Jammer Boxes

I talked about these wonderful plastic boxes in a previous blog entry and told you I had not been able to find them for quite some time.  These are great boxes for holding thread.

 

A web friend, Tich from Island Hame Crafts sent me the following information and consented to let me post it.  I didn't know what the boxes were called before this - now I know they are called Jammers and might be able to get them again so I am excited about that.

She wrote:

"I copied the following from the Internet a while ago, when I read about the 'Jammers'. You seemingly still can get the 'thread' boxes."

"Hooray!  Walmart toy section has the plastic boxes back for the little cars again (they've been missing for several years).  It's the one that opens on each side and has 48  little compartments that are PERFECT for lots of craft bits and pieces! Jammers are in the Toy section of Walmart – where they have the Matchbox cars. Whew! I just checked a nearby WM and the cases are still in the regular place @ the regular price ($4.88 each), so I bought two more. I'm glad to see that they're still there.

They may have them but you don't notice them. They are often on the very bottom shelf or up above on the very top shelf."

"If your store did have them and they are being clearanced, then maybe consumers didn't show enough interest in them. If you don't support the product, then you won't get it."

"You can order the "Jammers" cases directly from Plano. You have to buy a case (6?) but even with the shipping charge, it works out to about $5."

Plano Molding Co., 431 E. South St., Plano, IL 60545,

toll-free (sales and service) 800-228-9868,

mon.-Fri. 7:30a.m.-4:00p.m. (central time)

www.planomolding.com -

Jammers are NOT on the website.

You must call and order model number 5315 (48 car garage)

Until Later,

Lynn

Luggage Tags...Done for a While

This week I finished making another 21 luggage tag for my project to get 300 done for my friend.  Think I am up to around 160 and am really tired of making them so decided to stop for a while.  I have quilt guild friends that are making some too and will wait and see what come in from them before I cut and stitch more tags.

After making as many as I have I can almost make them in my sleep.  It is much easier to make them in batches too.  Saves wasted motion to cut a bunch, stitch a bunch, turn a bunch, press a bunch and stitch on the plastic in a bunch.

Happy Easter to Christians around the world.  We will be going to our son in law's parent's home on Sunday noon - they don't live too far away.  Can't get too far away from home for too long a time, even on Easter, as the cows don't care when they have their calves and we need to check on them pretty often in case one is in trouble and needs some help.  We had church early then a pot luck breakfast after church so we will be well fed today for sure!

Lynn

The Continuing Adventures On Our Farm

Thursday evening I was pretty tired so had planned to go to bed around 10 pm.  I usually stay up until 11 - 11:30 and sometimes later.  Just habit I guess.

John always goes out to check the cows around 10 one last time before he goes to bed to see if any of them look like they are having trouble calving.  If a cow needs help or needs to be put in the barn he does it then he will go out later to check that cow again.  Well, on Thursday he went out to do his maternity watch and discovered that part of the herd had broken out.  They had run through an electric fence and were calmly grazing on all the new weeds and grass scattered outside the lots.

I was ignorant of what was happening for a while just watching the news and thinking I really should go to bed.  All of a sudden I could hear one of the ATVs .  Sounded like John was just tearing around the farm yard so I went to a window and looked out just in time to see a cow run past the windmill and take a right by the first grain bin with John in hot pursuit on the ATV.

I changed my shoes (was wearing some new sandals trying to break them in), grabbed a jacket and my dust mask and headed out the door.  Finally got a second ATV started and helped get the pesky cows back in where they knew they belonged.  Of course it wasn't quite that easy....think the cows thought we were playing hide and seek.  We have rows of the large round bales near the lots, lines of machinery, a couple of large buildings and several grain bins in the area where they were "playing".

Being that it was dark they could quickly step out of the head lights and disappear.  Think John and I went round and round for an hour getting one or another and finally decided we had them all where they belonged.  I had looked in my yard around the house and thought, "thank goodness they didn't get in here". 

The next morning I picked up a couple of neighbor boys that I had hired to help me clean the flower beds and garden of last year's debris.  I of course had to wear that dust mask again - I hate the things as they are so scratchy around my chin and cheeks, plus my glasses just don't sit right on top of it and they get very hot.  Here is what it looks like...of course that isn't me, I have different colored hair and am not a man but you get the idea.  Actually his hair doesn't look so bad, mine was a mess after putting that rubber band thing around it.  It could have had a little longer straps too as it is really tight.  Guess that is the whole purpose of these masks is to keep the dust out.  It does have one nice feature though and that is that my glasses didn't fog up because it has a breathing filter.

We did find cow tracks in the flower beds and they also left smelly deposits on the brick walkway at the back of the house.  At least one had to walk by the window that was in the room where I was watching TV.  Wonder if she looked in the window at me and snickered!

The boys and I worked all morning, broke for lunch then worked another hour and a half after lunch but got all the flower beds and garden areas cleaned up. It took the three of us 4 hours to get it done since most of the time we were on our hands and knees clearing the dead stuff out of the new growth.  We worked hard and steady and now it is beautiful, clean and ready for the flowers to grow.

The last part we were cleaning was my vegetable garden and flower bed on the back side of the house.  The 11 yr. old was raking the strawberry bed, I was on my knees cleaning around and in my rhubarb and the 13 yr. old was nearby removing old flower stalks.  I am setting the scene so you can visualize what happened next.....

The rhubarb had dead leaves and stems that I was carefully removing since the new growth was about 6" tall and pretty dense.  Just as I grabbed one brown/black dried up stem another one moved.  I instantly screamed and tried to scramble backwards half crawling, half rolling to get away.  It was a garter snake... I know, I know, they are harmless but scare the pa-jee-bees out of me anyway.  I certainly did get the attention of the boys though.  I know they were not trying to laugh at the sight of me screaming and rolling away from the rhubarb but were very kind and didn't let me see their smiles.  (By the way - this is not me in the photo but probably a close facsimile but you need to add the beautiful dusk mask to the photo, age me quite a bit and give me reddish blond hair to make it more accurate.)

The older boy very calmly picked up the snake and I asked him to please take it to the far reaches of the farm yard so it would never be back in my yard again which he calmly did.  Took me an hour to stop shaking from the experience!  I do think I am traumatized from childhood as we had rattle snakes around where I lived and were taught to always presume any snake was a rattler. 

Last evening my muscles were so tired but a good kind of tired from a job finished.  This is the first time I have hired the neighbor boys and will do so again as they were a tremendous help.

No quilting done yesterday, but a day well spent (with the exception of the snake of course.)  I want to leave you with a much nicer image in your head.....

Happy Easter!
Lynn

Favorite Things - Part 3

Continuing on with my "favorite things" blog posts here are a few more.  This Bendable Bright Light  from BENDABLEBRIGHTLIGHT.COM is the best for increasing the light where ever you position it.  I have been known to position it over seams that I am to rip as well as over my presser foot.  It is amazing how much more light you can get from this little light.

I have drawer in my sewing table that I keep a lot of tools that I use often.  I keep my bobbins in boxes like the one below that I ordered years ago from Clotilde.  I like that it has a clear lid so the dust stays off the bobbins but I can see what is in each box.  The bobbins don't come unwound either.  Have two boxes but need to get a couple more to keep the different threads separate as sometimes I have to think a bit to figure out what thread is on which bobbin.

 This Bohin mechanical chalk pencil is really a nice marking tool.  The mark is narrow so you can be very precise and the chalk comes in green, yellow, white and gray colored chalk.  The chalk comes off the quilt nicely too.

Another similar marker is the Clover mechanical pencil that comes in yellow, pink and gray.  I have the gray and it pretty well brushes off with the brush on the end.  It too makes a small thin line.

When I first saw this notion a few years ago I wondered why anyone would want one.  Now that I have one I understand.  This is called a Quilt Dome by Clover.  You thread your needles and insert them one at a time into the 10 numbered slots.  After each needle is inserted you twirl the blue section clockwise and it wraps the un-knotted thread around the inside.  The needles can be pulled out in any order and the thread follows and never tangles.  This is invaluable when I am doing hand applique or quilting.  I can thread up different colors of thread for applique or 10 threaded needles of my hand quilting thread ready to go.  It works great for take along projects too.

Thread - so many choices and so many good threads.  I have a couple of real favorites from Superior Threads though.  I use Bottom Line in the bobbin all the time when machine quilting and have used it on the top as well.  I have used a heavier thread on top and the Bottom Line in the bobbin and have used silk thread in the top and Bottom Line in the bobbin and haven't had tension problems...I can always adjust it if necessary.  The second Superior Threads product that I use all the time now is Masterpiece Thread for piecing my quilts.  It is 100% cotton so much finer than most of the "regular" threads I have used and stitches so nicely.  When I go to Paducah in a few weeks I plan to buy cones of these threads in the colors I use most of.  I will get a tan/beige colored cone of Bottom Line and gray, black, white and tan/beige.  I am always running out of the Masterpiece thread so the cones will give me more of those basic colors.

These are photos of my favorite thread storage boxes.  I purchased the ones I have now in the toy department where they sell Matchbook cars.  These boxes were made to hold the small toy cars but work great for storing thread - lots of thread in each box.  They are double sided with hinged lids and really hold a lot of thread.  Sorry to say you can not buy them anymore around here anyway.  Luckily I got enough back when I could buy them.

Today was another beautiful warm spring day with the temperature not quite getting to 80 F (26.6 C).  The only drawback to the weather is the wind - it was blowing pretty strong all day.  That is one thing about Nebraska we do get lots of wind.  You do get used to it but the occasional calm day is wonderful!

Our cows are really having their calves this week keeping John busy tagging the babies.  On Tuesday we had 8 calves and have had a couple each day since.  Think we are a little over 1/3 done with calving so if they keep it up we will be finished in a few weeks.  Of course there is always a cow or two that don't have their calf until we have hauled the rest of them to the pastures in May.  We don't like the late ones as then the calf is little when taken to the pasture and also the cow will sometimes breed late again and it gets to be a pattern for some cows to always calve late.  They will get sold if they do it more than a couple of years in a row if they live here.  Another reason to bunch up the calving is that the calves are closer to the same size when we sell them.  Larger groups of same size calves sell better than the one or two small ones.

Hope it doesn't rain much or any tomorrow as I have a neighbor boy or two coming to help me clean out my flower beds.  My sinus Dr. doesn't want me out in the dirt any more than I have to.  Then I have to wear a dust mask and those are really uncomfortable and get so hot.  I need to cut off the iris leaves from last year as they didn't freeze off and die last winter like they usually do.  (Snow must have insulated them.)  Anyway I figure I can sit and cut leaves off on one side of the house while the debris can be cleaned up on the other, thus keeping me out of most of the dust.  Will still wear the dust mask but won't be moving around so much so maybe it won't get so irritating to wear.  Will be glad to get it done as I have tulips and jonquils blooming already!

Until Later,
Lynn