dancingraisin

Zeke! Really! Bring cookies for break! Do none of your three guilds have a scheduled pot luck "lunch" period? Here in the Kings River Quilt Guild, food R us!

We have had good luck with 4-H--but the quilting leader is a guild member. We have also begun a partnership with a local middle school in a "less advantaged" city neighborhood. A teacher there had begun an after-school sewing group to HUGE response. In this day of no home ec, these young girls came from families without a sewing tradition but wanted to learn the basics of sewing and begin to create things for themselves. (They are also big fans of Project Runway.) We invited them to a guild meeting to show what they were working on and gave the group a large check to purchase some machines since they almost all share the few machines that the teacher/group leader had personally. (One girl's family had given her a machine for her birthday--to her great delight.) (We also had many many bags of scraps and unwanted yardage that they received with delight.) The students who the group selected to come (only four could fit in their teacher's car) were blown away by our show and tell--they had never been exposed to quilting and all wanted to try!

When you talk to your eye doctor, you should pose the question of whether a separate pair of glasses might do the trick. I wear trifocals, with the medium range just right for the computer screen that I work at all day long. I have cervical spine arthritis and the separate pair of glasses with just that part of the prescription really helps when my neck is painful. The down side is that I have to change out of them to read or see distances.

After killing several irons using the same method as you, my latest model is the Rowenta Pro-Master. Good strong heat and good steam. Some of my quilting friends dislike its weight but I see that as an asset--it's all personal preference after all. I was told the Pro Master and several other high end Rowenta irons are made in Germany and are more reliable than their more affordable Asian-manufactured models. (Shop around-- I found mine on Amazon at a much better price (about $90)than the fabric stores advertise (about $120).) Time will tell. One of my previous victims was a low-end Rowenta that gave up the ghost long before I sent if to an early death by floor. DISCLAIMER: I haven't tried the irons with the separate steam units. They frighten me. Irrationally?

Love it! (My son is a guitarist and he would love it, too!)

Thanks for sharing, Linda. I just sent the article off to a friend who sometimes sells if she is approached and offered enough--she quilts beautifully but has very limited resources. Anyway, I find that I would rather give a quilt away to someone I know will enjoy it. But mercifully, I can still afford to do that. Things may change when I retire and my income drops to social security and a very small pension.

Thanks for the Craftsy tip, Vicki. I need to start using rulers but seem to have forgotten everything I learned in class with DeLoa.

Thank you all. I am in very much the same place as you, Joan, but was too embarrassed to confess since Lucey has been living with me a long time. My problem is not loneliness--I live alone and am used to solitude (although my doggy, who is usually right there with me, is afraid of Lucey and won't cross the threshold of Lucey's bedroom). It's more that I just love to piece. I am still working so piecing is my relaxation--I know what I'm doing and can lose myself in the purr of my DSM and the routine of making the blocks. I think Linda hit it on the head--it's so hard to be bad at longarming and it's so much more effort since I am sooo at the beginning! I need to discipline myself and practice, but oh yuck!, it's still so hard!

As to pot lights, I am slowly replacing them throughout my house with the LED versions, which are cooler, energy efficient and very clear bright light. You need to install an appropriate dimmer. I second the vote for working with a local electrician who knows his lighting--start with whoever your GC is using in the construction and work from there.

I have taken to folding the list in half, then stapling the edge so it is attached to my purse strap. My co-workers find this quite amusing since I frequently have a sheet of note pad stapled to the handle of my tote bag that says "milk," or "coffee filters," or whatever else I need to remember to grab in my morning fog tomorrow.

I understand that many, if not all, wrinkle releasing sprays are a dilute mixture of fabric softener and water. So the question is whether anything in fabric softener would be harmful in the long run.

Terriers are the cutest--but then they have to be to survive after their more terrier-ist moments! I am smiling at his courage. My poodle is terrified of Lucey--he cowers in the hall, watching and waiting for me to be devoured!

Santa, I've been so good this year. I have even been clearing up my UFO pile.

Here in Clovis, the predicted storm has been a big nothing. So sorry that you took your decorations down . . . . not having managed to get anything up myself this year, I just crawled to bed last night and hoped for the best. Seems like we got it--plenty of water but no damage in my neck of the woods. Cynthia

I love my reconditioned Lucey! Since I quilt only for myself, buying reconditioned put the Lucey in my price range. And with the savings from buying at a road show, I added Bliss. My understanding is that nearly all of the computer boards are replaced in reconditioning. Since mine was a relatively rescent model, however, I can't speak to how old you can go. Cynthia