Sewing Archives - Page 3 of 10 - Ruffing’s

Posted on December 12, 2010January 9, 2019 by Elizabeth Ruffing

Toy riot

This is a glimpse into my workroom, showing how it has looked over the past few days. I’ve been in a whirl of fabric and thread and stuffing, surrounded by toys in all stages of completeness.

All my little sock kittens went off to new homes, all but one kitty angel that I will show you later.

I miss them and need to make some more. My Hug Me Toads are hopping off too. And, there has been an onslaught of slugs.

This fourteen-inch slug is on his way to Australia. I have a big bunch more, in all shapes and sizes, that I’ll be working on this week, so they can be off before for Christmas.

Piles of personalized hang tags are accumulating, and more toys keep joining the ranks. I am sewing all day, each day, for the most part. I’m still on schedule, and every toy that has been ordered as of this morning, is either all done, or in progress. I’m currently on about a two-week turnaround time for making the custom toys. Almost all of my ready-made toy animals have been adopted, but I will try to add a couple more to my Etsy shop, if I can, before Christmas. I have some things I have to do this weekend, along with celebrating my birthday, and so I may run out of time.

My toys and prints have made it into quite a few Etsy treasuries over the past couple of weeks, and this one below made it to the Etsy front page. I saw the number of views rushing up on that listing, along with the number of hearts on it, and thought something must be up. I missed seeing it on the front page, but the curator told me about it later. I appreciate everyone who features my work. It’s a very nice compliment. I put the recent treasuries in a set on my Flickr page.

It seems like weeks now that I, at long last, got myself a Wacom tablet. I haven’t yet had the time to plug it in. I picked up a bundle with Corel Painter, which I have hardly tested out yet either. I tried the tablet during Apple class, but I haven’t had time to get to one of those lately either! I was thoroughly uncoordinated with the pen and tablet. I am going to need a lot of practice, once the holidays have passed.

I think one of my first projects will be to play with my hang tags for my toys. I am wishing I’d made up some kind of gift certificates or e-gift cards to send out for people who are shopping late for the holidays too, so they could pre-order slugs for gift recipients. Those are small projects, but I’m not stepping away from the sewing long enough to do them at the moment. I wish I’d been a little more on top of things this season, but I am more prepared than I was last year. The holiday panic is subsiding, and being replaced by fatigue. My mom is giving me a hand, cutting out eyeballs, and doing this and that. I’d be panicked and fatigued at the same time, without her help. Thanks, Mom!

As always, I have my kitty helper too. He is also invaluable.

Posted on November 12, 2010January 9, 2019 by Elizabeth Ruffing — 2 Comments

Lots of soft and fuzzy

I cut out a gargantuan pile of fleece over the past two days. I’m not sure how long it will take me to turn this into toys, maybe a couple of years! And that isn’t all of it.

I cut out fleece in two sizes. I think I have plenty now.

I also got Daisy the Dachshund’s web page up today. Daisy is one of Max Bailey’s original, one-of-a-kind art doll figurines. To me, her eyes look very soulful, just like a real Dachshund’s eyes. There is a little Dachshund who lives near us who likes me to rub her belly. She looks just like Daisy, only she doesn’t wear dresses, which is good because she would look very undignified rolling on her back with her paws up in the air, while wearing a dress.

I got to pet some kittens last weekend too. Marie’s camera has a broken part, and so I went over with mine. It’s easier for me to get a clear photo, the more light I have, and so we tried stepping out the back door for some. These are indoor-only rescue kittens. Sunny didn’t care for the great outdoors at all. We couldn’t blame her, since she had had a bad head wound from an animal bite. It has healed up amazingly well with all the care she has gotten through the rescue group. She is one lucky girl.

Once we went back inside, she was happy again, and got right back to playing.

This is Frosty (Update: Frosty is now our very own Josephine!), Sunny’s little sister, from another litter with the same Shoeshoe father. She’d only had human contact for a few days, but you’d never know it. She was very cuddly and sweet. I sat and held her for a long time. Her blue eyes are so sad and beautiful.

Windy, Sunny’s sister, below, was the only one of our subjects who actually enjoyed the sun on her face. She turned into a purring puddle o’ Windy. Frosty started to doze off a bit too. Maybe it was the fuzzy blanket.

We got them back in the house as soon as we could, and they all got Trader Joe’s Bench & Field Holistic Feline Treats. I’d never seen these before, and they all went cuckoo for them, chasing them across the floor, and hunting them down. I picked some up later, and our kitties went crazy for them too. Windy and her other sister, Cloudy, stopped to play with a stray litter pellet while hunting for cat treats. Marie says those are their favorite toys, even though they have bunches of cat toys.

They must have thought I was a giant cat toy. They all checked out my sneakers, very thoroughly. Sunny also inspected my camera. I kept getting “camera shake” only to discover her swinging from my lens cap. She is definitely going to be a helper cat.

Stormy, from the same litter as Sunny, Windy, and Cloudy, was very timid, but she still came out for treats and toys. She wanted to select one of her own from the toy bag. All the girls were really sweet, and I had a lot of fun visiting. Marie is really nice too. I put more kittens photos up on my Flickr page.

After playing, and petting, and cuddling with kittens, it’s a wonder I didn’t take them all home with me, but we do have a full house here too. My kitties wanted to know where I’d been. My sneakers were probably thoroughly sniffed on my return too.

These kittens will be adopted out when they are old enough to be spayed/neutered and vaccinated. Please consider adopting a pet, and please spay and neuter your pets.

Posted on October 31, 2010January 9, 2019 by Elizabeth Ruffing

Halloween musings

Happy Halloween! A few weeks ago, I decided I really wanted to make a Regency Era gown, and ordered a beautiful Sense and Sensibility pattern. I think I will make one for springtime. As Halloween got closer, a week away actually, I suddenly decided I was going to make a similar gown for a costume. I ran into town and got McCall’s pattern 6141, which is really a Renaissance costume, but rather similar in style to the Regency gowns.

I had recently gathered up a bunch of sheets to use for fabric for other projects, and I grabbed a blue twin sheet set out of the pile, along with a teal sheet for contrast. I spread the sheets, one at a time, out on my carpet and cut out my pattern pieces. I added some trims I got at Hancock Fabrics, to the sleeves and the neckline, and managed to get the whole gown sewn and hemmed by Saturday night, just in time for Jill’s party, which was a lot of fun. I got to talk to some great people, and made good friends with Jill’s corgi too, who followed me all over the house for in exchange for pets.

Jill, and a lot of the people who were there volunteer a local cat rescue, fostering cats and kittens. Just a really nice group of good-hearted people. I enjoyed myself very much.

It also did me some good to make something just because. It’s hard to give myself permission to make something just for fun, but I think I will have to do that some more. I even did a hand-picked zipper for the first time.

It’s funny what makes other things come into perspective. You make a dress, and you realize that you need to give yourself permission to paint a painting too, or take up photography, or make something only you might like, that might never sell or be of interest to anyone else, because those are the projects that come out the best and make you feel good about your abilities.

And you meet some nice people, and you realize that when you like someone, you just like a person. There’s no trying to like them, or trying to be fair, or trying to look past their bad points. You just like them. Since we moved here, I’ve been thinking that people are just different here, harder for me to relate to, but that isn’t true. I just met the wrong people, dated the wrong people, and didn’t like their friends, all for the same reason…they weren’t my kind of people. I had a date once, with a psychiatrist, who tried to tell me this, that people are either nice or they aren’t. I had been saying that people here seemed harder to get to know, more evasive, more secretive, and he said no. People are either open, or not, honest or not. He told me if I had trouble sorting them out, just call him and ask, because he could tell me right away. I’m realizing more and more, that I do know right away too. I just thought I was in a strange land, when I was really just trying to relate to the wrong people. I’m feeling a lot better about these things lately, where I live, what I do, and who I am.

Posted on October 22, 2010January 9, 2019 by Elizabeth Ruffing

Bits and pieces

I’ve been sewing Pixie Kitten bodies, and have a few of them in progress. I received most of what I spent on my ill-fated Viking Platinum from the Post Office, after the shipping disaster that cracked it to bits, and instead of buying a new sewing machine, I’ve been adding parts to my Kenmore 19233, to make it more versatile. I showed you the walking feet I’ve been using to sew, but I also found a straight stitch needle plate that fit.

It’s a Janome part number 200093305, which I bought online from Sewing Machines Plus. Janome made the Kenmore, and so I did some research until I found one that matched mine. This one fits the Kenmore 385 series. It’s easy enough to put on and take off. The larger screw in the upper left corner is what holds it in place. It’s good to remove the needle plate to clean out lint anyway. So, when you change plates, you can get in there to clean too.

With two machines, I’m accumulating a lot of presser feet and miscellaneous parts, and so I got a plastic organizer at Michaels to keep them in order. Some of the feet are left over from the Platinum, but these seem to work on my Viking Sarah, with the exception of the buttonhole sensor foot, which I will have to sell sometime.

I divided up my bobbins by machine too, each group in their own case. I had been finding them here and there, tangled together. I finally got my other shelf up in my workroom, and a couple more boxes to house fabrics. Sometimes I feel like I live in a storage facility, but it is better to have everything somewhat organized. I’m amazed how nice having just one open patch on a table can feel.

I’m still trying to expand my very limited knowledge of photography as well, while hoping to upgrade to a DSLR at some point. I’ve been practicing using my camera when I can. This is Spunky. He and other adorable kitties are at adoption events this weekend. The kitties have been patient with me while I’ve tried to figure out how to photograph them. My camera doesn’t handle the low light or motion very well. Since I now don’t necessarily need to put my postal insurance funds toward a sewing machine, I hope to be able to put it toward a camera instead. This just feels like something I’d like to be able to do better. I’m not sure where that will lead right now, but learning something new, especially something that can be used creatively, is appealing to me.