Randine's Christmas Hoodie

Yes, I realize I am a couple of months late. That's how I roll. I don't know why it has taken me so long. These fleece hoodies sew up super fast. There isn't much to them.

I cut it out and sewed it up yesterday. She stopped by last night to pick it up. Mom made her model, of course.

What did she say? "Where's the pocket we discussed?" Oh, yeah. I forgot. Knowing that she wasn't going to be satisfied until it had a pocket I had her leave it overnight. Today I let her know it was ready, again. More modeling ensued.

I think she finally likes it.

Recent Sewing Bargains

I recently found these lovely vintage patterns for $.99 each plus shipping. I have a serious "thing" about vintage patterns. Can't resist them. I swear I am going to sew myself a bunch of vintage style dresses....just as soon as I fully understand altering patterns to fit my pudgy body.

Until then these will go live in the pattern file with the rest of my collection. I don't want to jinx it but there is the possibility I will be dragging home a box full of vintage patterns this weekend. Wouldn't that be wonderful?

Yesterday I was bored and decided to make the run of the local thrift shops in search of bargains. I found these 2 books on using a serger, for $1.99 each.

Apparently the Singer book is THE book to get if you want to learn about your serger. I also found these 3 fabrics in a bag for 30% off $2.99. The first are cottons and there are 3 yards each.

There was also this super groovy piece of knit fabric in there. Sadly it is only half a yard. I'll have to wait until I get a solid knit to mix it with.

My Redneck Bee Feeder

The girls are starting to take in syrup at a faster rate. I needed to rig up a second community feeder. I'm not a woodworker or even very handy. All I needed was a way for the bees to get up under the jar lid. This is what I came up with. Just 2 pieces of wood and an inverted bucket. Not pretty but it works. When I sat it out this morning.

And after it warmed up into the low 40's. 

The Carniolan hive is much more active than the Italians. Not sure if it's because the Italians are sick, or in a colder spot in the yard, or if the Carniolans just like to get out and fly when it's colder.

Soon I'll be able to get in the hive and look around. I need to make sure both hives have queens. I think I want it to be into the 60's and sunny before I go digging around in there. Don't want to chill the brood.At that time I'll insert pollen patties and put the top feeders on. We want lots of strong, healthy bees so they can bring me gallons of honey this year. I know that spring is just around the corner. Look, both my chickens have begun laying again. They took the winter off. Slackers.

Essential Oils For My Bees

This year I had planned to explore organic beekeeping practices. The recent discovery that one of my hives was infected with Nosema has made me realize how important it is to ensure our bees are healthy. For the past 2 summers I was content to leave the bees to their own devices. Last summer I was more focused on splitting the bees into 2 hives. All seemed well when I tucked them in for the winter. Still, for some reason the Italian hive fell ill. The good news is that they seem to be rebounding. Many more bees are out flying and I don't see as many dead bees on the front of the hive, outside the entrance. It is still too early to be opening the hives but I have noticed the bees out flying more and more. I have begun to feed them at a community feeding station in my yard. Between the 2 hives they are taking about 3 cups of syrup per day. Today I decided to try adding some essential oils to their syrup.

I especially want to get the thyme oil into them. Thymol is reported to repel the dreaded varroa mites. It is also effective against tracheal mites. How does it work? The bees ingest the syrup containing the EO's (essential oils). They also feed it to the larva.The mites go to feed on the larva and are repulsed because they taste like thyme. The key is to feed the bees enough EO's to dissuade the mites but not enough to harm the bees. After some Googling I determined that I would need 5 drops of thmye oil and 10 drops of sweet orange, peppermint and lemon grass oils per quart of 1:1 sugar syrup. I need to get a calibrated syringe but for now shaking out the drops will have to do. I dosed up a fresh quart of syrup and set it out for the bees this morning. It smells very fragrant and I was wondering how the bees would react to it. No worries, they love it.

This morning.

Just before dark this evening.

Having the EO's in there didn't slow them down a bit. They ignored the pollen patty, though. I noticed it had moved. I think a bird must've sampled it while I was out running errands.

Meet Kathleen, My Singer 28K

I don't think I have introduced this sweet girl yet. I picked her up about a month ago (along with a German treadle machine). Her owner was only asking $25 for her and once again I could not drive there fast enough. Actually I made my husband drive since I have a phobia of freeways. The seller was an older British lady who's husband had just passed away. She was downsizing and wanting to part with a couple of vintage machines. This particular one had belonged to her mother. She brought it back from England after settling her mom's estate. Over across the pond hand cranks are a dime a dozen but they are rather hard to come by here in the states. Especially in this wonderful condition. I wanted to honor the original owner who kept such nice care of this machine so I named it Kathleen, after her. Kathleen came to me needing a little loving care. Her presser foot bar had slipped down out of the tube and she was quite dirty and full of lint and dust. However her decals are almost pristine and her internal mechanisms all work well. None of her screws were welded shut with hardened oil and even her clutch disengages as it should. Based on her serial number she was built in 1905. That makes her 108 years old. She also came in her coffin case which is in very good condition but I did not photograph that. Sorry. Here are a couple of videos of Kathleen in action to make up for that oversight. First up is a video of her winding one of her long bobbins. She uses these bobbins inside of a bullet shaped shuttle case. This is known as a vibrating shuttle (VS) machine.

And here is a video of her sewing along. Still going after 108 years. Amazing! What a lovely old girl she is. I am so fortunate to have found her.

She will have to share accessories with my Singer 66 Red Eye treadle and my Singer 15-91. They are all side clamping, low shank machines. I spent some time adjusting her thread tensions, both top and bottom and I think I have it set up perfectly. Look at these nice, even, balanced stitches. The swatch is folded over so you can see the stitches top and bottom.

Errol's Pajamas Are Finished

That is one owed Christmas present I can cross off the list. Here are the finished pajama pants. I doubt I'll be able to get him to model them so this will have to do.

I sure hope they fit. I had to guess at the elastic. Errol is so skinny, I'm sure they'll be fine. Here is a close-up of the mock fly detail, complete with button.

Pj pants sew up really quickly. Here is a picture of one of the pockets. I used a solid color on the inside front of the pocket.

I had barely  enough thread. This was a brand new spool when I started. I need to remember not to buy such tiny spools.

Children First

I am itching to begin a new sewing project for ME...but first I need to sew up the 3 Christmas gifts I owe. They won't take long. Just 3 fleece hoodies and a pair of PJ bottoms. Still, I am dragging my feet. Today I decided to get started on Errol's PJ's since they will be the more difficult (and interesting) of the 3 projects. He doesn't know it but his PJ bottoms will be an experiment. I want to see if I can accurately shorten both the crotch and leg lengths. That was my main unhappiness with this pattern when I made a pair for myself. I took Errol's measurements to determine what size to sew for him. Extra Small which was no surprise. He is a little guy. I also took his inseam measurement (28") and am using that to adjust the leg length. Once I altered the tissue pattern I transferred the correct size markings over to my parchment paper. You can see below that the paper wasn't quite wide enough and I had to splice a bit onto the crotch corner (lower right).

And here are the pieces all cut out and ready to sew. I adore this flannel print. It's a camping theme with little camper trailers. So cute!