Tag team!

Using the free arm of my Singer Featherweight 222K

and the power of my Juki

to finish some Christmas gifts!

Am I becoming a sewing machine hoarder?

Or just a collector?

Yesterday, this two-tone Singer 301A

came to live with me.

For $35, I purchased the machine in great condition

along with a cabinet and sewing chair.

This full-sized portable Singer was born in 1956

and was designed to fit in a cabinet or be portable.

It came in short and long bed options,

but only the short bed fit into a cabinet.

I'm dubbing her Susie after the granddaughter of the original owner,

who sold it to me yesterday.

She said something about whether this was my first sewing machine

and I admitted it wasn't.

I was hoping to find a 301 in a case as a take along machine,

but the cabinet is so lovely I'm going to keep it in there for now.

Here it is folded away into its cabinet, which measures 18 by 24.

Here's a view of the cradle for the 301.

It unsnaps at the right side and lifts out -- no unbolting necessary.

The foot pedal is mounted into the cabinet with clips

and there's a knee feed in the cabinet.

So, do I need to justify another sewing machine?

No, because I'm giving it a good home,

and I'm going to teach a young woman to quilt this year,

and this will be a perfect machine for that.

Did I say it sews beautifully? 

It made a lovely lock stitch after years of being folded away.

I've since oiled it and cleaned it and changed the needle.

How many machines do I have?

I'll tell if you tell!

Elna SU (zig zag and free arm) --40 years old

Juki TL98q for piecing and quilting 

Singer FW 222K for taking with me

Singer FW 221 given to me this spring

Singer 66 (I think) in a treadle cabinet, used as a table

unknown fiddle base hand crank, also mostly decorative

23-year-old Pfaff serger, which paid for itself when I made baby and children's clothing

and one red Little Queen toy sewing machine.

Let's go sew!

A quilter and sewer in the making

Recently I had the fun of sewing with a 10-year-old girl.

She wanted to make a bag for her bracelet-making supplies,

 and green is her favourite colour.

So we found some upholstery weight fabric, set up the Featherweight in its table

and started cutting and sewing.

I figured out the bag proportions, and M. did most of the sewing.

We did all of it on the FW except for the last seam, 

where I attached the lining to the bag on my Juki, which handled all those layers just fine.

M. spent less than three hours with me,

and by the time her parents came to pick her up,

the bag was done and we were halfway through Mary Poppins on DVD.

This is not quite Mary's carpet bag, but close.

We put in a big pocket from an old curtain

 for her plastic divided container with the rubber bands

and her two looms fit in the main compartment.

And the strap is long enough to go over her shoulder,

but not so long it drags on the ground,

even though it looks like it here.

I think it's superfragelisticexpialidocious!

I'm linking up with The Needle and Thread Network.

New on the sewing table

Last week, a Featherweight 221 (top) came to live at my house.

My neighbour offered it to me when she saw me carrying 

my 222K from the car to the house after a sewing day.

We made plans for me to come by and see the machine,

but for one reason or another, that meeting only happened last week.

Now I'm the proud owner of this 1948 221 Singer Featherweight.

It's in lovely shape, with only a few scratches.

It had lived in its case for 40 straight years,

but sewed a beautiful seam right out of the box.

I dusted and oiled it yesterday and it runs fine,

although it's a bit noisy.

Here's the Egyptian scroll faceplate.

My 222K (at left) has the striated face plate

The 222K has a free arm and the feed dogs can be lowered.

Here's the machines side by side, with the 222K at left.

It is slightly taller.

At right on the bottom is the accessories tray for the 221.

It came only with one foot, and a few bobbins,

but I already have several boxes of  Singer attachments,

so I'm fine with that.

Here's the difference in the cases.

The 222K is slightly taller than the 221.

Did I mention how much I paid?

My neighbour wouldn't take any money,

since she says she didn't pay for it.

She's happy to have found a good home for her mother's machine,

and I'm happy to give it a good home.

I'm linking up with Judy's Design Wall Mondays.

Instead of having something new on the design wall,

this week I have something new on the sewing table.

I'm also linking up with Stitch by Stitch's Anything Goes Mondays.

Transforming an old Elna

Elna Transforma with manual
Originally uploaded by scrapsandstrings

For a mere $15, this little beauty followed me home recently. Actually, I was at a large furniture thrift shop shopping for something else entirely, when I spotted this lovely green lady sitting in a cabinet that would fit my 40-year-old Elna SP. The cabinet is identical to the one that my mom's Elna Supermatic lives in, so I knew what I was getting.
This machine dates back to the mid-50s and is an early free-arm Elna (the Grasshopper was the first, I think.) It is very sleek and minimalist and modern,  and on closer inspection, has no reverse or zigzag stitch. That's because it is an Elna Transforma, which could be transformed into a Supermatic by swapping out that bit on the top where the screws are.
The sad part of this green lady is how abused she is. She lived in a smoker's house for many decades. I scrubbed most of the nicotine grime off , but you can see the rusty brown in the cracks and crevices. And she runs very loudly and needs a bit of help. I'm assuming she needs a visit to the sewing machine doctor, but I'm not paying for it. Doesn't that sound harsh? Instead, I'm donating her back to a thrift shop where volunteers fiddle and fix items like this.
And about that cabinet? Yesterday, I washed it inside and out FIVE times (after three previous washes), tryiing to scrub out that smell. And then I applied some Seek and Destroy odour spray. It smells a bit less offensive now, but I'm still airing it in my front porch. The plywood inside the cabinet has absorbed lots of cigarette smoke over the decades, and I'm hoping more airing out time combined with that spray will help.

New fabric, old machine

I've owned this Little Queen toy sewing machine for about 40 years, but it hasn't seen much sewing time. As I recall, one Christmas my sister got a knitting machine and I got this toy sewing machine. The knitting machine worked well, and we made many scarfs and hats for our dolls, some of which still survive, but this sewing machine never worked well. It only uses one thread, and operates on batteries or a hand crank. Right now, it is missing the thread spindle and the needle, and the directions are lost in time. It's been decorating my mother's sewing room for many years, but recently I took it home with me. I don't remember sewing much on it, preferring my mother's Elna Supermatic, which was new around the same time I got this machine. She still sews everything on that Elna, and I have an Elna SP of the same vintage, which is an extension of myself.
I've been tidying my sewing room lately, getting re-organized after a summer of quick projects or just neglect. Recently I folded all my yardage around my 6 by 12 ruler and look how pretty it is sitting in my cupboard. I didn't crop the photo, so you can see the chaos that reigns above and below my quilt fabric shelves. I have an armoire stuffed with fashion fabrics from my garment sewing days, and I've shoved leftover batting and other fabrics in the shelf below. The good part of re-folding my fabric was seeing what was in the cupboard. Lots of blacks and whites, more than enough to start the single quilt I was planning for my DS #2, some novelties for pillowcases, lots of neutrals, my hand dyes from last May, a stack of dotted fabrics, and assorted bits and pieces.

Here's some late summer gifts. The stack of homespuns are from Quilt Pixie (thanks again!) and the fat quarters and panels are from my mother, who was shopping the sale bin at a quilt shop recently. Note the word fabric in both shots, including that Moda sampler print in two colourways. Not sure what I'm going to do with that, but I'll have fun figuring it out. Thanks, Mom!

A beautiful, once useful, machine

Cleaning house is sometimes worth the effort. I was dusting on top of the bookshelf (translation: wiping off three years of cobwebs) where this antique sewing machine has lived for the past four years, and I took it down for some pictures. Here is the beautiful inlaid mother of pearl design on the bed, and the wavy edge of this machine.

It is handcranked, but completely seized up. It came to me from a friend who rescued it from a now-demolished restaurant where it was used as a decorative element for years.

. Here's the whole thing, with its inlays, gold decoration, and wavy base. It's been placed on a pine block, but I imagine it once had a beautiful case. I can't find any identifying model numbers or names on it, so I don't know when it was made or by what company. Anyone out there ever seen one like this before?