Time flies

I hadn’t forgotten about this little blog-ette, however it hasn’t exactly been top of my to do list, or even anywhere near it. Time has passed since I first wrote about my sewing machine. Things have changed a little. I’ve moved to a new house with more space and a lovely room that the sewing machine can live in. I’ve established that it’s definitely a 66k that I have. I know that I can’t lower the feed dogs or sew backwards but apart from that all things are possible. I’ve bought an awful lot of fabric. Seriously. For someone who thinks they don’t shop I managed to shop a fair amount. With wonderful intentions of course, but still. I also have recycled/reused some fabric, so it’s not all bad.

After wrestling with the tensions for a while I lost heart and gave up. Moving house doesn’t exactly leave time for hobbies anyway.

I managed to find a local guy who used to work for Singer years ago, he came round and has serviced it for me. The tensions are now spot on and it runs like a dream. His name is Mike and he can be found in Slough in case anyone else has need of a Singer-Wizard. We had a lovely chat about the Singer sales model and history of the company. He said that he’d been around the private collection somewhere in Dorset/Somerset(?), I was fairly green at that point. It was wonderful to chat to someone who properly understood the machine and the company. He’s got a couple of other family sewing machines now too that he’s going to try and put back into action for me. He understands that I’d rather pay to repair than pay to buy a new one. An old fashioned attitude perhaps but I won’t apologise for it. What could you buy these days that would still be working as well in fifty or a hundred year’s time?

Hurtling towards the end of the year

Christmas has come round rather too quickly for my liking. I’m not quite ready for it. Give me another month, we could have it at the end of Jan instead. That would be quite nice. I had all sorts of good intentions around home made gifts, which hinged on the sewing machine being functional by now. It’s not, so there are no handmade gifts. The only sewing I’ve done recently was making a very rudimentary bag to go with the childs game I bought from ebay. I did watch Kirstie’s homemade show – I alternated between fascination and shouting at the tv. I think entering something you made with an expert’s help for a competition is cheating. And I think the fact that she won was a crying shame for the other crafters who’d made their projects alone, unaided.

The worst thing about this Christmas being here again so soon is that I’m still sick, my delightful usual symptoms have been augmented by a cold/sinus infection which has left me green and exhausted, also feeling guilty for all the work I’ve not done recently. Somehow in the next week I need to get healthy, catch up on proper work, house work, OU work and general festive preparations. I fear I won’t manage all those things in one little week.

Mmm coffee

Espresso roast this morning. Wish I’d picked up a bag of decaf so I could have a 2nd cup without getting jittery. It was delicious.

Another weekend…..

This week’s been so long and horrible I can hardly remember being so relieved that the weekend’s finally here. Have done a little more research into my thread bunching issue, but haven’t yet done anything about it. Am frantically trying to squeeze enough studying into my week so that I don’t feel like a complete wastrel. Luckily my journey each day forces me to sit and concentrate on something, chemistry is just as absorbing as knitting — which is now reserved for evenings at home whilst chatting or watching tv. Was just reading the blog of someone I know who’s running the marathon. I so nearly went for a run this morning, but a split second of indecision was my undoing. Tomorrow. First thing. That’ll help the general feeling of having ‘done’ things. Somehow housework and mundane things like shopping seem to eat too many hours and constantly need doing. Wow. That’s quite a dull post I wrote there. My apologies if you read this far. Go do something productive. It’s what I’m about to do.

The Gate

Had dinner at The Gate next to the Hammersmith Apollo on Saturday. Had gone to see Seasick Steve but a flood had forced a postponement. Dinner was lovely, had a sort of bean chilli, then Apple Charlotte for dessert. We were lucky to get a table, it was crammed full, yet wasn’t uncomfortable.

Procrastination

Free Knitting Patterns – Farrow Rib Scarf.

Picked up a bargain at the knit and stitch show – am using Farrow rib to construct a scarf for dear friend who bought me the Singer. It keeps me busy on the train/bus. But I’ve spent more time kniting than playing with sewing machine in the last couple of weeks. Partly because I’m still under the weather and knitting’s more sedate than trying to coax the sewing machine to sew, partly because I’ve been getting back late so am wary of disturbing neighbours with too much noise.

I’ve installed the treadle belt – it wasn’t too hard. I undid the staple on the old one, used a small bulldog clip to link the new and old belts, then guided the new through the mechanism and pulled the old out gradually. I used a large bulldog clip on the other end of the new belt to stop it being pulled into the machine, finally joined them with the staple. Had to hammer a needle through the leather to make a hole through which I could feed the staple, before closing it with pliers. Not too technical at all.

I also oiled it, put in a new needle and bobbin and gave it another polish. Threaded it up and had an experimental sew. Had to change both tensions a few times to stop the thread snapping, but still have problems. I think it’s related to the tension. What happens is – I can sew ok for a bit, the stitches on top look fine. But the underneath isn’t – it’s a mess of bunched threads which can be pulled apart quite easily. I’ve read a fair few diagnoses online, I suspect it’s a tension issue, or the fact that I wound the bobbin by hand (uneven). I’ll try machine winding a bobbin, if that doesn’t solve it then some logical tension testing (I can feel a lab style notebook may be required….will try to resist more moleskins…) and failing that, it’ll be a complete breakdown and strip clean. Which I know I’ll need to do sometime anyway, was just hoping it wouldn’t have to be immediately.

Will have another play over the weekend and see if I can’t get it going properly. Have things to sew. Getting impatient about it again.

Invasion of mice

So. Parcel should arrive in the morning. New parts to install. Should be fun.

Have entertained myself (procrastinated, as I should have been doing something else…)by knitting mice for Battersea rescue cats. I made a few up as a test in the beginning – gave them to my cats to see if they were interested in them – also to test durability. I’ve been knitting outsides for a fair few weeks now on my way to and from work. Sometimes in the evenings. They’re really easy, quick, and fit in my handbag easily. I don’t know how many I’ve done but the box holding them is looking quite stripy. I’m going to ask a couple of friends to help make them up – add eyes, whiskers, stuffing, a seam and a tail. But first I need the sewing machine to be able to make the little catnip pouches easily. That’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it.

The Fluff didn’t seem too bothered by them…

 

Patience…

It’s only Thursday. This week has seemed very long. Thank goodness there’s only one more day before Saturday.

I came home to a Royal Mail ‘sorry we missed you’ card yesterday. My usual postlady must have been off, as she is wonderful and leaves packages for me in an agreed safe place. So I now have to wait until Saturday to get the new bits I ordered.  That’s ok, as I’m short on time and energy this week; it’s end of quarter at work which keeps me very busy. But I also have to get up on Saturday morning and go out to fetch it. I sound terribly lazy. I’m sure it’ll do me good, but I can’t help but think that I’d like a good sleep before tackling anything complicated.

I hope by Saturday afternoon I’ll be well on the way to getting things moving and working. How exciting. Now I just need to have a little patience. And sleep.

Pictures

I took some quick snaps on my phone…

 

This is with the table closed  – the sewing machine’s inside.

 

So, there it is. The blankets are to keep it well protected when I’m not playing with it – the other members of my household don’t respect 70+ year old technology.

Sourcing bits and bobs

So. My beautiful machine has been in the living room for a couple of weeks now. I’ve polished the wood with beeswax and dusted/cleaned it.

It needs some new parts. Nothing major. Not surgery or anything. Just a new treadle belt, some bobbins, needles and a bit of oil to keep it sweet. I’ve been looking online to find a place from which I can order all that I need. I found it at the weekend, but their site crashed on me and I was too impatient to put all the sundries I’d looked at back in the online basket. I called them yesterday afternoon. I was helped by a wonderfully sounding Geordie guy (they are in Newcastle….I found it odd that I couldn’t find somewhere in London to sell me things, but hey, internet shopping is not bound by geographical constraints). He was able to find my ‘lost’ online basket and read everything back to me. I was a bit indecisive but he was very patient and let me make up my mind without hurrying me. He apologetically explained that we’d missed that day’s shipping deadline so it’d be dispatched the next day. The next day! I didn’t feel the apologetic tone was warranted, but I appreciated it nonetheless. Oops. I’ve strayed from my original intention of writing about my sewing adventures into the murky world of customer service. I’ll try to refrain from doing that too often. That’s a whole other blog. But singermachines.co.uk have won my business for now.

Hopefully in the next couple of days the nice post lady will bring all the bits and pieces and I’ll put some pictures up of the process of fitting them.

The only thing I didn’t order which I will need is a patchworking foot. I wasn’t entirely sure if the snap on kind would be compatible with my machine so I’ve not ordered anything yet. I can measure out the seam and pop a bit of masking tape on the base initially – there are tape marks on there to be cleaned off so I won’t be doing any harm.

I’m very excited to get it working!