Traveling with a Singer featherweight

When I found out my husband's grandma had a singer featherweight, I asked to borrow it as we were traveling for thanksgiving and flying.  I was told yes.  But I knew I didn't want to travel with it in it's black case. 

Well the featherweight fits perfectly into my Vera Bradley Miller bag!!

So I open the bag up all the way, and I put a quilt inside it.  Usually the first time I put the quilt around the machine and then slide it into the bag.

Here you can see how snug the machine fits into the bag.  The best part is, there are pockets, which leaves me room for putting things like bobbins, thread, scissors, pins, etc.

And then it zips up all nice.  And it has nice long (padded) straps so I can easily put it on my shoulder or on top of a suitcase to travel with it.

A few tips for traveling with it (through an airport).  Take it out of the bag when going through security and put the machine in a bin by itself.  Now there have been sometimes they don't care when it's in the bag, but there are sometimes they do.  So it's just easier to put it in the bin beforehand.

Expect to have people ask you about it! I always have good conversations with TSA employees about the machine, they usually reminiscing about a machine someone in their family had.

I have not actually used this to sew at a gate (usually electric plugs are hard to come by) but it would be a possibility.  But once I get to my destination she usually comes out of the bag and is set up.

I don't just use this for air travel, it's handy when I am doing my craft fairs, or sewing nights, because it's easy to take a long.  

If you have any questions about traveling with a (singer featherweight) sewing machine please let me know and I will do my best to tell you my experiences!

Masks

School has started requiring masks again.  And since we moved I don't know where my masks went!  So I needed to make some new ones.  

I might not have known where my masks were, I knew where my cricut supplies were! so I was able to cut out some new masks.  I have very little waste on these, the little squares are part of my leader/enders (yes I am working on more than one!) and then 2.5" squares to keep up my collection (not that it's getting any smaller after all the quilts I feel like I have made with them!

Here are some of the masks I have recently made for myself.

Sewing Room finished

It took a lot of work, but we finished the sewing room floors!!

I love how they look, I loved being able to say that we did it! I also love the color with my purple walls. 

And I created this image with a before & after.

I love the purple so much! I cannot wait to show you how it looks with everything in here!

 

Battery Power

I love my featherweight.  I love bringing my featherweight along to my craft fairs, it's a conversation starter, and I get lots of things done also!

Not every craft fair I attend allows electricity or has it available.  Which stinks for multiple reasons.  But my awesome husband found a cool "gadget".  

We use a Ryobi electric lawn mower at our house.  They have these things that you can plug them into and then use outlets like normal (and USB outlets also).  So I have been able to sew at every craft fair I have gone to recently!

While it was a little expensive at first (we already have batteries) looking at the cost of paying for electric for every craft fair I go to, it should pay for  itself off soon!

And bonus it could be used for other things also! 

 

Carrot Cake

Someone on instagram was looking for pattern testers.  I looked at her timeline and our timeline with moving and thought I would be able to do it!  So I signed up to test Carrot Cake quilt pattern.  she actually released 3 patterns, with different colour ways. 

I really enjoyed the pattern.  It went together pretty easy.  It would have gone together easier if I wouldn't have been in the middle of a move, living in a hotel then a make shift sewing room!

You can kind of see the sizes of the pieces here.  I liked how big they were, it helped it come together quickly.  Although I was supposed to make a queen size quilt, but I did not, because I lost some pieces.  I did end up finding them after I moved into my sewing room.

Here is the quilt 100% finished, quilted, bound and washed.

And here is the recipient of the quilt! It's for my grandson, Kaison.  He didn't get it when he was born, but about a week later when we were able to meet him.

He was making this face when I laid the quilt out on him in the car.  So I turned it into a meme.  So excited that grandma made me a quilt! His mom has been teaching him right, because she already loves quilts! He always wants hers!

 I decided to make this quilt a little bit bigger than a baby size quilt, because I wanted him to be able to have it for a while.  Not that I won't make him another one, but I wanted one that he could use even in a few years!

New sewing room

Since we recently moved, I got to pick a new sewing space!  And since we plan on being here a while, I wanted to put everything I have ever wanted in here.

Here is Earl in the closet.  I am excited to have a walk in closet, it's a lot easier to put things in, so much space!

I chose purple for the walls.  It's actually the same purple as my previous sewing space! I really liked that color!

I wanted to have hard floors, so we took up the carpet.  (After we painted ;) so we didn't have to worry about paint getting on the floors!)

Here is the room all cleaned out, with the box of floor boards on the floor.

And the first few pieces in the closet!