sewing machines for hurricane evacuees

wow! what a wonderful idea. I wonder if letters and phone calls to our well supported local dealers would consider sending some of those reconditioned machines they have as well, along with basic supplies. Not only may these machine possibly be used for income but mending and altering gifted clothing as well.

Hi, Jack! (we met back in rec pets cats days) There are some efforts starting that way already, if I correctly understand the posts in the yahoogroups "wefixit". There doesn't seem to be quite the organization for distribution yet, but I suspect the machines will find new homes readily.

Actually, that's against the law here -- you can work for yourself at home, but the exceptions allowing you to hire someone else to sew at home are pretty minimal.

Please don't take this as being contrary or unappreciative -- it's a great idea!

Kay Lancaster

This is a good idea and I would be willing to participate. I know I have duplicates of a lot of things, especially thread. I always seem to forgot what I have in stock and buy more. I also have an old, but perfectly good, sewing machine that I could send to someone. It has been sitting in a closet since it was replaced with a new machine. I have the feet that came with it and the instruction book. I'd rather pay the shipping charges to make sure it finds a good home then just dump it at a used sewing machine store. In addition to the machines and notions, I have plenty of cotton fabrics in my stash that are suitable for little girls clothing. It wouldn't be any trouble to put the fabric in a box with the machine. Maybe the American Sewing Guild would be setting up something like this. Any members here that could provide advise?

Liz

I understand the current wish to help out the victims of Katrina, so this is for the future: you can list unwanted items on Freecycle and someone local will want them. It's amazing what you can find a home for - one person's junk is another's treasure.

It's a Yahoo group. You may be able to find your local one through the yahoo groups page, or you could Google for

What goes around, comes around...

Sally

I'll put in another plug for Freecycle. It's such a wonderful way to get rid of your unwanted stuff -- stuff that still has life to it, but you don't need/want it anymore.

To find a group in your area, go to the national site:

and search by zip code.

--Welmoed

I have been on several Freecycle lists, and I guess in my area they seem to be populated with cyberbeggars. Personally I think Freecycle lists should not allow people to ask for things, and I think it's ridiculous for someone to ask for something for free and give exact specifications as though they were ordering from a cabinet -- someone actually asked for something like "a cherry bedroom set" or some expensive wood and gave exact specifics as to what they want.

Melinda, who prefers to give away things through Craigslist.com because she doesn't have to look at the cyberbeggars and their posts get removed pretty quickly anyway

I'm on a couple of different freecycle lists -- at least in this area, "asking" is limited to one post a month per person. Mostly what I see are requests for such items as wheelchairs, kid's goods from foster families, craft supplies for kids groups, etc. I have seen the occasional request for sewing machines, too.

Well, that sounds reasonable, but I'll tell ya, I unsubbed from all 3 lists I was on because the cyberbeggars seemed to dominate the list.

I just put things on ebay with a $0.01 starting price. So far only one has actually sold at that price, but some of them still go very cheap!

Liz

Someone on one of the local ones asked for an Apple imac g3 so that she can run her dtp software.

Bwah hah hah! I should ask for a winning lottery ticket.

But on the whole it's a good group, and nice to see useful stuff go around.

Sally

Yeah; that's what the local lists seem to be peppered with, although I have to say that I blame the list owners for allowing it -- and they specifically do allow it with no apologies (I let each list owner know why I left their list and nobody cared). I think I'll stick with Craigslist, personally, until such time as the local lists migrate to a web site, which they said would do in the next few years.