Quilting, and more quilting and other sewing related stuff

This week I have done lots of sewing.

I hand sewed the binding to the "fly away home" quilt. Normally I don't hand sew anything, because it makes my hands hurt, but I was afraid of losing the points on the flying geese.

Memo to self: always put a border on a flying geese block near the edge of a quilt! 

I took it to the park for a 'beauty shot' hanging from one of the trees, when it was done. 

This one is going to the WAQA community quilts program- we give them away to shelters, rehab centres and other worthy causes. 

The Community Quilting group had a sewing day to make some progress on our Unfinished Objects. 

Someone had donated a stack of blocks and we played tessellations with them for a while.  

That brown fabric with blue flowers looks like a 1990s fabric to me...and I wonder what the original pattern was supposed to be? 

Nothing seemed to go with anything much, and there were not enough blocks for a whole quilt if we did some of the layouts -like the one below. 

I decided to sew some together in rows and see what I could do. 

Then I brought it home and this is the result, after I undid some setting triangles in order to add them to others so we could get a whole block. 

I am going to add some beige sashing strips to make it big enough -we usually have a minimum size of 50 by 70 inches for a single bed/comforter. 

For a while now I have been interested in adding an Elna sewing machine, if I could get one at the right price. I love well made sewing machines of a vintage era, but it has to actually work to join my herd. This one does work, and I got it for a tiny price this weekend.

I will be happy to get the power cord repaired and have this as a very portable sewing bee machine: there is a bit of broken insulation on the cord, and the plug has pulled away from the wire, exposing the wiring.

It needs a little clean and some oil  too. Yes, she is a bit scuffed on the sewing arm, but you would expect that in a well used machine. 

I think I learned to sew on a machine like this in high school! It is possibly an early 1970s machine, so it is probably more than 40 years old and still going strong. Lovely stitch, reverse, zig zag -all the mod cons. Drop In bobbin too. The metal case turns into quite a sizeable extension table, so it will be ideal for the sewing bees. I like the pinky beige lid! 

I feel like I have rescued this old girl from the tip...we must not throw out stuff we can keep using, if this planet is to have any future.