Zig-Zag Foot

Have you ever seen a zig zag foot before?  One of the ladies at the T.O.G.A. had one.

 It was short shank and fit right on my Singer 99 hand-crank.  I had never seen one before.  It had a perfect zig-zag stitch.  I am definitely going to keep my eye open for one of these.  It was super easy to figure out, I even made a video to show you, it's at the end of the post.

 For those of you who are not familiar with the older vintage machines, most of them are just the straight stitch.  I was looking for information on when the zig-zag stitch was added to machines, this is the information I found:  The Necchi, first imported from Italy in 1947, introduced the zig-zag machine to domestic sewing. Invented in the late 19th century, zig-zag machines had previously been used only for industrial sewing.  When creating a zigzag stitch, the back-and-forth motion of the sewing machine's needle is controlled by a cam. As the cam rotates, a fingerlike follower, connected to the needle bar, rides along the cam and tracks its indentations. As the follower moves in and out, the needle bar is moved from side to side. Sewing machines made before the mid 1960s mostly lack this hardware and so cannot natively produce a zigzag stitch, but there are often shank-driven attachments available which enable them to do so.

Here are a couple of pictures of the box and instruction manual.

 Wait until you see how the foot works!  Since the needle does not move, the foot moves the material!

I love learning about all of these old feet.  I need to learn how to use all of the feet I do have, I really want this one to add to my collection.

Missy

Featherweight

I wanted to show you my birthday present.  I got a featherweight!  It is in great condition!

I found some great information on the card table that was made for the featherweights.  

http://ismacs.net/singer_sewing_machine_company/featherweight_fever_those_elusive_featherweight_cabinets_and_tables.html

Here is the case it came in.

I had trouble winding the bobbin, turns out it was a super easy fix.  I just needed to put some oil in that little hole.

 To wind the bobbin, you just flip the little arm down and loosen a knob on the handle.

 I had to put in my 1/4 inch seam.

 I made my Sew Sweet Bee block on it.

I love the way it turned out.  I'm afraid I was late sending it off, this is the first thing I have sewn since school started!  September's queen bee was Renee at Sewn With Grace.

 To make this machine extra special, it is a bicentennial!  Isaac Merritt Singer formed I.M. Singer & Company with New York lawyer Edward C. Clark, following Singer's first lockstitch sewing machine patent in 1851. The Singer Sewing Machine is offered for sale all over the United States. Within two years Singer is the leading manufacturer and marketer of sewing machines in the United States.  In 1951, Singer put out it's badged bicentennial 221 to celebrate being in business for 100 years!  They were only made for that year!

 I wanted to show you the difference between my little featherweight and my industrial treadle.  It's a big difference!

You can read more about the history of the featherweight here:
 http://www.singer-featherweight.com/siteone%20pages/history.html

I have to say, it sews a perfect, smooth stitch!  I love it!

Missy

Chain Stitch Sewing Machines

One of the early sewing machines was a chain stitch sewing machine.  A chain stitch does not use a bobbin, it only has one strand of thread instead of two.  There were several chain stitch sewing machines at the T.O.G.A.  
You can find them as hand cranks and treadles.  Alex has done amazing research on these machines, so I will just share links to his website and refer you to him!
You can find more information about the Singer chain stitch sewing machine here:
This was Suzie's machine.

Sue had a Willcox and Gibbs hand crank and a treadle.  You can find more information about Willcox and Gibbs chain stitch here:

 See the way it is threaded?

There were several on the repair table too.

This is such a cool machine.  Sue let me sew on hers, it was the quietest machine I have ever heard!

I would love to have one, maybe someday!

Missy

AR T.O.G.A. 2015

I went to the first AR T.O.G.A this past weekend, in Mena, AR.  Cheryl from Cheryl's Teapots 2 Quilting blog was there, it was great getting to know her better!

 These are the t-shirts we bought, I just love them!  A toga is for people who use hand cranks and treadles to do their sewing.  Think quilt retreat with an emphasis on machines.

Cheryl did a great demo on how to make a hexie flower tape measure.  You can see a better picture of it on her blog.

There were not many people there, but we still had some great machines and demos.

There were a couple of sewing mats, Margaret told me how she made hers.  I want to make myself one.

I love this yo-yo quilt I saw at local shop.

Several of us rented a house for the weekend and here is a sunrise I saw.

It was a lot of fun and I still have a couple of more blog posts to write that I will share later!

Missy

More blocks and a mess!

I love teaching, but it does not leave any time for sewing!  I don't think people realize how much homework teachers have!
I got four more blocks last week.

 Counting the two I made, this brings my total up to nine!  My husband said my quilt is going to be ugly.  :(  I tried to explain that once I make more blocks it will look better.

Of course my kitties had to help me!

My sewing friends also sent me a lot of goodies!

Over Labor Day weekend I bought some shelves for my closet in my sewing room.

Here are the tubs I pulled out,

and the mess in my room.

 I have not had any time to do anything in my room. I try to spend at least five minutes every once in a while folding material onto the shelves.   It is driving me crazy!  I'm hoping to sell some of my machines to clear some room.

My goal is to get blocks cut and ready to sew for the T.O.G.A. next week.

Have a great day ya'll!

Missy

Sew Sweet Bee

 I got another block for my sew sweet bee!  This one came from Renee at Sewn With Grace.  She was also sweet enough to send me some cute kitty fabric and a charm pack.  This makes two blocks I have gotten so far.  The other was from Donna.
School has been super busy, as a teacher I always have a ton of homework, but it will slow down as the year progresses.
Watching the cats play with their catnip bubbles is a great unwinder!

I would also like to thank everyone who voted for my fur babies, they won first place in the Pets on Quilts Show!! in the cats on quilts category.

I hope to get some quilting done this weekend!

Missy