Featherweight (part 3)

Track and Trace told me that my sewing machine would be delivered today. Tonight Dieuwke and I can call ourself the "featherweight" girls.

Of course it's not only buying a Featherweight. You need special equipment as well. You can't put a feather weight just on your table.

Noooooo, it needs a special treatment. So Dieuwke and I designed our own Featherweight sewing mat. A pincushion and mug rug will be following. More pictures to come. We will take the pattern with us at Atelier Bep on the 3th of june.

Featherweight (part 2)

I really really had to try this machine.

And I couldn't wait untill mine will arrive, next week.

 I found some nice 30s, 40s fabrics squares in my stash and combined them with muslin, just for a little quilt. It's so fun sewing "old"blocks on Dieuwke's "old" machine.

Well stranger things can happen on a saturday night ; ).

Featherweight temptations..... (part 1)

Dieuwke's Sewing Machine

Oh sometimes you can make big mistakes ; ). One of them I made yesterday evening. Dieuwke called to show her "new" old feather weight singer sewing machine from 1947.

I should have stayed home (probably for the rest of my life) ; ).

What a beauty, and it's still working, and  makes wonderful stitches. For those, who don't know the Featherweight Singer. It's a portable sewing machine, and was made between 1933 and 1966. Standard the featherweight is black with gold decoration. But later they made them also in white and green. The machine is very small, about 39 cm (16 inch), and you can make it even smaller to 30 cm (12 inch).

Well what happened, I fell in love with the machine, and then, oh even worse, she told me that Andre where she bought the machine, even had more: 1952, 1957 both black, and a white one from the sixties.

So the deal was quickly made. Next week I have my own Singer Featherweight arriving, up from the north of the Netherlands. And while Rob and Tale are cycling through Germany. I will be playing with my new sewing machine.
Oh I'm really a lucky girl.

By the way:  If you love Singer Featherweights, on sunday the 3 of june, lots of ladies will take their machine with them to Bep during the "open day".

Meeting interesting people ......

......   at Atelier Bep.

It always feels like a  party going to Bep!!!! Her shop, kitchen and garden are always full with suprises and little treasures. Today she had organized a lecture about the dutch quilt history by An Moonen. THANKS BEP!

It's amazing how many people she can put in her livingroom: 19 ladies, 1 man, 1 small dog and the cat on the table. Really, I met the first dutch male quilter (that I know). There are probably or hopefully more men who like to quilt here in the Netherlands. Here is Gert's blog, "real man stitch and sew" where he's telling about his quilt adventures.

An Moonen : is an independent Antique Textile Historian residing in Westervoort. For 3,5 hours she talked about the dutch quilt history, and showed us some of here 17c, 18c and 19c quilts. Dutch quilts from this period don't have bindings, mostly made of triangles, or just one piece of fabric (a panel we would day nowdays) and as fabric they often used chintz fabrics. Typical for dutch quilts from that period is a quilted 8-pointed star in the middle. The back was often made of silk, and they quilted the back of the quilt not the front. Quilting was done by the upper-class, rich ladies with lots of time ; ).

Our connections with the far east had a great influence on the prints, colours and fabrics that were used. For some reason in the 20c the dutch quit quilting, but at the end of the 20c there was a revival.

And now there at least 13.000 woman and 1 man in the Netherlands who like to quilt.  

Weekend activities

Bep's wreath, always a succes. I haven't finished it yet, but it's easy to make, you need about 40 squares of 5 inch (12,5 cm), fold them, sew them on two sides, and just put a little bit of stuff in it, so that they're all still soft, then sew this seam. I use raffia to tie them around the wreath.

What else is going on. I did a little "pimp-up" of our balcony. A few flowers and some herbes.

Tale is going to give us a hand wednesday evening, because I have a big sink bucket where I want to put some mint plants in, to make my own tea. And the bucket is now on the roof of our balcony cupboard, and I can assure you it's pretty heavy. So I need an extra man (beside my DH).

Granny

Granny (86 years old) showing her new shawl in the kitchen, where she's still cooking our favorite menu:
- stewed meat
- cooked potatoes
- red cabbage with apple paste

She is always complaing about having cold shoulders, so I hope this will keep her warm. We have to take good care of her ; ).

It's not only quilting but also crochet at the moment

I'm partly in a kind of crochet mood. I finished my first shawl/wrap, with the leftovers brown and white for granny. It's a very easy pattern (in different languages) from "Drops desgin". I'm now busy with the second one in the colours on the picture, using Alpaca wool, very good to work with.

Apparently I'm not the only one with a crochet mood. Last thursday Dieuwke, Emmy and I had a "quilt"bee. And Emmy finished a cute little baby washclothes. A free pattern from Theresa Grant. I forgot to take a pictures so I borrow the picture from Theresa.

Dieuwke is still working on her embroidery cross stitch project. (I promise you I will make a picture next time, because it's a lovely pattern, and she's making it one-colour.)

The crochet squares are a very nice pattern, so if you don't want to make baby washclothes just make 25 squares or more, and turn it into a little baby blanket.

I had some problems with the english translation, so I made a dutch translation. If you're interested in the dutch translation just send me an email or leave a reaction..

(Haakpatroon baby washandje)

My hobbely-wobbely quilt from the 19c

That's how Dieuwke, Marne and I call quilts that aren't flat. Hobbely comes from the dutch word: "hobbelen", means bumping, rock. And "wobbely" from the dutch words: wobbelen and bobbelen (bumpy).

Well this lady in the 19c really did her best, and I wonder how they made their quilts in that time. I guess they didn't have the equipment we do have now. Like rulers, knifes or mats to cut fabric. Well to me it seems a hard job with only measuring tapes and scisscors. Or maybe this quilttop is just made by a less experience woman ; ). Anyway it doesn't matter.

Well my next problem: I now have to decide about the quilting. Which colour of thread will I use: blue, white or tea. And which pattern. I adore this little pattern of the schoolhouses, and it fits very well in the snowballs.

If you have some advices of ideas. Just let me know. I really appreciate your opinion.

I love antique quilt tops ......

... but the last months I haven't give them enough attention. There are several treasures waiting in my cupboard, to be repaired, washed, ironed and get quilted. This is one of them, probably made second half of the 19c, maybe turn of the 19c. It's always hard to know exactly. The woman who made it never finished it, she used mostly leftovers from men's shirt, and it is completely hand sewed.  

The fabric I chose for the back



And more reading Marne did send me this book for my birthday, it's a lovely book with very interesting information about the the history of quilting in the USA. There are always new facts and figures to learn.





Snowballs and nine patches



Feeding Japanese fish

The weather is a kind of up-and-down over here.

Yesterday, sometimes sunny sometimes a little bit rainy. This morning grey and cloudy, in the afternoon sunshine for a few hours. We visited the Japanese watergarden in Naaldwijk. Well beside having lunch there, the most fun is feeding the fish (koi). They're very well trained, as soon as you pass the bridge they come sprinting to you.