My antique Wertheim sewing machine in pictures
I’ve had my antique Wertheim sewing machine for many, many years. So long, in fact, that I’ve forgotten which birthday I received it for – maybe my 10th-ish?
It is a beautiful machine, both its action and its design. The table and cover are very ‘basic’ – only one drawer and no gold embellishment on the treddle.
But it is actually very far from ‘basic’.
The table is all marquetry, perhaps walnut (?).
Check out the beautiful inlaid ruler – in inches, of course.
And sorry about the filthy cover! If you have advice on how to safely restore this surface, I’d love to hear it.
The actual machine is also beautiful. Whilst not a “Superba” (no mother-of-pearl inlay, no intricate decals, no fiddle-base) the colourful decals are in what appears to be a highly unusual ‘art-deco’ style. I’ve not been able to find any photos of machines with this design on the web anywhere.
The ‘dwarf’ logo is repeated on the body of the machine, although it’s difficult to see under all the layers of what I assume is ‘japan’ black – it could just be years of grot though.
The rest of the machine is in reasonably good nick, except for the boat shuttle, which has a corner knocked off. I’ve tried many times to get the machine to sew – now I know why I’ve had variable success or lack of it.
So, if you have any clues about the model of this machine, or can point me in the direction of a replacement shuttle or bobbins or needles, please leave a comment below.
Restoring and Using my antique Wertheim
John Clarke is gone
After a day of housework and podcast planning I popped onto Facebook to ‘just check’ (I was trying to stay away for a whole day, but I’m useless). And the first thing I see is a post from my friend, Sarah – a tweet from Wil Anderson celebrating the genius of John Clarke. Scrolling down, the next post is from Kate, also about John Clarke. And my heart sinks into my boots.
Because ‘fake news’, I open another tab in Safari and type in “John Clarke”…and autocomplete gives me ‘John Clarke death’. And I check the sources and they’re all reliable. I read the article on the ABC website and start weeping. Because it’s John Bloody Clarke, for Christ’s sake!
Back to Facebook, and all my friends have posted links to articles, with various expressions of their disbelief, shock, and above all, their deep respect for the man.
He was one of kind. His particular brand of laconic piss-taking will be sadly missed. There will never be another Clarke and Dawe.
To quote Sue Ann:
It says something about the importance of and love for John Clarke when my feed is full of Australians saying how gutted and devastated they are at his passing. Not just sad, but gutted and devastated. We have lost a great satirist.
Gutted and Devasted
Remembering Fromelles — glaas inc research
Precisely one hundred years ago – 19 and 20 July 1916 – the Australian Imperial Force was thrown into its first major battle in France; it has become known at the Battle of Fromelles. After the evacuation of Australians from Gallipoli, the troops returned to Egypt where a number of battalions were divided up to […]
Wonders of being a Super Cat
This video was produced, written and directed by my niece, Ella, with costumes by Jessie, and cinematography by me.
Against Masculinity
Vegie Soup in the (old style) pressure cooker
This is a great Saturday lunch, and a fantastic way to use up the vegies that you’ve not used over the week, and which are going a bit limp in the crisper.
There are a few staples you will need – carrots, potatoes, celery and onion are must haves, as is some sort of legume or soup mix. In this recipe I’ve used McKenzie’s Soup Mix from the Ritchies in Mt Eliza, and soaked it for a while before putting in the veg.
So…
Dice all the veg, putting all the hardest ones in the pot first. Today I used carrot, swede, potato, celery, onion, sweet potato, parsnip, and garlic. If I’d had some slightly dodgy green beans I would have chucked them as well.
Everything needs to be diced, bite-size, otherwise it’s too difficult to eat off a spoon.
Add two heaped soup spoons of Massel Chicken stock. Pour in water until you can just see it – don’t cover the veg, it’ll be too thin.
Whack the lid on. A tip if you are using an old pressure cooker is to sit the lid in water to wet the seals, and to pull the seal out of the groove in the lid and then reseat it – stops the leaks when the pressure gets up.
Pop on the pressure weight and put on the heat. High!
When the weight starts ‘chocking’ turn down the heat so that the weight is balletic rather than frantic. Put the timer on for 15 mins, and when the timer goes off, turn off the heat.
Put the pot under cold running water to release the pressure – just a trickle, and keep checking the lid by turning it. It will release when the pressure is off.
Return to the stove, take off the lid.
Smell the aroma!
Chow down!
Thank you to all my mothers
On the eve of Mother’s Day in Australia, this piece from Felicity Ward in The Age struck a chord with me.
I began thinking of all the other mothers I’ve had over the years. Most of my teachers were women, and many of them taught me how to be a professional. Mrs Pat Judd gave me a passion for books in schools (my own mum gave me a passion for books in general). Miss Verway was a great teacher AND a style icon. Mrs Norman’s gentle insistence on the importance of English continues inspiring me today. And there were many more.
But I find that it is the women who were friends of my parents that have had a lasting influence on my personal life.
My first best friend’s mum, Pamela, was beautiful. High cheek bones, blond hair swept into a chignon, beautiful clothes, beautiful home, tennis morning lifestyle. But there was also a reserve which was hard to penetrate. She was cool, in that brittle way women of a certain class have. I was always worried that I was going to break or wreck something in that house, and I would be always thinking about how I spoke or ate or sat. Pam was a proper lady. And yet, when I unexpectedly got my first period on a sleepover at their house one summer, she was actually quite wonderful about it – concerned and helpful and motherly and caring. We haven’t spoken for many years, probably not since my wedding, 1991, which was the same year that her daughter, Mandy, got married, and then died of ovarian cancer. We both turned 25 that year, 11 days apart. Pam and John moved back to Sydney and rarely come to Melbourne. But Pam taught me a lot about how to behave in ‘company’, and how to be ‘classy’, which was good for a free-range kid like me.
Margie was the mum of my kid brother’s best friend, and our families have known each other for 40 years. We are the only people that call her Margie, she prefers Margaret, but I didn’t find that out until years later – she’s Margie to us. A big woman, with a huge bust, a huge laugh and a huge heart, Margie was a fabulous cook and a fearsome disciplinarian, and wielded a wooden spoon with abandon, whacking cakes and bums with equal gusto. A ‘stay-at-home’ mum, she loved her husband and kids with a passion, and loved anyone else in the house in the same way. Margie died just a few weeks ago, cancer again, and at the remembrance arvo tea their little house in Somerville was chock full of people who loved her and missed her. Margie was the ‘mum’ of mums.
If Margie was the house mum, Jen is the earth mother. A hippie long before hippies were ‘in’ and also well after they were out, Jen has been making the world more sustainable for years. At their house in Balnarring, the tennis court was ripped up and replaced by an extensive and well-maintained vegie patch, in which Jen grew produce to feed the family all year round. She churned butter, had bees, and they eventually moved to a property at Dargo, which needed reclaiming from the ravages of being over-farmed and over-run by weeds. Jen and Norm grew a business out of that passion – Dargo Walnuts. Jen’s self-sufficiency in the face rampant consumerism was and is to be admired, and her passion for it inspires me to grow something in my little backyard. And she’s a divine human being as well.
Sue. How can I explain this woman to you? And what she means to our family? A smoker for most of her life, Sue is a loud, cranky, passionate teacher. I thank the good goddess that I never had her as a teacher, because she scared the living crap out of my friends that did have her. Sue expected the best from her students every day, and heaven help you if you didn’t rise to the challenge! Expect an earful, young ‘un! What stops her from being mean with it? Damn, that woman has the twinkliest eyes, and her love for what she does and who YOU are shines out of her like a bloody lighthouse. She CARES – capital letters are required because then you can’t avoid it. I’ve known Sue my whole life – she was my Dad’s first girlfriend (she says) and they grew up together, as I grew up with her daughter, Sam. Sue is possibly the most positive person I know. Also one of the most outspoken, with views on politics (left), feminism (pro) and everything else in between – including her concern for me verging on the anorexic (ha!). She can talk to anyone about anything. She loves food. And her kids. All her kids, regardless of which family they come from. Sue is my mother from another grandmother.
The Erith Mob Godmothers. Hilary, Jenny, Nita (the empress). It’s hard to quantify this effect this group of older ladies had an me, other than to say that they delivered unconditional love and acceptance to me and to many others. Nita (our other Nan) died a few years ago, but would greet me as if I was one of her own children Hilary, the long-suffering footy widow (and that is tongue in cheek, as I’m sure she did a little happy dance as the footy fanatics left the house every Saturday) is quietly and consistently loving to all and sundry. And Jenny is a footy fanatic like me, loves the Dees and is cranky and passionate about pretty much everything. The pillars of the Mob.
My Nan. My Dad’s mum. She was our rock. A fantastic cook, knitter, crocheter, philanthropist (she gave away hundreds of knitted dolls, ducks, owls, ‘Harrys’, blankets and more to charity), wife and mother. Before she got diabetes and stopped ‘working’ she was a successful business woman, running a butcher shop, a milk bar and then a wool shop in partnership with my Gump. A Christian in the true sense of the word, she gave and gave, to strangers and to family. ‘Nanny Roast’ became a Sunday night ritual, with more than 20 people for a sit-down meal every week. Holidays were spent laying in front of the TV at Nan’s being fed at intervals – although dinner was always a sit-down affair. Canasta, ‘haggis’, hypos, swearing – which she came to late in life but embraced wholeheartedly – Nan was an old-fashioned lady that took on the modern world and won. I miss her every, single day. I hope I can be half the grandmother she was to me when me girls have kids of their own.
And Mum. The Big Bomba. Independent, a seamstress, an artist, a ground-breaking historian, a reader, and a writer. A feminist in the true sense of the word – that building people up and helping them to get better at what they do is how the world is improved. She is the icing on my mummy cake. Which she would certainly cook a million times better than me. It’s hard to included all the amazing things that my Mum does. Because there’s been heaps.
I will have left someone important out of this list. I’ve really focused on those early influences in my life, those women who grew me up. I think I turned out OK – and it’s mostly due to this motherhood of amazing women.
And I’m thinking to myself, just quietly, aren’t I lucky.
The Claustrophobia of Fear — Human Parts — Medium
This is very familiar to me…too familiar.
The Claustrophobia of Fear — Human Parts — Medium.
via The Claustrophobia of Fear — Human Parts — Medium.
Fun Fair 