SewExpo 2018

 This years SewExpo did not disappoint.

Focused on all things in the sewing world from fabric and patterns to knitting and yarn, to experts and the classes. Not to mention meeting other sewists. Who become friends instantly.

Fabulous inspiration.

The above photo is of a Pendleton vest I would love to make. I love the black and white wool and no sleeves means no itching and not so hot for Oregon's mild temps. I bought some of the wool jersey binding for that future moment when I have time. Just fabric panels cut and then bias jersey to wrap the raw edges. Very few seams.

 One of the vendors had this headgear in their space. Pretend you stuck some scissors through your head.

 I liked the business concept of this shop - already a month ago and their name is erased from my memory. Pre-cut coordinating fabrics along with your choice of a free pattern. The patterns themselves were interesting. And most of their coordinating seemed coordinated.

Customers decide on their colorway, pick their choice of pattern and run sew with it. Cool business plan.

 This was a fabric Pencil Girl picked out for me. Which I promptly bought, because she has awesome taste for me.

I've actually sewed up the pattern but have some proportional issues in a time-out for now. It's a little long on my body.  I have some ideas on how to fix it up but I'll need some uninterrupted time to make it work. And those photos are still on the Iphone, so I may show them later, if I have the gumption.

 My sleeves are the solid light aqua. The stripey aqua is the base and the mesh is detailed around the back neck area and may appear on the front as well when I do get back to this shirt.

 VacuumingTheLawn passed on these Mollie Makes magazine (from the UK). They come with a free stitching gift and she embroiders them all up. Kyle's mostly on IG nowadays but you can see some of her MollieMakes on her blog. which she has mostly abandoned.

 And then, because I was committed to my knit shirt, I bought some Kai scissors designed to cut knits. They have a micro serrated edge on one of the blades so they don't catch on the knit thread loops.

They worked quite well. I could cut with my rotary cutter but I don't have a great place to do that and lay out the knit so it doesn't slide all over.

 I also bought two Simplicity patterns to play with. This dress has great style lines.

 Some christmas presents for my friend in Japan. Three months late.

I was mostly finished putting the box together but felt it needed some extras, so I waited for SewExpo, which did not disappoint.

Some converse shoes in red and black - just because they were miniature and cutecutecute.
Sewing themed buttons for the same reason.
Not to mention the tiny scissors print.

The airplane fabric is all for me though.

 Simplicity put out these tea towels and tote bags printed with pattern reprints. She needed those too.

I bought one towel for me but it can't go up because hubby thinks you should wipe first and then wash. Ahem. Guys are so backwards.

 Pacific Fabris is putting out some Seattle themed fabric for the last couple of years so I had to buy this one yard piece.

 Kenmore Air flies those DeHavilland Beavers. Big round engine noise designed to haul lots of crap. I first flew in one over thirty years ago up in Alaska. And here it is on fabric in my favorite colors.

And I actually managed to get a good photo of those new Kai scissors with the serrated edge.

 More micro stripe knit in a nice color for a tshirt.

And the new Eloflex thread  which stretches slightly for stronger seams on your regular sewing  machine. It worked great too.

 And finally, some springy flowers. (behind in posting those too)

This guy kept me company while I pruned the raspberries back.

Behind

This was nearly a month ago.
My sis from MN came into town during a week off that I took to attend SewExpo in Puyallup. She came to help deal with the parents and our sister who is depressed.

We squirreled Mom and (surprise!) our sister away on a beach trip. Our older sis is better than last winter but was sinking fast again in the grey Oregon winter. It was a surprise that she came on the beach trip as she doesn't leave her house.

It was winter.

Blustery, rainy and snowy.

We picked Lincoln City/Newport because that mountain pass sits lower. My temperature gauge sunk to 33' as I was driving....thankfully, it went no lower.

We stopped in Lincoln City to see where the big super moon tides at the end of January hit Kyllo's Restaurant and saw the construction crews already had the windows that blew out back in. ODOT was still repairing the hwy where the tide came up to.

But it was cold and blustery so we hustled back into the car and continued on down to Newport where the weather app said it wasn't raining as much.

Baked oyster. These were so good.

We lunched at Mo's down at the dock and watched the seals in the harbor. We tried to go to the Hatfield Marine Center but *winter hours* - dang. Oh well, Rogue Brewery is always open. Here's my mom - shocking those grandkids.

 Our next stop was actually a detour as we had seen fresh crab at the Newport Thriftway (supermarket) for only $5.99/lb. Awesome price. We stocked up and continued north to the Yaquina Bay Lighthouse. 

My little sis and I journeyed over to Galway, Ireland when my daughter was doing a study abroad and we clearly recall the Cliffs of Moher. One step forward, two steps backwards in that Atlantic wind. That wind was in both our minds at the top of the headland where the lighthouse sits.

But it wasn't raining....

Steamed Clams - afterwards.

I think I had crab three times that week. Winter - post Christmas - is the best time to get fresh dungeness crab. Yummy.

There is light at the end of the tunnel at work with a possible sighting of the new clerk  starting Saturday. (six months after the other clerk retired!). Anyways, that will help downsize all the overtime and long 12-hr split shifts for me.

I've got a couple of unexpected weeks off work coming up and I have already over-scheduled it with jobs that must be done. If you need to know what unexpected means you can email or private message me.

I'm gonna try to get my backlog of photos off my computer as it has caught a wee virus and probably needs a check-up. I need to throw my photo collections onto the external hard drive beforehand. Hopefully, I'll summon up the energy to write a few blog posts with them.

My son's quilt/throw (second time around) is nearly finished. I'm hand-sewing the binding down now. I can't send it to them until April 15th when they move into their house they bought. I may just fly out  to visit them with it in my suitcase instead. And I'll have news on them in another blog post!

Dahlias And County Fairs

 The dahlias are living the dream.

Bumblebees this morning looked like they were sleeping off a pollen binge.

The garden is behaving itself producing just a few raspberries for breakfast and a few tomatoes for lunch. None of that buckets of produce causing friends to turn and walk the other way when they see you coming with more zucchini. None of that pressure to can (haha - pun intended). Even the weeds are puny (knock on wood).

Time to see which items won blue ribbons at my county fair.

 This is not my quilt (I Don't Quilt) but I love the playful animals getting into adjoining blocks.

And this teal and aqua one? Yum.

 Through the display window - my chicken hotpad making tracks on the chickie wallhanging.

My Mr. Hedgehog lipsense bag was a fair favorite. I bought that fabric from my friend in Kyoto.

 And my only second place red ribbon.  I bought this tote bag as a kit. Determined to follow instructions, I disliked the size of this bag (giant towel bag) and the lack of color interest (beige blah). The night before I had to enter my fair entries, I conceived a brilliant plan of ironing on this Big Book saying. Ahem.

Yes, in my hurry, I ironed it on upside down. I had to rip out the whole pocket area and lining and re-sew the pocket so it could be read.  Even though it did not get a blue ribbon, that red is still worth two bucks!

I made $26 dollars this year - enough to buy another couple of yards of fabric.

And finally, my daughter was able to connive her way into another Denali flightseeing trip (third time this year!) and managed to get herself into the right-hand cockpit seat for a bird's eye view of the mountains in summer. Her aunt (my sis) took her family up to visit Alaska.