"Eight Bells" - Montague Dawson

I found this great framed print over the holidays in an antique shop in Fredericksburg, Texas. It's a huge print (the frame is about 30"x40") of the painting "Eight Bells" by the nautical artist Montague Dawson. While I'm always on the lookout for prints or paintings of ships, this is the first time I found one that I liked enough to buy.

Before I purchased it, I wanted to make sure I wasn't getting ripped off by buying something that could be found online for a lot less so we ran back to the hotel and jumped on the computer to look it up. While several online shops had prints of Montague Dawson's more famous works, we found only vague mentions of this particular print in a few places (and they were mostly from people wanting to buy it!). I decided that it was worth it so we ran back to the store, bought it, and somehow managed to bring it safely back to Arizona.

Another interesting thing I found on our trip was in a book I purchased a at used book store in Llano, Texas. It's an Agatha Christie paperback printed in the 1970's. The odd thing is, there are pages of full-color ads scattered throughout the book!

I have two other Christie books from the same publisher and time period and neither of them have ads like this. However, those books originally cost $1.50 and $1.95 while the book with ads was only $0.95. I guess they were experimenting to see if people would go for cheaper books if they contained advertising. Thank goodness that didn't catch on!

My new sewing machine!

My new sewing machine is a Viking Platinum 755 Quilt. I bought it at a store called Sew What's New in Las Cruces, New Mexico (they also have a store in El Paso). Even though it was heavily discounted (because most of the Platinum line is being replaced with the Sapphire line), it still cost twice as much as we were planning to spend! Hopefully it will end up being worth it.

Before I actually visited any shops my two top choices for manufacturers were Viking and Bernina. But after seeing dealers for both, I found that the Bernina machines were more expensive and had fewer of the features that I wanted. At the Viking store I was torn between the Emerald 183 and the Platinum 755 Quilt. They had almost identical features and the prices were pretty close (the Emerald was a bit cheaper). I eventually decided on the Platinum 755, mainly because it was manufactured in Sweden and has a 20 year warranty (the Emerald 183 was made in Taiwan and had a 10 year warranty).

Roni Hardin, one of the owners of Sew What's New, must have spent over 3 hours helping me pick this machine and then showing me how to use it. I even came to her with a page of questions I thought of while researching on the internet and she very patiently answered every one. If you're looking for a sewing machine in the Las Cruces/El Paso area I would definitely recommend visiting her store!

Now that I have my new machine, I can finally finish the Christmas tree skirt I started last week. I'll do a post about it as soon as it's done.

Crafty blog of the day: Property of Kelly. Written by a graphic designer, it features her adorable illustrations as well as the occasional craft or cooking project.

Cool Sewing and Crafting Cart

I just bought a really neat sewing/crafting cart at Walmart! It goes from this:

To this:

We saw it advertised in Walmart's Black Friday circular where it was priced at $75. It was listed as "Sewing Craft Table." I really wanted it but I couldn't get excited about having to fight people on Friday morning to get it. However, I went to Walmart this morning and they already had it at that price! If you're interested, I found it in the fabric department on a shelf below the sewing machines. It's manufactured by Sauder and the product number on the box is 9707-150. Walmart also has it listed online where it's currently selling for $97.42.

It took me about 2 hours to assemble by myself. Compared to other self-assembly furniture instructions I've tried to follow, these directions were detailed and well written. Also, all of the pieces of wood had identifying numbers stamped or stickered onto them so I didn't have to guess which piece was which.

Here's the cart with all my supplies in it:

You can even store your sewing machine on the little shelf in the middle when you're not using it:

That's the only thing I find awkward about it - it's difficult to put my machine down there, and it's a featherweight. Someone with a heavier machine might have trouble getting it down there without dropping it.

I'm so glad I found this - I no longer have to do all my sewing on our living room floor! Now I can wheel the cart out when I need it and push it back against the wall when I'm done.

Here's Lucy checking out the cart: