Category Archives: Sewing room

Checking in

How are you all doing with this very weird time we are going through?   I’d love to say that I have been sewing up a storm but alas, I have had a hard time keeping motivated.  Not that I haven’t been doing any sewing.  I have been working on my log cabin quilt, made some face masks just in case hubby or I get a cold (the masks are not effective for the Covid-19 virus) and want to keep from coughing near each other , and I also have my hand sewing for the evenings.    wp-1585255006772.jpg

I have made pretty good progress on the quilt.  I only have 3 more rows to add.  Yay, the end is in sight.  wp-1585254689869.jpgWell, hold everything.   Just to add to the craziness of the times,   the machine I was using to do the decorative stitch on the “in-between” rows decided it wanted to start acting up.  I spent over an hour on it  and twice I thought I had fixed the issue but nope,  just a short line of stitching and back the issue came.  So, to keep my sanity, I just shut it off and walked away.   To borrow a line from Scarlett O’Hara, “Tomorrow is another day”.   And I’ll be here.   I can use my Brother machine to complete the quilt since it is both an embroidery and sewing machine.  I will just have to take the embroidery unit off and set it up as a regular sewing machine.   At this time,  I will not be taking a trip to the repair shop.  If hubby and I can’t get it fixed, it will just wait until things settle down and I’ll use my other machines.

I have been reading a lot.  I am on book #5.  The other night, because I didn’t want to hear anymore about the corona virus, we decided to watch a movie  instead of regular tv.   We chose The Two Popes on Netflix.  It was a very interesting movie.  I have also been re-watching  all the seasons of Call the Midwife because the new season will be playing on PBS soon.   And Emma is available On Demand now so I might talk hubby into watching that with me this weekend.

Weekends.  I remember when weekends were different than the rest of the week.  I teased my non-retired friends by responding with “What’s a week end?  to them when they spoke of what they did on their weekends.  Well, now that I don’t have to be anywhere on any day at any particular time,  I truly don’t know the difference between days.  I really have to think about what day it is when waking up.  I differentiate the days by what programs are on HGTV that night.

And one more note….. I miss baseball.  This was supposed to be Opening week.

So that’s what I’ve been up to.  How have you all be doing?  Getting used to the social distancing?   How are you keeping yourselves busy, entertained and productive?

I hope you are all feeling well.  Take care.  Stay home.

Bye for now.  See you soon.

Ginny

 

Advertisement

Social Distancing

The phrase of the month.    I was looking forward to going to see the movie Emma last week…… nope.   We also had plans to go to a local flower show and get some ideas for this seasons garden beds…….. nope.   We luckily had done a good amount of shopping a couple weeks ago so our pantry and freezer was pretty well stocked.  Just needed a few things and our dear Kathryn braved the crowded stores to get what we needed so neither of us had to venture back there and  we are all set for a couple weeks now.

OK, no movie, no flower show, no shopping, no picking up our grandson after school.    What shall we do to keep busy?

Well, first of all, I headed up to my sewing room to clean up and rearrange a bit to get set for some extra sewing time.

Rearranged my jelly roll and layer cake storage cabinets,   hubby helped me add a pegboard  to the wall by my embroidery machine so I can hang my hoops there and then I organized my scissors and rulers and templates.   Ready to continue work on some projects.

After I got done with that,  I prepped some hexagons for handstitching while watching tv in the evenings.   I had finished all the ones I had brought with me for my “retreat” time at my sons’.   Emma was replaced with some Call The Midwife episodes and a Svengoolie movie on Saturday night.

wp-1584414488992.jpg

We didn’t get to go to the big flower show but we took a walk around our gardens and enjoyed the show our own bulbs gave us this week.

The weather has been fairly nice so we get to take walks around the neighborhood.  We are getting started on our spring cleaning,  we are trying out new recipes and I have already read two books since last week.

I don’t know how long this new normal is going to last.   I miss seeing our kids and grandkids.   I miss baseball.  I was looking forward to the start of the season.  I hope hubby and I don’t drive each other totally crazy.   Without the schedule of school pickups,  lunch with friends, the occasional trip up to see my sister and my sons and other plans that were on our calendar, the days seem to all blend together.   I am looking forward to when we can get back to our old normal again.

In the meantime,  we will make the best of it and if the weather continues to warm up, we will get to do more work outside in our gardens which will be great.  We will enjoy walking up and down blocks we usually just drive by.   We will watch movies on Netflix and Prime that we have been meaning to check out.   We will get some painting done and closets gone through.   I will finish the log cabin quilt and a seat cushion for a friend (although I don’t know when I will get it up to her).   I’ll plan my next quilt.

So,  as you maneuver through this new experience,  look for something to make you smile each day.  I know it will be harder on some days than others.  Like today was for me but the smiles did come.  What are you doing to keep yourself occupied?  Are you home with your children because school is closed?  How is that going?  I would like to hear about how you are all getting on.

Wherever you are,  be well.     We will get through this.

Bye for now.   See you soon.

Ginny    

 

 

 

 

‘Tis the Season

What season you might ask?

The Fall craft fair season.  And the workshop officially opened today.   The cutting department (aka, Hubby) had his rotary cutter and rulers all ready and before long he had piles of 10″ squares ready to hand off to the sewing department (aka, Me!) and  then he switched his attention to some layer cakes.  No, not the eating kind, the 10″ squares of fabric kind.  Shortly thereafter, he had those 10″ squares cut down to 5″ squares that will become zigzag tablerunners in a few days.  20190813_134235.jpg

In the meantime, I was kept busy as the 10″ squares were cut and ready for adding batting.  Those batting squares were cut by my very efficient cutting department last week.20190813_134224.jpg

When the cutting department was finished with all that was on his workbench for today, he left the workshop for a bit of a break.  I felt the need for a bit of background music 20190813_144504.jpg  So I enlisted the help of the entertainment department (aka, my ipod).  Anyone care to make a guess as to what type of music was playing.  Here’s a hint:Elf

Well, as Scarlett O’Hara was famous for saying “Tomorrow is another day.”  But I won’t be heading to Tara;  I will be heading back to The Workshop.   We have three craft fairs lined up right now with two more on the “maybe” list.

Are you working on any projects for the fall or maybe some Christmas gifts?  Anyone doing any craft fairs?   I’d love to hear about what is keeping you busy these days.

See you soon.  Bye for now.

Ginny

Sunday Snippit on Monday

It sure has been a busy couple of weeks.  I missed posting last Sunday.  We had a quick visit with family and returned home on Monday.  I almost missed this week too but it’s  just one day later.

It has been pretty busy in the sewing room.  I made 5 sets of placemats.  Haven’t made them in quite a while.   I enjoyed putting them together.

I really like the wine bottle fabric and I can see some wine bottle gift bags made out of it.  The other four fabrics were very cheerful and summery.

While spending my time in the sewing room I was listening to a podcast of Leah Day’s.  (her podcast is called Hello My Quilting Friends if you want to give it a listen). Her guest was Stephanie Socha and the topic was organizing and decorating your quilting space.  (Stephanie also has a podcast: Make and Decorate with Stephanie Socha Design)  As I was listening I started looking around the sewing room to see if the way I organized my room was in a purely functional way or did it add to the decor of the room.  It made me think, what does the decor of my sewing room say?   So when I was finished sewing, I took some pictures of my space to see what vibes the different areas gave off.  Did they say utilitarian and functional or was there an element of fun and smile-evoking spots?

As I looked at the pictures,  I saw that there are things that bring a smile to my face in all corners of the room.   Yes, there are the functional parts like the two spaces that store my books and patterns and the pegboards that hold my scissors, rotary cutters and acrylic templates.  But mixed into those areas are items that are purely there just because they are “me”….. like the quilted Yankee wall hanging,  the “Officially Retired” sign and hat and the Charlie Brown clock that plays Christmas songs on the hour (ok, not ALL year;  I remove the batteries for that function in January).   And, while most of my fabric is either in the closet or in drawers,  I love seeing my Jelly Rolls displayed in a re-purposed cd tower.  Of course, the three machines in the room make me smile by just being there. Having pictures of my 4 boys when they were little hanging over my Featherweight, a stuffed puppy by my embroidery machine that reminds me of a very special grand-dog and a jar full of  thread on wooden spools that were from my grandmother and my aunt makes those areas even more special.

My conclusion was that yes, I try to keep my tools and supplies neat and organized and handy but I also see things in that room that definitely say  “This is Ginny’s sewing room”.    Do you have a room or a space somewhere that speaks to your likes, interests and  passions?   If you do,  I’d love to hear about it.  Leave a comment below and tell us about it.

I hope you have a good week.  I’ll be in my sewing room a bit each day enjoying all the special things in there.  Keep cool.   See you soon.

Bye for now.

Ginny