Sewing

by

When the sewing machine pedal isn’t working

The sewing machine pedal isn’t working – What to do

I once had a sewing machine that was used a lot. It was a beautiful machine. But the sewing machine pedal wasn’t working as it should. I should have seen trouble coming, but as it was, I pushed to finish my sewing projects. I was sewing breastfeeding pillows for a mother and baby clinic.

What I should have realized is that the sewing machine pedal was about to stop working all together. I was sewing away, suddenly there was a flash and the sewing machine pedal blew up!

So when your sewing machine pedal isn’t working as it should, there could be several reasons for this. The sewing machine pedal could be about to complete the end of it’s life span. In other words, it may blow up or it may stop working. A condenser inside the pedal could be blown. There are lots of things that can go wrong. But what do you do when the sewing machine pedal isn’t working anymore?

Several things can be done. The first is to trouble shoot the sewing machine pedal not working. Check if it’s plugged into the wall. Check if it’s thoroughly plugged into the sewing machine. It may be that it just needs a bit of a wiggle for it to make a connection. If this is the case, the plug point probably needs a little bit of cleaning.

If none of those things work and the sewing machine pedal has in fact stopped working and isn’t going to be working again, you can cut the cable off of the pedal. Take the pedal and cable to a sewing machine shop where they sell pedals. The shop owner will match the plug with another pedal and can connect the wires so that you will have a working pedal again.

If they can’t find a replacement pedal, you can always buy a brand new one. But ideally, when your sewing machine pedal isn’t working anymore, the first thing to do is to see if you can’t fix the problem yourself.

by

Finding the right online sewing course

The right online sewing course

So you want to try sewing, but you aren’t exactly sure how to do it. The next step is to find a sewing course. But if you don’t have the time or opportunity to do this, you will need to find an online sewing course.

There are thousands of online sewing courses out there. But finding the correct one can be a difficulty. The last thing you want is an online sewing course that you pay money for and that won’t teach you much.

The right online sewing course would have a decent lay out of course contents and what will be covered in the lesson material. There are other features to look for as well when you look for the right course to “attend”.

Some of the features for this would include things such as comprehensive material explaining the how to do the sewing and how it works. The course would contain many images and examples as well as online videos on how to do some things. Another thing the right online sewing course would cover would be things such as fabrics, sewing techniques, sewing basics, sewing accessories, pattern making basics, adjusting patterns, measurements, working with sewing machines and sergers, sewing straight, preparing fabric, how to read commercial patterns and much much more. If the course does not include these things, it’s probably not for you and probably not as comprehensive as it should be.

Another thing the right online sewing course would contain is exercises for you to practice, and feedback on what you’ve done. Perhaps even a chat with the instructor or at least access to the instructor so that you can ask questions.

If you are looking for the right online sewing course, then these are essentials that you need to take into consideration before you sign up for a sewing course online that would cost money, but not be worth much in learning.

by

How to sew pleats

How to sew pleats

If you are sitting and wondering how to sew pleats, I have good news. It’s the easiest thing in the world.

Pleats can look so good on a garment and add that tiny bit of extra look and feel it needs to look fantastic. But few people know how to sew pleats and find it hard to understand the patterns.

The first thing you need to remember when your pattern has pleats is that you need to make certain that you mark it on the fabric that you are about to sew the pleats onto. You cannot proceed and think you will get the pleats right if you haven’t marked it on the paper. This is not how to sew pleats. It has to be marked.

The next thing you do, as indicated in the image below, is to fold the marked lines of the pleats together, right sides facing.

You then take the rest of the area and fold it back over the fold you have just made. This is indicated below. I did use an already finished garment to demonstrate the next picture as I forgot to take the picture while I was busy sewing as all the other pictures. But it’s the same step.

The last part of the sewing pleats is to just sew them with a stay-stitch at the top where they will ultimately be sewn together in either an elastic, seam or hem. The last picture indicates this.

I hope this has shown you how to sew pleats. It really is an easy process and once you learn how to sew pleats you will be well on your way to beautifying whatever you sew.

by

How to sew a shirt

How to sew (a shirt)

If you are new to sewing and have no idea how to sew, you’ve come to the right place. In this short tutorial I’m going to show you how to sew a shirt. It’s really not as difficult as it seems.

This particular shirt that I’m going to show you how to sew is a kid size shirt, made from a pattern I had previously enlarged for a six year old girl. The first step to sew a shirt is to sew the facing, if it has facing. If there is no facing, then you can go ahead and just sew the shirt, but in this case, there is facing. I laid the facing out inside out as shown in the picture and sewed it around the edges, only leaving the bottom open. I then turned it the right way round, ironed and stay stitched the edges. The following three images will show how I sewed this part of the shirt.

When you know how to sew a shirt this part is quite easy, but when you’ve never done this before, it can be quite complicated to understand. It’s simple. It gets sewn the wrong way around and then turned over.

I proceeded to do the same with the back part and facing.

The next thing you need to know about how to sew a shirt is to fit the two panels together along with the bottom part of the shirt. I proceeded to insert the pleats into the bottom part (see my post for how to sew pleats) of the shirt (top of the bottom panel) and once again, with the wrong sides together, sewed the two pieces together. The image below will show you how that was done. Edge to edge, so that it’s aligned properly.

You will see that when you flip up the top part of the shirt, the front part of the shirt would look complete. I sewed the back and front together, inside out. When you turn it around, you do not see the seams that you’ve sewn.

The important thing in learning how to sew a shirt or any other garment is that you need to always remember that most often, about 99% of the time, sewing is done back to front to hide the hems. Nobody buys clothes in the shop that looks like it’s made inside out. The hems are always on the inside.

After having sewn together everything, the shirt is turned around and completed. The only thing left was to add one button at the back, which you can check out in my article on how to sew a button hole.

I hope this has shown you how to sew a shirt in a couple of easy steps. It’s really easy and with a bit of practice, you can learn how to sew a shirt and almost anything else that you want to!

How to sew a shirt – tips:

As always, I have explained how to sew a shirt. But I find that just reading about it does not always help. One has to also practice how to sew a shirt to do it properly. So my suggestion would be to go to your local fabric store, get some off cuts for a cheap price and an old pattern and start practicing how to sew a shirt.

When you choose a practice pattern, don’t choose a button up fancy shirt but more something like a tshirt. It’s easier to practice how to sew a shirt with a plain t shirt type of pattern than a fancy pattern. Once you get the hang of how to sew a shirt, you can move on to more complicated projects.