Asian Influence

I was furniture shopping with a friend today and spotted a bunk bed that made me laugh. Here's a photo:

Anyone interested in Japanese antiques has probably come across this type of steep narrow staircase with drawers built into the steps.  They look impossibly small for one with rather larger feet and taller stature, but such staircases were common in older Japanese houses. Here a replica provides the steps to get to the top bunk for American children. I just think it's interesting. (The sheet of Plexiglas is fixed in place temporarily to keep customers' children from climbing up.)

Snow Birds Arriving Daily

Many folks around the world have heard about the weather here in the US over the past week. Here in Central Florida we have, as usual, avoided most of the unpleasantness and have just put on an extra sweater and an extra blanket. Today is warmer, cloudy with intermittent rain showers.

I took the opportunity between downpours to walk to the mailbox. Just outside my door, however, I was met with the sight of the latest arrivals from the frigid north.

 Nothing like a soak in the hot tub after a long flight. For my British friends, these are American Robins, which are quite different from your Robin Redbreast.

Back to basics, and a hint on sewing knits

In my effort to work on my goals for the year, I entered my sewing room this morning, wondering what I should put my hand to.  On top of the "pile" were some mending/slight alteration projects that had been multiplying slowly as these things tend to do.  There is some colder weather predicted in the next week or so and there were several cold weather tops that needed their sleeves shortened.  There was also a new skirt I had gotten on a too-good-to-pass-up-sale, even though a size too big. All it really needed was to have stronger, shorter elastic inserted in the waist. So, now I have two over-
shirt/sweatshirts and a purple knit skirt ready to wear. Sometimes you can get as much satisfaction in taking care of these kinds of projects as you can from something entirely new.

I'd like to pass on one tip to those who would like to sew with knits and especially have difficulty with machine hemming.  I am fortunate to have a sewing machine that has special settings for different types and weights of fabrics. But, even with out this advantage there is one thing many sewists can do to make the process go better.  If your machine will allow it, decrease the pressure on the presser foot. Check your manual or the shop where you purchased your machine if you don't know what I'm talking about. There are also numerous explanations and videos if you type "presser foot pressure" in to your search engine.

This adjustment reduces the machine's tendency to push the top layer of fabric ahead of the bottom layer and causing your hem to skew out of shape. You can see that I used the same stitch on all three projects. It's a triple stitch zig zag -(three stiches up the zig and three more down the zag.) It provides stretch and coverage. There are many other ideas about sewing with knit fabric, but I am always impressed how much this adjustment helps, without adding adhesives or changing feet or needles. I hope you can incorporate it into your bank of sewing knowledge. Maybe you won't have to say, defensively, "I don't hem knits!"

To be more crafty

Some might say I'm crafty enough, but might not be referring to working with my hands on useful projects to enhance life's experience. This year I will try to act on more ideas and use more of my stash and in general be more crafty!

I would also like to read the Bible in chronological order.

My focus word for the year is "fellowship". I need to expand my circle of friends and work on existing relationships.

How about you?

Update on the Quilt Repair

I have done a little work on the vintage Double Wedding Ring quilt. I last blogged about it here. It took a while to finish the binding, but that's been done a while now.  I did some re-quilting here and there where the original thread had worn out.

The time had come, I thought, to work on a fabric hanging sleeve.  In my head it could work, but in practice it's being just this side of impossible. Maybe just impractical. When I googled a question about hanging a scalloped edged quilt the answer was to use wooden compression quilt hangers. I still think the thing will be wavy.

I guess I was concentrating pretty hard on getting the bias binding on so that it wouldn't be puckery, but instead it did end up a bit wavy. After all the fabric was new and the quilt is quite soft. Sigh.

Anyone in the quilting/blogging world have a suggestion?

Merry Christmas to all my friends in Blogland

This is the time of year we especially remember that our God came to earth as a human baby to live a life, die a death and rise again for us all. Praying you know the love of the living Jesus this December 25th and always.

Fifty-Five or better - BASSIF IV

So, I was looking at taking an apartment in a building not too far from here that caters to persons 55+ in age. There are some, like this one, that have an income limit because they get a tax credit. Something like that. Just one of the several things for which I never received an adequate explanation. So of course they can't just take you word for things, everything has to be checked out.  Just how extensive this everything was is another of those areas where the explanation was hazy.

There followed a lot of drama at this point, both on my side and theirs. Mine because I like to understand and I'm a people-pleaser, theirs because I was slow to realize all they wanted to know.  At the end of this phase I was feeling rather violated and vulnerable.

Turns out, my income is slightly more than what is allowed, so, since I wasn't interested in changing that, I could not take an apartment in their building.  This all took a couple weeks and here I am back at square one, looking for somewhere else to live.

I would have preferred being treated as though I have a brain or two in my head, I would have liked to have had, in writing, a list of the information that was needed  and an explanation, in writing, of the process used to calculate a person's eligibility.

Another learning experience. I now know the kinds of things to look out for. I don't remember apartment hunting being this obtuse. In Japan it was more a matter of the landlord being willing to rent to a foreigner.