Sewing Tricks

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

I am going to finish the year 2019 with 5 sewing tips.

Threading a needle

When I was a young girl, I used to watch my mom and my grandmother sew clothes and crafts. Every time they needed to re-thread the needle, they would bend their head down to the thread and moistened the end of the thread with their mouth and then twist the thread between their thumb and index finger. This process brought all the thread fibers together to a nice point which made it easier to pass the thread through the eye of the needle.

You don't have to lick your threads. Just give the end of the thread a clean cut on the diagonal with your scissors and it will thread into the eye of the needle nicely. You are basically cutting off the split ends.

Sewing peddle

I am not very tall and when I would sew I would get leg cramps. The cramps came from the fact that my leg and foot had nothing to rest on. I was reaching and pressing the sewing peddle with my toes; my heel dangling in mid air. Much like I do when I am driving a large vehicle.

I have two foot peddle positions that I use. In both positions, I rest my entire foot on the peddle.

In the first position, with my entire foot on the peddle, I press down with my heel.

In the second position, I rotate the peddle 180 degrees so that it's backwards. I rest my entire foot on the peddle and I push down with my toes.

Layers of jeans

Like a kitchen mixer is graded on how many cups of flour it can mix, a sewing machine is graded on how many layers of jeans it can sew through. If this is the case and I have a machine that can sew through 12 layers of jeans, then why am I having such a hard time sewing through the layers when I hem jeans?

It's not because of the layers, it's because of the angle of the foot. The sewing foot needs to be level to sew properly. There are gadgets, such as the Jean-a-ma-jig from Dritz that you place under the foot in front or behind the clump of fabric depending on how the foot needs to be leveled.

I suggest that you keep near your sewing machine a piece of scrap jean fabric. When needed, fold the fabric to the desired thickness and place that under your sewing foot to level it.

Sewing chiffon

Chiffon is a very difficult fabric to cut, pin and sew. It is slippery. It moves easily and it will distort its shape as it shifts.

Here are a few things to keep in mind as you work with chiffon.

• Use a rotary cutter to cut your fabric. Scissors will cause the chiffon to shift as you cut distorting the fabric.
• There are special pins made for delicate fabric such as chiffon. I do not use them. They are so thin that I am constantly stabbing myself. I have opted to use weights instead but even with the weights the chiffon still moves.  
• If you need to line the chiffon garment, I found that it was best to use a temporary adhesive and temporarily bond the chiffon fabric to the lining fabric. Then you would cut the two layers simultaneously as one layer. The chiffon does not shift and it is easier to manage.

Professional looking sewing projects

Here are some quick tips for improving the look of a finished sewing project.

• Clip any stray threads. Even if the threads are on the inside of the garment and no one will ever see it, clip your threads. 
• Press hems. I dislike ironing but when I took classes at the local fashion school, they were forever reminding us to iron our seams and hems. After about two years of classes, I started ironing my seams and hems. OMG what a difference that makes. I bought a tailers clapper at Fabricland to make my hems that much more crisp. It definitely made my sewing projects look more professional.

Hope you have a relaxing and safe holidays. Wishing you all the best for 2020.

Christmas Embroidered Pillow Cover

"Beauty is in the details" could not hold more true that in this project.

I loved the Retro Christmas Truck embroidery design from Embroidery Library and wanted to try embroidering a pillow cover to either give as a gift or decorate my living room for the holidays.

I purchased a plain coloured pillow cover from IKEA and began embroidering the design.

This pillow cover, although large was difficult to embroider due to its narrow opening. Once you got the pillow cover hooped, there was very little space left to embroider. With my hands in the space and my fingers near the needle I kept the fabric out of the way and maintained a clear space for the machine to do its work.

As the image stitched out, I was becoming more and more disappointed with the image. I did not like it. I was second guessing my colour choices. Look at it. The tree has no definition - maybe I should have gone with a darker green. The truck highlights were too bright, next time I would select a deeper shade of peach.

However, I have learned over the years, after many crafty failures, not to give up.

The last step in the embroidery design was the black stitching. Wow, what a difference that made. I absolutely love the image. The black details changed this image. It brought definition and pop to the design.

Sorry family but I am keeping this one to decorate my living room.