Serging in Spokane

I left here Friday morning and drove over to Spokane. The drive over was lovely because it was early enough in the day that traffic was light. I took the northern route, through Libby and into north Idaho, and arrived in Spokane around 9 am Pacific time. Going westward nets me an extra hour.

I spent the day shopping, hitting all four Joanns and two Hobby Lobby stores. The clearance racks yielded up some treasures, and one store’s remnant rack was so full that all the remnants were 80% off. I picked up a couple of new serger project patterns at the big quilt store. I did some shopping at Trader Joe’s for myself and a friend. Dinner was a huge Cobb salad from Safeway (I do love their salads) and the hotel was so quiet that it was like I had the place to myself.

And oh my goodness—class yesterday was so much fun. I had six students. Two had newer air-threading BabyLock sergers, two had Bernina sergers (relatively new, but without air threading), one had an older Elna, and one poor lady had an early model Singer serger that was a beast to thread. She knew its limitations coming in and she’d like to upgrade, but she just bought a new sewing machine so a new serger will have to wait. Nobody brought a Juki, which surprised me a bit, but the store owner, Irene, had two Juki sergers and a coverstitch machine set up for people to try.

All of the students got their machines threaded and running and most of them also got to try out a few different fabrics. One student asked me if I had an engineering degree. No, but I have the genes.

And then class was over.

“When are you coming back here to teach?”

“Can we have a class on making tops and T-shirts"?”

“Is once a month too often for you to come to Spokane?”

LOL. The husband said I can’t move there.

I always ask at the beginning of class for students to tell me why they are in class and how they hope to use their sergers. Everyone in this class wanted to make clothing. Like me, they are tired of not being able to find quality clothing that fits. One lady even asked if I would do a private class for her on making a bodice sloper. Irene said I can come and teach whatever and whenever I would like. The only negative is that she has a tiny little classroom space—six students is the maximum and there really is no place to spread out and trace and cut patterns. I suggested that if we do a T-shirt class, we set it up so that we do a few hours on a Friday afternoon or evening to take measurements, send everyone home to trace the pattern and cut it, then come back on Saturday and assemble the top.

[I wore my Laundry Day Tee made from the turquoise and royal blue DBP print that I picked up in Missoula. I paired it with some royal blue Charter Club jeans. Even though I knew I risked looking like a giant blueberry, I was reminded of something Kaffe Fassett said in a podcast interview. He believes that color is an energizing lifeforce. If his fabric lines came in knits as well as quilting cottons, I daresay my closet would be full of them. No muddy earth tones there.]

I’ve really got to sit down this week with my calendar and get things under control for teaching in 2023. And did I ever think I would be teaching serger classes and classes on making clothing? No, I did not. The universe has a stunningly deep sense of humor.

My original plan was to spend Saturday night in Spokane, as well, but I decided to hit the road right after class and come home. A big line of thunderstorms came through here Friday night and I was getting alerts on my phone for smoke investigations and grass fires. (When our fire department gets paged out, the alerts come to our cell phones.) Being away was making me nervous. I took today off from playing at church and even though I am home, I think I am going to take advantage of the break and work in the garden.

Speaking of fires, I drove home the southern route, past the wreckage of the recent Elmo fire. A lot of people think of wildfires as consuming only treed areas, but wildfires in open, grassy areas are just as devastating.

This road was closed at one point, and you can see how close the fire got to the pavement.

This is looking northward—Flathead Lake is to the right. The fire went up and over that ridge.

There were a few spots where the red fire retardant dropped by the planes was still visible on the ground. I know several of the homeowners were wondering if they were going to lose everything, because the fire got to within a couple hundred feet of their homes. It’s mostly contained now and not threatening any structures. The fire probably won’t go out completely until it snows, however.

Seeing where this fire started and how it spread, it wouldn’t surprise me a bit to know that it was the result of someone carelessly flinging a cigarette butt out the window.