Quilts, Etc.

Been quilting.....

 Finished one that had been started and quilted three more.  I didn't make it outside to photograph these, so maybe I'll have more luck tomorrow.
They were all fun, but the pink and blue was the most fun.  Five of the blocks are hankie prints, and they brought back so many memories.

Then I called Rocky, the Sew Man, to see if he would take a look at the Necchi Leila BF I was given a couple of weeks ago.  The card board face plate was courtesy of Bob when he serviced the machine years ago--at least I'm guessing it was years ago by the label.  Rocky thinks he has a similar model at home that he's been using for parts, so he'll see if he has the face plate.  I asked on my on-line Necchi group, but no one offered one.

 I took it in to Rocky because the motor was throwing some carbon "dust."  He cleaned it and said it's safe to use until I see it sparking throughout the motor rotation.  I'm pretty sure that somewhere I have the motors I removed from a couple of 1940 BUs when I decided to treadle them.  I think I had taken Rocky the Singer motors but not the Necchi ones.

Officially this machine is pink.  I thought it was from the early 1960's, but Rocky thinks it's ten years older than that.  When I got it back home, I used it to quilt the border on the pink and blue quilt.  It stitches sooooooo much faster than my treadles--which is interesting, because when I began treadling, I thought I treadled as fast as my electric machines sewed.  However, this is a finely engineered Italian machine, so it may stitch faster than the electrics I was using.

For the time being, I'm just leaving the end of the machine open since I oil them after every six hours or so of use.

The other adventure I had was that when I bought groceries yesterday, my card was declined--twice!  Someone had put through a small charge from a little town in Illinois that is so small that I'm sure it doesn't have the kind of business it claimed to be from.  Anyway, since my info was stolen, I had to make another trip to the city to get a new card.

I had been there earlier in the day to attend the Fiber Arts Fiesta.  There were some interesting quilts, fewer vendors than in the past, and none of the long-arm dealers were allowing potential customers to actually try the machines.  I purchased nothing--although that was probably a good thing since my card would have been declined.--Don't get me wrong; I'm immensely grateful that the fraudulent charge was spotted by someone with really good perceptions.

Okay, I'm going to try to get some quilting into another quilt yet tonight.  I do love quilting!!!(However, I have to admit that part of the fun of quilting right now is watching the tree in my front yard leaf out--it had just a few tiny leaves on Thursday.  It has a lot more now!)

Happy quiltmaking.....

Said Goodbye--to My 1919 Singer 66

 I said goodbye to one of my sewing machines last week.  (Amazing, I know.)

 It is a Singer 66 Redhead (sometimes called "Redeye") from 1919.  Singer made literally millions of these machines each year for many, many years.

 It was an absolute mess when I bought it (for too much money). I always had the feeling that someone had intentionally messed up this machine--perhaps because the owner wanted to replace it with a newer electric model?

 I purchased it near the end of 2009 after months and months of searching for a treadle in working order or one I could get in working order.

 Once I got it cleaned up, it was very pretty.  However, it always had tension issues. Clearly someone had partially disassembled the tension and had not gotten it back together properly.

For several months it's been sitting beneath one of my other sewing machines because I removed it from it's treadle and put in a lovely old black Necchi BU.

Last weekend I stopped by Rocky Campos' shop at the Moriarty Flea Market because I was looking for another high shank darning foot for a Necchi BU.  We started talking, and I ended up coming home, getting the 66 as well as several other motors, foot controls, and lights that I had removed from various machines.  I was a bit sad to see it separated from the irons and cabinet which have been its home for nearly 100 years, but I'm not someone who collects old sewing machines just for the amusement of looking at them.  Rocky replaced the broken bottom plate on the foot control of my 1952 Singer Featherweight.  Before I left he said he was going to take the 66 home and put a motor on it.  So, this machine is off to new adventures so that it can be well and truly loved and used by some other sewist.  Still, it was with a touch of sadness that I said goodbye.  It felt a little like when I watch my daughter off to new adventures--excited for her to be trying new things and growing, but still knowing that some good things are behind us.

I'm sure there are many, many landfills across the nation that have consumed too many vintage machines--and I've seen way too many horrifying conversions of these machines into other novelties.  Whatever Rocky does with this machine, it will see more activity fulfilling the purpose for which it was created.  As long as it gets oil, use, and a little TLC, it will continue to sew for another hundred years, probably more!  I do so love vintage sewing machines!

Learning About and Using Vintage Machines

I was asked how [and why] I learned about vintage sewing machines.  I tried to blog that but it was just way too long.  So here's a condensed version.

I first discovered Singer Featherweights while teaching in the S.E. United States (Tennessee, Georgia, Alabama).  I'd seen just one on the Today Show back in the 1970's in a segment on setting in sleeves--I can't even imagine a morning news show covering such a topic these days!  I didn't see one until someone brought one to my classes in the 1980's. A friend paid $15 for one at a yard sale, had it serviced, and mailed it to me in the late 1980's. Despite the fact that it was merely packed loose, surrounded by polystyrene peanuts, it arrived safely.  We  joked that the heavy coating of nicotine held it together. (Seriously, anyone shipping a machine needs to learn to do so correctly--layers of bubble wrap, double boxing, and more.)

Since during my childhood the piece of equipment I used most often was this, I decided I could learn to maintain a sewing machine.

As it turned out, the Featherweight was designed to be maintained by its owner, as were many sewing machines in those days.

A couple of years ago, after months of searching, I purchased a 1919 (Redhead) Singer 66 treadle.

 I did quite a bit of piecing on it--although the upper tensions was very "fiddly"--I'm not sure I ever quilted on it since the 66 bobbins are much smaller than class 15 bobbins.

The next acquisition was this 99, the "little sister" to the 66.  I converted it to hand crank, and take it with me when I'm piecing where electrical outlets are at a premium.  It too has "fiddly" tension.

 The photo below compares "1/2 size" Featherweight to the full size 66.  (The 99 is considered 3/4 size.)

 A few months later I was able to get my full size Singer 15-88.  I'd wanted that one because of the large capacity of the bobbins, great for quilting. 

 Somewhere along the way my dear friend gave me a Singer 15-91, thinking I could convert it to treadle.  Since it has a "potted motor," which means the motor directly drives the gears, it was wiser to leave it as an electric and use it with its motor; it's great for heavier duty sewing, although I have pieced and quilted on it both at home and when I'm somewhere too inconvenient to take a treadle.

Then last summer, after thinking about it for several months, a Treadle-On member sold me an extra Necchi so I could use it for things like buttonholes (haven't tried that yet), blind hems, etc. as well as quiltmaking.  I dearly love this machine, as well as the fact that it fits in both my treadle tables.

People interested in sewing on old machines should feel confident that there is plenty of on-line help available.  There are a few antique and vintage machines that challenge their owners to find the correct needles, but with a little (or a lot) of oil and a new belt, most vintage and antique machines can challenge any of the new ones on the market since they were built of metal and intended to be around for several generations of sewists.  In fact, today I heard of a costumer in Santa Fe who just purchased a Necchi because a car can be purchased for less than many of the heavily advertised sewing machines.

I'm very grateful to the very helpful members on the sewing lists I belong to who have helped me get my machines working and who are available if I have surprise problems with them.  Almost every brand of vintage and antique sewing machine has a group of supporters who share information and help each other with their machines.  While I don't think I have any working machines that are true antiques (over 100 years old), I'm on lists with people who regularly use theirs.

In my own quilting arena, I'm trying to finish up some more quilts; that list in my sidebar is the smallest it's been at year's end in a long time!

The quilt below, Flight Lessons, is only 24" square and has been waiting for binding for several years.  I'm happy to say it's finally complete.  I used the Necchi and variegated thread to give the binding an attractive finish--I knew it wouldn't get done if I had to hand stitch it!

This little quilt later became  a donation to raise money for my church's African mission project.  (The mission used the funds to buy their first truck to haul produce to market--as well as other things, I'm sure.)

Happy quiltmaking.....

Vintage Necchi

Yesterday I installed this old Necchi in one of my two treadle tables. I've been oiling it and working to get it unfrozen off and on for several months.

This machine had been sitting in someone's dusty garage for several years. It belonged to her grandmother, and she wasn't quite sure how it had come into her possession. She herself had purchased one of those very, very expensive Berninas, but she knew these Necchis had great reputations. They certainly do. In fact, they are such great machines that they should never have the misadventures this poor machine has experienced.

However, this very fine piece of post WWII Italian engineering was stripped from its cabinet. The foot control was lost. The bobbin case was lost. The control into which the light and the motor is plugged was lost. The broken needle was left in the machine, however; no idea why, since so much else had been stripped.

Over the months since it was carried into my home, I oiled, and oiled, and got the parts moving. Thanks to others who appreciate Necchi machines, I was able to get it loosened, and even got the zig-zag mechanism moving.

Last weekend I borrowed an electric drill so I could ream the mounting holes on the machine to 9/32" so they would fit into a Singer treadle cabinet. (Broke one drill bit, no idea how, and had to wait until I could get to Albuquerque to buy another bit--the local hardware store was closed for the weekend.) I also had to purchase a new-used bobbin case and a treadle belt. Usually each machine needs its own belt since, more often than not, each machine has its own distance to the treadle wheel.

After more fiddling than usual, it was in its temporary treadle home so for the first time I could check it out with real sewing. Unfortunately, I can not get it to stitch with true zero stitch width. I'm hoping some of the members of the Necchi Sewing Club, who possess much greater knowledge than I, can help me get the stitch width back to doing what it says it should do. I'll also need to adjust upper thread tension, as well as tension on the used bobbin case purchased from Ryan.

I really need to get to some quilting and binding today--another storm moving in with maybe only 6-12" this time. [It's true that we are all now scoffing at our gullibility when we were assured that a La Nina year would mean very little precipitation!]  I've decided to take my other Necchi BU out of the 1919 treadle and put it in the 1936 treadle--and shift the 1936 Singer 15-88 to the 1919 irons and use it for piecing so I can quilt with the Necchi BU that works in irons that work more smoothly.  Of course, the downside is that these machines are very heavy.

The upside is that I have countless quilts I want to work on.

Happy quilting.  Happy Christmas!

Big Business That Doesn't "Get It"

I was surprised last weekend to have a notice (aka advertisement) pop up on my Face Book page indicating that Pottery Barn is now selling vintage sewing machines for decorative purposes.

In near disbelief, I followed the link and ended up here: http://www.potterybarn.com/products/found-sewing-maching/popup/more-views.html

They claim the machines were manufactured in Europe from the 1920s to 40s. In addition to German-made Singer, they have Durkopp, Phoenix, Victoric, Gritzner, and Kohler--although the buyer doesn't get to choose.

Pottery Barn is selling them for $199 each.

I contacted Pottery Barn and pointed out that...

Even if this machine were inoperable, it usually takes very little to
make them work. Even without a motor, they can be treadled--and with
minimal care they'll last longer and work as well or better than any of
the "new" sewing machines on the market.
Seems more than a bit crazy to me!

Pottery Barn replied:

Thank you for contacting Pottery Barn.

We apologize for any inconvenience.  Pottery Barn does not sell sewing machines.  Please provide more information regarding your inquiry,so we may assist you.

If we may be of any further assistance, please contact us via email.  Alternately, you may contact our Customer Service Department directly at 1-800-922-9934 from 5:00 am to 9:00 pm (PST), seven days a week.

Kind regards,

I replied by sending them the link and saying it certainly looked like it was for sale.

They wrote me back and said:

Thank you for contacting Pottery Barn.

We apologize for any confusion.  These sewing machines are meant for decorative purposes only. 

If we may be of any further assistance, please contact us via email.  Alternately, you may contact our Customer Service Department directly at 1-800-922-9934 from 5:00 am to 9:00 pm (PST), seven days a week.

Kind regards,

So, I wrote them again:

That is exactly the point!  You've taken machines that could easily be repaired so that they will sew for another 40 to 100 years (much longer than any currently available "modern" plastic wonders will sew) and have created overpriced "decorative" items!

They replied:

Thank you for contacting Pottery Barn.  We regret to learn of your disappointment that we are selling sewing machines from the 1920's to 1940's for decorative purposes.  While we do not know for sure, we suspect these were determined to no longer be functional and have been successfully repurposed.

However, we appreciate your feedback and will forward it to our Buyers for their future buying decisions. 

If we may be of any further assistance, please contact us via email.  Alternately, you may contact our Customer Service Department directly at 1-800-922-9934 from 5:00 am to 9:00 pm (PST), seven days a week.

Kind regards,

Okay, they don't get it.  Here's what I get:

I do believe in using vintage sewing machines.  I love their engineering, and mechanics, and the fact that with a little attention (aka oil) they're willing to work well decade after decade, often for well over a century. It breaks my heart that these are being sold at inflated prices for some rich person to have around for "cute" when there are so many people in the world who would be thrilled to have them to use.

Sadly, I also get that a few resources and the will to make a profit mean that some very usable machines will be merely "decorative." 
 

A Bit Tickled

I've had more time than I expected to work on the quilt from the last post.  It's being tickled with lots of feathers.

So far the only thing I've marked before stitching is the semi-circles just under the triangles above.  Everything else was just done freehand with no marking.

Last weekend I tried to contact the person from whom I acquired this treadle, a Singer 15-88 and his e-mail was returned to me.  I phoned the cell number but did not hear from him and wasn't even sure it was still his number.  This morning he phoned me (most of his family has moved to the Dallas area), and I asked him if he thought his mom would like to have a quilt made on the machine.  This quilt has been calling her name ever since I started it. I love how this machine operates and I am so glad she took good care of it for all those decades.  (I know she also had modern electric machines.)  Her son says she made him lots of shirts on this machine.  So far I've used it only for alterations and piecing and quilting.

I've been horribly stressed, and working on this quilt with all the winter-brightening colors and all the white areas for quilting has lifted my spirits (although that may have a lot to do with praying as I work on it).  Although the weather has been better than many winters here, the season still feels like it will last forever, so despite the fact that these colors are far from my favorites, their cheerfulness is welcome.

I'm getting closer to finishing it and would love to complete it this weekend, but, of course, I never can guess ahead of time how much I'll get done.  However, I need to get past the road block on a gray/violet quilt, and if I can't do that, I need to be working on a blue/yellow quilt.  Both are in the piecing stage. (No, we will not mention how many other unfinished quilts I have.  One year I posted them in my side bar, and every time I signed on to the blog, I felt further and further behind.  Not going there again!!)

Stay warm, friends, and happy quilting.....

They followed me home...really

Actually three followed me home--quite literally.
This is a Jones Hand Machine--the label says so.  I think now it's more commonly just called a Jones Hand Crank.
The last owner's dad picked it up in London at the end of WWII, took it to South Carolina, didn't use it, and let it sit on a shelf for at least 40 years.

So far the only thing I've used on this machine is sewing machine oil, cotton tips, and some tiny squares cotton batting scraps.
When a machine is this old and has received only minimal care, it's really hard to guess what may have happened to it.  There's a yellowish powdery looking substance several places, especially on the hand wheel.  With a lot of patience, cotton tips, and sewing oil, the substance does come off.
I can't help wondering what its WWI and WWII adventures were like.
The decals all over the machine are extremely fragile--undoubtedly too fragile to save--and that's sad.
The needle in the machine is broken, has a completely round shank, and I'm not sure what currently available needle would replace it.

That bright and shining gold circle is the back of the badge as seen from underneath the machine.

Yes, there will be a learning curve with this machine--and it starts long before it will be ready for sewing.

It does amaze me that a piece of fascinating Victorian mechanical ingenuity can sit around for a century or so and still work.  All the gears operate pretty smoothly--they'll do even better after they get used to being oiled.

I have not figured out how to get the shuttle and bobbin out yet.

Lots to learn--and eager to learn it.

Another Treadling Quilter...

A quick post:
Please visit Treadleworks By Tammy to meet someone who has rediscovered using a treadle sewing machine.

The Singer 66 Redhead pictured here is mine (and some blocks I was setting together).
Tammy's photos of her 66 are on her blog.

Enjoy,

I Love Vintage Sewing Machines

Love antique ones too--but I don't own any of those, and so far, I'm quite happy with my vintage machines.

This is the machine I'm now using for most of my quilting...

It's from 1935 and has a very pretty faceplate.  I chose it because class 15 machines have high capacity vertical bobbins.  Many people just set the stitch length to zero and attach a darning foot or a spiral wire when they quilt.  I don't like the drag that feed dogs create on a quilt, even when the stitch length is set at zero, so I was very grateful when  Dolly over at Dolly's Home decided she'd figure out a way to get the feed-dog-lowering mechanism to work and encouraged me to do the same.

I know some people with both vintage and quite modern machines use both for different purposes. We have a fairly new, fairly small list where those of us with vintage machines that we actually use are sharing our experiences.  It's called Vintage Machine Q & E [Quilting and Embroidery] and

If you and/or a friend would like to subscribe to this group:
1. visit
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/VintageMachineQandE/join
-OR-
2. send email to VintageMachineQandE-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

Okay, back to the reorganization of my sewing studio.....
Happy quiltmaking....

Country Life & Results of July Friday Night Sew In

My Friday Night Sew In project was this reconstructed 4-patch quilt treadle-quilted on my 1935 Singer 15-88.  I used Fil-Tec Glide thread for the solid threads and Thread-Art variegated for the others.  Prior to using this machine to quilt, I was having trouble with the Thread-Art threads on my Viking 6000 series machines.  But this machine seems to like it just fine---so, until I can get some variegated thread from the Fil-Tec people, I'll use up some of these.
A few detail pictures:

 All the quilting was done with free motion and with no markings on the quilt top.  I try to maintain the character of the quilting designs but put in a lot of variations.  I started doing that because so many of the quilts I make are for people with cancer, other serious illness, or serious injuries, and I felt the quilts would be more interesting to them if there were variations in the quilt designs--kind of like a puzzle.  Of course, all my quilts are prayer quilts, made while I'm praying for the recipient, even if I don't know who that might be.

Country Life:

Although we live in a small town, there's a field across the street from us and a farm beyond that.  We've been promised rain today, and Alex and I thought we'd sleep late.  After a very late night serenade by partying cats, we were counting on it.  However, our sleep was interrupted before 6:00 a.m. by a plane repeatedly flying quite low over our house.  Undoubtedly, the neighbor was cropdusting and choosing to fly over our residential neighborhood to change directions instead of the barren fields east and west of his farm.
So....since it's impossible to sleep while being repeatedly buzzed by a plane, I got up.  About 20 minutes later, no plane.  By that time I'd decided to bake fresh muffins.  Guess the plane had gone to re-supply, because it was soon back.  When it was done, I made fresh New Mexico coffee, sliced a fresh fig (from Costco, not from any local tree), and took my muffin outside for breakfast.  One of the things I most treasure about summer is breakfast outdoors.  My makeshift table consists of an upside down galvanized tub with an ancient metal milk basket on top, with tiles on top of that.  I've been looking for a discarded or used cafe table for a couple of years, but haven't found one.  A table definitely falls into the "want, not a need" category, so I'll keep looking.

That bushy plant next to the table is the sweet basil I picked up at Trader Joe's for $1.99 yesterday.  The basil we had from before our trip east barely survived the summer heat, despite receiving the neighbor's care.--Actually, I had told her to use it, but she didn't.  I'll repot the new basil after we make our post office run.

Blessed summer days........
Dora

How do I lower feed dogs?

I'm looking for an answer about how to lower feed dogs on my Singer 15-88 from 1935.  According to the instruction booklet for this and similar machines, loosening the turn screw on the right should lower feed dogs, but when I do that, the feed dogs continue to hold their position.
Obviously, this machine sat unused for many years (although it was a matter of neglect rather than abuse or misuse; the machine was very clean when I received it).

I've applied quite a bit of Tri-flow where the two pieces meet, thinking that would loosen it up.  The bracket nearest the head of the turn screw has a kidney shaped slot that indicated to me that the screw should be able to slide along that shape to lower the feed dogs.  However, it doesn't do that--seems pretty stuck to me.

So......I'm looking for ideas on how to get it to move.  (Yes, I know many people machine quilt with the feed dogs in place and by setting the stitch length to zero; however, I really dislike the way the feed dogs grab at the quilt when they are up--and I feel that way about any machine I've used, not just this one.)

I would love some advice from people who've solved this problem, including OSMG's [Old Sewing Machine Guys/Gals].
Thanks.

Ready for Some "Vintage" Quilting?

Like an actress required to make her entrance down stairs so that the first things we see are her legs, Vernice makes her entrance:

 

Here's her head--now cleaned up and shining, although you can't see the dozens of pin scratches from the old fashioned pin-strip that must have been fastened around her sometime in the past.

  

She has two drawers on each side and one in the center,

 A  

a lovely face plate, 

(the tension assembly is mounted right on the face plate) 

and a spoked hand wheel.

 

She has a couple of spots on the wood, one to the right of the machine,  

and another near the left hinge at the back of the machine.

I thought I'd be stitching with her tonight.  I did get her top tension adjusted.  However, the wood was sooooooo hungry that once it was clean, I lavished it with lemon oil and beeswax.  I decided to let it drink up and wait until tomorrow to wipe her down.
 I'm so glad she's had some appropriate attention in her 74 years.  Someone did clean her decals with something that turned them silver, but there's a good chance she'll still be sewing in another 100 years!

Road Trip!

No pictures because I inadvertently left the camera at home.
Alex and I headed over to the Texas panhandle today.
We managed to find some needed wardrobe additions for 70% off.
We loved traveling through miles of spring green--usually we don't travel those routes until the world is much browner.
When we reached our destination and exited the car, we both gasped at the humidity we hadn't experienced in months!
In addition to our wardrobe additions, we came home with "Verniece"--a 1936 (I think) Singer15-88, whose original owner (of the same name) is entering assisted living with her husband.  She has a more modern sewing machine but had kept this one oiled and used it rarely.  It needs minimal cleaning.  Her son demonstrated how well it still work with its motor and controller--we drove several hours home with the smell of burning rubber--I'm guessing from the motor.  My plan is to use only the treadle anyway.
I'll try to get photos tomorrow.
I'm guessing this machine will work quite well for another hundred years.

What Are These Machines?

I just received a call from my little sister in Houston. It was followed by an e-mail with these pictures attached.  These machines belonged to a family member and have been stored at our dad's house.  She wants to know if I want them.  She has a fuzzy memory of when they were purchased (she was a child) and thinks one might be an embroidery machine.  I've never seen the actual machines, only these pictures.  So please help me out if you have information about what they are.

  

   

 

These pictures supply the only knowledge I have of these machines, so I'm looking for information.  Since I'm mostly a quiltmaker (I piece, applique occasionally, and quilt), I'm not sure if they would serve a purpose for me.  I do love the quality of vintage machine; I know Wilcox & Gibbs made some great sewing machines.  But aside from that, I'm pretty ignorant about these machines.

If you're knowledgeable, please leave a comment, e-mail me, or reply to the list to which this post was linked.


Thank you, friends.