Hello Kitty pumpkin and other musings

Ok, so you are wondering about the Hello Kitty pumpkin that Paulette made for me. Well, you just never know when something will strike us. While at the Juniper Moon Farm, Susan showed us her sewing machine. Said it was the best basic machine ever, however, it did have one serious drawback...it was a Hello Kitty edition! Say what? Yep, she said it was only available on Overstock.com for $199. Next thing I know, Paulie has ordered one for each of us! And, here's the thing.....we don't sew! Well, I do a little, and I love my vintage Singer Featherweight. It is very very basic but very very portable and I've taken it over to Paulie's house several times to sew curtains for her. 

Allie enjoyed checking out the well named machine, actually a Janome 15822 Heavyduty Sewing Machine.  We haven't tried them out yet, but I am intrigued with the automatic threader.

I wondered a bit about the Hello Kitty brand, and learned on Wikipedia (don't you just love that) and learned that HK is a Japanese fictional character produced since 1974 by Sanzio and introduced to the U.S. in 1976. The designer got the name from Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking Glass where Alice plays with a cat she calls Kitty. I never noticed that Hello Kitty doesn't have a mouth, but the lore states that she communicates from the heart, not from the mouth.
She is a a female white Japanese bobtail cat, now worth $5 billion a year in sales of various products, including our two sewing machines! Having just got our first cat, Allie, I am intrigued with all things cat related.

I know, I know, Paulie and I need another hobby like a hole in the head, but, we have visions of making pillows from vintage fabrics we have collected. Who knows, I've always wanted to have a chair upholstered from some of my antique bedspreads, maybe I can do it myself! Ok, that was just plain silly.

I do know that 1974 was a great year, and 1976 was even better, so, Hello Kitty sewing machines are fine with me.