When I was twelve and I asked my mom to teach me to sew, one of the first lessons was how to use her Riccar sewing machine. It was a pretty high-end model, built to last, and as far as I know, still runs great. The only thing I specifically remember from that lesson was my mother’s stern admonition: “Never, NEVER, turn the hand wheel backwards.” She threatened me with death if I did it, and demonstrated how to turn the handwheel properly. She meant that the handwheel on the machine should never be turned away from me as I was seated at the machine, and she explained that that would cause the threads to tangle and possibly break the machine.

Many years later, I was quite surprised by how many people I saw doing just that in classes, and wondering why the threads were all jammed up and they couldn’t get the fabric out of the machine. I guess they missed that part of the lesson? More recently, I’ve (carefully) risked my mother’s wrath by turning the handwheel on my Pfaff backwards just one half of a complete turn, to get the needle to come back up without completing the stitch if I’ve taken just that one stitch too many (or the stitch landed in the wrong place) when I’m machine quilting. (Theoretically my mother wouldn’t care anymore, since it’s not her costly machine I’d be breaking, but do me a favor and keep my malefaction between you and me!)

One half of a complete rotation of the handwheel doesn’t seem to damage the machine, but frequently it will tangle the threads, so sometimes the technique works and other times it doesn’t. If it works, I’ve saved myself taking out a whole line of machine quilting because there’s one wrong stitch at the end. If it doesn’t, sometimes I can keep stitching (and ignore the little jig of the misplaced stitch or try to work it into the design somehow) and other times the threads are so tangled that stopping and restarting is the only option. It’s a 50-50 chance with the Pfaff. Read the rest of this entry »

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I remember when we moved to this house, my girls used to scoot around to the other side of the house to see the landlords. Our landlords are retired and have grown kids and grandkids of their own, but they’ve always treated us almost as their own as well. When my girls would end up in their part of the yard or I’d send them over to relay some message or other, the girls would always come back clutching a few doppelkeks cookies, large round biscuit cookie sandwiches with a chocolaty hazelnut filling:

The girls used to love these cookies, and I must admit to eating a few myself! Today I visited the landlords (to tell him I needed help with an electrical issue in the kitchen!), and I came home with my own “handful” of cookies:

Our landlady wouldn’t let me leave without sharing an entire plate of the cookies she’s been baking with me. And homemade German cookies are soooo good—Yumm! I couldn’t even get these pics posted before half of them disappeared down the kids’ throats! Time for a coffee and cookie break; add in a couple of quilt magazines, and I’m set.

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I must be getting old. It doesn’t seem like 40 should feel that old, and in fact it didn’t bother me when I turned 40 in March this year. Of course, to my children, I’m ancient, and to my husband, I’m young. I’m nine years younger than ITMan, which is not so much, until you remember that he grew up in the 70’s and I was an 80’s child, and there are some vast differences in attitude based on that. I guess it’s all a matter of perspective when you’re talking about age. To me, 65 seems old, but now some of my readers may be sending “Who’re you calling old?” comments my way.

Forgetting things almost always bites you in the butt, one way or another…

Whatever your perspective on the age issue, I’m starting to feel old sometimes, like when I can’t remember things. Part of the problem is just having too much creative stuff bouncing off the walls in my head, and the non-creative stuff just can’t compete so it just gets out of the way and then goes into hiding. (As an aside, I don’t have nearly as much trouble in the memory department as ITMan, who seems like he’s battling early-onset Alzheimer’s sometimes!) I write more notes these days, which is a good thing because I absolutely HATE to forget things. Forgetting things almost always bites you in the butt, one way or another, by inconveniencing yourself or worse, someone else.

It’s finally gotten to the point where I write notes about sewing machine settings or other quilting-related tidbits about certain techniques, so that I can remember them when I go to do something again. Only problem is, I tend to lose little bits of paper quite easily. Ok, they’re not exactly lost, just buried under other bits of paper, and sometimes fabric and such. Read the rest of this entry »

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