Helen Kelley | loose threads

    Let's
    Have
    Another
    Cup of
    Coffee

Every morning, the first thing I do is make the coffee. While Bill is poking around in the cereal drawer, I fill the carafe with water and pour it into the top of the coffee maker. Every morning, the water spills over the side and splashes on the floor. Every morning Bill says, "Would you like me to show you how to do that right?" And every morning I say, "No, thank you." Then I pull a paper towel off the roll and drop it onto the floor and blot up the water. The floor beneath the coffee maker is the cleanest place in the house.

I like making coffee that way. It's the way I've done it for years.

There are lots of things about my sewing that I have done the same way for years, too. There may be newer and easier methods for doing some of these things, but I have always done them in the same way, and I'm happy with them. For instance, the edges of the window curtains do not quite meet when I close them behind my sewing machine table at night. The closing mechanism would probably work again if I threaded a new cord through the fixture, but that takes time. When the sun comes up in the morning and shines into my eyes through the crack, I just reach into my pin dish, pick out a long pin, and pin the two sides of the curtain together.

Helen Kelley is a quiltmaker, lecturer, author, and teacher from Minneapolis, Minnesota. You can visit Helen on the Internet at her website www.helenkelley- patchworks.com or email Helen at this address: helen@helenkelley- patchworks.com.

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When I pick out basting threads and bits of badly sewn patchwork, I have a wastebasket right beside my knee to catch them. I drop those clingy threads and scraps toward that spot. The threads, of course, are electrostatically charged and cling to my fingers, landing on the floor or my jeans legs or my arms, but rarely in the wastebasket. I could pull the basket a little closer, I suppose. I could put a cup of water beside me to wet my fingers to foil all the static, but I don't. When I finish sewing, I crawl across the floor with my trusty lint picker-upper, gathering those errant threads before I vacuum. In that way, I can corral them before they get wrapped around the rolling brush on my vacuum cleaner. I do it this way every time. Have for years!

When I am working on a scrappy quilt, I begin carefully sorting through the fabrics in my cupboard. I lift the pieces out, one at a time, trying each fabric against the others I have selected. If satisfied, I drop it on top of a waiting stack on the floor. Sometimes, as I work, fabric falls out of the cupboard. I add that to the stack, too, or I simply push it to one side, out of the way. What I started to do carefully–picking and sorting fabrics into neat piles–turns into a wild conglomeration of yardage, scraps, and tatters of fabrics scattered all across the floor. With all those lovely colors and patterns spread out, I feel like an artist mixing her oil paints on a palette. I can shuffle through my stash and discover happy accidents, delightful combinations that might never have been found if I had planned my fabric choices more carefully. Years ago when I first got this cabinet for my material, every piece was folded flat, de-threaded, sorted by color, and neatly stored. Now it is utter confusion. My way might bother others, but I've done it like this for a long time.

Somebody somewhere said that you can't teach an old dog new tricks. I don't want to know new tricks. The old ones work just fine. In the same way that I find the feel of fabric and the glorious colors comforting, I find my old habits soothing. My friends have lovely new cutting tables and design walls. They have fancy filing cabinets and tricky tools. Their work spaces are orderly and dust free and everything is convenient, but my ways suit me just fine. I don't want to know another way to make coffee or to clean up my thread messes. There's something satisfying in my old habits. They are an integral part of me. I've always done these things this way. Have for years!

©HK 2006