Category Archives: My Thoughts

On a Mini Break

Meet: My Bernina 440 QE

Hello! Welcome to my stop on the Meet My Sewing Machine blog hop. I’m glad you’re here!

I own a Bernina 440QE (quilter’s edition) that I purchased in 2011. It was my upgraded-upgrade machine (meaning it was my second good machine since I started quilting.) I tested Berninas when I bought my first nice machine (a Pfaff Creative Expression) in 2010 but decided they were too pricey. Then in 2010, I met a few women at the Dallas MQG who had Berninas and brought them to our Saturday Sews. That was fine. I was still happy with my Pfaff. And then our guild started meeting at the Bernina store and that was the end of it. That machine had to come home and live with me! At that point, I felt like I knew enough about quilting and sewing machines to deserve such a fancy Rolls Royce of a sewing machine.

There are two aspects of the Bernina that I ADORE. First, is the BSR – Bernina Stitch Regulator. I couldn’t free motion worth a swear word on my Brother, but was decent on my Pfaff. With the BSR, I can pretty much do any design I set my mind to and it looks pretty profesh. (You know, professional.)

The second thing I love about my Bernina is what they call the Barbie case and all of those Swiss-made all-metal presser feet inside. Droooool.

The foot I love most is #37, the 1/4″ foot. It sews a perfect scant 1/4″ seam. It was very smart of Bernina to make the foot numbers so prominent on each foot. None of my previous sewing machines were so user-friendly. There is one feature I would love to have – an automatic thread cutter. The Berninas are also kinda noisy compared to many other sewing machines. Maybe that’s due to the all-metal feet and parts. Even so, I would recommend this machine to a friend. In fact, most of my friends have one. At retreat, we sit at the Bernina Table. It’s the cool kids table.

The Bernina is a majah (said like a Spice Girl, specifically Victoria Beckham) upgrade from my first beginner baby machine, a Brother something-or-other. It was a $200 super basic machine that quickly fell apart when I started making a quilt every other week (no joke. I did that.) I also own a Brother serger that is rarely used, and I do have have a few other dream machines I’d like to own if I had the space.

Janome Horizon MC7700-QCP

These machines were in all of the workshops at QuiltCon so I spent an entire day sewing on one. And it was a dream. Super quiet, all of the bells and whistles. This would definitely be a delight to sew on every day.

Juki TL-2000Qi FS

I’ve never even tested this machine, but I’ve heard good things. It would be my quilting machine and I’d use my Bernina mostly for piecing.

Long-arm of Some Variety

I’ve gotten to play on a long-arm a couple of times, and I would LOVE to own one. That would necessitate a MUCH larger sewing room, but a girl can dream.

Speaking of sewing rooms, mine is ~~jammed full of stuff~~ very nice. I have three windows so I get lots of natural light and hardwood floors that make it easy to sweep up sewing messes (charm pack dust, thread explosions, etc). I keep most of my fabric stashed away in the closet, but I like to display pre-cuts and neatly folded fat quarters because they just look so pretty.

{Moda fat quarter bundles in aqua DVD holders from the Container Store}

{My cutting table from Martha Stewart’s collection for Home Decorators}

{Vintage shelf with pre-cuts. I store a lot of stuff in various glass jars like these and these.}

{My sewing chair – a vintage one that I painted and reupholstered}

{CD storage unit from Pottery Barn filled with fat quarters}

That’s my machine and my sewing space all in one. Thanks for stopping by and don’t forget to visit the others stops and sign up for the linky party.

SUNDAY, MARCH 17
Erin @ Sew at Home Mummy
Angela @ Heart of Charnwood
Shannon @ Crafty Turtle
Amy @ Stitchery Dickory Dock

MONDAY, MARCH 18
Ebony @ Love Bug Studios
Jaclyn @ Jaclyn Quilts
Amy @ Diary of a Quilter

TUESDAY, MARCH 19
Kara@ Me and Elna
Nerissa @ Nissa Made
Elizabeth @ Don’t Call Me Betsy

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 20
Carly @ Citric Sugar
Celine @ Espritpatch
Patti @ A Yankee in Queen Liz’s Court

THURSDAY, MARCH 21
Stacey @ The Tilted Quilt
The Jolly Jabber Staff (Chelsey, Kimberly, Debbie)
Rachel @ Sew Happily Ever After!

FRIDAY, MARCH 22
Erika @ Sews it All (Bernina)
Lisa @ Vintage Modern Quilts (Bernina) {ME!}
Adrianne @ On the Windy Side (Bernina)

Stranded on the Moda Fabrics Island

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That doesn’t sound bad at all, does it? I am taking part in the funny and silly notions month happening on Moda’s Cutting Table blog all month long. Hop on over to read about my favorite notions.
{P.S. Ryan Gosling is on the island, too.}

The Book Club

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I’m a huge book nerd, always have been and always will be. One of my favorite memories of elementary school is filling out the Scholastic book order. I had shelves and shelves of books, all organized by series: Anne of Green Gables, Sweet Valley High, Nancy Drew, Trixie Belden, Ramona Quimby, Babysitters’ Club…Many of those books are still in my old room at my parents’ house.

My book love continued through college where I majored in Literature. Reading a book (or more) a week was nothing to me. I used to belong to a book club. But then I started quilting…I went from reading a book a week to listening to an audiobook while sewing to reading nothing but US Weekly on my iPhone (lame but true).

So I bought a Kindle on a whim a few months ago, never imagining how much I’d like it. I just happened to read an email from Amazon advertising the latest one (the Kindle Paperwhite), and I said “yes, I think I will!” I read 12 books in the first two months I owned it. FOR. REAL. I love reading on that thing. It’s lightweight, it “opens” to the exact page you were reading and it tells you how many hours you have left in the book. Which I see as a challenge. Like Watch me crush that six hours and 43 minutes, Kindle! Bam! I read it in 5 hrs and 59 minutes. (Not that I really know I’m crushing it because I’d have to be tracking on some other device like an iPhone and I’m not that competitive with an e-reader. I have nothing to prove to you Mr. Kindle. Or you, Mr Bezos.)

So the point of all of this is….TA DA! Vintage Modern Quilts Book Club! I’ve read some great books and I NEED to discuss them. Here are my picks for 2013.

1 2 3 4 5

6 7 8 9 10
11 12

For the books I loved in 2012, stop by on Monday.

The Quilt Guild

Re-treated and Re-newed

Hexagons

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Hexagons are everywhere these days, in the quilting world and among the “regular people.” It’s just one of those design trends like ombré and chevrons that’s become really popular in the last year or two. Tonight I was looking for lamps at World Market, and I spotted this hexagon wine rack. I’m pretty sure if it were aqua, most quilters I know would put one in their sewing room. Right there on the cutting table. Very quilty, right?

Late Night Sewing

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Since Ben has started going to bed alone (progress! We have been co-sleeping and it can be a roller coaster of good and bad), nighttime is my favorite time again. It means at least a couple of uninterrupted hours of sewing. Tonight I pulled out my courthouse step blocks from the Second Time Around the Block bee. Man, I love this quilt already!

Courthouse steps was perhaps not the wisest choice for a bee since it requires accuracy – or at least consistent inaccuracy – and that is tricky with twelve different quilters and machines. Most of the blocks are precisely 12.5″ or very close to it, some need a little fudging and some are way off. But that’s okay because they’re all beautifully sewn and the ones that don’t work on the front will work on the back. The steps pattern looks pretty obvious in the photo though it is less obvious in person. I’m hoping it will become more apparent as I get more blocks sewn together. I didn’t plan this quilt and I was expecting to have to make a lot of blocks to make the ones I received fit together, but I’ll only have to make six. If I had planned, the four color layout would be consistent and repetitive but I actually like the scrappiness of this no-plan version.

A Place of No

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If you are a Real Housewives fan, you will probably get my reference to Bethenny Frankel and her “I come from a place of yes” mentality. I decided last week that I need to come from a place of “no” for a while when it comes to sewing.

Many quilters seem to thrive on project-oriented quilting. They work on one quilt from start to finish and they always have a recipient in mind. I don’t sew like that, and I don’t imagine that I ever will. The real enjoyment of the hobby for me comes from the process. Choosing the fabric, cutting, piecing, and even dreaming about a new quilt design are all equally enjoyable to me. I like the freedom to sew what I please when the mood strikes me. Sewing with obligation – for an Etsy shop, a craft show, a bee, a gift – takes away a lot of the joy for me. It makes my therapeutic hobby into something that I have to do, rather than something that I do to relax. That point has really been driven home for me since I had my son and my sewing time has been greatly reduced. I feel like I need to be more selfish with my free time now. So I decided this week that I am only sewing for myself for the rest of this year. This doesn’t mean that everything I make will be for me, but it does mean no deadlines and no obligations. Just making that decision has already been freeing. I’m working on projects I put aside years ago and I even whipped up a simple rag quilt in a couple of hours yesterday (I’ll share it once it comes out of the dryer).

I’m so enjoying my new freedom that maybe I’ll change my blog name to The Selfish Quilter with the tag line “Yes, I Made That and No, I Won’t Make One for You.” Ha.

A Stash Pact

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I am a fabric addict. My sewing room is literally bursting at the seams with fabric and since my son was born, scrapbooking supplies. My friend Lucia and I have shared our fabric/scrapping obsession over the years, and we both came to a conclusion earlier this year. We no longer enjoy adding to the fabric (or scrapping) stash. Both of us easily have enough fabric to quilt for the next 10 years (backs, binding, and everything!) and never buy another yard. I probably wouldn’t even run out of thread or batting for the first 2 or 3 years. My sewing room is so crowded with supplies, quilt tops, projects, and the chaos of a crawling/cruising/active baby boy that I can hardly even move around in it, much less sew productively. And I really want to sew again every day, obsessively, like I used to. I have so many ideas and the energy to create again.

So Lucia and I made a stash pact. Anything we sew or scrap this year should come from our own stash. We each made a short list of “cheats” – things we can buy without feeling guilty. It’s actually been pretty liberating. I’ve already been piecing scrappy blocks, making bibs, and rag quilts for my son. It has given me the freedom to cut into some precious fabrics that have been folded up and saved for “The Right Project.”

Including this beautiful stack:

It’s the original Flower Sugar from Lecien (circa 2009, I think?) plus some black and white prints. I omitted the mostly white Flower Sugar prints because they are too light for the quilt I have in mind. I’m also thinking about adding in some solids. You can never go wrong with solids…though Ben seemed to like the fabric combination as is:

-Lisa