Giveaway and Scraps

Quilting on a Budget is having an OttLite giveaway! I tried to post this yesterday, but apparently I did something wrong and it didn't work...so...I'm trying this again. I have been looking for a floor lamp for my dimly lit sewing area since, I don't remember how long. Anyway it's been a while. It would be nice to see the colors of the fabrics better.

I have been working on some bags of scraps I picked up from school. There was so much that our scrap bin was overflowing. I am still in the process of washing them and bagging them. I'm putting them into gallon sized ziplock bags until I use them.

Giveaway and Towels

Jane4girls is having a giveaway! She is giving away a set of reusable snack bags or bulk food bags to one lucky reader here. Check out her blog. She is great a stretching her dollars for things. I followed her link to the Plum Creek Mercantile company website and wondered if I could make my own bags. Hmmm...something to think about.

Anyway, pictured here is an old bath towel that I recycled into two hand towels. Many of our towels are getting threadbare and instead of tossing the good bath towel, I decided to see if I could give it another purpose, besides being a rag. I cut off the raggedy ends, then cut the towel in half and zigzagged the raw edges. Now, we have two towels that are just like new! I just have to figure out what to do with the ends of the towels that I cut off. Any suggestions?

Japanese Quilting Book and Vermicomposting

Well, it's been a while since I posted and I apologize for that. I hit a dry spell for a while, but now I'm back on track and busy sewing. I purchased this Japanese quilting book for inspiration. It has some really cute stuff in it, but now I have to translate the instructions. Okay, now that's going to take a while. They have pictures to follow, but I'd like to try and translate what I can. Maybe my no. 1 daughter will help me when she comes home for the summer. She may double major in Japanese ( keeping my fingers crossed).

Anyway, I'd like to tell you about my worms. We're going green at school. I have a bin of garbage eating worms at school. We're trying to make a school bin. I have had a small bin since the beginning of the school year (August 2008). Pictured here are others harvesting their worms. This is called vermicomposting. The worms are vegetarians. They eat fruits and veggies, newspaper and cardboard. The worms reproduce rather quickly and one of their waste products is a very fertile soil called vermicast which is great for growing plants. The liquid in the tofu container is called vermicast tea which helps ward off white flies! I put some of the tea on my potato plants and the white flies are gone! Hooray!

Anyway, back to the worms...I bought a black containter from Hardware Hawaii for $5.00 (it was on sale). I learned how to drill holes in the bottom for aeration. Then I put burlap on the bottom first. On the burlap I put torn pieces of cardboard. On the cardboard I put shredded newspaper. Then I dumped in all of the contents of my old worm bin. The bin rests on the tofu containers for aeration. The tofu containers collect the vermicast tea.

I didn't harvest, I just went to a bigger bin. Maybe next time I'll be able to harvest my worms. I don't know if you can see the worms (they're red). I'm hoping I can get enough to have some for home.