ive been having a lot of fun with the style of the ginkgo embroidered items recently and i wanted to make another ginkgo pattern that matches more closely :)

A new rug post, since the old one got very long.

I'd been picking away at this project occasionally for a little over a year, and finished it a couple weeks ago! I was inspired by some very old rugs my grandparents had, and copied the construction I saw on them, but with quilting cotton instead of wool. It took about 4 and a half metres of fabric, and the finished thing is 109 cm by 74 cm. I didn't track my hours so I have no idea how long it took, but it's probably more than a hundred.

I tore the fabric into 4 cm strips along the straight grain, double folded and pressed them using the pin method, and slipstitched the edges together with heavy linen. I braided them and whipstitched the braid to itself, round and round and round. The only machine stitching is in the little tiny seams that join the ends of the strips together. I added a few at a time, and even then the ends were very annoying to manage while braiding.

Now it lives on the floor next to my bed, and will help me not have as much dust and dirt on my feet.

This looks like so much fun to make!

But oh god the prep work seems HELLISH. Gonna have to really think about it!

I didn't do it all at once, so it wasn't too bad! I'd sew on a couple strips to each of the 3 ends, press them, sew them, braid them, and then do that again. I didn't know how much fabric I'd need, so I had to tear new strips several times. The only things I found unpleasant about the whole process were the fact that the ends keep braiding in the opposite direction if you let them hang down and it's annoying to keep them in order, and also the way your eyeballs go a bit screwy if you look at the moving strip of fabric too long while running it under the iron & pins.

I should do a blog post about the whole process.

Saw an adorable pistachio green Singer at the thrift store yesterday and ugh it's terribly overpriced for the condition its in. 100 CAD is too much when you've got no bobbins and are missing the bobbin plate cover! There's a bunch of dust and dirt in there of course, and no lightbulb, and who knows what other work it needs. Also the green plastic box it's in seems kinda warped and shaky, though at least it still has the lid.

Not my photo but it looked like this.

just a bit sadder and with an indecently exposed bobbin area. Edit: Like this one.

But it's probably good for me that it was out of my price range, because I'd be sorely tempted if it was under 50, and would have probably bought it right away if it was under 30, and I Do Not need more machines when I haven't finished fixing up the ones I already have!

(It's not that I want to Possess a ton of vintage machines, you understand, it's just that they are all sad little orphaned kittens and puppies to me. Who will give them a metaphorical bath and medicine? Would they starve without me??)

Looked back in today and it's still there AND there's a 40% off sale on several categories of thing, including electronics, and I asked if that includes sewing machines and was told yes it does.

I left because I was hungry and carrying heavy groceries but ohh dear. That makes the sweet little green baby $60 CAD, which is only slightly more than I paid for the groceries. A solid metal machine lasts so much longer than a groceries.

The annoying thing is I have no idea how long the sale is on for, because the employee I asked said presumably the whole week but who knows, and their website and social media also doesn't say.

Hrmmmmmmmmmmm I may go back tomorrow and ask to plug it in and try the pedal. That would be bad and naughty and neglectful of my other machines but I may do it.

How about I make a list of tasks I have to do first! If I:

Then I'm allowed to buy it if it's still 40% off. Normally I am very slow at Tasks but this may speed me up.

Well that was the most productive evening I've had in a long time!

I injected glue into 3 cracks on my wooden case and put wood filler in the holes and let that dry for several hours.

I found a very helpful video on fixing the timing & needle bar height on a 99k and got that all sorted out and now it's stitching again! And I popped the motor & light back on, which is by far the fastest and easiest task on this list.

I sanded the wood filler and wiped the dust off and glued the 4 sides of the box together. (Now I can return this clamp that I borrowed from Papa a few weeks ago.)

Still plenty more to do on the box, but progress is being made!

During this time I was also adding hourly coats of shellac to the scruffy horn bit on the shuttle holder thingy for my White VS2. I did 3, and then a 4th daub on one part, and I also found a couple small burrs on the metal and carefully filed & sanded them off.

I let it dry overnight, tried it this morning, and it seems to have stopped the big loopy snags!

I still need to mess around with the tension a bit, but I'm going to wait a couple days just to make sure the shellac is fully cured before I subject it to any more vibrating shuttle action.

Now just the last 3 tasks to go!

Also, I was surprised to hear in the notes that apparently 100 is still a good price for this machine? Maybe I've just been very lucky, but the last two machines I got in sad fixer upper shape (the 99k and a Japanese Singer 15 clone) were $20 each, and my Pfaff 360 was $25 at an estate sale. (Originally 50 but it was half off day.) I paid 200 for my 15-91 when I moved out and it was newly refurbished, so half of that for something that will need new parts and hours of work feels like an awful lot.

Self-imposed task list: DONE in just over 24 hours!

Singer 185J: MINE for $60!

Arms: TIRED ow I walked all the way home with it. At least it's a "portable" model, so smaller and lighter than the 15.

I'll make a separate post with some more pictures later!! (Also I really need to make an actual post about my 15 clone sometime)

I'm still amazed at how well that worked as motivation to do tasks. I never get that much done in one day. I will try to bribe myself in a similar manner to do more tasks, but I don't think it'll work as well without an unknown time limit. But I could make a list of tasks to finish before I can wipe the dirt off the surface, another list to do before I can remove the motor and the world's crustiest drive belt, a big task to do before I can free it from the cracked plastic case (oooh!!) before I can order new parts, etc.

One wonderful thing about the internet is that sometimes you can type a very specific mechanical problem into a search bar and find an unedited video of some old person walking you through exactly how to fix it.

I’m paying to force seven thousand strangers to see a photo of my late husband having fun with his dog. Tumblr Blaze is totally worth it. XD

Thank-you to all of my new Internet stranger friends for being so gracious about having my post shoved onto your dashboards. I loved reading all of your kind tags and comments! Both Martin and Bosco have been gone for several years now but for 24 hours, they felt very present in my life. I greatly appreciate this gift. ❤️

Reblog to have your dashboard be visited by the spirit of joy that death can end but not erase.

Love that this is well beyond 7000 people now and still going

@leavescrown Exactly! It’s a beautiful gift. Martin and Bosco out there travelling around the Tumblr community, continually making new friends.

@sseanettles

Reading your tag made me laugh out loud. It’s like two old friends unexpectedly stopped by your porch for a quick visit. XD

I’ll always reblog Martin and Bosco when they splash across my dash, because of Reasons.

What’s loved, lives.

There is something truly beautiful in seeing a comment like that from someone so very loved and recently lost.

Yes, Peter, you’re absolutely right. What’s loved, lives. You three boys all come back around again to see me again soon, okay?

Finished the Fungi SAL that I’ve been working on since last year. Feels good to have it complete. The ghost fungus on the last page has glow-in-the-dark thread.

2026 Make 9

Meant to post this yesterday, but here is my make list for 2026. Obviously will be budget constrained, but super excited for the rest of the year

Betty Busby, "Diatom Parade" (2022), quilt [52 in x 68 in]

Please Note:

QUILT

Wings sourced from beekeepers dealing with the loss of their hives due to extreme weather, the pieces are made to memorialize the bees.

"A veil lifts between two worlds: light and dark; life and death; individual and union. It is worn in ceremony of transition. It is a fabric of both grief and celebration, made up of a community, a hive." by lucijockel

Every time I'm forced by circumstance to hand-sew something, I remember a fairytale I once read. There are lead-up shenanigans as the humble protagonist helps small animals and meets the princess and all that, but in the climax, the princess rigs a contest for her hand by setting her own task: sew her a dress in a single night.

The noble suitors, who have never sewn a thing in their lives, sabotage themselves by their own ambitions: they choose difficult fabrics to work with and cut huge, elaborate patterns and select gems and pearls and beads to sew onto it, and snip such long bits of thread that they lose time detangling their stitches, and ultimately resort to pinning bits together as they run out of time, so that their offerings initially look beautiful and flashy, but when the princess tries them on they stick her with pin ends and fall apart as she moves.

The humble protagonist uses a very simple pattern without embellishments and sews using short lengths of thread (snipped off and threaded for him by little birds of course) which don't tangle and therefore save time. His dress is plain by contrast, but holds together and the princess is able to move freely in it, and so he wins the contest and her hand.

I particularly think about the bit about threading the needle with shorter lengths of thread, needing to tie off more often but avoiding tangles and thereby saving time.

I then ignore that piece of wisdom passed down through who knows how many years and proceed to cut the longest damn length of thread I can manage because I hate tying off beginning or ending knots and I will not subject myself to more of that even if it does mean more tangles along the way.

There used to be a plotline that goes something like "you're the best gamer in the world, and game was really just a covert training and recruitment tool, so now you're going to use those skills to fight aliens or whatever". It's more or less gone away, one of those speculative fiction tropes that did not stand the test of time.

I think it's a great premise though, and should start being applied to other hobbies.

"Ma'am, this regional knitting competition was actually a covert operation to find someone to run this machine of the elder gods we found buried in the desert."

"Congratulations on your silver play button, you are hereby inducted into the Paranormal Defense Force, a subsidiary of Youtube and a branch of the United States military."

"Welcome to the Olympic village. If you've made it this far, you're hereby recruited into the international super soldier program, fighting our enemies at the edge of the Crab Nebula."

the fun part is this did actually happen in real life once. during WWII, several british women solved a crossword really well and subsequently discovered they'd been recruited as cryptographers.

The wish fulfillment potential of "we see how good you are at your thing, we recognize its importance and we want to pay you to do it" cannot be overstated.

ALSO I'm knitting a cardigan. It's been in the wip box for maybe two years cause I put a lil mistake on it but to day I was so brave and I pulled it out and I did what I could to fix it and now I am just accepting my imperfection and trying to simply finish any thing. I'm so proud of myself. I can't wait to wear this cardigan

You ever see something innocuous, minding its own business on the clearance shelf at Michael’s and before you know it, it takes over your life for a few weeks?

So it was with this desktop greenhouse.

I took it home and after taking an appropriate time to “season” my idea in my mind (read: a month or two) I set to make my vision of a mini botanical garden a reality.

I started by removing the heavy glass panels and building a raised floor above the latch. I wanted to use the base as a foundation on the building.

I wrapped the foundation in plastic stone textured flooring (meant for Christmas villages) and built a pond at one end of the same. I then gave it a more realistic paint job and designed a rough layout for my plants and displays.

I also knew I wanted to make the ironwork significantly more intricate, but I wasn’t sure how just yet…

Up next - PLANTS! I went wild making all kinds of plants. Some were specific species and some were more conceptual.

I made several trees with polymer clay and moss, cacti out of beads and flocking, cattails out of raffia, hot glue and coffee grounds, and giant monstera leaves out of paper and wire.

This part should have taken me a long time, but it really came together fast. I loved finding ways to replicate natural shapes and patterns using bits of this and that.

I did make adjustments to my plans as I went like eliminating benches in favor of a simpler overall design.

Then I needed to fill my pond with water. For this I used resin. Lily pads were added to the top layer, and I wired in simple LED fairy lights. The batteries are kept in the box under the foundation.

In a weekend frenzy I added more plants, metal (paper) steps, new (plexi)glass windows, a roof, wrought-iron vines (paper again), doors that open, and a hose reel disguising the latch. Suddenly, a project I thought would take months was finished…

I love my desktop botanical garden. Right now it sits on a simple lazy Susan in my office. But I’d love to get it a proper display box to protect from dust.

Thank you for coming on this little journey with me. This piece packs a lot of joy into a tiny space. I always love building miniatures, and I’ll be doing more in the future I’m sure.

Playing with an idea. There will be more of these, while I obsess over this new thing bubbling around in my head.

When I'm working on a new piece, I often create a small 'side cloth' where I can do a few quick stitches to test an idea, try out a colour, stitch or thread. I find it really helps me make decisions on the fly and not have quite so much ... unstitching.

When I've finished the larger piece, I keep the side cloth as a reference for future work.

Do you sample as you work? How do you manage that process? I'd love to hear your thoughts on sampling!

Something I've been quietly stitching in the evenings: these zokin - cloths for cleaning, made from old tea towels.

When I was with family over Christmas, my MIL mentioned offhandedly that she really should throw out all her old threadbare tea towels, but that she couldn't quite make herself do it. I asked for them, explained the whole zokin concept and she gave me a small pile of lovely old linen tea towels. I've been using my old cotton towels as the middle layer to make them more squooshy and absorbent. I aim to make a heap of them so I can gift some back in their new form.

Not pictured: the first one I made, which is already in service in the kitchen as a cloth for our teapot to sit on.

They are a lovely quiet evening stitch project. They felt a bit 'ugly' to share, but I'm enjoying them more and more, so here they are.

I recommend The Green Wrapper on youtube if you'd like to make zokin from your old cloths.