being afraid

Why is it that so many of us are afraid of our quilting tools? Not the sharp rotary cutters and hot irons -- that's the kind of fear that makes sense. I'm talking about the fear where you're afraid to take your new toy out of the box.

I've got a basting gun I've never tried, and a Cricut I got for Christmas last year that I haven't even touched. And then there's my Featherweight -- I'm beyond scared of breaking that! What if I can't get them to work?

I've been having trouble with the bobbins on my Janome for a couple of years now. They just don't wind properly anymore, even after I've had my machine serviced twice in the past year. I have to turn the speed down and hold my breath and sometimes rewind the same bobbin four times just to get one I can sew with.

This week, I finally broke down and bought a Sidewinder. If it saves me even a fraction of the time I spent fighting with the bobbin winder on the Janome, it'll be an absolute Godsend. But anything to do with bobbins stresses me out lately.

If I didn't need something to blog about this morning, it would probably still be in the box.



It wound my bobbins -- now I guess the question is whether they'll work for free motion quilting. Are they wound evenly enough? I think I've forgotten what a properly wound bobbin looks like.

Bobbing winding has become an important part of our preschool curriculum around here. I personally can't see what's so exciting about it, but I can't wind a bobbin, or do anything that sounds like winding a bobbin, without eager little helpers materializing beside me.



There's lots of discussion about how many bobbins we've wound and how many we're going to wind and stopping and starting and taking turns. And only good little boys get to wind bobbins. Isn't that just the weirdest thing you can imagine bribing little boys with?

One of the projects on Stashbusters this year is keeping track of how many spools of thread we use. I like the idea, because it'll help me figure out what's a realistic amount of thread to order from Connecting Threads.

So far this year, I've used five of their 1200 yard spools and a 500 yard spool that came with my sewing machine. And I'm running out of the neutral color I use for piecing and most of my quilting. Didn't I just order thread?

Whenever it actually was, I put all of the thread in a big Zip Loc in the drawers next to my sewing machine. At the time, it was bulging and barely zipped shut. Now it's less than half full. Which makes me think I might need to order thread soon.

I'm good at convincing myself that I need to order thread (yarn, fabric, etc.) whether I really need it or not, so I've decided to wait until I'm down to my last spool of off-white. Now the question is whether or not I should use up the colors that I can use for scrappy piecing before I get to that last spool of white...

Typing this got me thinking and I ran out to the sewing room to see how much thread was actually there. Most of it has to live in the sewing room because the thread holder is so tippy I constantly knock it over. Not something I'm going to put in a house with the rabid preschoolers. Or the nine-year-old. Or the girl.

And while I was up there, I decided to try something --



The drawer came from Grandma's antique mall. She had a whole stack of them, from two different treadle cases, and asked if I wanted a couple for my sewing room. Like she had to ask!

Then I got to wondering if the thread would fit as nicely into the drawers of the treadle that lives next to my sewing machine. Yup, they're exactly the same size. So now I've got to figure out where to put the things that live in those drawers and I can have most of my thread right where I sew.

I have more thread than I thought I did. Yay!