Oh Google maps, how I love you. I was playing on there last night (you know, as one does when they are bored with all their iPhone games) and I searched my area for 'Brother Sewing'. Low and behold a (new to me) quilt shop popped up about 20 miles away!
The Sewing Garrett. Their website wasn't much, but it had photos of their Brother accessory wall and what did I spot- the two things I have been looking for! A walking foot for my machine and a new embroidery hoop for my machine that has three places to connect it to the machine. So instead of unhooping and rehooping my fabric, I can just hoop a big piece and then scootch the frame down as I need to. I still have to stitch within my 4x4 size, but at least I can leave the fabric hooped if I have a bigger design that I want to do (I just have to split it into threes). I may have stunk at explaining that. I'll try again in another post when I actually use it.
I did use the walking foot this afternoon though. One of my best friends from high school and his wife are expecting their first child this fall and my husband and I are going out to visit them next week- and Southern girls
never show up empty handed.
Behold, the beginnings of their gift! Homemade bibs for their soon-to-be little one. The fabric on the right was just too perfect- Pat loves cars, planes, and skydiving (hoping he gives that one up now that he is going to be a daddy!)
I had made bibs before when I found out Angie was expecting baby
Sam, but of course I found a tutorial on Pinterest that I wasn't smart enough to actually pin. "I'll just search again the next time I need it" #famouslastwords Thankfully I mentioned how I made it on my other, family website. Just two pieces of fabric with terrycloth sandwiched in between.
For these I decided to put denim on the backs, mostly so the two bibs would kind of tie together.
On the left here is a finished bib (except for the Velcro closure which still needs to be sewn on) and on the right is the fabric before being sewn. It always surprises me how much the bibs shrink after sewing, flipping, and top stitching. Turning those ends right-side-out was not easy! Thankfully I found a chopstick in my kitchen drawer to help. I had never tried that trick before, but it was really helpful. So much so that the chopstick now lives in my sewing room :)
