A Couple Finishes and a Birthday

Here is DS the Elder's quilt, all finished and ready to go home with him. It's made from Australian Aboriginal fabrics, which I chose because he loved the three months he spent in Australia so much. This quilt is HUGE, has wool batting and flannel backing and I still managed to quilt it on my Bernina 440! A sit down long arm would be awesome, but not in the budget anytime soon. The pattern is Garden Path and can be found here.

Here is Mr. Z's fishbowl quilt. I just drafted a pattern for this to use with the 6" finished squares I had on hand. I try to make most of my novelty quilts with that size square, so I re-draft patterns as necessary.  He is my oldest grandson, and he lives in South Africa. I got to talk to him yesterday on Skype, and he is excited to get his sea quilt, but now he wants a dinosaur quilt too :-) He is so much fun to talk to! He'll be five later this month. I'm working on his little brother's car quilt now.

One of the reasons I got to Skype yesterday with DD#1's family is it was my birthday! Mr. Z sang me "Happy Birthday", and it was so sweet! So glad we live in the internet age when family is so far away.

 

DH bought me flowers, a bouquet of orange roses and a mixed bouquet of mostly orange flowers. I put them in the same vase because I liked the mixture.

 

I've been wanting to try quilting on a vintage machine. I already do most of my piecing on vintage machines. I was doing some reading online, about which vintage machines are best for quilting, and the Singer 15-91 kept coming up. They are in pretty high demand so the prices are higher. I found out the Singer 15-125 is the same machine internally, but has an updated look and the body is aluminum instead of cast iron. It's hard to see in this photo, but it's a pale green with pea green accents. It needs to be cleaned up, but it looks like it will be up to sewing for quite a long time to come. I won this one on ebay for a great price, and it was very well packaged.

The Singer 15-125 only had one owner, and they had saved the original sales receipt! I am so glad they sent it with the machine! Originally purchased September 2, 1958 for $164.50 before discounts. They got a church discount, how cool is that? The buttonholer they bought at the same time? Yeah, they sent that too! I have the slide plate for the machine, but it is cracked so I already ordered another. The machine needs a good cleaning, but DH wants to drop is by the Sew and Vac shop to check the electrical anyway. The wiring looks good to me, but he'd rather be safe than sorry. Now I have a new vintage machine for my birthday too!