Sewing Expedition

Hand Sewing to Sewing Machine

When I was a young girl, I loved to sew by hand with my grandmother. She taught me how to add buttons, fix holes, make aprons, and get creative with thread. The sewing machine however… I gave it a few tries before it wound up in the shed. Recently, my dad pulled it out for me and I set it up in my closet office. It had a few technical difficulties. The part that holds the needle fell out in several pieces. (I didn’t even know it could do that.) Thankfully my dad fixed that the next day. Then, when I practiced sewing an old fleece blanket the machine started to eat my fabric. At that point I tossed out the idea of making all our clothes and launching a handmade clothing collection for the shop.

Renewed Motivation

Until I came across Peek-A-Boo (PAB) Pattern Shop. I subscribed. Then I joined the Facebook group. After seeing everyone’s PAB creations and reading about how easy it is to understand the patterns, I decided to finally go for it!

Yesterday, I bought the Tide Pool Tank PAB pattern and took my son to the fabric store. He chose 4 awesome fabrics, some thread, and wonder clips. When we got home I cut everything out and clipped them together. Then I began sewing at 7am.

Problems & Solutions

It wasn’t all smooth sailing. My sewing machine still likes to eat the edge of my fabric. I came up with the brilliant idea of putting a small piece of paper underneath the starting edge. Then just tore it off when I was done. This worked marvelously. No more fabric eating!

I also ran into trouble with fitting the neck band to the scoop neck. Turns out it just takes a bit of practice because I figured it out on the second shirt.

When my son tried the shirt on I discovered another problem. For some reason it was too big underneath his arms. Maybe I didn’t cut or sew a completely straight line or I stretched the fabric when I was sewing it. Either way, this was an easy enough bit to hem and now they fit him perfectly.

Beach Ready

I LOVE how the shirts turned out and my son does too. They are ideal for our next beach camping trip. I can’t wait to tryout more fabrics and patterns.

This is just the beginning. I don’t know if I will get to the point of sewing all our clothes and making an earth-friendly clothing collection for kids, but I am definitely going to keep trying.

Stop by Instagram and tell me what projects you are working on.

30 Days of Blog 2017: Day 1