Authentic Hand Cranks

The past few years I've been interested in hand crank sewing machines, my interest piqued because of the Treadle-On group and specifically, the River Rats TOGA I've been attending. When you see them in action and try one out for yourself, it's a bit hard to resist. They are generally old, beautiful, and somewhat smaller than a standard sewing machine. Up until this time I've converted a few 3/4 sized Singers into hand cranks with an after market crank:

Singer 99 with after-market handcrank added

They are not as nice but affordable and gives you a taste of this type of sewing. Then I bought a nice German hand crank and got a better one:

German hand crank in fancy wood case

The action is smooth, precise, and perfect for piecing blocks when quilting. Just in case you are not a quilter and ask "What is piecing?" as I once did, it's where you are sewing together the pieces cut out to make the whole of a block (and the blocks sewn together to make the top of the quilt, etc.). The more precise in cutting and sewing, the better your pieces fit together, look better, and you have fewer problems, at least with your quilting project. After using the German machine I had an opportunity to buy a Harris from Joe, something I wrote about in Three of a Kind. The Harris is a fairly small hand crank sewing machine and I've found it works well on the ironing board. As I cut, press, and pin with a cutting mat on my ironing board, there's room for the Harris on one end for sewing and then back to pressing. That's how I sew those block-of-the-month patterns where each block is done only once with precise directions. No multiple layers or cuts so setting it up on the ironing board works good for me.

Beloved Harris in wood case

At First Quilters last Saturday I had a request for a hand crank sewing machine so I brought an after market crank and a a Singer 99 for demonstration. As fascinating as something like that is, it's still a very heavy sewing machine, not great for travel as the woman who was interested was thinking about. When someone has a request, I start looking and the next day a child's sewing machine was for sale, a Singer model 40 hand crank:

Singer model #40 hand crank

The owner told me how much she used it as a little girl with all boys in her family: this was something all her own. Missing a needle and the case was pretty cracked up, I worked on it until she was purring again. Needles? I found some round shank industrial shorts that worked and were just lying around, waiting for the right sewing machine. The case could be taped up with colored Duck tape for a passable cover when traveling. The only hitch I can see is that it's a chain stitcher, not a lock stitch. With a chain stitch you only need a spool of thread for the top, no bobbin, but unless you secure the thread at the end it can be easily pulled out, a plus for mistakes but a minus for longevity. My research on chain stitching tells me it's more flexible and less likely to break that a lock-stitch but I'm going to have to try this one out.

Chainstitch front

Chainstitch back

With a taped up carrying case, it looks more like a child's play doctor kit:

Singer model #40 carrying case (tape on bottom side)

Even though it's a toy sewing machine, something I scoff at, this one might just be okay!

Final Cabinet Fix-Up

As we head into fall and the coming cold weather, I feel the pressure of getting the cabinet models sold and out of the garage. This means some need to have a face-lift so they can be sold and I worked on a few of them this weekend. One was a Bernina Record 730 that came in a very nice cabinet with drawers and even a pull-up thread rack. When open it looks good but the top was a mess when closed up with a big black ink stain and poor surface. I masked it with tape and plastic bags and stripped off the finish. That poor ink stain remained but it did shrink and lighten. Mahogany stain followed by two coats of polyurethane and it looks so much better:

Cabinet for Bernina 730 with refinished top

Now that was a quick fix but here's one that was long in the making but had a fairly quick finish. This Brother sewing machine below is one of my favorites with a compact cabinet and chair, in excellent finished shape but...no chair seat. I bought the wood and foam but just lacked the tools to cut the wood to size. It ended up in my kitchen for several years and I finally said "ENOUGH" and moved it to the garage. Yesterday I visited my daughter to get a grandbaby fix and brought along the chair and wood for my son-in-law to  cut for me. Eric has a great set-up in his garage and really knows what he's doing but it all goes into storage during the winter so I had to get this done now. He cut the wood perfectly and I brought it home to complete in steps:

Cabinet with Brother sewing machine looks good..

...and then you see there is no seat!

With wood cut and foam in place it's getting ready

Foam covered with a layer of batting

Fabric pulled up and stapled onto plywood in place

No sew corners, just folded

Thin wood with notched corners screwed together. Metal brackets keep it from sliding.

Seat and cushion ready for use.

It fits nice but I wish I had matched the fabric better to the machine colors but sometimes the buyer doesn't care or has their own ideas in mind and would have changed it no matter what I would have done.

Number three in the cabinet fix-up was a compact cabinet that came to me in pretty ugly form:

Green paint inside treadle-stripped out base

Inside of the door

Opened up it's clean and smooth

Green interior? It looked like someone got sick in there but the exterior wasn't too bad with just the top surface stripped and in rough shape. So with lots of sanding and cleaning up, I finally gave the interior a face lift with white paint. The cabinet got stained and polyurethane to end up like a decent cabinet:

Closed with top sanded clean and smooth

Ready for the finishing products

Opened up with inside painted

Final assembly with inside finished, door back on.

 The sewing machine itself is a well used Singer 66 that needed some attention. Because this was originally a treadle cabinet that has been stripped of the treadle mechanism, when they added the electric motor and cords it didn't really fit well. The motor block was sitting on the top surface behind the motor but I figured I could change that to under the top surface between the holes for what would have been the treadle belt. I had to extend the electrical cords so they would reach but that wasn't too difficult. Finding a set of cords and knee control that would fit into the cabinet was more difficult but I had one and got it all into place.

Bottom of the sewing machine head showing motor block placement

It's never going to be a beautiful sewing machine or cabinet but it's good in a semi-rustic way and will have many years of use left in it. It came to me pretty ugly but is leaving looking a bit rustic but not rough. I call that a win-win.

Modest little cabinet with a Singer 66 hidden inside

Comfort

It appears I have worked myself into a state of exhaustion so I took nearly a week off from work, suffered from flu-like symptoms, visited the doctor twice, and still have intestinal distress. What's a girl to do? I think it's time to pamper myself a bit. Here's some of my favorite things:

• Visit my grandkids: who doesn't brighten up to see they little faces?
• Rest and read in the bell tower in my backyard: I'm a librarian, enough said.
• Relax with some knitting while watching favorite TV shows, preferably something funny.
• Sewing: either a new project to finish up an old one
• Sewing machines: fix up an old one, clean up a dirty machine, discover new features

The above list is pretty much in priority order but weather, time of year, commitments, all of this is subject to change. Even though I think I'm on the mend, no one wants to risk catching this and with either rain or bugs on the scene, I'm inside the house working on sewing machines. I know, I suffer so.

Viking 6360

Here is my latest sewing machine model that I fear I will have to put back on a shelf. This Viking series are wonderful when they are working and I have one in perfect condition. I have disposed of several that I thought I could fix in my early days of sewing machine repair and now I'm so much more savvy. There's now another one on my worktable so I guess I'm just not that savvy. Ellie brought it over and my first response was "No way, problem machine for sure" but you know it's quite difficult to just toss a sewing machine without at least looking at it. Dials would not turn, there were faint cracks on the cam gear, poorly replaced take up lever, and the back cover was broken. Time to walk away! So here's how I (almost) fixed this problem sewing machine.

1. Heat and sewing machine oil: this combination got things moving again. The next day I had to start all over again. Who is the stubborn one here?

2. Compare to working model: even when they were not exactly the same, they were similar enough.

Model 2000 in a beautiful green

The cam shifter showed it should be clicking into each selected stitch but mine was swooshing between selection. Without a firm "click" it never actually engaged. Without positive contact it would only stitch in the needle left position and backwards.

Here's the location of the problem but difficult to photograph

3. Heat and oil.

This went on daily for a few weeks (or maybe it only seemed that long) until the stitch selector dial would move but the indicator did not.

Dial stuck on the purple/green choice

 Oh oh, this is bad news. But I persisted, replacing the poor take up lever:

Take up lever with a weld?

Old lever on top, replacement on bottom

and fixing the back plate. When will I quit? I just found the applications for fall craft fairs and realize I have to get sewing again instead of playing with sewing machines. That's still something on my "happy" list so I pack up the Viking 6360 in hopes for either inspiration one day or cleaning out when my good sense reigns again.

Old Friends

To say this has been a busy summer would be an understatement but here we are, partway through August and I'm wondering where the summer went. I never get enough time to sew or work on sewing machines let alone enjoy our marvelous weather in Minnesota during these months. But this year I had a very good reason to be busy because I have been taking care of my aunt in Iowa. The adventure began last spring when a series of events indicated my aunt was having some dementia and making poor decisions. That lead to a visit from a social worker who was an angel with so much help and resources for us to call upon. A doctor's visit, a hospital stay, recuperation and evaluation in a nursing home indicated her dementia was quite advanced. She could no longer live alone at home, the lovely home her husband built for them 58 years ago. She was only in the nursing home for three months when she passed away peacefully.

Gone are the plans to make up last quilt blocks she started for a flower garden quilt into a lap quilt, but I have been going through her craft dresser and found patterns and supplies for some of her favorite contributions to the church craft bazaar. Iron-on transfers for flour sack dishtowels, yarn for plastic canvas coasters and bookmarks, remnants from crewel kits (what do you do with the leftovers when you are done?) as well as neat stacks for fabrics, less than half a drawerful, for future quilts. She was pretty organized but I suspect she had not been able to sew for the last five years due to her dementia. The ability to judge spacial arrangement and distance can be affected and for her that was true. This keeps you from driving, too, since you cannot always tell where you are on the road.

This is a final tribute to my aunt Marcella who taught me that even a quiet life can be meaningful, contain joy in little accomplishments, and it's always right to love your family with a fierce love that doesn't give up.

Karen and Marcella, May 14, 2019

Hand Sewing

With my love of sewing machines you would think I never pick up a needle and thread for hand sewing. It's almost true but for most projects there is a bit of finishing work that requires hand sewing and I don't object too much. We have been cleaning out my aunt house in Iowa and she has been a crafter and quilter, making items for her church sale every fall. Over the years she made each one of her nieces a quilt that was all hand pieced and quilted. I still have mine:

My quilt from Aunt Marcella, all hand stitched!

and I figure it's about forty years old. My aunt was a big crocheter and we shared patterns as well as recipes: these are things I have treasured and all the more since she can no longer do them. You see, my aunt is slowly yielding to dementia and it has taken away her ability to make spacial judgement. That means following lines when embroidering flour-sack dish towels is tricky, cutting out shapes and patterns becomes difficult, and centering your car on the road is a challenge. Through a series of events and a hospital stay she is now in a nursing home. This was not a choice we wanted for her and she was ready to leave and go home for the first month and then she stopped talking about it, accepted her new quarters, and now has made friends. Come to find out, she was comfortable in her home of sixty years that her husband built for her, but she was very lonely.  The staff all love her and they tell me she is a favorite resident.

As we have gone through her house, taking her clothes and personal items to the nursing home, we have found some great treasures. One has been her tall dresser with craft items. Here's a quilt in the making:

Flower garden quilt blocks

I packaged it up and brought it home and now have started to figure out how it can get finished and enjoyed by her. There were blocks finished, extra pieces of fabric, and even yardage of the white used between the motifs. As I check it over I saw it was all hand pieced and the pieces were small enough that it would have been even more difficult to use a sewing machine. I got out my needle and thread and got to sewing, cutting, sewing some more, until I've come up with this:

Final arrangement of flower blocks

Trying to figure out the edge work has been challenging: how do you finish an uneven edge? My sister said she could use a long arm quilter for the final quilting but I don't want to make the edge any kind of a challenge. It looks like I will have to fill in enough white around the edges to try and make them straight. I think the corners can be rounded and it might be preferred if she is in a wheelchair. I'm excited to finish it and to see if she recognizes it or can remember any of the fabrics.

Adding edges

Three of the sides are about done so I'm taking it with me to sew in the car on the ride down and then I can sew on it during the evening when we are back at the hotel. It can go to my sister who will long arm quilt it and possibly add the binding but might also send it back to me so I can finish the edge.

A project like this gives me great satisfaction because you can see something that was clearly a UFO (Un-Finished Object) that is going to get finished and make someone happy. The quilt will give staff and visitor something to talk about with her. Everyone likes a little positive attention, even when you are not quite sure what all the fuss it about!

Aunt Marcella with the quilt she made over 40 years ago

Keep on Learning

Some people scoff at the phrase "lifelong learners" but I really believe in the concept of learning new things as long as we live. My late in life obsession with sewing machines has nearly transformed my life (and my house) giving me many new friends, an occupation in my retirement, and a worthy place for my mind to travel to. All that is a prelude to those pesky Pfaff 1222's that I cannot fix! The one that's only running in reverse is my current project and hoping I could take one more look to see if it's the buttonhole mechanism that is stuck, is now going back home. I can hardly blame the owner but it feels like such a failure; she bought another one and her husband wants to take a look at her original machine again. It's getting picked up today and another machine is getting dropped off: a treadle!

Now we are back into treadles and it came about when I found a model 22 cabinet reasonably priced and not too far away. It was a fun texting conversation when I asked if the treadle mechanism was still inside and she said "What would that look like?" As it turns out, there not only was a full treadle mechanism inside, there was a Singer 66 sewing machine, too. Since it had been in their family I tried to convince her to keep it and I would even show her how to use it but they were moving and there would be no room for this cabinet as a TV stand. Yes, that's the most popular use of old treadle stands. We got it home and when I went to use it there was resistance as I treadled. Was it the treadle or the sewing machine? I took the metal spring belt off (those are so cool!)

Treadle belt in spring style steel

to find it was a problem with the sewing machine so I came inside with me. After cleaning and oiling several times it still wasn't smooth but I took it back outside to the garage hoping it might get past the problem as it was treadled. Nope, it was still sticking at some point. It was late and I went to bed, hoping for better results in the morning.

Singer 66 in treadle cabinet with steel spring belt

Never underestimate to power of walking away when you can't figure something out: it worked fine in the morning. No kidding, it was smooth, made a nice stitch, action of the treadle was fairly effortless. I'm going to have a harder time selling this one when it is just so nice. Actually, that's not entirely true because now I'm looking for a Singer 66 Red Eye for this awesome cabinet.

Drawing room cabinet similar to Singer #22

In the meantime I get a call from Jane saying Bob can drop off a treadle today. We have been working on getting this one from Bob's garage to mine for several years and today is the day. Here's what she looks like:

New Home treadle with missing drawers

I think I have some work to do on this one. We had to concede to leave one of the cars out of the garage for the duration of the summer (and into fall) so I can get the cabinets ready for sale, something that happens each summer, but I have been very careful about bringing cabinet models home. Here's what it looked like for most of the winter:

Yes, that's a Bernina cabinet stacked on top

We are getting ready for a garage sale and those cabinets will still be here so I bet there will be For Sale signs on them, too. I've got my work cut out for me!

Baby Baby

We are all wrapped up in babies these days with my new granddaughter only two months old and a step-daughter getting ready for her third in October. There is a baby shower in August for the October baby and I already bought a backpack diaper bag that was requested so I considered my job done. Not so: our granddaughter, Sarina, who has been sewing with me, came over on Saturday and brought her sewing machine along. She showed me the photos taken on her iPad last winter of the fabric she wanted to use in her next project. Of course, I had forgotten all about it so we dug out the Minky and flannel trying to think up a project. It didn't take her long to decide it would be nice to make a baby blanket for her newest cousin. This is something I really like about Sarina: she always wants to make something for someone else. One of her first projects were pillowcases for her cousins and now a baby quilt. What a sweetie.

Here was our plan: aqua Minky fabric in the center with a cream print border in flannel, another border in aqua print flannel, and then a final border in blue floral Minky. We picked a blue print flannel for the back and got cutting. Of course, the fuzzy and stretchy fleece was going to be difficult to sew on but after consulting Tips on quilting with minky fabric from Superior Threads I remembered I had a Brother walking foot we could use. This was a new idea to Sarina but she took to it like a duck to water and most of the sewing went off without a hitch:

Minky fabric center with first border

By the time we added the second border we could see it was getting too big so we stopped right there.

Two borders was just right for size

 Adding the blue flannel backing just didn't settle right with we so we took it to a higher authority: Grandpa. Sarina argued we had an animal theme going on so the white sheep on the blue flannel was great but I argued the blue looked too much like a boy and this was a baby girl so she needed some pink, not blue. Grandpa encouraged us to make a trip to JoAnn's to see what they would have in a better color match. Off we went to the fabric store only to find there were too many matches! We took our top three to the counter so see in better light and decided the baby's mom would like the print with baby onesies on a clothesline the best. We bought what was left on the bolt and rushed home to wash and dry it. While it was fluffing up Sarina played Battleship with Grandpa and then Cribbage and I made up pizza fondue for supper. When the table was all cleared off we got things set up again and Sarina did the final sewing.  One final pressing job and she asked me to do the top stitching all around since it was going to show. I thought it also needed more stitching so I added stitches around the Minky section for added stability. Here it is, all done and Sarina is so proud of her work:

Sarina with her new baby quilt

It amazed me how well that little Brother sewing machine worked. The walking foot was a real help but I think Sarina just needs to keep sewing straight lines to gain more confidence. It was her plan and design with only a little assistance from Grandma, especially when planning on how wide and long to cut the borders. That's right , you even use math in everyday life!

Final quilt with backing showing