As of last week, there’s a new little member of the Wandering Cat clan. Meet Miss Winnifred

When Mom’s cat Deuce died last summer, she wanted to bring another cat into their home, but was worried that Jem would be too rambunctious (otherwise, Mr. Burton may have stayed there.) But Jem is a year older now, and a little calmer, so when her work friend knew of a kitten in need of rescue, Mom decided it was finally time.

She’s just a wee little thing – we think no more than five or six weeks, and she only  weighs about one pound. When Mom brought her home, she had a severe upper respiratory infection and her eyes were constantly covered with mucus. She was the only survivor of her litter, and Mom knew without quick intervention, she wouldn’t make it.

But a trip to the vet soon set her right. She’s on antibiotics, and got a cream for her eyes. I saw her on Friday and she’s already infinitely better than she was. She’s certainly a tough little thing. She’s got an independent streak a mile wide. While she is quite a cuddle bug, when she’s on the move, there’s no stopping her.

The dogs have been fabulous with her and she has no fear of them.  In fact, she frequently chases them. Mr Tibbs is a little put out, (he’s a mama’s boy) but I’m sure he’ll come around soon. He missed Deuce quite a bit.

The vet thinks their might be some Maine Coon in her, but we’ll have to wait and see on that. We’ll know for sure when we see how big she grows. Right now she’s just a round little puff ball with stumpy little legs.

And the strangest tail I’ve ever seen! It’s going to be so fun watching her grow.

Welcome to the clan mini Winnie!

Wyoming Breezes asked me to do a post about my sewing machine, which she glimpsed in my L&E post the other day.

It is not a Featherweight, as she suspected, but a Singer 201K.

It was made in 1949 in Scotland… and it was Dave’s Grandmother’s machine.

How it ended up in my hands is a bit of a story. Last year, or the year before, Mom some how got involved in a vintage sewing machine forum. She had her Grandmother’s Singer treadle machine, though it wasn’t in good shape. After being on the forums for a while, she decided she wanted to get her hands on a Featherweight, because she was thinking of taking some sewing classes, and the Featherweights are much more portable than her modern Husqvarna. Soon enough she found one, and the next thing you know, friends, neighbours, coworkers and others, are all turning up with “old” Singer machines they had kicking around their house and didn’t want. Next thing you know, Mom is a full-on collector, collecting almost every model Singer put out between the late 1800s and 1960. She learned how to tune and fix them, and in the case of the machines in tables/desks/cabinets, she started contracting out the wood refinishing to Dave.

And suddenly Dave said “I’m sure there is a Featherweight kicking around Grandma’s house.” As you may know, some of the Featherweights can be worth a pretty penny, so we went on the hunt for it. We never did find it, but the 201K turned up in the garage. The desk was in terrible shape. For the last 40 years it had been used as a work bench/craft table by various members of the family.

The machine itself was in need of a lot of love mechanically, though the paint and decals just needed a good cleaning. Between Mom and Dave, they had it restored in a matter of weeks.

It was supposed to stay with Mom (she didn’t have a 201 in her collection yet), but given the history, she decided it should live with us. And here’s it’s been ever since. I use it almost daily. Dave’s grandma (who turned 90 last month) was thrilled to know it’s been given a new life. I made her Christmas present (place mats) on it and she was just tickled by that.

It’s not 100% original. Mom put a modern, LED light on it and had to replace a few other pieces. Almost all the bobbins were rusty, so I have all new bobbins for it. It also came with plain striped face plate, but Mom surprised me with this beautiful Celtic one at Christmas.

Despite it’s decoration, it’s not a fancy machine. It only does straight stitch, though it does have reverse. (I have a modern 1993 Singer if I need to do anything this one can’t do.) I’ve been able to get some fancy feet for it, including an even-feed foot, and a free-motion foot, both for quilting. This model has the ability to drop the feed dogs, so I can free motion on it (they call it the “darning” feature in the original instructions – which were still in the drawer!)

The feature I really love is the knee-lever. While it does have a foot pedal, it also has the knee-lever, which allows you to power it by pushing your leg against the lever. I find it’s much more comfortable than the foot pedal, and easier to control speed.

And as for Mom and her Featherweight that started it all…

well, it found a few other Featherweight friends, as well as other models. She now has 15 vintage machines in total – all working (and she sews on them all). She has treadles, and hand cranks, as well as electric machines. She has machines in large desks, small cabinets, and wooden carrying cases. She did give one Featherweight to Paisley, and a 99K  in a small desk to Rowan.  I guess we’re all just Vintage Singer girls!

This year, the first rose to bloom is one of the new ones….

Scentimental. The blooms are very small (about 2.5 inches) but that could be because she’s young. Online it says 4″ blooms, so we’ll have to wait and see.

I thought Garden Party would win the rose game, but she’s taking her time opening up. She is out front though and gets half the light that Scentimental does. I love that touch of pink with the creamy yellow.

Blue Girl (who’s looking rather pink right now) will likely come in a solid third. I thought I lost her this year, so I’m happy to see her bloom. She is definitely my favorite of them all.

Of course, Ebb Tide may just take that title if she turns out to be the deep dark purple the internet claims she is…

But enough about the roses. (Don’t worry, you’ll see much more of them in the coming weeks).

One of my other favourite flowers are the sunflowers. Mostly because they bring in the little goldfinches, and I just love those little tweeters.

I wasn’t going to plant any this year, because there really isn’t room for them (last year, they shaded too many of my other plants). Property Management is suppose to be rebuilding our fences, so I figured I’d wait for them to do so, then build a special box on the outside of the fence. (we are an end unit with a common area on one side).

But then a couple of sunflowers started sprouting all on their own (thanks to messy birds and birdseed). They weren’t in an ideal spot, so I moved them down beside the lilac bush. And I realized there was room for a couple more there (at least for this year).

So I’ve got some seeds started (these are the Mammoth variety, but I have some Teddy Bear ones sprouting too).

Unfortunately, the ones I transplanted have been snatched away (probably the squirrel). If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s always plant more sunflowers than you actually want… because someone/thing always eats half of them!

Like most of you, we have a tendency to use pet names for our pets, instead of their proper names.

Burton is often called Burtie, BabyBurt, BurtBurt, Fluffer Nutter, Mr. Floof …and my personal favourite….

…BABY FLUFF BUTT!!!

Thanks to all who’ve followed us to the new blog so far. I’m still getting the hang of this WordPress thing. I’ve replied to all the comments from yesterday. Did you get an email when I did… or do you have to come back and manually check? Let me know when you have a chance.

Now… business….

As I’ve read more and more quilt blogs, I’ve discovered the magic of Leaders and Enders. For all  you non-quilters, you can find an explanation of L&Es here.

As mentioned before as I’ve completed projects, I’ve been cutting the leftover fabrics into two sizes – 2.5 inch strips, and 4 inch squares. The strips are being used to build my scrappy log cabins, but I didn’t have a plan for the squares.

That is until I saw Wyoming Breezes’ Melting Pot quilt top.

The basket that holds the squares was getting quite full, and it was definitely time to start doing something with them

The quilt uses a lot of four patches, and they are perfect blocks to use for L&Es. I matched a bunch of squares up and put them to the test as I made a few more Disappearing Hourglass blocks

After making two blocks for the Disappearing quilt, I had quite a few squares sewn together, ready to turn into four patches…

It’s kind of amazing that you can build a quilt while building a totally different quilt!

Welcome! And thanks for following us at our new home!

Now to business!

When Rowan and Paisley were down for March Break, Mom took them on a little shopping trip to Claire’s. Apparently, Miss Rowan fell in love with a Unicorn make-up brush, but decided it was too expensive.

I knew where I could get a full set for a decent price, so I put in an order and waited for them to arrive.And then of course, they needed a case.

This was a quick project. I didn’t have a pattern, but based it off a knitting needle case I used to have. It’s just a simple square, with a stitched pocket for each brush.The whole thing rolls up, and secures with a ribbon. Perfect for stashing in a back pack for sleepovers!