Stitch and bitch thread #3 Sewing is harder than it seams

[NutellaEllaElla]

And i'm very glad to have you clever sewists to selvedge what's left of my dignity .

My stash is fairly ridiculous! I could do with some big storage boxes because it's all sat on a chair at the moment and I don't really know what I've got.

I'm isolating this weekend ahead of a small operation next week and am delighted to have the excuse to just sew and knit all weekend! Should probably do some cleaning too

It's tough, I really want to resist fabric hoarding but I really want to buy more fabric

I think my New Years resolutions need to be to use stash fabric first and to resist impulse purchases from online sellers.

I have lots of 3m lengths of fabulous fabric that I bought because it was pretty and ridiculously cheap but I’m not doing well at matching it to projects. It doesn’t help that most of my stash is summer weight but that shouldn’t make any difference as I wear summer weight clothes all year round.

I’m going to pick a pattern and match some fabric this weekend ready to make a start on Tuesday.

I have a chest of drawers for my fabric stash. 5 drawers and they are all relatively full. I've started on pyjamas for DSs and I've been doing some gift bags for Christmas but haven't got started on anything else for me.
I'm at the Knitting and Stitching Show next week and will be looking at sewing machines! I'm sick of mine not working properly when I'm quilting.

I've made two tops today and I'm really pleased with them - both Tessuti patterns, the Brigitte and the Mandy boat tee. The arms on the boat tee are a bit tight which is annoying as this is supposed to fit a size 16-18 and I am barely a 16 on top with slim arms. Oh well, it still looks good on. The neck on both hasn't quite worked out, I've got the seams wrong, but I've done a quick fix on the Brigitte.

Well done! I don't know how you are so quick. I cut out the pieces for my dress, sewed the pin tucks, stabilised the seams and sewed the neck and shoulders up. Then I got tired so stopped for the day.

I cut them both out last night and then it was mostly just overlocking today, all quite simple. The fiddliest but was pinning the sleeves on but even that was fairly easy!

I chickened out of using my new overlocker today. Pansy

Lovely tops, @dubyalass! I love the colour.

I've been busy with my overlocker, this week. Assembled 2 tops and, this evening, in just under an hour, including faffing, stitched the long leg seams on my jammie bottoms. That would have taken 3 times as long with my normal machine and bleft me exhausted from the noise and concentration!

I chickened out of attaching sleeve cuffs with the overlocker, mind. Far too fiddly. I stuck with my usual over casting stretch stitch which does a nice job of them without an enormous foot to stretch around.

Pintucks are a slow job, nutella

Please don’t be intimidated by overlockers! They can do so much. It took 7 years to get my first (secondhand) overlocker out of the box!

I rethread manually, it’s quicker than tying on and pulling through.

I’m going to make a Waves & Wild Cuppa Tee tomorrow in blue jersey with blue roses on it. I think I’m going to hack the neckline to add a cowl neck.

Then I need to make Miss 11 yet more face coverings. She’s lost 11 in the past 3 weeks, argh, I loath making face coverings!!

I think for me it's more the fear of having to try to unpick it for some reason. It feels like a final thing, I'm not very brave.

You’ve come on so far in such a short time @NutellaEllaElla. There’s no problem with taking your time to build skills and increase confidence.

I’m relatively new to overlocking but I'm gaining confidence with it and using it for more things than I expected to. I thought it would be used for neatening edges, repair work on T shirts and the occasional stretch project but like @PickAChew I’m using it for long seams. I would have struggled without it when doing all the recent alterations for my mum.

Not long to new sewing machine and I’m excited to do a test panel of all the embroidery stitches.

Ah thanks @Jins, it's so crazy to me that i started dress making in February and now I can't stop. I love this new hobby. You have been so helpful, I really appreciate it.

I’ve been umming and ahhing about the Mayfair dress so went to google it. It’s been a freebie with simple sewing but not when I had a subscription.

May still buy it. I’m so undecided

That's annoying. Someone in Scotland is selling it on Facebook marketplace for super cheap but I only buy from the when I collect. There's no guarantees that they're actually going to post it to me

So problem! My machine is skipping more stitches than its sewing!! Initiall the needle was bent so I changed it and somehow that made it worse!! It basically won't do a zig zag right now. I'm using a stretch needle, stretch stitch, just re threaded the machine

Are you using a walking foot? Mine skips stitches if the fabric doesn’t feed properly.

I’ve just cleaned my machine and done some test seams and found it was skipping stitches. I tried everything then discovered the bobbin thread had slipped out of the notch in the holder. I usually find problems are due to the bobbin

Yes I am using a walking foot. I haven't tried re doing the bobbin so I'll try that now thanks.

It's not that either

Will it zig zag on woven fabric?

Hay! Great minds, I JUST tried woven fabric and came back to say it works perfectly on that, but back to malfunctioning on the ponte. What do you make of that??

It’s probably struggling to get over the thickness of the fabric. I’ve seen someone on YouTube flattening the fabric with a wooden stick thing like a lolly stick before it goes under the presser foot.

Have you got a jersey needle as opposed to a stretch one. I’m sure the eyes bigger on the stretch needle and ponte usually quite stable so a jersey needle should suffice.

It refers to rounded needles causing skipped stitches here. rounded needles skipped stitches