This year has begun in a very particular way. The very first commission was an enormous quilt. That large quilt with the sunset, if you remember. 🙂
On top of that I have orders for 3 large quilts for May. After that, though, everything but patchwork.
February, for instance, was filled to the brim with sewing bags: a bamboo flute bag and a whole row of different kannel bags. I have added plenty of pictures here.
One large kannel bag, for instance, was for a 100 year old and restored kannel. One special order went to Finland, ordered by a kannel maker there. So exciting.
Now, in the third month of the year, all kinds of repair work have come along one after another. The previous posts were about servicing beanbags and mending a horse rug, the next will be about repairing chair seats, and after that I start sewing seat covers for an endlessly lovely car.
I often wonder whether I should really take on work of such variety, because every field calls for different materials, a special machine, tools and supplies.
In one room there are the patchwork fabrics, the sewing machine and overlocker, laces of every kind, ribbons, buttons, threads and so on. All of it has to be sorted by colour, of course.
Elsewhere I store upholstery fabrics, artificial leather, PVC, thermantine (production offcuts), boxes of zips of different weights and colours, boxes of zip pulls in matching colours and sizes, plus every possible rivet, eyelet, snap hook, clip, ring and so on, and the tools for using them. The leather sewing machine, threads and other supplies.
Then wadding of various thicknesses in rolls, large bags of beanbag granules, hammers, staplers, nails, screws, dowels and so on.
Photographic equipment and lighting. Most recently I bought 2 more lamps, so that the pictures come out better still. A tripod would still be needed; for now I lean my backside against the wall or press my elbow against the corner of the sofa, so my hand does not shake.
But that is exactly what makes it exciting. I cannot imagine sewing 5 days a week (sometimes 7) ONLY quilts or ONLY bags or ONLY anything else.
In the last pictures a little nostalgia. I dug old threads on wooden reels out of the boxes and left today's reels in the background. I do not use small reels; when I buy, I buy the kind that lasts a good while.
In the milk can of my childhood there are coloured buttons that I use in decorations. For decorating small fabric hearts, for instance.
The little red sewing machine from childhood could do with some cosmetic attention, to stand out even better among the boxes of sewing supplies. Untouched, it stayed quite pretty, but in the last two years a couple of technically minded elves have discovered that machine, and everything wears when it is used keenly. First the plastic motor cover crumbled to pieces, then the paint started to escape 🙂
I do not even know where to start with that job. I still have no paints or metalworking supplies in my studio. 🙂
