Come Stitch With Me

Let’s talk about sources of sewing instruction available analog style. Some libraries offer DVDs for check-out. Instructional videos are offered for sale in a DVD format alongside the digital download. I’ve seen many sewing DVDs from Nancy Zieman, Martha Pullen and Fons & Porter for sale at recent estate sales. No standalone DVD player in your home? You can buy a USB DVD player to plug into your laptop for less than $50.00.

Let’s go real old school now – live TV. In the mid-1990’s, I used to get up early on Saturday mornings to watch Sewing with Nancy and Martha’s Sewing Room that aired on my local PBS affiliate at 7:00 a.m. I’d set my VCR to record shows when I couldn’t watch them live. Believe it or not, sewing, craft and quilting shows are still being broadcast over-the-air each week on PBS. You simply need a digital HD OTA antenna to pick up local channels.

Metro Atlanta is fortunate to be served by two PBS affiliates – WPBA (Channel 30) and WGTV (Channel 8). WPBA is supported by Atlanta Public Schools and WGTV is the state-wide PBS affiliate. WGTV is the PBS affiliate that broadcasts CreateTV – a channel devoted to cooking, crafting and making – separate from the regular PBS station. It airs on HD Channel 8.2 in metro Atlanta. Currently, you can watch shows such as The Best of Sewing With Nancy, Fons & Porter’s Love of Quilting and Fit 2 Stitch. Reception is kind of spotty on the west side of metro Atlanta, so I’m glad that the programming is also streamed online. Some of the episodes are available to stream on-demand. I particularly like this feature when directing students to specific videos. We can avoid the YouTube distractions.

We have an indoor HD OTA antenna that picks up most of our local channels beautifully. We still have cable but will be transitioning to a combo of streaming/OTA in the near future. This way, we can still watch local programming even if the internet or cable goes out for some reason.

And sometimes, I just want to be completely disconnected from my laptop, tablet and smartphone.

I guess you could say I’m channeling my inner Lara Langston – the heroine in the animated Aloha mystery video series – by sewing along on my Singer Featherweight, too. I finished the blocks on National Jelly Roll Day (Saturday) and laid them out this afternoon between a therapy dog visit with Sadie and a private sewing lesson with a middle school student.

Bit by bit, the quilt will get done. The directions call for a pieced border that resembles a checkerboard. Since there’s so much color going on in the quilt, I’m going to opt for a simple white 2-1/2″ border to frame the quilt and then bind it with a teal print.

Oh, and yes the post would not be complete without a picture of Sadie from today’s visit at the Georgia Primary Care Association annual conference at the Intercontinental Hotel in Buckhead.

What are you making with your jelly roll strips today?

Me? I’m finishing up the blocks for my Aloha Mystery 5-0 quilt:

I’m about two-thirds of the way through making blocks. I used a jelly roll and white background fabric from my stash. I purchased the bright blue and green fabrics used as accent squares in each block. The teal print seen in the back stack of fabric will be the binding (and perhaps an outer border once everything is laid out). Backing fabric will be a Lori Holt cheater print that a friend gifted me. My plan was to rent time on the longarm at Tiny Stitches, but available slots are few and don’t mesh with my schedule for the three weeks. I’ll FMQ it on my domestic machine instead since I need it done in time for an event on October 11th.

Bonus Project: If you’ll notice, this quilt pattern required a lot of stitch & flip (a/k/a folded corner) units. I sewed all the of the leftover triangle bits together and trimmed them to yield 1-1/2″ HSTs. Final result: a useful hot pad for my kitchen – instead of adding to the rubbish bin.