, so this will be very helpful.

I taught a Decorative Coverstitch class yesterday. I was happy with the way it went, all things considered. Coverstitching is more complicated, in some ways, than serging. I tried to structure the class to minimize thread and needle changes, but students got a lot of practice unthreading and rethreading their machines and moving the needles. (Coverstitch machines have three needle positions with four combinations.) Add in the fact that I had three different machine models in class and I was on my toes the entire time. We got through all the material, however.

I’ve had ongoing issues with students not coming prepared to class. Two showed up yesterday not ever having looked at the supply list. One of the students who had come prepared pointed out that the supply lists were on the website with the class listing. I appreciated her jumping in. Sometimes, when another student does the calling out, it makes more of an impression than when the teacher does it. Yes, students can buy supplies at the store, but that takes time from class and sometimes the store is out of needed items.

It’s a process.

I wore my Burda 6329 pleat-neck top with the black waffle knit Harper Cardigan. One of my students came to class in her Harper Cardigan; she’s wearing it every time I see her because she says it’s her favorite cardigan ever. I will just say that it is wonderful to put on clothing in the morning that fits so well that I don’t have to think about it for the rest of the day.

I sent off an e-mail to the class coordinator at that store about 2024 classes. We need to start getting dates on the calendar. I don’t think I am going to schedule anything at the other store here in town—those classes never fill.

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The husband ordered a new work truck back in March. This is to replace his 2008 work truck and it is the same model as the one he got after the accident that totaled his 2014 work truck. We ordered it through the same dealer in Tacoma. At the end of June, I got an e-mail letting us know that the truck had been built (in Mexico) and was ready for delivery to Tacoma.

And there it sat. The truck has not moved for five months. This has caused frustration on all sides. The fleet manager must have lit a fire under someone because we got an e-mail from him yesterday. The truck has an estimated arrival date in Tacoma of early December. Once it gets there, it has to have the tool racks and tool boxes installed, but we are hoping that we will be able to drive over and pick it up before the end of the year.

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I was surprised to see an e-mail from Bloglovin’ in my inbox this week, so I popped over and logged into my account to see what was going on. I used to use Bloglovin’ to manage all my blog reading, but Bloglovin’ crashed and burned over a year ago. I moved to Feedly. Eh. Feedly is okay, but I really missed the Bloglovin’ format. I am happy to say that Bloglovin’ appears to have risen from the dead. I look forward to lots of blog reading.

Suck It Up, Buttercup RSS

All the Hot Pink

I may only get one or two days of sewing per week—although I am trying to change that—but I am making the most of them. Yesterday, I put together another Laundry Day Tee, the black waffle knit Harper Cardigan, and a pair of StyleArc Linda Pants in the purple bengaline. I also hemmed a Burda 6329 made from some double-brushed poly I pulled from the stash.

The Laundry Day Tee:

This is already a favorite and I haven’t even worn it yet. The fabric is that nice beefy rayon spandex from the Walmart remnant rack. I am teaching a decorative coverstitch class today and I’ll probably wear this top.

Or maybe I’ll wear this one—another Burda 6329:

Decisions, decisions.

The purple bengaline pants fit very well. I can still see a few very minor wrinkles on the back, but I am not sure how to adjust for those and truly, close enough is as good as it gets. I don’t want to become one of those sewists who obsesses over every single wrinkle. I will take the pattern and these pants to my private sewing class in two weeks and get input from the instructor. Otherwise, they fit and feel and look good. The one change I might make on the next pair is to try power mesh instead of elastic in the waistband. I’ve seen some examples where the power mesh and waistband were cut together and treated as one piece.

I am rather proud of those pants and the fact that I was able to identify the issue—a rise that was too short—and figure out how to adjust it properly for my body. I have miles to go yet, but what I learned with those pants will be helpful in future classes. The only issue is that I have nothing to wear with them. Purple is not a color I gravitate to.

[It occurred to me that the reason I love high-waisted pants is because my body is so long from waist to crotch long that high-waisted pants fit me like mid-rise pants fit normal people.]

I still have the top-down, center-out pants fitting kit from J Stern Designs and may tackle that in December.

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Oh look, a squirrel—Itch to Stitch just released the Andes Jacket Pattern:

I need a thousand more hours in my week. This is on the to-do pile, as well. I still have to order Cordura for generator covers from Seattle Fabric so I might as well order some softshell for an Andes Jacket while I’m at it. They have it in hot pink. 😉

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Having done my first successful Zoom interview for the podcast, I e-mailed half a dozen other people I’d like to interview and the responses have been overwhelmingly positive. Most of the interviews won’t happen until after the holidays, but they are on the schedule.

I’ve started working on a few new embroidery projects in the evening, too. I’ll post pics of those later this week.

Bunnies Need Snow

The piano tuner is coming here this morning. He tuned the baby grand at the church on Friday and today is my piano’s turn. I try to get both tuned in the fall. Mine gets very screechy at this time of year. It has a bright sound to begin with—that’s part of the reason I bought that particular model—but the line between “bright” and “screechy” is rather thin. (I am probably the only one who notices, though.) Both pianos have humidifiers on them because our relative humidity averages around 25%.

This guy does a good job, but he’s not Frank. Frank tuned both pianos for years. When he came to my house, he would bring recordings of low brass ensembles with him. Frank played euphonium and he knew I played the trombone. After he tuned the piano, I would make a pot of tea and we would sit and listen to music and visit.

Piano tuning is an art, not a science. I can’t explain it well, but it’s more than a matter of tuning each note to a specific frequency. (Read the book Temperament: How Music Became a Battleground for the Great Minds of Western Civilization if you want to know more, then read the book Grand Obsession.) My high school friend Robert, who lives in Tennessee now, is the most musically-knowledgeable person I know. He is a retired low brass instructor for the Akron Bluecoats drum corps. He did a podcast episode with them last year on intonation. After listening to Robert talk about low brass intonation, I understood why Frank did such a great job when he tuned my piano. Frank was able to tweak the tuning to produce a much richer, fuller sound, and part of that had to due with the fact that he was a low brass instrumentalist. My current piano tuner isn’t a musician.

Frank died of leukemia several years ago. I miss him and I miss how my piano used to sound after he tuned it.

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I stayed after church yesterday to help set up for our gift festival later this week, then came home and canned 19 pints of white beans. Beans aren’t a labor-intensive canning project. They soak overnight and then I put them into jars, load the canner, and run it for 90 minutes. A five-pound bag of beans makes 19 pints and my canner holds 19 pints, so it works out nicely.

I know, Sunday is supposed to be a day of rest, but there is no such thing for church pianists. I had already spent half my day working. And I was trying to keep myself awake. I hate changing the clocks. It’s a stupid practice and I wish we could eliminate it.

The bunny is now completely white:

The bunny should hope it snows (again) soon so it has some camouflage.

I am supposed to have a class at the store in town on Wednesday but I need to find out if anyone has signed up. I also have to check with the store in Missoula to see if I have students for next week’s class. I am supposed to teach a class in Spokane at the end of next week, but that class never made it to the store website. I need to contact the owner. It is possible that the class filled up without any advertising because the store is so small that there is only room for a few students. It is also possible that it slipped through the cracks.

This is a busy week. I’ll be working at the gift festival for a few hours each day. If I have classes, next week will also be a busy week, but the week after that is Thanksgiving and my birthday and I have some fun activities planned.

The Clowns are Here

We have been entertained by the antics of the Stellar jays this weekend. I put some scratch grains out on the platform bird feeder by the chicken coop. Three of them were arguing over who owned that territory:

I saw a fourth one in the trees, but I think it was too intimidated to come down and eat. The jays are only here for a couple of weeks, although the husband opined that these three might get too fat to fly anywhere.

We butchered chickens yesterday morning. Butchering is never fun, but it has to be done, so we do it as efficiently as possible. The husband and I were up early getting everything in place. Our former pastor, Jeryl, came to help, as he always does. Tera’s husband brought five of their chickens. Elysian came over with eight of her birds. We did 14 of our own. It took us two hours to process all 27. We worked in a light drizzle, which was less than ideal, but better than working on a hot day.

Our chickens are resting in the fridge in the old garage. I follow Nicole Sauce’s advice to allow them to sit for a day or two before sealing them in freezer bags. That way, they go through rigor mortis and are much more tender when cooked.

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In this week’s episode of “Can You Fix This?” I had to repair a pocket on one of the husband’s hoodies:

I cut off what was left of this pocket and sewed on a replacement. The fix is not pretty, but it’s functional.

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People constantly ask me how I get so much done. The topic of productivity also came up in the homesteading chat group this week, so I’ve been pondering some thoughts while I work.

I have been allotted the same number of hours, minutes, and seconds in the day as everyone else. Believe me, I wish I had more—I could get more done. But here are my cheat codes. These work for me. Your mileage may vary.

• I am married to someone who likes to work. People ask me if he ever relaxes and I joke that he relaxes by watching other people work. I am also a bit competitive. He will tell you that it’s not a competition to see who gets more done, although I suspect that if I were married to someone slightly less ambitious, I might ratchet my production back a bit. I do not see this competition as a bad thing. I appreciate the motivation that comes with being married to someone who works hard.

• I live by the monthly color-coded calendar that sits on my desk right in front of my computer. I am always looking ahead—by a day, a week, a month—to see what is coming down the pike. I don’t want to be surprised when I suddenly remember, with two hours to go, that I offered to make soup for our dinner meeting at church. I took the sausage for the soup out of the freezer on Friday afternoon so it could thaw overnight in the fridge. I browned it yesterday morning while I was cooking breakfast, then put the soup together to simmer all afternoon once we were done with chickens. (It was very good soup, by the way.) I put beans to soak yesterday so they would be ready for canning this afternoon. I try to be as proactive with my schedule as I can.

• I multitask. I know there are “experts” out there who will tell you that multitasking is impossible, or that it consists of doing many things badly at the same time. I think all of those experts are men. I think women, by their natures, are constantly multitasking. The husband asked me yesterday morning how women can get together in a group and sew, like at a retreat. He wondered how anything gets done. I told him he doesn’t understand because he’s not a woman.

• Organize, organize, organize. Systems, systems, systems. I use my canning supplies all year, so they are kept in an easily-accessible location in the basement. If I’m avoiding a task because it takes too long to locate all the needed supplies or because of some other bottleneck, that’s a sure sign I need a better system. And I make lists. Lots of lists.

• This one is a not a cheat code I’d recommend, but almost dying (twice) does tend to put time into perspective. I am grateful for the time I have and I don’t want to waste it.

My work habits have been honed over a lifetime, so I don’t even think about them much anymore. Maybe it’s discipline. Maybe it’s enjoyment and satisfaction from seeing a job through to completion. Maybe it’s excess energy. Whatever it is, this is how I am and I don’t intend to change.

Atelier Janet

I started out Thursday morning like a house on fire. I cut out a Laundry Day Tee from another chunk of rayon spandex (Walmart), a Harper Cardigan from some black waffle knit (Walmart), a Burda 6315 from some French terry (Joann Fabrics), and another Burda 6329 from a double-brushed poly (Joann Fabrics).

The French terry from Joanns has languished in my stash for far too long. Every time I took it out to make something with it, I would get frustrated by how badly it was off grain and I would put it back. The other day, I took it out, stretched the living daylights out of it, got the grainline mostly straight, then let it relax for a couple of hours before I cut a Burda 6315 from it.

My stripe matching is on point 🔥

I suspect this one will get a lot of wear.

Somewhere along the line, I lost the black cardigan I bought at Target last year, so I’ve been wearing an older black cardigan that is past its pull date and needs to be retired. I decided that a Harper Cardigan from the black waffle knit would be a good replacement. The black waffle knit is identical to a dark green waffle knit that I also got at Walmart. This stuff is so cozy. I made a Patterns for Pirates Cocoon Cardigan from the green waffle knit. Although I like that pattern and the cocoon cardigan turned out well, I think it looks funny on me because it needs to be about 3” longer. I spotted some of the black waffle knit on the remnant rack at our Walmart about a month ago but didn’t buy it. (I am trying to show some restraint.) When I went back to get it, it was gone. However, on my trip through Spokane a few weeks ago, I found another chunk of it on a remnant rack there and bought it.

I am not an impulse buyer, even of fabric. There has been a three-yard chunk of navy blue and white striped ponte on the remnant rack at our Walmart for several weeks now. (It’s very similar to the French terry, above.) Every time I saw it, I thought what a nice cardigan or jacket it would make. I was in Walmart yesterday and it was still on the remnant rack, so I gave in and bought it. I am thinking of using it for an Alina Design Company Fulton Sweater Blazer.

I am getting closer to my goal of having a curated closet of clothing that fits me well, coordinates nicely, and features colors I like. In the process, I am teaching myself fitting and pattern alteration. I know it seems like I am making more clothing than one person needs, but I don’t know how else to learn these principles except by doing. Eventually, I’ll cull the collection to the pieces I truly love and reach for over and over.

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Our Joann Fabrics now has a sign on the door now stating that they will be closed on Sundays beginning this month. Our store, at least—if not the entire corporation—is circling the drain. I did get the end of a bolt of a dark purple bengaline for making a full pair of Linda pants with my altered pattern. I got a smidge less than two yards for $4.

The body shop called yesterday afternoon and said the BMW was ready to go. The husband was home early, so he ran me in. Not only did the body shop fix the car, they detailed the inside of it, too. I feel like I am driving a brand-new vehicle. I do love that car. It’s been fun driving the Acura because it’s a stick shift, but I am glad to be back in the Diva. I noticed, when I got it home, that one of the wheels was missing its BMW badge. The husband said it was like that when I came back from Seattle. That seems to happen every time I go to the big city, so the husband keeps a box of replacement badges—available in bulk on Amazon—on hand.

The washing machine is fixed. I can do laundry again. I made the husband a couple of pumpkin pies from the pumpkin I canned on Tuesday. My goodness, those Galeux d’Elysine pumpkins are sweet! The next time I make a pie, I’ll cut down the amount of sugar. Pie from home-grown pumpkins is nothing like the pie made from canned Libby’s pumpkin. (That is not really pumpkin anyway, but a different squash variety.) It’s like the difference between eating vine-ripened heirloom tomatoes and the styrofoam ones they sell in the grocery store.

Today is chicken butchering day. It’s not our favorite day of the year, but it has to be done. If we don’t butcher chickens who are too old to lay, we’re just feeding pets. Feed is expensive. There is rain in the forecast for this afternoon, but we should be done by noon.

I put a couple of handfuls of scratch grains out on the platform feeder by the chicken coop yesterday afternoon, and within minutes, there were three Stellar jays arguing over who got the bounty. The bunny is about 2/3 white now. I’ll try to get a picture the next time it’s in the yard.

A New Tried and True

Alliteration and rhyming today.

I made up Burda 6329 a few weeks ago but I did not like the fact that the sleeve pattern piece had a shoulder dart in it. That pattern is designed for knit fabrics. I thought the dart was unnecessary and unattractive, so I re-drafted the top of the sleeve without it. Yesterday morning, I ran up a quick muslin to check the fit.

Close, but not quite. I had pulling at the shoulders. I generally like raglan tops because I have broad shoulders, but these sleeves needed more breathing room. I did a broad shoulder adjustment according to this tutorial on the 5 out of 4 Patterns website, then ran up another muslin out of some double-brushed poly from the Walmart remnant rack. I wasn’t crazy about the print—it was intended for use as a muslin all along—but now that the top is done, I like it very much.

It fits beautifully. I could live in Laundry Day Tees, but some of the fabrics in my stash are only two-yard lengths. The LDT needs about 2-1/2 yards because of the width of the front and back pieces that create the swing. I can get Burda 6329 out of two yards, and it’s dressier than a plain T-shirt thanks to those pleats at the front neckline.

Speaking of LDTs, I hemmed two more yesterday, as well. I’ve never been much for tie-dye, but I love these colors and this rayon spandex has a lovely feel and drape:

This black floral print is also rayon spandex, but in a lighter weight. It’s also a Walmart remnant rack find. It doesn’t feel like a very good fabric to me, to be honest—certainly not as nice as the tie-dye fabric—but I liked the print.

So that’s three tops added to the closet and another pattern added to the tried-and-true pile. I’ll probably run up a couple more using Burda 6329. I have two lengths of knits with chickens on them that are begging to be made into tops.

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I did my first podcast interview yesterday. It is destined for next week’s episode. I asked my friend JC Briar if she would be my first victim interviewee. JC was my tech editor for my Twists and Turns cable newsletter and my Aran and cable books. She is also a teacher and designer in her own right, as well as the author of Charts Made Simple and the mastermind behind Stitch-Maps charting software. Like many of us during the pandemic, JC turned to sewing, and now does the most fascinating improv quilting. You can follow her on Instagram at JC.Briar. (Make sure you include that period in her name.) I thought it would be fun to talk to her and I knew she would be understanding if things went sideways.

The recording went off without a hitch. It’s about 30 minutes long. We could have gone on gabbing—and I am hoping we can get together in person next summer—but I thought that was a good first effort. I can always have her back on the podcast. And now I feel more confident about asking other people to be guests.

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I got quite a bit done yesterday. I have got to figure out how to organize my schedule so I have more days to devote to sewing. I get a lot done when I can put my head down and work without interruptions. Besides making the Burda top and hemming it and the other two, I also ran up my second muslin of the Linda pants pattern (another bike shorts version). The smaller size fits better, at least in the bengaline, which is pretty stretchy. A stretch poplin may not have as much give.

I canned pumpkin Tuesday. I cut up one of the Galeux d’Eysine pumpkins—the variety with warts on it—and that yielded nine quarts. I promised to make a pumpkin pie for the husband today.

It’s raining. I don’t have to go anywhere so I am hoping for another productive sewing day. I finished the second of my Squash Squad blocks and need to get the third one ready to embroider. I’m also trying to decide what project to take on my next trip. I am going to be gone long enough that my little Janome sewing machine will come with me. I’ll probably take some simple scrap quilting project that doesn’t require a lot of thinking or cutting.

Apples and Aprons

We are practicing alliteration this week. 😊

My friend Susan and I, along with our pastor, were invited to lunch with two members of our congregation who are in an assisted living facility in Kalispell. I picked Susan up yesterday morning and we drove in to meet them there at noon. We had an excellent meal and visited with them for a couple of hours. Susan and I also ran our errands while we were out and about.

Susan has a large orchard of about 40 fruit trees, mostly apples. She loves heritage apple varieties and has grafted quite a few. Because she has run out of room in her own orchard, I am now the beneficiary of her grafting experiments and have half a dozen trees from her nursery. One of them is Westfield Seek-No-Further, which I asked her to graft specifically for me because it appears in a series of books I love by Sara Donati. (The Wilderness Series.) I’ve also got several Duchess of Oldenburg trees—my favorite pie apple—a Liberty, and a Spokane Beauty. She will have more for us to plant here next spring.

Susan and her husband went over to Sandpoint, Idaho, a few weeks ago for an apple tasting. The tasting was hosted by the Sandpoint Organic Agriculture Center, part of the University of Idaho. Susan has also gotten scion wood for grafting from SOAC. She said she got to try about 30 different varieties of apples. SOAC hosts a free monthly webinar series on apples—breeding, growing, and harvesting—and Susan says they are very well done.

Apparently the museum there had an exhibit on aprons. Susan knows I love aprons, so she took some pictures for me. The first photo she took, though, was of the sign on the library:

How appropriate.

And the aprons!

I love this style, below. I don’t look that good when I’m ironing, though.

So elegant:

I might try to get over to Sandpoint next year for the apple tasting. It sounds like it was a lot of fun.

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I have to get my teeth cleaned this morning and then I am coming home to try to get some things done. I ought to can up the pumpkins because I want some on hand for making pies. I need to revisit that Linda pants pattern, too. And I have to figure out what is going on with the BMW and when I’ll be able to have it back.

Cooking and Canning and Copying

I added nine quarts of really nice chicken stock to the pantry yesterday:

Next up is another batch of ham stock. I’ve got quite a few bags of scraps and bones in the freezer.

We are butchering chickens on Saturday. Our church’s former pastor, Jeryl, is coming to help as he always does. (He lives up the road.) He usually brings chickens of his own, although I give him some of ours, too, as a thank-you for helping. He and the husband and I have an efficient system and can do several dozen birds in a morning. I think Elysian is coming over, and Tera’s husband wants to bring some of their chickens and learn the process, too. We should have a good group. I see showers in the forecast, but I can put up our pop-up tent. And the forecast probably will change between now and then.

After this, we should be back on our usual rotation of chicken breeds. Things got messed up during the pandemic when I couldn’t get chicks. I hatched out my own chicks that year, but they were Heinz 57 chickens. The next year, I had to get half of one variety and half of another. We also had some that the husband brought home from one of his customers. By next week, we should be back down to Barred Rocks, White Leghorns, and Dave. Dave is getting up there—roosters typically don’t last more than 4 or 5 years and he’s 3—so I might incubate half a dozen eggs in the spring and hope he fathers a replacement. He such a great rooster, though. I’ll be sad when he’s gone.

The mice are lining up to get caught in our traps. They are coming in on the south side of the house and the traps in the laundry room and in my office have been busy. Ugh. Hopefully this will be over in another couple of weeks. The two feral cats have been parked outside the chicken coop, but they aren’t catching everything.

Such is life in the woods.

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I’d love to get out of pattern alteration land. I’ve got Burda 6329—a pleated-front raglan tee shirt—on my cutting table so I can frankenpattern it with the Nancy Raglan. I like that Burda tee shirt except for the fact that the sleeves have darts. I don’t understand why, as that pattern is designed for knit tops. I usually only see darts in raglan sleeves for wovens. I think they distort the sleeve, so I want to take them out. I compared the two patterns and I should be able to make the sleeve for the Burda pattern look more like the Nancy Raglan.

Pattern alterations involve a lot of tracing, taping, and labelling. Sometimes I have the patience for that and sometimes I just want to sew.

I’ve also got to get started on some kind of Christmas outfit. I don’t want to leave that for the last minute.

I Found the Missing Fabric

The husband and I hit it hard yesterday. After a breakfast of bacon and eggs (ours, of course), he took apart the washing machine to see what was going on. It was throwing an error code because the drum wasn’t filling with water quickly enough. He thought that cleaning the filters would help, but after putting the machine back together, we determined that it still wasn’t functioning properly. The valve needs to be replaced. He ordered one and it should arrive next week. In the meantime, I can wash clothes if I add a few gallons of water to the drum and make the washer think that it has filled to the proper water level.

[I have a washing machine and a husband who knows how to fix it. I will manage.]

He went outside to work on some equipment-related projects. I did the rest of the laundry and tidied up the house. I started two trays of lettuce in the indoor growing system and set the chicken stock to cook down. I also froze containers of chili for the husband to eat while I am traveling. Our neighbor, Anna, brought us a big pot of chili left over from one of her catering events. We ate some for dinner the other night but there was a lot of it.

After lunch, I made a top:

I am planning to wear this to church with my hot pink corduroys. The fabric is a fine-gauge sweater knit from the Walmart remnant rack. It has a bit of shine to it so I think it must have some rayon in it. The pattern is the Nancy Raglan from 5 Out of 4. I love this pattern. It was one of the first ones I tried when I started making my own clothes, and comes in top, tunic, and dress lengths. I’ve made several from sweatshirt fleece; this is the first time I’ve tried a sweater knit. The entire top took two hours, start to finish. I did stabilize the raglan seams with some knit stay tape.

I also located my missing bin of fabric. It was in the closet; I just hadn’t dug deeply enough. I want to check the fit of the smaller size Linda pants with another quick bike short muslin, and if I’m satisfied, I’ll make a pair of pants with the Hobby Lobby bengaline. I’ll remember to cut them on the crosswise grain this time, because bengaline stretches down the length of the fabric, not across the width.

I wish I had started making my own clothes a long time ago. I could have avoided decades of muddy earth tones, sad pastels, and ill-fitting garments.

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Our congregation is getting ready to host our annual International Gift Festival, November 9-11. This sale features handmade items from artisans all over the world. We’ll also be serving soup and homemade pies in our Village Cafe.

We can always use more volunteers (the oft-heard refrain), so if anyone local would like to come and help, we would love to have you join us. Those of us working at the sale always have a good time. We also need donations of homemade pies for the Village Cafe. (Just not pumpkin—every year we get a ton of pumpkin pies and it’s nice to have a wider selection.) The Crown of the Continent Choir will present a concert on Friday evening at 7 pm.

This year, a portion of the proceeds will be donated to Heart Locker and Sparrow’s Nest, two nonprofits here in the Flathead Valley.

Come to Class

I traveled to Missoula yesterday to teach a serger mastery class. This is a free-to-students class for owners of Bernina sergers. (I get paid to teach it.) I left a bit early because I wasn’t sure what the roads would be like. As it turns out, the areas south of here got more snow than we did. Traffic was minimal, but I wasn’t traveling at my usual speed.

My class was at A Clean Stitch. The store has been in this strip mall for a couple of years, but it quickly outgrew its original location. Last spring, it moved down a few spots to a much larger space. The owners still have another 5000 square feet to organize and renovate into a service area and classroom space, so my class was in the main store area. Fortunately, it was a quiet day in the store.

Five students registered. Four came to class; the fifth decided not to travel because of the roads. One student thought that class ended at noon instead of 2 pm and had to leave for an appointment. Another student thought class ended at 1 pm and also had to leave. I crammed as much information into those two hours as I could for them, but we didn’t cover everything.

I don’t know what to think about these classes. Students sign up and don’t come, or come and leave early. I tell myself that as long as I am getting paid to teach the class, it’s not big deal for me, but the students are losing out. Maybe if they had to pay for a serger mastery class, they would be a bit more careful about getting their money’s worth. Or not. Sometimes that doesn’t seem to make a difference.

I’m scheduled to teach two more classes at this store—one in November and one in December—so we’ll see what happens with those.

I checked out the two Walmart stores on my route and both still had full remnant racks, which was gratifying.

We need a photo for the blog today, so here is one of the banners hanging up at church:

Isn’t that lovely? Ginger, who is in charge of visuals for our sanctuary, is so creative. I love walking into that space every Sunday morning and seeing what’s she done.

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I need to spend some time today on housekeeping. I’m going to start a roaster pan of chicken stock to cook down this morning. I’ll can it tomorrow afternoon. The husband is going to look at the washing machine (a Speed Queen) because it’s throwing an error code and stopping mid-cycle. He thinks the filter screen is plugged up. I have a few mountains of laundry to wash when that’s sorted.

The body shop called yesterday. The car would have been done yesterday afternoon, but they tried to put the new bumper on and realized that it was the wrong part. The attachment clips didn’t line up. They ordered the correct bumper, but it’ll be another week and a half before it gets here. In the meantime, they will repaint the old bumper and put it back on. The car should be ready Monday or Tuesday. I am not thrilled about having to take it back in a second time, but it is what it is.

My hot pink wide wale corduroys from Macy’s arrived this week. They fit nicely. I plan to wear them to church on Sunday and blind everyone. The bizarre thing is that the tag on the pants is in US sizing, so why they were posted with the weird 25-36 size range on the website is beyond me.

I have lost some fabric. I have a bin of wovens somewhere, but it is eluding my attempts to find it. I can even picture what fabrics are inside. I am pretty sure that it contains some Hobby Lobby bengaline, and now that I have this Linda pants pattern under control, I’d like to make a pair with that fabric. Part of me says that this is an indication that I have too much fabric, but the other part argues that I just need to label bins more clearly.

Pants and Socks and Other Clothes

I ran up another muslin for the Style Arc Linda Pants—incorporating the changes to the rise—and they fit so much better! The wrinkles are gone. I am going to drop down a size, though. I seem to be erring on the larger side of some of these patterns. I think that once I have this pattern dialed in, these pants will become a wardrobe staple. I do get tired of jeans.

I also finished the second LDT and took in that sleeve/armscye seam on the Sadie top. Those are waiting to be hemmed.

And I went through every single one of my patterns and divided them into three piles: 1) don’t like; 2) definite keepers; 3) still want to try or re-try. Now I just need to prioritize that third category.

I taught my serger sock class last night. A few days ago, when I checked, I had four students registered. One didn’t come because of the weather, another had to cancel for a family emergency, and a third forgot about the class. (We called her, but she lives too far away to have gotten there in time.) The store owner decided to take the class, though, so the three of us spent a very pleasant couple of hours visiting and making socks.

I provided the fabric for this class. I don’t usually do that, but I wanted something specific, and I knew that if I had trouble sourcing it, the students certainly would. I ordered an athletic knit, but what I got wasn’t the same as the sample fabric I had on hand. I defaulted to some swimwear knit. That worked, but I’d still like to find more of this brushed athletic knit.

[Why do I like shopping the Walmart remnant rack? Because I can see and feel the fabric and don’t have to order blindly.]

The second fabric I wanted was some microfleece. Again, I had a sample that had come from Joanns, but every Joanns between here and Spokane was sold out. On my way to Seattle a few weeks ago, I stopped at the Joanns in Moses Lake, Washington, and they had a bolt of that microfleece on the clearance rack so I bought what was left. Joanns still has it listed on their website. I might order more in case I want to teach this class again, although the store owner is trying to find a supplier for it.

[These are first-world problems. I am aware of that.]

The socks turned out very cute. This is the swimwear fabric:

And this is the microfleece. The store owner liked her microfleece socks so much that she wore them home.

I’ve got a serger mastery class in Missoula tomorrow. I pulled out one of my Nancy Raglans (5 Out of 4 Patterns) to wear to class last night. I do like that top. If I have time, I’d like to make up another one today that I can wear tomorrow.

The store owner threw out the idea of having a serger retreat. She has frequent retreats for quilters and embroiderers and they almost always sell out. She holds them at the church camp on Flathead Lake where the husband and I were in the deck collapse in 2017. I haven’t been back there since. You can be sure, though, that I won’t be going out on that deck again.

We’ll see. That would take some planning, but it would be fun—a whole weekend of nothing but serging and someone else cooking all the meals.

Falling Off the Cliff Into Winter

We got about 2" of snow yesterday, followed by a back door cold front. It’s 20 degrees right now with gusty northeast winds. Temps are supposed to warm up into the low 40s next week, but I think we can safely say that the seasons have changed. I am not unhappy about this. I like the slower pace of winter, and dark and gloomy doesn’t bother me like it does some people. I also have more time to sew.

Our resident bunny is getting whiter and whiter:

I had to run into town for an appointment yesterday morning, so I put on my peacoat with my new lambswool scarf. Isn’t it pretty?

The scarf was a gift from my neighbor, Theresa, from her trip to Ireland last spring. It is so soft and warm.

When I got home from town, I put together a long-sleeve Laundry Day Tee and a Seamwork Sadie. I made a Sadie last year. The pattern didn’t immediately make it to the tried-and-true list because I was undecided about the fit. It is billed as a “structured sweatshirt,” although it feels oversized and slouchy to me, especially in the shoulders. The description indicates dropped shoulders. I’ve noticed some discrepancies between sewing and knitting terminology. My definition of dropped shoulders is a rectangular body with no sleeve cap shaping. (Think Alice Starmore.) Sadie has both armscye and sleeve cap shaping. What it feels like is that the upper bodice just isn’t drafted well. I pinned out the excess in the sleeve and armscye after making this version, and the effect of pulling up those shoulders to where the seam should sit was dramatic. I’ll re-sew that sleeve seam today. I also changed the pattern in case I decide to make it again, but honestly, I think I like Burda 6315 better. We’ll see.

I am re-making some of these patterns I’ve made before even though I was ambivalent about them the first time. I know more now than I did a year ago, so I want to revisit some patterns to see if I can adjust them to fit better.

I sewed up a second LDT yesterday that needs either a neckband or a cowl. After that, the next one in the queue will be a Juniper Cardigan in some navy blue hacci sweater knit. A navy blue cardigan never goes amiss. And I still need to do the second muslin of the Linda pants.

The Socks on the Serger class is tonight. I think it will be a fun one.

A Winter Storm Approaches

I think the universe knew I needed a break after my travels. Early yesterday morning, I dropped the car off at the body shop. While I was waiting for the husband to come pick me up, I got a call from the dentist’s office. Could they reschedule my cleaning? The hygienist was out with a sick child. That freed up my scheduled for the afternoon. I went back into town—driving DD#1’s Acura—and stopped at the quilt store north of town to see if I had any students for today’s class. Nope! That freed up today’s schedule.

I did a Costco run, then came home and moved the squash from the greenhouse to the old garage. This is the forecast for this week as of 4 am:

It will be chilly. How much snow we get depends on how far down the snow levels drop. I am glad I got my snow tires put on before my trip. The husband fired up the wood boiler over the weekend, so the house is nice and toasty. We were sitting in the living room last night, watching YouTube, when I heard a trap go off. Sure enough, a mouse had met a sad end in the laundry room. I expect a few more of them to try to get in this week. ‘Tis the season.

I don’t think there will be any problems with my Wednesday evening class. The storm will have moved out of here by then.

I cut out two Laundry Day Tees yesterday afternoon. Fabric does me no earthly good sitting in the stash. I have fabric set aside for three more. At least one or two of them will have the cowl neckline instead of the plain scoop. I got the Juniper Cardigan printed while I was in town yesterday and may cut that one out, too. I am feeling the need for some cozy tops and sweaters and I have a pile of patterns waiting:

• Sew House Seven Toaster Sweater

• Burda 6315 (hacked to make it long enough for me, with a turtleneck mod)

• Juniper Cardigan

• Harper Cardigan

• Nancy Raglan

• New Look 6771

• Seamwork Sadie

• A few others picked up along the way

I’ve also got a nice stash of sweater knits and lengths of French terry that I’ve been collecting over the past year. I reach for my Burda 6315 and Nancy Raglan tops over and over because they fit so well, but I’d like to add a few more to the tried and true pile.

I also adjusted the front and back rises on the StyleArc Linda pants. I’ll run up another bike short muslin to see how close I am. Just to put it in perspective, the crotch seam on the Linda pants pattern measures 28". The crotch seam on my work pants measures 31". (That’s the crotch seam, not the inseam.) When I talk about the rise on most pants being too short for me, I am not kidding. My body measurements are just far enough outside the average that I’ve got to make adjustments.

Pants—The Continuing Saga

I ran up a muslin of the StyleArc Linda pants using the stretch cotton I bought at Hobby Lobby. The bad news is that the pattern needs some adjustments to fit me properly. The good news is that I am getting better at figuring out exactly what I have to fix. I had the husband take a photo of the front and back of the pants while I was wearing them. Based on the wedgie I was getting, I suspected the rise was too short. The photos showed the wrinkles. I checked the photos against the wrinkle chart in one of my fitting books and that confirmed my hunch.

Here are the Linda pants next to my favorite Noble Outfitters work pants. I love the way these fit. The difference is obvious:

I considered adjusting the crotch seam on the Linda pants—the white chalk line—but looking at these pants next to each other, I think I need a more drastic revision. I am going to enlist the husband’s help in getting an accurate set of measurements before I try again.

It’s no wonder I hate low rise pants. I feel like the poster child for why ready-to-wear looks so awful on most women.

I signed up for a two-hour private lesson at the Sewing and Design School in Tacoma a few days before Thanksgiving. That’s where Kenneth D. King teaches, although my class is with one of the other instructors. The private class can be anything I want, so I asked for help with drafting a pants sloper for myself.

Some day, when I make my way out of this pants maze, I’d like to get back to making more sweaters and tops. I have that Stretch & Sew pattern for the saddle-shoulder sweater, but I’m also kicking around making a Juniper Cardigan by Jennifer Lauren Handmade:

This cardigan has a saddle shoulder detail, as well, and comes in two lengths.

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We had stellar weather yesterday, so I worked out in the garden. We finally got a frost, I think, but it wasn’t hard enough to kill the tomatoes completely. The Blue Boar Berry cherry tomato plant is still churning out ripe ones. Go figure. I brought in a bucket full of the last of the tomatillos and tomatoes. I cut the cabbages and made “egg roll in a bowl” in the Instant Pot with one of them for dinner.

I’ve been watching Michael Snyder’s Pacific Northwest Weather Watch channel for the past week. It’s been a battle of computer models. The GFS (North American) model has been steadfast in its prediction that we will get cold air from Canada mid-week that will bring snow. The European model had the cold air staying above the border—and no snow—but it capitulated yesterday and is now in agreement with the GFS.

The husband replaced the mixing valve on the hot water heater yesterday and fired up the wood boiler. I will hang up the rest of the insulated curtains today and we will wait to see what the weather throws at us this week.

All Coverstitch, All Day

I finished my class sample for the coverstitch class yesterday morning, and then I recorded next week’s podcast—the topic, of course, being coverstitch machines. I seem to have fallen into a pattern of using whatever I’m working on as the main topic for the podcast. The subject material is fresh in my mind and easy to talk about. I didn’t think I could blather on about coverstitch machines for 30+ minutes, but I did.

(I have a bit more to say about the podcast later on in this post.)

I made a sampler of what I want to teach in the coverstitch class:

From bottom to top:

• A rolled-edge ruffle—the rolled edge was done on the serger—gathered with a chainstitch on the coverstitch machine and then stitched down to the background fabric with a two-needle narrow coverstitch over 3/8'' satin ribbon. I keep looking at that and thinking it would make a nice detail on the lower edge of an apron . . .

• A two-needle wide coverstitch, looper side up, using 12wt Wonderfil Spagetti in the looper.

• A stacked coverstitch—a la Gail Yellen—done by first making a two-needle wide coverstitch with 12wt Spagetti, then going over it with a different color Spagetti using a two-needle narrow coverstitch. A third pass could be added using a chain stitch (one needle).

• Jumbo rickrack attached with a chainstitch using 12wt variegated thread in the looper.

• Zipper insertion featuring, on the bottom, a decorative two-needle narrow coverstitch, looper side up. I had a little hiccup getting around the zipper pull because the coverstitch machine doesn’t have a true zipper foot. The top is a triple coverstitch (three needles), needle side up.

The sampler isn’t perfect, and it isn’t an actual project, but it gets the point across. If I have some time between now and the class next month, I would like to design some kind of zipper pouch to incorporate and show off these techniques. As it was, I was trying some of them for the first time. I have run into situations where class proposals require that the student make a project as part of learning a technique. I have mixed feelings about that. While it’s nice for students to be able to show off an item they have made, working on a “project” in class brings added pressure. Students tend to compare their projects and focus more on perfection than learning. This is an evening class and we may not even be able to get through all the techniques on the sampler, let alone make a zipper pouch. My goal is to introduce the techniques and inspire students to think about creative ways to use them. I know my students. They won’t disappoint me.

Class prep is a lot of work. That’s part of why I am happy to be teaching some of these classes at the stores in Missoula and Spokane, because if I am going to spend a day making class samples, I’d like to use them more than once. But now that I know what I want to teach in the class, I can make up the supply list and the handout.

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The podcast is having some (not unexpected) growing pains. Yesterday’s recording will be episode 8. I am happy with the analytics so far but I need to start recording some interviews. A podcast that consists of me blathering on for half an hour may not be sustainable.

I listened to an excellent podcast episode on the way to Seattle. The host was Toolman Tim Cook of Workshop Radio, who was also at the Self-Reliance Festival. Tim and his wife live in Alberta, which makes us almost neighbors. Tim has a great story and gives a talk at events about escaping the “poverty mindset.” He is also an all-around Nice Guy and a terrific podcast host. The topic of that episode was “content creation”—that’s the new buzzword—and his guests were Nicole Sauce (Living Free in Tennessee podcast), Brian Aleskivich from the LOTS Project, and Kyle Perrault of Backwoods Butcher. (Kyle did a pig butchering demo at SRF.)

My big takeaways from that content creator roundtable discussion were 1) consistency is huge and 2) it may take a couple dozen episodes before things really gel for a podcast. Nicole laughs about the fact that her first podcast episode had 87 downloads and the second episode had 14—of which she and her mother were two. That was eight years ago and now she’s hosting big events and being asked to present at conferences around the country. I have no such ambitions but the trajectory her life has taken is fascinating.

I do need to give some attention to my social media links for the podcast and get them organized such that posts automatically go up for each new episode. Even with as much frontloading as I did, I haven’t covered everything yet. I keep telling myself Rome wasn’t built in a day. This is a process. I am having fun with it and that’s the important part.