Caturday

 

Caturday

Hems and Hemming

Did I enter the sewing room yesterday? Yes, to put a shirt on the cutting table as it needs a snap replaced and then ironed. That was it.

I have almost finished cleaning the upstairs. There is a lot of dust and fine ash on everything due to the wind and fire. It is calm out and we had a good, but short, rain to dampen things down. Safe for a few days.

Carolyn at Diary of a Sewing Fanatic wrote a blog on Hems. Her questions were

So what about you? How are your hemlines? Do you take your time and add a lot of important details? Or do you rush through so that you can wear your garment? Also do you have any special techniques that you use to get a superior finished hem? 

Hemming is usually the final task to do and, like others, I am ready to be finished with the garment and have it out of my hair. I usually have to have a stern talk about not rushing the hem.

When doing rodeo wear, I always serge the hem, turn it up and machine stitch if it is going to be covered with saree trim. If not, I do serge the hem and then carefully, with small stitches, hand stitch in place. Sleeves and top hems get serged and machine stitched in place. Hems are tucked in and sleeves usually have lots of crystals to hide the machine stitching. Linings are turned up and machine stitched. Is that really satisfying hemming this way? No but it is cost effective.

For my own clothes, I want to do better. I need to work on doing better. Or should I say, I need to know what type of hem is best for each item I make. Here are some of the things I really want to learn to take my sewing up a notch:

• When to serge finish a hem
  
• When to use lace tape
  
• When to machine stitch a hem vs. hand sewing a hem
  
• Using interfacing or other fabrics in the hem to give it weight
  
• Different hand stitching techniques for hemming

I guess I am going to have to do a study in hems and make some samples.

Invisible Hem by Sherri at Paper Scissors Cloth is probably the first I will try as I have never mastered that hemming stitch.

I hope to work on the Teal Blue shirt today. Even if only for 2 hours.

Until tomorrow………………..

Fire, Fire Go Away

The weather cooled off yesterday and it remained fairly calm until mid afternoon. But overnight on Sunday about 50 people were evacuated from their homes as the fire was moving in a direction that might have put them in danger of being trapped. The worst had happened; the fire jumped the highway.

By and from the house of the ladies we helped pack up to leave on Saturday afternoon

People had to leave their homes after 10 p.m. and head into town. Those who could, stayed with friends and others headed to the Evacuation Social Services headquarters to get a hotel room to stay in.

About the same time on Saturday but at a different location.

Yesterday morning the road up to the mine was closed and people had to get a permit to travel up there. By 2 p.m. it was opened again. People were thankful for that though they still needed a permit to go on the side roads.

There are many hot spots showing this morning and it will be interesting to see what develops. The wind is blowing already which is not good.

We see helicopter activity between the fire and the local airport which is their fuelling station. The helicopters are getting water from a man made lake in the fire zone (the whole place was spared when the fire divided 200 feet from the buildings). Here is a great picture that a friend shared.

One lady summed it up to the Spousal Unit who volunteered at the Emergency Social Services headquarters. “The fire came real close to the house. The vinyl siding warped and buckled but that is easier to replace than the house if it had burned down”.

As you can guess, I didn’t make it down to the sewing room. Instead, I had two back to back meetings and wrote the literacy year end document. I finished all that by 5 p.m.

Today I am cleaning house. I want to get rid of the fine soot on the furniture and floor. I will start with the dining and living room and then do the kitchen. After that is done, I will sew. I think I deserve a few hours of sewing today.

Until tomorrow………………….

Forest Fire

Mother’s Day was different this year. We went to the city and got a few things including a patio table and chairs, we headed home to hear that our community is on evacuation alert due to the fire not far from us.

The smoke wasn’t too bad when we drove into our community but the high winds did a number on the fire. After unloading the vehicle, we headed out to see the fire from across the river.

It wasn’t pretty and just before we left, there was a huge flare up.

On the way back into town, we got another view of the fire. We were in a hurry as we had to head out to help people evacuate.

The fire was moving towards the highway and people could be caught behind the fire. We checked in to see if a friend needed help but all looked okay for him. He had 100 horses behind irrigation and lush green fields.

We headed out to another area to help two ladies pack up their belongings. The house they live in is near lots of trees as were a few other places on that road. They were on evacuation alert when we arrived at 5 p.m. Everything of importance was either packed or ready to go. Their game plan was good and they were evacuated at 11 p.m. along with campers and other families. Not sure if the fire will head to their home, but the fear was the road being blocked by fire.

The sad part of this; the fire was started by people burning grass along the river so the wild asparagus would grow better. It wasn’t totally put out by firefighters and then it flared again causing this horrific forest fire.

FYI, we have lived through a forest fire scare in the mid 90’s. It was on the ranch we managed in this area. The fire was very close and the employees were out helping fight the fire and moving cattle to safer ground. We were packed up ready to leave and I had to orchestrate the moving, feeding some crew members, and being the command post. It was scary which is why we jumped in to help people yesterday.

Today is literacy day, meetings and hopes of getting a wee bit of sewing done.

Until tomorrow…………….

Caturday