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Wednesday, November 06, 2013

a different animal




sewists know that sewing knits is different from sewing fabrics.
now sewing machine knits is a different different animal. the fabric has to be stabilized in some way because when you cut it unravels ending  up in a useless mess of yarns. sharp scissors or much better, rotary cutters aid in keeping the edges as neat as possible.

there are some ways to stabilise the knit such as using liquid stabiliser, fray check ( envy,envy impossible to get here) iron on fusible web such as bondaweb and if push comes to shove elmer's washable school glue.they'll all disappear when washed.
 you sew a seam about 2 cms away from the seam with long basting stitches, sew the actual seam, take out the basting trim and  finish the  raw edges with overcast stitch. 
side note: if i had a serger it would be easier, but i'm NOT going there.

the walking foot aka plaid matcher is an essential tool when sewing knits with a sewing machine.
it works with the feed dogs  to feed both layers of fabric evenly. thus you don't end with one layer shorter or longer than the other.
disclaimer: although i sound very knowledgeable, do not be fooled. i have been getting all my education here. talk about knowledge transfer!


neki desu
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4 comments:

  1. Anonymous1:59 PM

    Liquid stabilizer and Elmer's washable glue do disappear during washing, but I've never seen Fray-Check go away - it just get nastier and turns yellow. Don't be envious, it's an ugly edge treatment. No experience with Bondaweb, does it really wash away?
    I bought my serger specifically to deal with handwoven edges without any gluey-gooey edges. Why not "go there?" Are you put off by having yet another machine? If you worried about threading them, some new ones thread themselves and I always just tie on and pull through new thread on my old cheap one. Stitching each seam three times seems an inefficient method.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. you're absolutely righ!
      stitching the seams trice is not efficient. however, having 2 sewing machines plus an embellisher i can't hardly justify another one. and there's the space issue too. since i'm not selling garments time is of no concern to me.
      thanks for stopping by.

      Delete
    2. totally mortified. i meant i can hardly... but you knew that didn't you ;-)

      Delete
  2. Don't be mortified. That's the norm around my part of the woods.
    Good sewing adventures, and a great blog recommendation.

    ReplyDelete

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