National Sewing Machine Day! & some stitching!

Happy National Sewing Machine Day!  June 13th is the first of TWO National Sewing Machine Days!  The second one is September 10th.  Sewing machines are so wonderful that they get TWO days to celebrate!

In honor of National Sewing Machine Day, here are some photos of my latest sewing machine.  I got this machine back in April, but never posted any photos.  This is a 1950 White Rotary Series 77.  It is in a lovely desk/cabinet.

cabinet opened up

In the top drawer of the desk is a holder for broken needles and pins (the black circle).  It has a glass jar that holds the needles (you can't see the jar).

black lid opens to hold broken needles

This machine also came with all sorts of attachments, including a button hole maker and a zig zagger.

drawer full of attachments

This lovely machine needs a new home (I'm out of room for cabinets).  If you know of someone that would be interested, this machine is in the western suburbs of Chicago.

I have been stitching, too.  I made 4 pin cushions.

 

I also made a mini Penguin quilt.

I finished two more Ukulele's for someone else (his wife and his sister in law).

I also made a dress for my granddaughter and a matching one for her doll. 

The dress was from material that was already smocked and layered.  All I had to do was to stitch the seams and add the straps. 

Now to get the dress in the mail.

I did get the last baby quilt quilted, but I still have to sew on the binding.  I also got 5 game board quilts basted.

Slow Stitching and Some Finishes

I've been slow stitching today.  I finished stitching down the binding on a baby quilt.

hand stitching the binding

Since the back is Minkee, I stitch the binding to the back of the quilt then hand stitch it to the front.  It's much easier that way (at least for me).  Here is the full quilt.

baby quilt

straight line quilting

quilting from the back (color isn't true, sorry)

I've also finished one of the 'We're On a Roll' toilet paper quilts.  I hand quilted it.  It was mailed off to my inlaws earlier this week.  My father in law had a hard time finding toilet paper when this whole pandemic thing started.  I thought they might get a laugh from the quilt. 

1st TP quilt

Remember my ukulele from the last blog post?  Well, I was asked to make one for someone who actually plays ukulele.  I made this yesterday.

2nd ukulele

Our neighbors brought us some cookies.  They've done this a couple of times before.  They are yummy!

 It's so nice of them to bring us cookies. 

I'm linking up with Kathy's Slow Stitching Sunday.

Squirrel Stitching

I got distracted this morning with a 'squirrel' project.  Sew4Home offered the cutest pillow this morning in their newsletter.  They have some of the cutest projects.  This one is a Ukulele pillow.  I knew my grandkids would like a Ukulele pillow to play with.

I did do things just slightly different than their pattern called for.  Instead of cutting the interfacing, then ironing it on, I decided to iron interfacing to the material, then cut it.  I figured it might make the seam a bit stronger.  Also, I sewed the buttons on before I sewed the front and back pieces together.  It was just easier for me that way.

1927 Singer 15 hand crank

 I stitched this on one of my hand cranks.  Instead of using a zig zag stitch by machine on the brown felt parts, I hand stitched the blanket stitch on those two pieces.  I did use my Janome to stitch the strings.  I had never used the stitch that they recommended.  It worked great!

ironed, before stuffing it

finished Ukulele pillow

This was a fun project.  I was supposed to be hand quilting one of the Toilet Paper quilts today.  Oh well, I'll work on that quilt tomorrow.

Last week I did finish more of the striped circle blocks.  I now have 52 of these blocks.  Until last week, I hadn't stitched on those since March.  I only stitch on these blocks at work, and I only got to work 5 days in April (and I stitched on the TP quilts those days).

striped circles

I did make more of the black circles this week.  I ran out of them.  I still have lots more to make. 

I get to work 3 days this week, so, after the TP quilt is quilted, I'll work on the striped circle blocks.