Vintage Club - The first meeting to discuss portable sewing machines and how the Singer Featherweight model 221 fits in the timeline

Thanks to Deb Hayter's blog post on My Quilty World  a new opportunity came about.  Staci, a Dallas, Texas local shop owner of Rocking Bobbin, saw Deb's post after Staci offered her shop classroom for our group to have a Sew Day together.  

Later, Staci contacted me since she saw us sewing on our Featherweights; did I know of anyone that would like to lead a Vintage Group about vintage sewing machines?  Yes, that would be me!  I've started this blog to show you some beautiful, built to last for generations, sewing machines with their proud owners.

 First group Wednesday, February 22, 2017

Here is a picture of the portables from my collection to share with the group.

 Left to right: black Singer 99K hand crank, Larch Green General Electric Sewhandy,  black Singer Featherweight 221, and Singer 301 LBOW (Light beige oyster white) short bed.

L to R: Nancy with her Mom's Featherweight she learned to sew on (a family machine!) and Shirley with her sweet Featherweight.

 L to R: Cindy with her Mom's Featherweight and Janelle with her precious Featherweight.

While crawling around on the floor to plug in my machine in, I noticed this . . . Nancy has kicked her right loafer off with the placement of her entire foot on top of the foot controller to operate the active button with the ball of her foot.  Shirley on the right, has also kicked of her right sandal with the active button facing her and using the side of her foot to press it.  Interesting, isn't it?

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Second Group meeting Saturday, March 4, 2017

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 Back in the upstairs classroom for Rocking Bobbin.  The same information was covered for those that work during the week and needed a weekend class.    
                          

Me and Candice are at this table.  I've got my friend Cindy's white Featherweight from 1967 to sew on and show to the others in this Vintage Group meeting.  We covered the same material as the Wednesday group.

Here is Candice with her machine "Dora".  It was a gift from her sister. This was her first time to really sew on it!

Same for Susan, her first time to sew on her Featherweight beauty!

Jeanne is sewing on ONE of her EIGHT Featherweights! Her project is from fabric that was being tossed out by someone else so she rescued it and is making a quilt.

Here is Janet with her Mom's machine -- lots of memories and history packed into this little beauty!

The set up was flip flopped from the right side of the room to the left.  I liked the U shaped seating   area for the attendees.  The quilt by the open door is called En Provence; an online mystery with Bonnie K. Hunter at www.quiltville.blogspot.com It is now available as a digital download from her website.

Here I am working on my newest quilt called Midnight Flight from Bonnie K. Hunter's book More Adventures with Leaders & Enders.  I'm a big fan of scrappy quilts.

Ah, here's my friend Brenda after her B.I.G. shopping spree. Susan showed us her sewing machine needle threader, I tried it and was instantly wanting one so and I ran downstairs to check if they had
them.  They did and we each purchased one.  No pic of it, but here's the info: Dritz #253 Machine Needle Inserter & Threader.  I know the threader works great, will have to demo the needle inserter next meeting.  Amazing what you can do when you read ALL the words of the directions.

Well now, small world! While visiting during our sew time, Candice is the gal I recently saw on Bonnie's blog post from the workshop in Denton for the Split Nine Patch. She's also been on two cruises with Bonnie to the Caribbean and Mediterranean -- nice gal and "gets me" regarding scrappy quilts.  We have the same Super Quilting Hero!!!

These gals!!  Me on the left, Stephannie and Sherri from Our Quilt World Facebook page. Sherri was in town for some retail therapy from East Texas and Stephannie met up with her. I was just delighted they stopped in to say hi, show us their purchases and get a hug.  My face is about to break!!

Well, that is it for the first post.  If you are interested in attending the next Vintage Group meeting, get in touch with the shop. Link is at the top of the post.  

Remember, vintage machines were built to last generations.  Go find out what is lurking in the cabinet or that carrying case in your Mom/Aunt/Grandmother's closet.  You might be the fortunate one to have a family machine.  Now go sew something wonderful on it!!  Until next time, Allison