How to convert a Singer 99 to a hand crank

Edited in 2024: the vendors mentioned in this post are no longer in business.  Central Michigan Sewing Machine Parts sells the spoked wheel and hand crank discussed in this post.

With comments about its cousins, the Spartan 192 and the cute green 185

So here's the story.  I tried something that didn't work the way I expected it to.  Various bloggers and board members offered advice, but not all of the advice meshed together. At about the same time blogger Rain challenged those of us who restore vintage sewing machines to write more about the processes, hence the post about the treadle irons and this one.  I decided to investigate the whole hand-crank-conversion process and record what I discovered.  

Since I am a relative newbie to this hobby (3 years) I feel a bit of a fraud telling others how-to-do-it.  Am I just reinventing the wheel?  On the other hand, a newbie has a newbie's perspective, composed of part stupidity and part curiosity.

My approach will be to tell you what I have personally done to machines that I have had right in front of me. The 99 was produced over decades and some features changed over time so your mileage may differ. 

Singer 99

Singer 185

Singer 192, Spartan

Many vintage sewing machines can be converted to hand cranks, but the 99 and its cousins are ideal for conversion.  The small size makes it both appealing and more useable for children, whose reach is smaller than an adult’s.  It’s relatively lighter weight (30 pounds instead of 40 for a full size machine) makes it a bit more portable, at least if you have decent upper body strength.  You can take it out to your patio in fine weather, or take it along in your camper or motor home. 

Why hand crank?

You are in complete control of the speed—no runaway takeoffs from the foot pedal (more properly called the motor controller).  It's nice to have a people powered machine around, and if you have one with terrifying looking wiring, this is a good way to solve that problem.

Where to get the spoked wheel and hand crank?  See the links to Sew-Classic or Stitches in Time on the left hand side of this page.

Look for the yellow push pin icon in the photos below--they show you the part of the machine being discussed.

 

Remove the light.

The light fixture is bolted on to a bracket which is bolted on to the machine.  You have to take it off the bracket first.  The photo shows the bolt partially loosened so that you can see where it is.

The light fixture is wired to the motor.  Just lay it to one side for the next step.

If you need to clean the machine, remove the bracket from the machine.  If not, leave it on there.

Remove the motor.

One bolt is holding it on.  Look on the pillar on the right hand side of the machine.  Remove this bolt.  This one is silver colored, some are black. This one has a hexagonal shape, some are round.  If they have a hex shape to them, a wrench makes this job much easier.  If round, you are stuck with using a screwdriver.  If stuck, apply sewing machine oil and heat with a blow dryer until it loosens.

As the motor shifts, you will be able to remove the belt from the motor.  Slide it off past the bobbin winder. 

Tip:  put the motor bolt back in its hole so that you don’t misplace it. 

You are finished with the motor-controller-light assembly now, so put it away somewhere.  You can always reverse this process and reinstall it later if you want to.

Remove the hand wheel

Loosen the clutch screw.

 

Remove the clutch knob.

 

Remove the clutch washer.

 

Remove the hand wheel.

Before you install the hand crank, you have to replace or alter your original hand wheel to get a hand wheel that will fit the hand crank.

Option A:   Replace the original hand wheel with a spoked hand wheel

But before we do that, we have to pause for a moment to discuss how the 99, the 185 and the 192 Spartan differ in the relationship between a spoked wheel and the bobbin winder.


The 192 Spartan

The bobbin winder on the Spartan is a simple design.  It moves on a pivot point and does not latch into place.  You rotate it up into position until it comes into contact with the hand wheel.  It plays nicely with BOTH the spoked hand wheel and the notched hand wheel (discussed below). 







The 185

With the 185, you have to remove the hand wheel cover and bobbin winder in order to used a spoked hand wheel.

The bobbin winder mechanism  inside the hand wheel cover prevents the spoked wheel from making its rotation, so the machine will not operate.  Remove the two screws on either side of the hand wheel shaft and it comes right off. 

 

The 99

Once the spoked wheel is in place you will discover that the bobbin winder in the down or engaged position does not reach the spoked hand wheel, therefore it won’t turn.  There is no real reason to remove it, but at the same time there is no real reason to leave it on here either.  It is a simple matter to remove it, there is one screw on the top holding it in place.   

I think it looks cuter with the non-functional bobbin winder removed. 

If your bobbin winder is gone, what do you do if you need to wind a bobbin?

• ·         Wind it on another class 66 bobbin machine
• ·         Buy a Sidewinder (separate bobbin winder, available online, at Joanns and Walmart)
• ·         Buy a package of pre-wound class 66 bobbins

Now, back to installing that spoked wheel...

Put a drop of sewing machine oil on the inner opening of the spoked hand wheel and smoosh it around in there.

Slide the hand wheel on to the hand wheel shaft.

Replace the clutch washer (bunny ears UP or towards you).

Put a drop of oil on the threads of the clutch knob screw.  Screwing it in will distribute the oil around, no need to smoosh.

 

Replace the clutch knob.  It helps to tilt the machine up so that gravity holds the clutch washer in place.

Replace the clutch knob screw.

TEST:   Spin the hand wheel and make sure that the needle is going up and down.

 

The hand crank has a hinged finger on it.  Flip this to the up postion (towards the handle of the hand crank).

 

Take the motor bolt back out (if you have been storing it in place) and use it to attach the hand crank to the machine.  

 

Tighten it most of the way and while it is still a bit loose, flip the finger down into one of the spaces between the spokes.   

Tighten it the rest of the way.

 

There are two oil holes on the hand crank.  Put a drop of oil in each one.

Everybody complains about the poor quality of these reproduction handcranks, but they seem to be the only game in town.  They are guaranteed to be the clunkiest part of your sewing machine.

Option 2:  Notched Hand wheel

don't do it this way

It’s possible to use the original hand wheel with a hand crank if you cut a notch in the wheel for the finger of the hand crank.  The advantage to doing this is that the bobbin winder will function.

Step One:  Remove the hand wheel as described above

Step Two:  Find someone to cut a notch in the hand wheel.

Metal work is beyond me.  Fortunately for me, student Heather’s husband Augustin is a welder, so we worked out a barter that included cutting notches in a bunch of hand wheels.  Neither Augustin nor I had the slightest idea what we were doing, so we ended up with the “Grand Canyon” of notches that you will see in the photos.  TreadleOn board members tell me that the notch only has to go through the rim of the hand wheel.

The problem that now has to be solved is that the finger of the hand crank is not long enough to fit securely into the notch in your hand wheel.  Even if you cut the notch correctly.  It slips out of the notch when you try to sew with it. So you will need to add a rigid collar around the hand crank finger to extend it.  It has to be the right size to fit on the finger and fit into the notch. It has to be flexible enough to be forced onto the finger but rigid enough to hold the finger in place in the notch.  There probably are many products that would do this, and here is one of them.

Step Three: 

Cut a 1/2” section of “Orbit (brand name) 1/2” riser flex pipe, designed to “connect additional sprinkler head to existing sprinkler lines”.  I found it at Home Depot, or, to be more accurate, a nice Home Depot lady found it for me. 

If you have another recommendation on a product that works for this, please leave a comment below and tell us the specifics and where you found it.

Remove the black rubber-band-material sleeve from the hand wheel finger.  Throw it away.

I used a bolt cutter to cut the 1/2" piece of pipe because a bolt cutter was what I had.  It created a smooth edge and had the additional benefit of pre-mooshing the edge of the pipe into the correct shape for forcing it on to the hand wheel finger.  I tapped it down into place with a small hammer.

Replace the hand wheel as described above.  Attach the hand crank with its new piece of pipe extender as described above.  The pipe extender should extend out to the end of the notch but not beyond.  If it sticks out too far it can interfere with the bobbin winder.

You now have a working hand crank sewing machine WITH a bobbin winder.  This works with the 99, the 185 and the 192.

I hope this post will be helpful to someone.  It's really easy if you know how (except for that notch-cutting part).  

Now to passing along Rain's challenge to other vintage sewing machine bloggers:  what have you mastered that you could share with the rest of us? 

Stupendous Students and Their Fabulous Projects. And a Story.

Heather and I are still bartering:  massages for sewing lessons.  I am the best paid sewing teacher in the world, no doubt about it.



I taught college and university students for 40 years, and health care front-line supervisors for about five years.  This is hands down the best teaching experience I have had.  It's not because after all that time I perfected my skills, either.  It's because the student wants to learn.  Heather takes ideas and runs with them.  She sees things in the studio unrelated to the lessons of the day and goes home and figures out how to do them on her own.

Heather wanted to combine the characteristics of two different baby slings, and together we figured it out.  The cool retro fabric of the sling is from a recycled curtain.  We finished this in one session.

The patchwork bag was completely her own creation.  There are quilts in various stages scattered around the studio and Heather has quilters in her lineage.  But we have not done any piecing or quilting together.   You can imagine how excited I was to see this! 



Next she pieced the quilt top on her own (still no quilting lessons).  She brought the top to the studio and we discussed batting and I described the binding process and offered to show her how to do it.  No need, she went home and finished it by herself.  Here's what she said about it on Facebook:
"MY FIRST QUILT IS FINISHED! Henceforth, it shall be known as THE finest quilt in all the land."
Indeed.

Heather and Raven got familiar with the treadle with a string piecing project.  I cut and starched some 6" squares and suggested the strong black and white giraffe print for the center line.  They string pieced outward from that:  one block per student per week, for a total of two blocks each.  That was all it took and they were ready to take the treadle home.

We briefly played with arranging the blocks in different ways to make patterns and the to-sash or not-to-sash question.   She went home and made a lined tote bag with the string blocks.  Now, we did not cover lining tote bags in the tote bag lesson.  Raven's tote bag was made from upholstery fabric with a rubbery lining specifically because it would not need to be lined.  I was going for speed with that first project for Raven.  So Heather figured all of that out on her own too.



My second-favorite teaching experience is totally different yet exactly the same.  The setting:  a nursing home in a fairly tough neighborhood in Baltimore, Md. in the early 1980's.  Back in the day, nursing assistants did not have to have any training or certification.  It was a job that a hard working woman with no educational background could do.  The best of them got promoted to being a shift supervisor, and it was my job to teach them the basics of supervision and management.  I was a 30-something woman with a graduate degree and no actual experience of management or supervision.  Gloria was a 50-something tank of a woman with 30 years of experience in nursing homes.  I arrived for Day 2 of our course and as I stepped out of my car there was Gloria steamrolling her way down the parking lot towards me with a gleam in her eye.  I was terrified of her.  When she said "I want to talk to you about what you said last week" I almost peed my panties.  I figured she had seen right through me and my total lack of experience. 

But no.  She wanted me to know that she tried a technique I recommended (praise employees in public, offer criticism in private) and was astonished at how well it was working.  She had experienced the "light bulb" moment and was seeing her role towards her employees in a new way.  She was transformed as a supervisor.  This is one of my favorite memories out of my entire lifetime.  And again, it wasn't my skill or remarkable knowledge, because I had neither.  It really wasn't about me at all.  I had basic information that she needed, and she knew she needed it. Anybody could have given it to her.

Believe me, although I taught some excellent college and university students in 40 years, none of them could hold a candle to Gloria as a student.  Or to Heather.

Finished skirt modeled over her clothes

Heather's daughter Raven has been a joy in the studio also.  She used a vintage ruffler to apply the ruffle to this skirt.  How many of you vintage sewing machine buffs have ever used YOUR rufflers?


She made a skirt with elastic in the waist, very cute.  I love her choice of fabrics.

also makes a funny hat

And she made more bears.








A lot more bears.  They were destined for a children's craft fair.


Heather was very wise and knew from the beginning that Raven would need her own sewing machine.  Raven made these bears on her Singer 99 hand crank, a straight stitch machine.  At home Heather treadles a Singer 237, a cast iron beast of a zig-zagger.  In my studio she sews on a 237 hand crank.

The 237 always surprises me when I pick it up because although it is styled like the other machines named "Fashion Mate", it weighs much, much more.  The others have significant amounts of plastic, are lighter, and should be considered disposable (they may be working well now, but don't hold your breath).  The 237 is one of the all-metal treasures. It is one of the few all-metal zig-zaggers that can be easily converted to people-power, takes easily available needles and bobbins, and the one that around here is most often spotted in the wild.

I've paid $10 to $20 for my 237's.  This price/value relationship definitively proves that either
a)  all of us vintage machine collectors are brilliant economic strategists who will be able to retire to a private island once the world wakes up to the relative value of one of these to, say, a modern Bernina, or
b)  there IS no relationship between price and value.


photos by Cheryl Warren and Heather James, used with permission.

A Tale of Two Treadle Irons. NOT a tutorial, just looks like one.

Restoration Field Notes
 All of us who are interested in bringing the old machines back to life have read a lot of contradictory information on the boards about what to do and how to do it.  The most accurate advice (and plenty of others have said this also) is "there is no one way to do things."  Chemicals that do a beautiful job on one machine destroy the finish on another machine.

I'm planning a series of blogs with "field notes" in which I will tell you what I did, why I did it, what else you might consider doing, what I screwed up, what I did to fix it, and the truly astonishing revelation of how long it took to do it.  These may look like tutorials, but that would assume that I know what I am doing.  Usually I don't. 

This is a really long post and it is ONLY about treadle irons, so read on ONLY if that topic fascinates you.  Tune in next week for more cute pictures of Heather and her adorable children and what they have been creating with their people-powered sewing machines.  

A Tale of Two Treadle Irons

Treadle on the left:  Before.                       Treadle on the right:  After.

Two set of treadle irons recently passed through my hands that had very different characteristics. 

Side by side before restoration they appeared to be an almost identical dirty brown.  One had layers of greasy dust and the other one had dust and light rust.

My only experience is with Singer treadles, so that's what I am talking about here.

Remove the cabinet from the irons

This is easier and less intimidating than you might think.  There are four screws that hold the cabinet on to the top of the irons, and there may be additional brackets holding them on to the legs .  Peek under there and you will see them.  Take them out.  Lift the cabinet off.  It isn't heavy and one person might be able to do it, but it is bulky so if you have an extra person around, grab them for a minute.  Literally, a minute.

You can skip this step, but it really is simple and quick to do and it makes cleaning the treadle irons much, much easier.

It's also possible to disassemble the treadle base but I never have.  If the treadle is operating (pedal moves the pitman rod that moves the wheel), that's good enough for me.  And if it is not operating, I would not have bought it in the first place.  There are too many decent treadles out there at decent prices for me to bother with a broken one or one with rust or missing pieces.

Total time required:  less than 5 minutes

Repair or replace parts

I would only do this if I had inherited a family treadle that needed repair.  Objects with family history are in a special category that transcends economic considerations. 

If you have acquired a non-family non-working treadle, you will probably find it cheaper to  buy another treadle than to buy parts to fix it. Of course, a sudden onset of VSMAD often results from the initial treadle acquisition, so you may just consider that first treadle as a parts machine for your future treadles.

VSMAD:  Vintage Sewing Machine Acquisition Disorder

Remove any rust

Extensive rust would also deter me from buying a treadle, but you may spot an otherwise decent, functioning treadle with a few spots of rust.

Someone else will need to chime in on rust removal.  See below on what I tried that did not work.

Clean the irons

Here is a project where you don't have to be obsessively careful about cleaning products.  I have used a variety of kitchen cleaners (PineSol, Mr. Clean and the cheapo orangey stuff)

Slosh the cleaner on a section of the irons with a brush or a cloth, scrub.  Use a toothbrush to get in the crevices.  Wipe it off.  Repeat.  Repeat,  Repeat.  Repeat.  Turn it upside down.  Repeat.  Repeat.  Repeat.  Repeat.  You get the drift.

Greasy, furry logo before cleaning

There's a good chance that it has not been cleaned in 100 years.  The first one I cleaned had greasy grunge that actually looked like brown fur.  Just keep scrubbing and cleaning until it is gone.  Your goal is to get all of the dirt off.  Once you begin to get down to the actual paint you should be able to distinguish between an area that is tolerably clean and one that still needs further scrubbing. 

Don't worry about rinsing at the end.  There is one more step to go that will remove any residue from the cleaner.

If possible, do this outdoors.  First, the horrible brown stuff that will flow down off the treadle base has to go somewhere, and outside is a better place for it than your floors.  Next, there are so many nooks and crannies on a treadle base that even in the best interior lighting you will not be able to see all of the dirty bits easily.  Full sunlight is the way to go. 

Some of the paint may have chipped off, and some may be loose and will come off with the cleaning.  If it is loose enough to do this, I want it to come off now. 

Approximate time will vary according to the degree of filth.  The brown furry greasy one took about 2 hours to clean.  

Dusty rusty one on left, before cleaning

One of my treadles had light rust under the dust, and I thought some 0000 steel wool might take the bloom of rust off.  I was wrong about that, but on the upside it did not remove or scratch the remaining paint and it did a dandy job on the few spots of grease (under the oiling points) that were on these irons. 

I dunked the steel wool in the cleaner, let most of it drip off, and then gave the whole thing a scrub down.  I went lightly over the gold logos, and again the steel wool did not appear to do any harm.  After scrubbing each section of the machine I wiped it down with a cloth dampened in the cleaner.  

I might try steel wool again, cautiously, on a greasy one.  Remember, just because it didn't scratch the paint on this one does not mean that it wouldn't on another one.

I was somewhat concerned that all this liquid would merely promote more rust, but it evaporated quickly.  It was a crisp day with low humidity, around 50 F.

The lack of decades of grease meant that this cleaning went much more quickly.

Time for the steel wool wipe down:  just under 30 minutes.

Comparing the two led me to wonder about their histories.  Perhaps the greasy one sat in a kitchen, and the rusty one was in a parlor.  Sitting in a parlor in the humid South for decades before the age of air conditioning could have led to the rust.  And the layers of grease undoubtedly protected the kitchen irons from rust.

Pause to evaluate

I imagine it is easy to repaint a treadle base.  A spray can of black Rustoleum should do it.  The question is, do you really want to do this?  This is just another one of those personal preferences.

Logo after cleaning.

My own preference is for machines that look good but show some age.  If the chipped paint reveals gray iron, I leave it alone.  The gray softens the look.  If you paint it glossy black it will probably look terrific, but may not appear in harmony with your vintage cabinet and machine.  Think of a wrinkly old lady you have seen with dyed jet black hair.  No matter how good the dye job, it's never going to look right.

After cleaning, were you astonished to discover gold paint on the Singer logos?  If that paint is worn, you can ponder whether to touch it up or not.  I did, and lived to regret it.  I should have stopped at this point.  See above about age-appropriate beauty treatments.

 

 

Brightly painted logo.  Too brightly.

 

Painting the gold trim

I touched up the gold paint on the formerly-greasy irons, which I am keeping for myself.  I'm not entirely happy with the results.  It looks a bit garish to me.  Not garish enough for me to want to try to fix it, however.

You need a good small artist's paintbrush and a can of gold paint.  I used a Rustoleum American Accents gold satin paint, simply because I had a can of it sitting around.  And you need a steady hand.

I had the most trouble with the large oval surrounding the logos, and my paint job looks sloppy.  I did it first freehand, was not satisfied, went back and marked it off with blue painters tape and did it again.  It looks better but not great.  From a distance, however, it looks just fine.  And I'm not expecting anybody to get down on their hands and knees to examine the paint job.

Sharpie makes a marker with actual paint in it.  My new favorite thing for touching up chipped paint on a machine.  Or painting over mistakes in the gold paint.

The logos have raised images and lettering, and if your hand is steady enough and your brush is small enough it is a fairly simple matter just to lay some paint down.  If you are lucky the outlines of the old paint are still in place and you will only need to fill them in.

Approximate time:  This took me another two hours.

Oil the moving parts

Normal maintenance is a drop of oil at every point of movement.  We're not ready for that just yet.  The goal here is to flush out any cleaning fluid that sneaked into the joints, at the same time dissolving and flushing out old dried oil, dust and dirt.  This phase is also best done outdoors.

Use sewing machine oil.  There are a myriad of other products, all more expensive.  If you use them you will have to flush them out with sewing machine oil at the end, because they leave residue behind that will dry and harden.  So skip the expensive stuff and stick with the cheap stuff.  Any brand of sewing machine oil will do. 

Run oil into each point of movement until it starts to drip (it will only take a few drops).  Use either the treadle pedal or the flywheel to turn it several times,  More oil, more turning, more oil, more turning.  Is it moving more freely?  Keep going.  When it stops making improvements, sit at it and treadle it for a couple of minutes.  Oil it again, treadle it for another couple of minutes.  Keep going if you are still detecting improvements.  If the performance is smooth and consistent, leave it for a day.  Then oil 'er up again and treadle it for another couple of minutes.  Still smooth and consistent?  Then wipe off all that oil.

Time:  Depends on how gunky the joints are.

Wax

The final step in the cleaning process is to use an automobile cleaner/wax product.  I used Meguiar's, but I don't think the brand matters.

The bottle instructs you to wipe it on and polish it off.  I put much more effort into the front end of the process, and use it as a cleaner and rub it on.  More brown stuff may come off on the cloth. At the end of this vigorous wipe down, use a clean cloth to wipe on a coat of the cleaner/wax and let it dry thoroughly.  Then use a microfiber cloth to wipe off the wax and buff it to a shine.

Total work time (not including drying time):  One hour.

There is still brown stuff coming off.  Shouldn't we press on and clean it some more?  Happily, the answer is "no".  At some point you stop taking off the dirt and start removing the 100 year old paint.  The question is:  where is that point?  Since I can't tell, I just relax, admire my work and move on. 

Reassemble

Pop the cabinet back on top and put the screws back in.

Time:  less than 5 minutes.

Again, the disclaimer:  read the blogs and boards, but in the end you have to make all of the decisions and you will be the one stuck with the results.  Whatever you decide  to do, test a small and inconspicuous area first.

Thanks to Nicholas Rain Noe of The Vintage Singer Sewing Machine Blog for suggesting some detailed restoration blogging. 

To anyone who read this far, hope you enjoyed it.  Leave a comment, like "more please" or "promise you will never do this again".

Notched Handwheel Gone Awry

Rumor has it that you can cut a notch in a Singer handwheel and attach a hand crank to it.  This should do two things:

• save the extra bucks that the spoked handwheel costs
• allow the bobbin winder to function (it won't with the spoked wheel)

Heather kindly volunteered her husband to cut the notches as part of a barter.  The notches are notches, can't see how anything could be wrong with them.  But the finger on the hand crank is just too short to seat securely in the notch.  It looks more or less OK until you go to use it, then it immediately slips out of place.

Singer 99 notched wheel and handcrank

In place

Out of place

 And yes, the notch is wider than the finger, but that should not matter.  By the way, he also cut a notch in a Singer 237 handwheel, which is thicker, and that works on the 237.  In that case also the notch is a bit wider than the finger.

Any ideas?

thanks in advance,
Cheryl

Musical Sewing Machines: When the music stops, who is in the cabinet?

 My husband's grandmother's 1922 Singer Red Eye 66-1 treadle has gone to live at DD Aurora's.  The MIL and I are thrilled that she wants it.  Aurora says it is an art object.  I say that she should know how to operate all of the devices in her house.  This argument is designed to appeal to the engineer in her.  Let you know how that goes...

cleaned up well, don't you think?

Naturally I have to have another treadle.  Last Easter I bought one with a pretty rough cabinet and a gunked up Singer 127 Sphinx inside.  I bought it for the treadle because I already had a Sphinx.  Then DD Emily extravagantly admired my Sphinx and its hand crank (she loves the rhythm of the vibrating shuttle).  I cleaned the gunky Sphinx and gave it to her for Christmas.



So I had an empty treadle but like I said it was cosmetically rough.  It does have drawers, this photo shows it in prep for cleaning. 

I watch CraigsList daily, and although there are a lot of truly delusional sellers out there, there are also good machines going for reasonable prices. 

Before restoration

 

Eventually it all came together:  a CraigsList posting for a nice looking treadle with a Singer 66 Lotus inside.  I've been yearning for a Lotus as an art object.  I wouldn't turn down another Red Eye either.  They are both beautiful, beautiful machines, but a pain in the neck to treadle, IMHO.  You'll see the Lotus later after a good cleaning, and with a hand crank.  Maybe that won't turn backwards and break the thread EVERY SINGLE TIME I pause for a moment.




Studio student Heather likes the people powered machines and will be taking the funky treadle home with a Riccar 108 zig-zag machine inside, a post-WWII Japanese vintage beauty. 

Riccar 108, near-mint all metal powerhouse

So what is going into the newly acquired 7-drawer treadle?   A Singer 115 with Tiffany decals.  The 115 has the reputation of being a good treadler, and I am looking forward to the test drive.  The irons have been restored and the cabinet is almost finished, so it will be soon.

Singer 115 after about 20 hours of cleaning and polishing

In other studio news, it's amazing how much can get done while baby is sleeping.

Raven checked out a Singer 185, but prefers the 99.









Her second project is a teddy bear.  She tried out the incredibly cute tiny clothes pins that I found in the office supplies section at Walmart.  Much less intimidating than sharp pins and they worked out well.

She finished sewing the bear and took it home to stuff it.

Is 5 months too young to start sewing lessons, do you think?  He really wants to get his hands on this machine.

Sewing Karma's Gonna Get You

Lucky me.  I met a young woman who wanted to learn to sew and she asked me what I would charge for lessons.  I told her, but also told her that I was open to the idea of bartering.

She then uttered magical words that were music to my ears:
"I am a massage therapist."

So now I am getting a weekly massage from a professional massage therapist (Heather James at Hillsborough Yoga and Healing Arts) and she and her daughter are getting weekly sewing lessons.  This will remain a health-issue-free blog, but trust me when I say that I do have issues for which massage provides the perfect therapy and relief.

Not only is the massage wonderful, but having people come over to play with me in my studio is just as wonderful.  Not only that, but one of them is a 9 year old girl who is very interested in sewing.  Not only that, but a 5 month old baby comes along for the ride.  This may or may not be YOUR idea of heaven, but it is mine. 

On her first lesson, Heather completed a pair of pants for baby Gryphon from a recycled sweater. 

Adorable, don't you think?  Heather went home and made another pair, too.

On lesson 2 Raven came along with her mom.  Here you see her using a Singer 99 with hand crank to add rick rack to a strap.

By the end of that session she had the straps sewed on to the tote.

She came back with me on Saturday after my massage and while her mom was still working and finished up her roomy tote bag.  She did an excellent job.  Just look at how straight those straps are.  First class.

The bag is made from upholstery fabric with a coating on the inside, the straps are the serious kind I use on luggage, and there is rick rack.  The Singer 99 crunched its way through two layers of all that on the bottom seam, powered by Raven.  

I gave Heather and Raven the 15 minute tour that I call "The History of America From The Late-1800's To Now Through Sewing Machines."  (leaf tensioners, vibrating shuttles, 66 in a treadle, 115, 15-91, 15 clones, 15-125, 306, a Kenmore 89 cam stack machine, and my modern Janome with 500 decorative stitches.  It's a selection designed to tell a story, not the complete herd.  mwahahahahahaha.)

They like the people powered machines and on the next lesson they can try sewing on the 66 treadle and Heather can check out a vintage Japanese zigzag machine that I adapted to hand crank.

Someday I will outline the DragonPoodle economic philosophy, but for now I will just say that casting your bread upon the waters can come up trumps.  How's your sewing karma? 

Seduced by Color. AGAIN. (and some sewing machines)

Another post about crocheting (and the last one, I promise!)

National Paveway, 3/4 size, weighs a mere 16.5 pounds.

But first, photos of my latest restorations (so that my vintage-sewing-machine buddies don't get bored and wander away! )

Regular readers met this little machine last spring.  Here she is "before".

You can read the earlier post about her here if you like.




And here is the "after".  Not bad, eh?

Thanks to Wes Cook at Dual Supply in Hillsborough, NC, it now has a lovely "hand knob" a la Laura.  Wes is the owner of the kind of hardware store that has everything, and he knows where it all is, too.  He spent a LOT of time helping me with this and with another one and claimed to have enjoyed the experience.  The total charge by the end was $1.17 (I brought the glass knob with me).

The big news on this one is that I came home yesterday with a 3/4 size Free Westinghouse and this machine fits in that cabinet.  Sort of.  It won't fold down.  The Free Westinghouse is brown crinkle and you may see it after its spa treatment.

Singer 347, basic zig-zag all-metal machine

Twin Singer 338's.  Take Singer flat cams

By the way,  for the total novice sewing-machine-repair-person-wannabe, there is NOTHING like having two identical machines on the bench.  Unless maybe it is THREE.

Three Singer 401's.  Two have found new homes by now.

Now for the crocheting. 
It seems I just can't catch a break.

I was determined to crochet a moebius scarf to match my purple suede jacket and keep me toasty warm in case we ever get around to having a winter here in NC this year.  On the first go-round I fell for some beautifully colored acrylic.  A few days after that fiasco I was driving through beautiful downtown Mebane, NC, and noticed The Twisted Knitter yarn shop.


Kim Pate of Twisted Knitter sat down with me at a table in a sunny corner of the shop and pulled out several skeins of different yarns so that we could see what went with the jacket.  I left with Noro's Silk Garden in similar colors to my first scarf.  The level of service was what I always feel entitled to when I go in a small specialty shop, but rarely receive.  I spent 5 times as much as I had spent on the acrylic, and SHOULD have been treated like a queen.  And was.





And although I was impressed with Kim and her shop, I have to say that I just don't "get" the Noro Silk Garden.

• First, you would think that a yarn that is 45% silk, 45% Kid Mohair, and 10% lambswool would be soft.  NOT.  Scratchy, in fact.  
• Next, you would think that an expensive yarn would be produced to high quality standards.  NOT.  The thickness of the yarn varied from color to color (It's a variegated yarn) with giant slubs in spots, NOT in a pleasant thick-and-thin yarn kind of way, but much more like a beginning, and very unskilled, hand spinner had done it. 
• Finally, you would think that skeins with the same color number and dye lot would be the same color,  REALLY, you WOULD think that!  NOT!!!!!!!!!!!!!  When I went back to get more, Kim had to go in the back and get out a whole box and we had to pick through them to find skeins with the same colors in them.  And I am not talking about variations in shades, but skeins that had some completely different colors in them.

In short, I am totally bewildered by the Noro yarn.

I more-or-less solved the thickness problem by using a double strand of it to crochet my scarf, figuring that the thick colors and the thinner colors would play nicely together and they did blend well.

And I am done for the year.  No more moebius scarves.  No more expensive trips to yarn shops.  Sadly, no lovely cuddly soft warm beautifully-colored moebius scarf for me as I had envisioned.   It is warm and I like the color but hate the scratchiness.

I did have a wonderful time in The Twisted Knitter, though.  How about you?  Are you treated well in expensive specialty shops (like quilt shops)?  Or are you totally ignored?  I've had more than one bad experience in the closest quilt shop to me and refuse to give them my money.  I once took my SIL Mary there but they were way too busy schmoozing with the regulars to even speak to us, let alone wait on us or take our money for the things we wanted to buy.  Now, Mary and I both bathe regularly and don't look like derelicts.  That was the very last time I crossed their threshold.  I was embarrassed to have taken Mary in there and subjected her to that.

And speaking of SIL Mary, I'm hoping she didn't read my last post in which I trashed acrylic yarn.  I have a beautiful afghan that she crocheted for me decades ago.  Still looks as great as it did when new, and it has been washed several times.  It has not pilled, twisted, or stretched out of shape.   It must have been a superior species of acrylic.  Just like everything else, they probably don't make it as well these days.  Twenty years ago I think that Noro would have been laughed off the stage.

BIG news in the studio!  I'll tell you all about it next time.  This post has already become a novelette.