January 2023 – The G. G. Files

I think there is a declining breed among sewers/sewists in this twenty-first century. This is that rarefied group of sewists/sewers who eschew anything that smacks of fast-fashion-ready-to-wear techniques. For years, every time someone said a certain tool or technique would make the garments I sewed myself resemble ready-to-wear, all I could picture was crumbling sweatshops in third-world countries where workers toiled in outrageous conditions so that first-world consumers could have their choice of millions of pieces of clothing of questionable quality. No, I said. That’s not for me. And it always seemed that there was a serger involved in those discussions.

I fancied myself a couture sewist/sewer. Can you feel me rolling my eyes at that conceit? Oh, yes, I did learn to make a Little French Jacket (or three), hand-inserting silk linings, and I taught myself traditional tailoring, spending hours hand-pad-stitching the undercollars. So, I effected a kind of snobbery about that sort of sewing where a serger was involved in seam finishing or worse, *gasp* making a garment from start to finish. Then, a few years ago, I got one. And this past Christmas, I found a combination serger-coverstitch machine under the tree. What in the world?? I’ve evolved.

Oh, don’t get me wrong. I am still in the couture sewing category when it comes to most of the kinds of clothing I love to wear and make, but I’ve added a few tools and techniques to my repertoire. And over the past month, that repertoire has expanded to include coverstitching. Let me tell you about my adventures over the past few weeks.

For years, I sewed with only a sewing machine. Then I added the aforementioned serger, using it to finish seams of leisure wear and the odd seam in a shirt or hem edge in a jacket or dress. I always kept it to three threads since I had no intention of ever making a garment from start to finish on my serger. Finally, it occurred to me that being able to do a coverstitched hem or edge (or even use it in reverse for an interesting detail) might be a nice addition to my sewing arsenal. So, what exactly is a coverstitch, you might well ask (as I did).

According to the lovely Linda Lee’s terrific book Sewing Knits from Fit to Finish:

“…the most popular coverstitch is produced with two needles and three threads. There are two rows of straight stitches on the top and a series of looping stitches on the bottom…there is often an option to use three needles for three parallel rows of straight stitches…”

And, of course, there is no knife for cutting off the edge of your fabric like on a serger because it’s mainly for hemming. You might think that the double-needle stitching capability of your sewing machine is the same, but it really isn’t quite the same. Anyway, I thought I’d like to give it a whirl, so I began searching for the right machine.

Now, I’m a kind of neatness nerd, and I live with an even more dedicated neatness nerd. So, the idea of adding an extra machine to my downtown-sized sewing atelier (*cough*) seemed a bit excessive. That’s what sent me looking for a machine that could do both serging and coverstitching. I found the big sister of my current Singer serger and put it on my Christmas list. There it was on Christmas morning. Then, I had to learn how to use that sucker.

In this view, the machine is set up for serging with the knife in place.

I decided to cut some pieces of knit fabric and practice the coverstitch—for which the machine was set up and threaded out of the box—and figure out how to most easily convert it to a serger. Let me just say there was a very steep learning curve. And this is despite the machine resembling its little sister in many ways, but in so many more ways, it simply does not. There was much to learn.

Once I figured out a few things—tears and frustration notwithstanding—I realized that I learned so much more by making threading mistakes. Or at least, that’s my story. I did manage to find a reasonably good video on YouTube that helped me immensely, but as I searched YouTube, it occurred to me that most of the sewing videos were too long. I thought I might start a YouTube channel with sewing videos no longer than five minutes, but that’s for another day (or maybe even lifetime!). After many goofs and threading mistakes, I decided to pull out some leftover fabric and make a new top, all on the new machine—no sewing machine needed. This approach is so contrary to my former point of view that it isn’t even in the same ballpark. But what is life if you can’t evolve, hmm?

I decided to make Butterick 6418 as my test garment. I liked view D with its contrast sleeve and bodice insert, and I had enough fabric left from two previous projects to get it done. So, I began.

I used what my (very detailed) machine manual calls a “three-thread ultra-stretch mock safety stitch.” The three threads are left needle, right needle and cover looper. The safety part refers to the fact that it is designed for seaming, and I can report that it is a very stretchy stitch.

That was great for my project. Then I would use the three-thread coverstitch for the hems and the neckline. I was a bit leery of the coverstitched neckline—for good reason. The pattern design calls for the neckline to be turned and stitched. I think the next time I do this, I’ll make a narrow neck binding for a better finish.

I motored along the seams, seaming and finishing all in one fell swoop. I have to admit I was a bit tickled by the process. I didn’t do anything fancy on this project, but I can see a few interesting approaches in the future. I can see decorative finishes using the coverstitch reversed or even trying to make a bathing suit, although that may be a bridge too far!

Lessons I Learned

A combination machine requires patience since it has to be rethreaded and rejigged from serger to coverstitch machine every time you change modes.
You can minimize the changing by thinking through a project before you begin.
I am still not a fan of the imprecision of doing seaming and serging all at once. I’m a stickler for fit, so I prefer to have an exact measurement. This doesn’t seem to be too much of a problem, though, in stretchy enough knits.
I need to never lose sight of the usual things I am aware of—like when my needle thread runs out. When it did, I thought there was something wrong with the machine. No, it just ran out of thread.

The coverstitch book I also received for Christmas:

Anyone who has been reading my online posts for a while will already know that I’m a bit of an odd duck when it comes to sewing bloggers. Rather than being a sewist who writes, as most sewing bloggers seem to be, I am a writer who sews—that’s why my posts usually contain a story or two. I don’t just tell you what and how I’ve been sewing. I usually have a story about why I’m doing what I’m doing.

I’ve been sewing since I was about twelve years old and writing for as long—but I’ve spent more of my adult life writing than sewing. About two years ago, I wrote a book that combined these lifelong passions. Until then, most of my writing had been a thirty-year career as a nonfiction health and business writer with a bit of historical fiction added to the recent mix. When The Year I Made 12 Dresses launched in mid-2020, I had no idea it was the start of a book series. I had no idea that Charlotte (Charlie) Hudson, who learned as much about herself as she did about sewing that year she made 12 dresses, would stay in my imagination through so many stories.

Charlie has become slightly more peripheral to the stories recently, although I would argue that she is pivotal—and that will become increasingly clear when the next (and final book) is published. In the last book, Charlie found an unfinished manuscript for a romance novel among her great-grandmother’s belongings after she died. And Charlie, being a writer herself, decided to finish the story. What she never counted on was that she had the ending wrong. Charlie discovers the real people behind the characters in her great-grandmother’s story and knows she has to listen to them. Today, I’m launching the fifth book in the series.

It’s 1989, and Antonia St. John has a single goal. To crash through that glass ceiling created by 1960s Madison Avenue advertising men. Then, the one thing she never saw coming threatens to derail her plans until she can find a solution. She never planned on having a baby―especially a baby who turns out to be a ballet dancer, something Antonia cannot get her head around. But the baby is just the beginning of Antonia’s journey into family life.

When she learns her baby’s father, Tim, has a secret buried in his past―a secret so big it changes everything― Antonia has to dig deep within herself to find the courage to see it through to the end and to find her place in the family. With an unlikely ally in her mother-in-law, Grace, who never liked Antonia, she finally begins to learn the lessons that families―even dysfunctional ones―have to offer. Figuring out where you fit into a family―and the world―may be the ultimate challenge.

There’s another thing about me that many of my readers don’t know. I’m a ballet mom. My son lived away from home in residence at Canada’s National Ballet School from the time he was eleven until he graduated in 2007. That experience as a parent of a student at an elite ballet school was part of the inspiration for this book, which is dedicated to 2007 graduates of the National Ballet School.

Charlie doesn’t do a lot of sewing in this book (just wait until next time, though!), but she learns a lot about life.

I hope you enjoy reading it.

Click here to read more about it.

Month: January 2023

Overcoming Sewing Snobbery or How I Learned to Love my Serger (and new coverstitch machine)!

Happy New Year: A Sewist Who Writes or a Writer Who Sews?