Sloth Week

This hasn’t been a terribly productive week. A couple of times a year—and it seems like it always happens during a full moon—I get a few days where I feel like I am moving through molasses, both mentally and physically. This has been one of those weeks. I’ve learned that I just have to wait it out. I cleaned and did laundry and organized patterns.

The husband and I had eye appointments Thursday afternoon. We’re both nearsighted, and we were told that our prescriptions had actually decreased in strength. Apparently, that is not uncommon as one gets older. That also explains the headaches I was having with my current prescription. The husband ordered new glasses while we were there. I’ll go back some time next week and order mine. It was late in the day and I didn’t feel like making decisions. I still have the glasses with my previous prescription and I’ve switched to wearing those.

I caved and bought a piece of fabric from the Walmart remnant rack.

I have looked at this piece of fabric for a month now and decided that at four yards for $6, I should just buy it and have done with it. The fabric was wrapped inside-out, which may explain why it languished on the remnant rack for so long. This is a very drapey rayon jacquard (stranded) knit that feels more like a woven. The houndstooth pattern is tiny—about 7 “teeth” to the inch. It reads gray from a distance, which is not always my best color, but I’ll make something up and see what I think. Maybe this Burda pattern? View A, on the right?

I designed and ordered some business cards for the podcast to take with me to Sew Expo as I expect to do a fair bit of networking while I’m there. I’ve already got a couple of interviews scheduled in February. I am having such fun meeting people and talking to them about sewing.

The husband asked me what I am teaching at Sew Expo. I said I was teaching three knitting classes. “Do you even remember how to knit?” he asked me, which made me laugh. I didn’t give up knitting completely—I knock out a prayer shawl every couple of weeks or so—but in his defense, he never sees me knitting because I work on prayer shawls during church and during meetings. I may have to refresh my memory on one or two techniques before Sew Expo, but I’m not in danger of ever forgetting how to knit.

I do need to work on making handouts this week and unearthing class samples from storage. I retrieved my serger class samples from the quilt store north of town yesterday. Of all the classes I scheduled there last year, I only taught one class to one student, so I haven’t scheduled any classes there for 2024.

I also want to touch base with the small quilt store in Spokane where I’ve taught a couple of classes. When I talked to the owner before the holidays, she had plans to sell most of her fabric stock, have some construction work done in the space, and concentrate on selling machines and doing custom quilting. She still plans to sell Juki sergers and wants me to come over and teach serger classes for her. Clearance sale notices for her store arrived in my e-mail this week, so it sounds like that part of the store revamp is underway. I’ll stop there on my way to Sew Expo.

There is No Clutch Pedal in This Car

The husband has a working theory about The Diva’s current issue. I drove it yesterday to test it out. That car has an 8-speed automatic transmission, although it also has a “manual” mode. Manual is where the driver, rather than the computer, shifts the gears—to a point. If the driver tries to do something stupid, the car overrides him (or her). It’s like driving a manual transmission with training wheels.

I actually find it kind of annoying to have to drive that car in manual mode, especially in town. It’s a lot of shifting. And at one point, my brain thought that because my right hand was on the shifter, my left foot must need to operate the clutch pedal, except that I tapped the brake instead. If I’m going to drive a manual transmission, I’d like it to be one with an actual clutch pedal.

Anyway. What has been happening is that when I am up at about 45 mph—or where the transmission would shift into 7th gear—the car starts hitching. Driving it in manual mode, I could keep the transmission from shifting into 7th gear, even though it meant running the engine at slightly higher RPMs. I wouldn’t want to do that long term, but for driving around town, it was fine.

The husband thinks it is a bad solenoid in the transmission. He was getting ready to research it as I was heading to bed last night, so I’ll have to wait until he wakes up to hear what he thinks. Can he fix it? He’s fixed every other problem with that car, including an exploded transfer case, so I have no doubt he’ll be able to fix this problem, too.

Stay tuned for the next installment of Janet Tries to Avoid Buying a New Car.

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My podcast interview yesterday lasted two hours. It might have gone even longer but my guest had another appointment. We went a bit far afield from sewing in the second half, so when I post it, I’m going to post two versions: a shorter, sewing-related version and a second, extended-play version for those who want the whole interview.

I had a fun serger class yesterday afternoon with two students. I love these mastery classes because students come in being terrified of their machines and leave feeling like they can go home and actually make something.

When I got home, some fabric was waiting for me in the mailbox. I needed another yard of a French terry I ordered a few months ago, so while I was at it, I threw a couple of yards of a second French terry into the cart. Both pieces came yesterday. I love love love this print:

Both fabrics are destined to become Nathalies, I think, not that there has been much sewing this week. The husband and I have appointments with the eye doctor this afternoon. I hope the doctor can adjust my prescription for me. I have very good close-up vision, out to the distance of my hands held out in front of me. I don’t wear my glasses when I am sewing or working on the computer or playing the piano, because when I have my progressives on, which I need for distance, they are too strong. That means I tend to leave my glasses off for most of the day, but then I end up with headaches. I’ve got to find a solution, even if it means two pairs of glasses. I’ve tried keeping my glasses on a chain around my neck, but I tend to catch my hands in the chain while I am working.

Cookies, Newsletters, and Seeds

Today is a busy day. I have a podcast interview this morning and I’ll be teaching a serger mastery class this afternoon. I think we’ve resolved the class registration issue at the store. I am not being a diva by expecting students to register for my classes. I’m not psychic. The only way I know if I have students to prepare for is if they register for a class, and that’s nothing that any other teacher wouldn’t also expect.

I baked cookies yesterday. I told Susan I would fold the homestead foundation newsletters on my folding machine, and the easiest way to do that is to set up the machine in the kitchen and feed them through while I work on something else at the same time. She copied the newsletters on Monday and her SIL dropped them off here yesterday morning. I had promised the boys—our employees—that I would make them each a batch of cookies because they came over and checked on things here while we were in Tacoma in December picking up the new work truck. (We paid them for their time; the cookies are a bonus.) Both liked the ones I made before Christmas that were chocolate with peanut butter chips, so that’s what they got.

While I worked, I also listened to Jack Spirko’s podcast on YouTube. Yesterday’s episode was entitled This is Dystopia, Wake Up. The husband has been listening to Jack’s podcast for years. I listen less frequently, but it was through Jack’s podcast that I found Nicole Sauce and the Living Free in Tennessee podcast. All of these people—including the person I’m interviewing today for the podcast—are part of the same network. Jack was one of the speakers at Self-Reliance Festival, where I taught last October.

The husband came in to tell me he was leaving and heard me listening to Jack’s podcast. “You needed a hopeful and uplifting message, huh?” he asked me. We joke about doomer porn. I said, “Jack’s talking about the fact the we’re in the middle of a collapse, but most people don’t see it,” and the husband said, “I am reminded of it every day, trust me.”

[I had just spent an hour attempting to track down the title for the new truck. We had this problem two years ago when we bought the other truck. The county will no longer process title paperwork for LLCs, so when our business buys a vehicle, the title paperwork goes to a company in Billings for processing. Last time, it got lost for three months. The husband does not want to get pulled over for driving around on expired temporary tags.]

The message that Jack and Nicole and others are trying to get across is not based on fear mongering. Rather, it’s an exhortation to do what you can, when you can, to make your life the best it can be no matter what happens. And it’s not proscriptive. It’s not the “beans, bullets, and band-aids” kind of prepping. It’s a recognition that making one’s life the best it can be looks different for everyone depending on their circumstances and goals.

The temptation to succumb to the darkness and fear is overwhelming—that’s why the husband and I joke about doomer porn. (After everything I’ve been through in my life, I do gallows humor very well.) Much of what used to work reasonably well no longer works, and I think that will continue to get worse. We have a choice in how we respond, though, so I bake cookies and fold newsletters, because life goes on.

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My seeds arrived yesterday:

Talk about hope and optimism—there it is. Victory was already sold out of a couple of things I wanted—Fisher’s Early Sweet Corn and Carolina Amethyst peppers—but I substituted with other varieties. I don’t experiment much with my plantings. I find what works and stick with it, and I’ve been ordering from Victory for over 10 years because I’ve always had such good success with their seeds.

The husband and I will have to decide soon about raising pigs again this summer. We might take a year off. We’ll see.

A Pair of Baby Shoes Inspired a Dream

I am excited about today’s podcast episode. My guest is Melanie Knight of Starry Knight Design. I first met Melanie 30 years ago, when she was about 11 years old. She’s a wife and mom now, and owner of a very successful sewing-related business.

Some of my newer blog readers (welcome!) may not know that in June of 1994, about nine months after the husband and I moved to Montana, I was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia. We had just bought the property we’re living on now and DD#1 was about 15 months old. I had been sick for several weeks. My doctor thought I had a sinus infection and had given me antibiotics. One day, I woke up with an enlarged lymph node on the side of my neck that was pressing on my vocal cords. I went back to the doctor and insisted that he figure out what was happening.

One of the first people I became friends with here in Kalispell was a woman named Judy. Her husband and mine worked together on several construction projects and we got to know their family well. Judy homeschooled their three daughters—Melanie was the oldest—and that day, she kept DD#1 for me while I was at the doctor’s office.

The doctor called the husband and me into the office and said that they had determined I had leukemia, but that I needed to be on the next plane out of Kalispell because there was no way they could treat me here. I called my mother and let her know I would be arriving in Cleveland the following day to be admitted to the Cleveland Clinic for treatment.

I wanted to take DD#1 with me, but I was so sick that I could barely manage myself, let alone a busy toddler on a trip involving three flights through several big airports. It was obvious that I was going to have to leave her here with the husband. Judy offered to keep DD#1 during the day while the husband was working. That was a hugely generous offer. She and her girls kept DD#1 every day for the month of June until the husband could bring her to Cleveland to be with me there.

Judy and I didn’t see each other as much as our girls got older and our lives changed, but we tried to celebrate important events together. We attended Melanie’s wedding and the baby shower for her oldest son, and Judy came to DD#1’s high school graduation and wedding shower. I ran into Judy a few years ago at the grocery store and she told me about Melanie’s very successful business in Corvallis, Montana, about an hour south of Missoula.

Sadly, Judy passed away last January. When I started the podcast, though, Melanie was at the top of the list of people I wanted to interview. We had a great visit over Zoom and I got to hear all about how she started her business making leather shoes for babies and toddlers.

(Photo borrowed from the Starry Knight Design website.)

If you’re following the podcast, I hope you’ll enjoy this episode.

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Still no actual sewing here, although I’m almost finished with my Robert Mahar embroidery project. Yesterday was podcast editing day, which took most of the morning. After lunch, I tended to the indoor lettuce system, cleaned up a bit around the house, put away a bunch of canning jars, and organized my indie sewing patterns. I’ve pulled out a few that I want to work on in the coming months, including the Alina Fulton Blazer and the Itch to Stitch Andes Jacket. That Andes Jacket is going to be a fairly involved project, I think, because I know I am going to have to lengthen the pattern.

While I was at church on Sunday, I talked to Pat. She took my bin of 5” squares and turned it into six comforter tops. We’re going to have an all-church comforter-tying party on February 24. The comforters will be donated to Mennonite Central Committee to be given out where needed.

Tomorrow is the rescheduled serger mastery class, so I’ll need to stop in at the store today and see if I’ll have any students.

A Versatile Pattern

I had a church meeting yesterday morning, but I finished the Burda 6146 top after lunch. I am sure I will be using this pattern again:

This is nothing spectacular, but sometimes the quiet ones have the most impact, and there is much to like about this top. I can safely say that even though it was intended for a woven fabric, it works quite nicely in a stable knit. If I were to do it again in a knit, though, I’d eliminate the bust darts. Knits stretch enough that bust darts aren’t really necessary. The V-neck is perfect, as is the overall length. I love the 3/4 sleeves, although I would change the cuff area. The photo on the pattern envelope makes it appear that the sleeves are gathered onto a cuff. They aren’t. The sleeve ends in a band with a length of elastic threaded through it. When I make this again—especially in a woven, I will gather them onto a cuff as the elastic is rather bulky.

This could be lengthened into a dress. The sleeves could be short or long. How about a flounce around that V-neck? So many options. I suspect this pattern will get a lot of use this summer.

I continue to explore pattern drafting and style information for people with high hip curves, and I’ve found quite a bit that validates the issues I’ve always had with clothing, especially styles like low-rise pants.

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I was lying in bed last night, reading, when a voice on my phone suddenly intoned, “A winter storm warning has been issued for your area.” My phone is set up to notify me of weather alerts, although when it’s quiet and I’m not expecting my phone to speak, that alert is momentarily heart-stopping. The storm warning was for freezing rain and ice. It looks like we got a bit more snow up here, but the roads down in the valley probably were treacherous.

We’ve warmed up considerably since last week. Right now it’s 20F, which is thirty degrees warmer than it was last Sunday morning. The high today is expected to reach 35 degrees, and that will feel like a heat wave. Soon, snow will begin cascading off the metal roof. Even though it will sound like a freight train roaring through, I’ll have a better view out the bedroom window. Right now, it looks like this:

I like looking out the window at the mountains, so I’ll be glad when this snow slides off the roof and my view is restored.

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There is much truth to the adage that you become what you consume—literally and figuratively. I am ever vigilant about our food, obviously, but it is a constant battle against the stuff I allow into my brain. I am aware that I am surrounded by people who are obsessed with the fact that the world is burning, and they want everyone else to be obsessed with that fact, too. The husband often reminds me that 10,000 years ago—or even 500 years ago—people didn’t have the luxury of worrying about much more than keeping themselves fed, sheltered, and clothed. Do you have time to care what your neighbor is doing when you’re being chased by a sabre-toothed tiger? I suspect not.

I am not sticking my head in the sand. Far from it. I think the husband and I do a good job of staying on top of what is going on around us. We simply don’t allow it to distract us from what we need to be doing. We focus on our sphere of control—which is a lot smaller than most people realize—and we’ve arranged our life so that we can respond to whatever happens. I am ever grateful for that online homesteading group I belong to, because it’s an oasis of get stuff done sanity in the midst of all the handwringing.

We Have Some Snow

Winter storms invariably are followed by breathtakingly sunny days:

The husband was out clearing paths on Thursday, so I followed him around. You’ll notice he’s wearing bright orange in case he has to direct traffic or falls into a snowbank. (He would tell me that comment is irreverent, but it’s still funny because I bought him that coat.)

We have anywhere from 2-3’ of snow on the ground. In some spots, it has drifted deeper.

A tree did indeed fall down in the pig pasture.

I am always amazed that trees know exactly which direction to fall in order to cause the most damage. If it had fallen to the right, it would have landed in the middle of an open pig pasture instead of on top of the garden fence.

The forecast for this week is temps in the mid- to upper-30s and rain or snow, so all of this will become an ugly, mucky mess.

I ordered seeds yesterday. Hope springs eternal.

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I am working on view B of Burda 6146:

I actually bought this pattern to make the blouse on the left, because that is very much like the one I found at Kohls last spring that was too short on me. (I will lose those fussy cuffs when I make it.) I liked the top on the right, too, although every time I looked at this pattern envelope, I imagined view B in a stable knit, not a woven as called for in the pattern.

I traced both views a few months ago, lengthening them (of course), and put the pattern on the pile of future projects. The other day, I ran across a length of fabric in the stash that I thought would be good for a muslin for view B, so yesterday, I took it out and got started. I can tell by the construction that the fabric is a jersey knit, not a ponte, but it’s a beefy jersey knit. It has to be a Walmart remnant because it’s teal, and I wouldn’t deliberately order teal from a fabric supplier. I have too much teal in my closet as it is. It looks and feels like a polyester/rayon blend.

When I discovered I could make my own clothes, and that I could make them so they fit me properly, in colors I love, I went a bit nuts. I made a lot of pieces that were quick to run up on the serger. I’m tired of eating Twinkies, though, and I have enough of those kinds of tops and pants in my closet. If I am going to continue to make clothes, it’s time for me to slow down and make items that require more time and care and that incorporate other construction techniques. View B of that pattern appears simple, and it’s not complicated. It cannot be done entirely on the serger, however. The V-neck has a facing. The facing has to be sewn into the neck opening on the sewing machine and then understitched.

As much as I love my Janome 6600P, it requires some sweet talking to get it to sew knits. That’s the one issue that has me thinking, occasionally, of trading it in for a different machine, although it did well enough with this top. I made it far enough in the assembly to try on the top and assess the fit. I’ll post a photo in the next blog post, but so far, it’s looking promising.

I have had good luck with Burda patterns.

I’ve been following a new YouTube channel called Calcedonia Sewing. The sewist is a woman in Germany and she does a lot of magazine reviews. In Europe—much more so than in the US—patterns come as part of magazine subscriptions. An issue might have 20-30 patterns, all printed on top of each other on large pieces of paper inside the magazine. (They have to be traced, obviously.)

Camelia reviews the monthly issues of Burda, Knip Mode, and Patrones magazines. I am enjoying these videos. She has an accent, but I am hardly going to complain about someone who speaks a second language fluently, and I love the musicality of her speech. She’s also brutally honest about what she thinks. Sometimes I find her comments hilarious but spot on. Check out her channel.

I Am An 8

Another iteration of the knot top:

The length is good, but the top does not look as good on my body as it does on the dress form. There are issues around my waist and hips. That sent me on a safari through my fitting books for help.

The husband is baffled by my obsession with clothing. He gets up every morning, puts on shirts and pants that do not match, in the same size he has worn since college, and goes out the door. Clothing, for him, is entirely utilitarian. I am obsessed because this is a puzzle. This is a code I am determined to crack. I want to be able to make clothing that fits me well and looks good, and if I am going to teach fitting classes, I want to be able to transfer that knowledge to other people—people who are shaped differently than me.

After looking through all of my fitting books, I determined that I have a high hip curve. (I remember Ryliss talking about this when I took my private class in Tacoma in November.) That means that the widest portion of my hips is up near my waistline. My hips flare out and then go straight down, as opposed to someone who has a more gentle angle from the waist that ends in wider hips 7-9" below the waist. A lot of people with high hip curves also have “hip dips,” although I don’t. A hip dip is where you have a little divot in the side between your hips and thighs.

Once I had that piece of information about hip curves, I went to Pinterest. This, I think, is where Pinterest shines as a research tool. I searched “high hip curve fitting” followed by “high hip curve drafting,” and all sorts of interesting stuff started popping up.

If you spend any time in the deep end of the fashion/style pool, you are bound to run across articles about body shapes. Are you an apple or a pear? An inverted triangle or a rectangle? If you don’t want to be categorized as fruit or a geometric shape, perhaps the Kibbe body type system is for you. You’ll be a Dramatic or a Romantic or something else that sounds like it came out of a gothic novel.

I ran across an article that mentioned the “8” body shape. This is a subcategory of the hourglass that includes people like me with high hip curves. If you’ve ever put on a dress with a belt and been told (as I have) that you look like a “sausage tied in the middle,” you might be an 8. When Ryliss pronounced me a “rectangle,” I was a bit baffled as I do have a well-defined waist.

This also explains why I love love love high-waisted pants. The 8 body shape also tends to have a longer rise. Hey, that’s me! And if you put mid-rise or low-rise pants on an 8, with a defined waist but straight hips, there is nothing to anchor them in place. High rise pants that fit around my waist keep my pants from falling down.

This is where things get into the weeds. I started looking at some style advice for 8’s and it was all over the map. Some articles recommended peplums. I look like an idiot in peplums. Other articles recommended wearing tops and dresses nipped in at the waist. That only works if your waist is in the same location as ready-to-wear clothing, not 2" below it. Some articles said 8’s should never wear tunics. Other articles said tunics and tops that skim past the waist area are the best choice for 8’s.

[There is a metaphor for life in there somewhere.]

I thought about the tops I like to wear and realized that I very rarely wear anything with a defined waistline. My favorite pieces of clothing are the tunics and tops that skim past the waist, although I have to be careful that they don’t look too much like maternity wear. Those are the silhouettes that I find most flattering.

So. I have arrived at the next station on this fitting journey. The first stop was realizing how long my torso is compared to RTW industry standards, which means dropping the waistline by at least 2" on any pattern I make. The second stop is where I’ve figured out that even though I now know where to put the waistline on the clothing I make, having a defined waistline may not be the most flattering choice.

[I have fantasies of living on a planet where I am not an outlier—a planet where clothing fits me, people are ruled by common sense, and I can buy a diesel station wagon that gets 40 mpg (or better) because that’s what I want to drive.]

I’m going to go through all my patterns today. I want to take a hard look at what works and what doesn’t, and I think that by the time I make the next iteration of this knot top, I may have cracked this part of the code—for me, at least.

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For my Mennonite friends who may be reading this blog (if you made it this far), I have a favor to ask. Our minister retired in October of 2022. We hired a dynamic young woman to be our transitional pastor, with the shared understanding that she would be with us for about 18 months while we undertook a search for a settled pastor. (The Mennonite church prefers to use the word “settled” rather than “permanent.”) She comes from a different faith background, but that hasn’t been an issue.

Nothing about this process—neither the part about hiring a transitional pastor nor the part about searching for a settled pastor—has gone according to plan. (Obviously, because we have a former Presbyterian minister serving our congregation.) Some of us are chafing at the rules that we are being asked to follow, because it’s obvious that God is following a different set of rules. That points up the folly, I think, of attempting to put God into any kind of box, but that’s a sermon for another day.

We have a listing for our pastoral opening on the MCUSA website. It’s been up for two months with not so much as a nibble. We are aware that this process could take a while, but we’re also aware that the traditional channels may not work for us. If any of you out there know of anyone considering a pastoral position, would you send them our way? Northwest Montana is a beautiful place to live—occasional -40F days notwithstanding—and we have a wonderful, supportive congregation. Thank you!

King of the Coop

I meant to post this picture a few days ago when it was so cold. This is Dave, my rooster.

Dave was in this spot every time one of us went into the coop. As the husband noted, “Dave’s not stupid.”

I’m going to have to incubate a few eggs this spring to try to get a baby rooster. Dave will be four years old in March and that’s getting up there for a rooster. When I get an exceptional rooster, I like to keep his genetics going. Dave’s father was a Buff Orpington and his mother was a New Hampshire Red, so any baby isn’t going to be a purebred by any stretch of the imagination, but I want one with Dave’s personality.

We ended up with about 10" of new snow, but somehow managed to avoid the blizzard. The wind blew a little bit, but nothing like those windstorms we often get. I see that by the end of January, our temps are supposed to be up close to 40F. The husband really wants to get back to work. He is not enjoying his enforced vacation.

I did not sew yesterday. I spent most of the day sorting and organizing paperwork and other stuff. I still have a few things to update in QuickBooks but the bulk of that work is done.

While I was working, I watched one of the Special Operations Equipment build videos. Special Operations Equipment makes tactical gear in Camden, Tennessee, and their facility is where the Self-Reliance Festival is held. SOE is owned by John and Amanda Willis, and John has a thriving YouTube channel. The video I watched yesterday was of him making a dog leash. I couldn’t see the front of the machine, but I am pretty sure he was sewing on a Consew 206. I like watching his build videos because he’s is a great teacher and explains everything he is doing and why. Also, he does dumb things and says bad words just like I do, and that makes me feel better. (His videos are a bit salty. You’ve been warned.) I always pick up some useful tip from watching him sew. When I was there in October, Amanda had just acquired a beautiful Singer Red Eye treadle.

It’s time to order seeds for the garden and plant sale. I found last year’s order while sorting paperwork. Thinking about the garden is not easy when there is so much snow out there, but we have our first planning meeting for the plant sale this week, so I’ve got to have some idea of what I’m going to grow. We’re also resurrecting our fundraising garden tour in July, and I really need to get started on the herb garden plan. I have the luxury of being able to spend some money on infrastructure for both gardens this year. The herb garden will get raised beds, and both gardens need a comprehensive watering system instead of something cobbled together.

The husband says that a tree fell down in the pig pasture in last week’s storm and took out part of the garden fence. He’ll be able to fix the fence once the snow melts. I am thinking of hiking out there to take a look (and maybe a photo).

This is also the time of year that Susan orders scion wood for grafting apple trees. She always finds the most interesting varieties. Of course, everything sounds delicious in January.

I think today is going to be devoted to trying to get that knot top pattern squared away. I might also start the Oxbow Tote, finally. I have no desire to go anywhere—running errands in town on Tuesday was a slog. I’m driving the Acura until the husband figures out what is going on with the BMW. The Acura does okay in the snow—it has snow tires—but it’s not ideal.

Knot Top Rescue

I had enough Walmart remnant fabric left over to re-cut the tops and make the front bodice piece again, and this time, I was careful about where the print landed:

The knot portion of this top is perfect. I like that it is a V-neck but it’s not so low that it exposes my bra. I am still not 100% happy with the length—the top feels too short—so I am going to play around with that some more. Interestingly, it’s the same length as the original top, which has short sleeves, and I wear that one frequently. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that this is a winter top with long sleeves.

I also ran up another Burda 6315:

I didn’t have enough of this fabric for a Toaster Sweater or a Nathalie, so I made the shorter version of Burda 6315. This fabric is a French terry from Knitfabric.com. I adore the print.

I am getting a better sense of what lengths work with my proportions, although “cropped” is not ever going to be one of those lengths.

It’s amazing how a slight change or two can alter the look of a top. The New Look 6555 keyhole top is a great example. That’s this one:

The first one I made was view B, with the handkerchief hem, because on me, longer is always better, right?

Nope. That version never looked good on me. The proportions were off. We were making that pattern in a class one day and one of my students tried on that version, too, and she had the same problem. (She’s about my height.) I walked over to her and folded up the bottom so that it looked like view C and voila!—much better. Now, when I make this pattern, I make view C and I am much happier with it.

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I ran across an interesting comment on a sewing-related YouTube video the other day. The commenter complained that content creators who sew hundreds of garments a year for their YouTube channels are no better than people who indulge in “fast fashion” and buy tons of cheap clothing just because it’s cheap.

Let us first acknowledge the fact that there are a lot of unhappy people in the world who take to social media to vent their spleens. It took me forever to get my Twitter feed curated so that I see posts from clothing historians and fiber artists instead of wackos looking for opportunities to argue about politics. The world is also full of a lot of people who aren’t doing anything productive with their time but who take joy in criticizing people who are.

I find it fascinating that people search out opportunities to consume sewing content while at the same time complaining that content creators are creating too much content.

[I know I said I thought that the Vlogmas videos were oversaturating the YouTube sewing channels, but I was more curious about how daily posting affected their analytics than anything else. It’s important to be consistent, but I find that when I post too much on the blog, traffic decreases.]

Once again, it’s time to point out that if you don’t like a channel/blog/podcast, don’t watch/read/listen to it. That goes for this blog, too. I’m not forcing anyone to come here and read what I write.

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We are still under a winter storm warning here as of 5 am. The husband has resigned himself to spending the day moving snow. The worst of it is supposed to come this afternoon. We shall see what materializes. I am planning to spend the day organizing tax paperwork. I don’t have to do as much data compilation as I used to now that our accountant can get into our QuickBooks account, but I still need to organize the paperwork for storage. I used to try to do this in real time—I carefully filed each invoice and receipt into labeled file folders—but a few years ago I just started chucking all the paperwork into a box. That means that I have to spend much of one day in January sorting and filing, but I am willing to do that in order to avoid daily filing tasks.

If I have time this afternoon, I’ll see what trouble I can get into in my sewing room.

Move Those Flowers

I pulled out a Walmart remnant and my reverse-engineered knot top pattern yesterday afternoon, just to make something quick. I cut the pieces, carefully followed the order of operations I had written down, sewed the center seam together, then opened the front bodice piece and laid it out on my cutting table:

Oh, what an unfortunate arrangement of the print. The only thing more unfortunate would have been to have those flowers separated by about four inches.

Note to self (also written on pattern pieces): For large-scale prints, cut each front piece separately and check the placement of the design.

I have to see if I have enough fabric left over to recut the front pattern pieces. If not, this may just get chalked up as a learning experience.

I think it’s important to show failures as well as successes. Our lives can’t be—and aren’t, if we are being honest—an Instagram parade of perfection.

[Speaking of Instagram, which I am beginning to hate as much as I hate QuickBooks Online, it won’t let me into my account unless I pass its Captcha verification every single time. It keeps telling me it has detected unusual activity in my account, which is weird because I hardly ever post to IG. The whole thing is getting extremely tedious. The issue seems to have started when I opened a second IG account for the podcast.]

I might not sew today. I need to edit a couple of podcast episodes and prepare show notes. I did pull a combination of fabrics over the weekend for the Oxbow Tote and could work on that. We’re under another winter storm watch for Tuesday night into Thursday morning and today is a holiday, so I’ll run all my errands tomorrow.

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I cleaned out the lettuce-growing system last week and replanted it:

The one part of this system that I’d like to change is the need for these rooting plugs.

The rooting plugs are a one-use item. They are not hideously expensive—about $18 for a bag of 50—but I don’t like that they can’t be used more than once. One or two bags will get us through the winter; once the lettuce plants are established, I can cut them and let them regrow 3-4 times before they exhaust themselves. Some people use rockwool, I think, but I don’t know if that can be reused, either.

When it’s up and running and I have it on a succession planting schedule, this system provides us with a lot of lettuce. And the difference in taste between what we grow and what comes in those plastic containers from the grocery store is huge.

We Are Montanans!

It’s only -18F this morning. We are supposed to warm up to 12F by Tuesday, and then into the high 30s a week later. No doubt we’ll all be running around in T-shirts and flip-flops by then.

This was part of a text conversation amongst our worship leader group yesterday:

I laughed. And even if only the worship leaders are there in person, we will be able to provide a worship service for everyone on Zoom. I’m ready to get out of the house anyway.

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I quilted some yesterday, but most of the day was spent going through my patterns and re-tracing and refining the ones I love most. The Toaster Sweater pattern had to be lengthened. I need two versions of Burda 6315—one shorter, one tunic length—and I want the dress length version of Simplicity 9018, although not as long as the one in the pattern.

While I worked, I watched Michael Snyder and some of his buddies livestream from Vista House, which is east of Portland along I-84, up above the Columbia River. They were clocking winds of 90+ mph. At one point, the hood of the car of another storm chaser up there blew off the car. That was wild. Portland (and points south) got hammered by that storm off the Pacific. I hope my friends who live there are doing okay.

I also caught up on Gail Yellen serger videos. YouTube algorithms annoy me. I am subscribed to a number of channels, but I have to go searching for their content because YT keeps wanting to show me things it thinks might interest me. You know what interests me? The channels to which I have subscribed. Apparently, Gail Yellen released a new product last fall (October) called Thread Fusion, which is a multi-spool thread stand that fits sergers and sewing machines and allows for the use of multiple spools of thread for thread blending.

Let’s say you want to use four strands of embroidery thread in the upper looper. There is no place to put those extra spools. This thread stand slips over the spool pin and voila!—four spool pins instead of just one.

I totally missed this product launch. I’ll be ordering one of these.

[Yes, I am aware that I can hit the notification button on a channel. However, I tend not to want to do that because I get way too many notifications as it is. Also, I usually watch YouTube on the TV in my cutting room, and notifications don’t show up there like they do on my computer.]

Gail Yellen also has a new YouTube series called Serger Savvy. The first episode was released last week. I’ll probably watch that one this afternoon.

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The husband and I had a conversation yesterday morning in which he made a comment that I’ve been chewing on since. He makes no bones about the fact that he thinks I self-censor myself too much on the blog. He said—I am paraphrasing here—that I have a platform and he believes there are a lot of people who want to hear what I think and that I should stop holding back.

Some of you are thinking, “She is one of the most opinionated people I know!” but you would be surprised what I don’t say. Part of that is because I have a lot of friends on the left-leaning side of the social and political spectrum. I may not agree with them, but I respect their right to their opinions. I don’t always get that same respect in return, so sometimes it’s easier not to say anything.

Part of it is because I have caused minor anxiety attacks in a few people to whom I have expressed my opinion. (That sounds like an exaggeration, but it’s not.) I don’t see the benefit in attempting to black pill my friends if it causes them discomfort.

And finally, I don’t enjoy conflict or drama. I don’t enjoy people attacking me because they disagree with me. (See comment about respecting other people’s opinions, above.) Civil discourse has gone extinct in this country.

You can let me know what you think, either in the comments or via e-mail. I can’t promise that I am going to let everything hang out, but maybe I’ll be a bit more open about certain topics.

Brrrrrr

I feel like this week has been a repeat of the week between Christmas and New Year’s Day. I don’t know what day it is, the daily routine has been upended, no one is working, and we’re all just waiting for things to get back to normal.

As promised, a photo of the thermometer on the porch at 4 am:

Kalispell broke its previous low temperature record for January 12 (and probably will for January 13, as well).

The husband has been collecting eggs every few hours because otherwise they freeze. The chickens seem to be doing okay. We have two heat lamps in the coop and the flock congregates underneath them. He told me that Dave claimed the prime real estate underneath one of them, which is good. His comb and wattle could get frostbittten otherwise.

We don’t warm up above 0F until almost mid-week. That will feel like a heat wave.

I made another Nathalie yesterday:

The fabric is a Minerva cotton/lycra French terry in the Celestial Motion colorway. It was very easy to work with. For this version, I made the body a bit longer and hemmed it instead of adding a band. This hits me about mid-thigh. I might run up another one today that is closer to dress length, or a length I’d be comfortable wearing with leggings or tights and a pair of boots.

This is such a customizable pattern, a point I plan to emphasize when I teach this class. It can be banded or hemmed (both sleeves and bottom), lengthened, shortened, made with long sleeves or short sleeves, with drawstrings in the cowl or without. Although I like that cowl very much, I would also like to try scaling it back a bit so that it crosses over but doesn’t fold down. I’ve got a couple of tops (from Kohls) with necklines like that.

I might also start an Oxbow Tote. Anna Graham, of Noodlehead, is running a sewalong for that pattern. I watched the first video yesterday. I’m having trouble deciding what fabric to use, though. She shows several different combinations in the video. Should I use a cotton print quilted to batting/foam? A canvas print? Waxed canvas? I am casually shopping my stash to see if anything leaps out at me.

Situations like this are why I have a large stash. I can work on any project I want to and not have to stop mid-creativity because I’m missing some key component.

I pulled a pair of yoga pants out of my closet yesterday that need to be hemmed. I know it’s a trend to wear them long and let them pool around your ankles, but that’s a recipe for tripping and falling. (Also, it shreds the fabric!) I unzipped the original coverstitch hem and cut 2" off the length. I’ll re-hem them the next time I have black thread in the coverstitch machine.

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I joined the Washington State Quilter’s Guild Spokane chapter and I also joined Artists and Craftsmen of the Flathead, which is a local group. WSG has a lot of interesting programs in Spokane. ACF is also very active. I think it’s important to support these groups even if I am not participating regularly.

My podcast interview on Thursday was with two of the organizers involved with Sew Expo, where I am teaching in March. That will air this Tuesday, which is also the day that registration opens for Sew Expo. The interview I did on Wednesday will air the following week.

Things They Don't Show You on TV

It’s -20F right now. I am waiting until tomorrow morning to take a picture of the thermometer because it is supposed to be even colder then. That’s air temp, not wind chill.

Yesterday was kind of a wild ride. It wasn’t the worst winter storm I can remember, but it had some teeth nonetheless. I think it was worse down in the valley, judging by the reports and pictures I saw on our local Facebook group. At one point, the county asked people to stay home and off the roads. The snow started coming down early in the morning, and the winds started not long after. Amazingly, we never lost power. A small tree did come down in the yard.

Someone in that local Facebook group posted a picture of the predicted cold temps across the state of Montana, with the caption, “The exodus should start about now. John Dutton didn’t warn them about this.” 😂 (That’s a reference to the TV show “Yellowstone,” for those of you who have never seen the series.)

[During the winter of 1996-97, we got a ridiculous amount of snow. We had so much snow that our dogs were up walking around on the roof of the garage. It started snowing on October 15 and the last of the snow didn’t melt until the end of May. And there was not a U-Haul to be found that spring, because so many people were fleeing northwest Montana.]

I wondered if our annual firefighter dinner, scheduled for last night, would be canceled. Our fire department trustees host a catered meal every winter as a thank-you to the firefighters. The husband checked his e-mail in the afternoon and said, “They are planning to serve dinner at 6:30, so we should be there by 6:00.”

This is Montana. We don’t pass up a prime rib dinner because of a silly little snowstorm (or because the county asks us to stay off the roads). I donned my long johns, a pair of my me-made ponte pants, one of my Burda 6315 tops, wool socks, my pashmina scarf, a pair of gloves, and my grandmother’s wool coat and hopped into the plow truck with the husband. By the time we left, the winds had died down a bit but the temperature had dropped to -10F.

[My maternal grandmother had a beautiful black wool coat with Persian lamb trim that she wore to church every Sunday. I admired it for many years and joked that she should leave it to me in her will. After she died, my mother sent it to me. It is the heaviest and warmest coat I own and I wear it when the weather is frightful.]

This was my view from the passenger’s seat as we traveled down our road:

Our plow truck is my old 1999 Dodge 2500. The husband said that he is reminded that it is 25 years old every time he drives it and then gets back into one of his new trucks. He has it equipped with chains for extra traction. Although a bit on the rustic side, it does a good job when we need it. The county plows had been out, but there were quite a few places where the roads had drifted shut to one lane.

The 50 or so of us who braved the weather enjoyed a delicious dinner and some visiting. The husband and I were back home by 8:30. Pretty much everything is shut down today because of the extreme cold, so we’ll be staying here.

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My sew-jo seems to have gone on vacation; I’ve been spending my time this week cleaning, organizing, and prepping projects. I’ve been working on the paisley quilting for an hour or two every day. I also basted the baby quilt with batting and backing, cut more scraps into 5" squares for Pat, who is making comforter tops, and pressed fabric. I’ve got another Nathalie ready to cut out. We have a class for that pattern scheduled for March 20 and the store needs a display sample.

I think we got the class registration issue straightened out. Having been a teacher at national fiber events, I have certain expectations about class etiquette. Things at the local level tend to be a bit less formal, but less formal still needs to be respectful of the teacher’s time.

I am going to finish up paperwork this morning and then get started on that Nathalie top.

So Much For That Forecast

No wind, no additional snow beyond what we got Monday night. Everything seems to have tracked south of here. Oh, well. This just trains people to ignore doom-and-gloom forecasts, and then we’ll get hit with something big and no one will be prepared.

The winter weather advisory expires this morning. A winter storm watch starts tonight and extends through Friday morning. I may try to dash into town mid-day and finish the errands I didn’t get done on Monday. I did get heat lamp bulbs. The low Friday night is supposed to be -30F (air temp), and I don’t want Dave to get frostbite.

We rescheduled yesterday’s canceled serger class for two weeks from today. The class coordinator is helping me work out some issues I am having with class registrations—or, in this case, non-registrations. I decide whether or not to hold a class based on who has signed up and is in the computer. I canceled yesterday’s class because as of Monday, no one was registered, only to find out later that a couple of people were told they could just “show up.” I find that very disrespectful of my time and effort as a teacher. I need to know who is coming to class so I can prepare properly. A few times, students have just “shown up” without a pattern or any needed supplies because they didn’t register and thus didn’t get the supply list. I also get paid by who has registered for the class, so having people come to class who aren’t registered means that I have to do extra administrative work to make sure the class list is accurate.

We will get it sorted, but that has been a disappointing start to 2024.

I prepped pattern pieces for the Oxbow Tote yesterday.

I have no idea if or when I’ll get to this, but at least it’s ready to go if the urge strikes. There are two sizes, so I prepped both.

I’ve got a podcast interview today and another one tomorrow. I said to the husband that my goal is to get the podcast to a point where people are asking me if they can be on the podcast. I’m excited about today’s interview. It’s with a young woman I’ve known since she was about 12 years old, and she has a very successful sewing-based business here in Montana. I’m not as interested in interviewing celebrity sewists as much as I want to talk to regular people who are doing fascinating things with their sewing.

I also worked on the blue quilt yesterday. Quilting that paisley pattern is very relaxing. It’s going to take a couple of weeks, but I am enjoying the process.

And I need to prep for my sewing classes on Saturday. I have nine students signed up—four in the morning and five in the afternoon—and we will be making pillowcases. I’m thinking I’ll offer that class again in a couple of months, and I also want to do one on canning. I’ll schedule that one for later in the summer when we can set up a propane stove outside and make pickles. The kitchen in our community center is small and mostly used for storage, so it’s not a good spot for canning classes.

What Will Be the Weather?

I’m still on the paperwork train, although the new year is starting to settle into a routine. I am such a creature of habit. Enjoying my 4 am cup of coffee alone in my office sets the tone for my day. I get a bit discombobulated on those rare occasions when the husband is up at the same time because he has to pour concrete at 6 am.

He’s not pouring concrete at 6 am today. We’re waiting to see what this winter storm does. It seems to have petered out somewhere between Spokane and here, although we got an inch of snow overnight and it’s snowing as I write this. It actually warmed up enough in Spokane that what started there as snow changed over to rain. The big question is how much wind we will get today.

I think the weather forecasters really have no idea what is going on until they look out the window.

And once again, Snoqualmie Pass was closed last night due to spinouts and collisions. The pass is currently under a blizzard warning—”additional snow accumulations of 8 to 24 inches with winds gusting as high as 65 miles per hour,” but I am sure there are people still trying to drive through there who are completely unprepared for those conditions.

I ran errands yesterday so I wouldn’t have to be out and about today. I also canceled today’s serger mastery class because no one had registered. Unfortunately, I had to cut my errand-running short because the BMW is having issues again. The check engine light isn’t on, but the engine is doing this weird hitching/hesitation at road speeds above 50 mph. I had this same problem over the summer. Back then, the husband waved his hands and said a few incantations over the car and the problem went away, but now it’s back.

[I am only half-joking. That about sums up what he did.]

I am trying to resign myself to the fact that I may have to get a new vehicle. I am just so annoyed by the fact that I will have to give up a car that gets 40 mpg for one that gets half that. That makes no sense.

Okay, enough griping. I did start quilting a top yesterday:

It took me forever to decide how to quilt this. I couldn’t settle on a good ruler pattern. Defaulting to loops would have been too easy. In the end, I decided on paisleys, which I love. I am using 50wt Wonderfil Konfetti in both the top and bottom. A 40wt thread would have been too heavy with this much quilting. Paisleys will take a bit longer than loops, but I got into the rhythm easily yesterday and quilted for about an hour. This was the right choice.

I got the backing for the baby quilt, so I’ll get that put together next.

This came in yesterday’s mail:

It’s our annual box of cookies. DD#1 had the good sense to marry a man whose mother is a phenomenal cook and baker, and she sends us a batch of cookies every year. I love getting them in January rather than before Christmas, because by now, all the Christmas cookies have been eaten.

This week’s podcast is up. Listeners get to hear me talk about sewing machine needles for half an hour. I’ve got some fun interviews coming up in the next couple of weeks.

I'm Teaching at Sew Expo

We got our Sew Expo teacher information on Friday, along with badges to use on social media.

The class catalog is live on the site, and registration opens on January 16. I am teaching three classes:

• Make Holes in Your Knitting: The Basics of Lace

• What Do All These Symbols Mean? How to Read a Knitting Chart

and, of course,

• Twisting and Turning: Basic Cable Stitches for Texture and Design

These are all classes I’ve taught before in some way, shape, or form, and I am excited to be teaching knitting again. Pass the word around!

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I put together the baby quilt top yesterday and I basted another quilt top with batting and backing. I don’t think it’s my imagination that quilt batting is getting thinner. (This was Warm Company Warm and Natural.) Like everything else, the quality is going downhill.

I love my rotating cutting mat:

This made trimming the hourglass units a breeze. The baby quilt pattern called for eight different pink fabrics and a yard(ish) of white background. That was supposed to make 64 hourglass units. When I got all the units up the design wall—a queen-size white flannel sheet tacked to the wall next to my sewing machine—I discovered I was missing one unit. I got a ninth pink fabric and made four more units and swapped those out with four original ones, just so things wouldn’t be quite so matchy-matchy.

I found the missing unit under something else after the top was sewn together. Oh, well.

I also put a border on the baby quilt. The pattern didn’t call for it, but I decided the quilt needed a border. I used a 10th fabric for that. I have to get a backing for it before I can quilt it, but I’d like to have it done before the end of January.

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Watching the weather forecasts for this coming week has been very entertaining. We got roughly 6" of new snow yesterday, but there is a much larger storm coming in off the Pacific on Tuesday. (The phrase “bomb cyclone” is being tossed around, which sounds ominous but is a legitimate weather term.) I said to the husband that I suspect the Tuesday storm may bring us a windstorm. We get these “back door” cold fronts that come down the mountains from the east, and they’re usually accompanied by a pressure gradient that causes a lot of wind. We’re about due for one. And the storm on Tuesday will be followed by a drop in temperatures. The high on Friday is forecast to be -9F. THAT IS AIR TEMP, NOT WIND CHILL. The low is forecast to be -23F. I need to make sure we have enough heat lamp bulbs for the chicken coop. Hopefully, this cold weather won’t bring a string of house fires.

Of course, I-90 over Snoqualmie Pass was closed again last night due to people in AWD vehicles thinking they are invincible. I continue to be amazed that no one has been killed.

I am mostly caught up from the week of being under the weather. If you haven’t noticed, the podcast did get moved to its own website. That has made keeping track of things on my end much simpler. I’ve still got a thousand little details to track down, but at least now each activity has its own home.

A Fabric Delivery by Royal Mail

Minerva had a sale at the end of 2023, so I took that opportunity to order some fabric. I bought a couple of yards of this luscious green Meet Milk Ottoman Rib fabric:

That looks to me like a machine-knit tuck stitch. That doesn’t clear up the mystery of the handknit version of Ottoman Rib, but it gave me an excuse to buy this fabric. I think it will end up as a cardigan of some sort.

I also bought two yards of the Minerva loop back French terry in the Celestial Motion colorway. (I also have their crushed velvet in this colorway.)

The fabric is a cotton/lycra blend but has such a wonderful hand that I thought at first it had some rayon in it. I’d like to make a Nathalie from this.

It’s a good thing I don’t live in the UK because I’d want to buy everything that Minerva sells.

While I was in town yesterday, I stopped in at Joann Fabrics. Interfacing was 50% off, so I replenished my supply of knit interfacing. I relieved the remnant rack of half a dozen pieces of quilting cotton at 75% off. And Simplicity patterns are $1.99 this weekend, so I bought two.

This is S9707, an oversized buttoned shirt:

And S9467, a buttoned shirt with some gathers and ruffles:

I am not a gathers and ruffles kind of girl, and I tend to avoid buttoned shirts because it’s hard to get them to fit properly, but both patterns would be suitable for that Kaffe cotton sateen. And I can make things as samples even if I don’t wear them. Sometimes it’s about the process, not the product.

I have all my pink baby quilt units sewn together, but now I need to cut them apart, mix them up, and sew them back together. I think I’ll be working on that project today. I ran errands yesterday and will try to avoid going to town again until next Tuesday, when I am scheduled to teach a serger mastery class. It’s snowing every day, the roads aren’t great, and I have seen way too many near-miss accidents from people driving like idiots. I’ll stay home and sew, thank you.

All the Pinks

I am enjoying having some time to quilt again, and the break from making clothing is nice, too. I started a couple of baby quilts yesterday. What a delight to pull out the bin of pink fabrics and see what plays well together

I’ve have a pattern for another project, but I haven’t pulled the fabric for that one yet. That quilt could be done with 16 fat quarters, so I may use the Tilda bundles that I bought for myself with my birthday money. Or not. We’ll see.

I also cut apart the quilted potholder sandwich, prepped a table runner for quilting on the Q20, and pressed the backing fabric for a quilt. That top may get basted with batting today. I embroidered a bit after dinner last night. Forward progress, little by little.

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I parked myself at my desk yesterday morning and did computer stuff until I couldn’t stand it anymore. A big chunk of what I’m dealing with is related to the homestead foundation and has to be done before our board meeting Monday night. I am also moving my podcast to its own website. Thankfully, I was able to clone this website. The podcast website will look different, but at least I didn’t have to load all the files again.

I have built enough websites in Squarespace that I am considered a “professional” and have access to a special set of perks. Oh, the irony. I would not call myself a website professional. I certainly wouldn’t want to do website design 24/7. I am proud of the one I did for the homestead foundation. That website, more than anything, allowed us to level up our game because now we can offer online registration for events and and take donations.

There are always a thousand niggling little details that come along, though, and have to be dealt with. This is the time of year to do that.

I also e-mailed the accountant and asked him what he needed from me for tax prep. We’re using QuickBooks Online now, so he has access to our files. He e-mailed me back and said to let him know when I had reconciled the bank statements through the end of the year and had compiled some additional information. I responded that I had reconciled the December bank statement at 6 am on New Year’s Day so that was all done. 😇

[I am a bit obsessive about tracking pennies here at Chez Schuster-Szabo, but I don’t think that’s a bad thing. Also, the accountant appreciates clients who don’t wait until the last minute to do their taxes.]

Easier tax prep may be the only positive thing that came out of moving to QBO this year.

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It looks like we may be making up for our snow deficit soon. There are systems moving into the Pacific Northwest and the forecast includes snow every day for the next week. The end of next week is supposed to be frigid, with low temps in the negative numbers. Winter might finally be here.

Seeds for the New Year

The goal for this week is to catch up on everything I didn’t get done last week while not falling further behind on this week’s tasks. Most of what I need to do is paperwork, so I’m not doing as much sewing.

Our homestead foundation fundraising committee had its monthly meeting last evening. I joined this committee halfway through 2022. At that time, our former pastor was the chairman. When he retired in October 2022, I took over chairing the committee. (The church and the homestead foundation are not connected, but some of us are involved in both.) He had laid an excellent foundation for our formal fundraising efforts. The fundraising goal in 2022 was $15,000, which we met. I kept that same goal for 2023, but thanks to the hard work of a whole lot of people, our fundraising total for 2023 ended up being $24,291.05. We’re hoping to keep that momentum going into 2024.

It’s tempting to judge successful fundraising efforts by the “big” events, but when we break down the totals, the smaller events together often add up to the lion’s share of income. Every little bit helps.

I’ve got two sewing classes scheduled for next Saturday at the community center, which the homestead foundation owns and manages. We will be making pillowcases. There will be a morning session and an afternoon session, and each class has slots for six students. The class fee includes materials and machines and is donated to the foundation. We’ve had other people offer classes the same way. Susan did a pruning class last spring that was wildly successful. We’d like to build up a reputation as a place where community members can come and learn some of these skills.

Spring is rushing up at me already. I am chairman of the annual plant sale, in May, and we have a plant sale planning meeting in a couple of weeks. We have also decided to resurrect the annual summer garden tour hosted by the homestead foundation. That is scheduled for July. I need to start looking at seed catalogs and deciding what I want to grow in my own garden. The husband and I have been discussing infrastructure projects and where I am planning to put certain crops this year. My herb garden will be ready to replant in the spring, too. I know a lot of people think the month of January lasts forever, but it always seems to zoom by for me.

I haven’t been out there recently, but this is probably what the garden looks like at the moment. Maybe not this much snow. This is an old picture and we just haven’t had the precipitation this year because of El Nino. It is supposed to snow this weekend, though, so we might catch up. I’ll be happy if the freezing fog goes away. We have been socked in under inversions for a couple of weeks now.

I did quilt a potholder sandwich yesterday afternoon after running errands in town. I like having these smaller projects stacked up and ready to go when I have some time here and there. I need to get back to my neglected embroidery projects, but I’ve been reading in the evenings lately. I’m about halfway through this book and enjoying it very much:

The author relates stories about her hunt for vintage fabric at auctions and estate sales.

I also got an e-mail from Minerva and note that they have just launched a new (free!) series called Master Your Overlocker. (coughDeanacough) I think their videos are always very well done and I’ll be watching this one because I can always learn something.

Hello 2024

The old year went out with a virus. Whatever I picked up last Tuesday decided to hang around. I would start to feel better, then not, then feel better again, then not. I skipped church yesterday to avoid passing this on to anyone else.

I tried to be good about resting when I needed to, but oh!—that is so hard when I wanted to be up getting things done. And everything that was on my to-do list from last week has been pushed forward. I’m starting 2024 behind the curve and that is not my preferred place to be.

I did manage to get one generator cover made, which was the #1 item on my to-do list for the week between Christmas and New Year’s. Thankfully, I had the old one to take apart and use as a pattern:

This was a relatively quick sew once I had it all cut out. Certainly, it was faster and easier than drafting one from scratch. It’s that cylindrical piece on top that is the tricky part.

I still have two smaller covers on the list, but I told the husband that I repaired his pants and made a generator cover for him this week, so he has to go to the end of the line and wait his turn again.

I think my voice has improved enough that I’ll be able to record the podcast today—again, that was something I wanted to have done last week. Ah, well. I’ll just have to do the best I can to get back on track.

The word of the year is CULTIVATE, but sometimes you can’t get into the garden because of the weather.

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One of the pervasive myths in the homesteading community is that to be a “real” homesteader, you have to do everything from scratch yourself. (And document it for your YouTube channel.) Hahahahahaha. It’s worth noting that a lot of those people who champion that viewpoint are wearing Carhartt clothing purchased at the farm store. I want to ask them why they didn’t raise the sheep or grow the flax, then spin the yarn and weave or knit what they’re wearing. THEY ARE NOT REAL HOMESTEADERS. 😱

In this day and age, we have the luxury of choosing our activities. I don’t knit socks because I learned a long time ago that I don’t enjoy knitting socks. I haven’t ever made my own underwear, either, but that’s about to change. I’ve been buying the same style and brand of underwear for years. They fit well and have held up—until recently. The latest batch, purchased about six months ago, is beginning to fall apart. It’s most apparent in the elastic, which is disintegrating.

I have all the supplies for making underwear, so I have no excuse. I can make myself the same supply of underwear for a fraction of what new ones costs, and mine won’t fall apart after six months. I may not get started on that project for a while yet, but underwear is on the list of things I want to make in 2024.

In a nutshell, I choose to spend my time producing things of better quality than what I can buy at the store. At the moment, that includes food, clothing, and generator covers. I want nourishing food that isn’t contaminated with glyphosate, soy, high fructose corn syrup, and seed oils, so I grow it and cook from scratch. I want clothing that fits me well and lasts, so I make it myself. The husband wants generator covers that don’t fall apart in a slight breeze, so I make those, too.

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I have mixed feelings about how 2024 is going to play out. All I can do, though, is control myself and my immediate environment, so that is what I am going to do. I’ll spend today getting as caught up as I possibly can. I’ve got my to-do lists for January all laid out in front of me. It’s time to get started.