Jeans hem tutorial

When shortening jeans into shorts, it is not possible to keep the original hem.  I needed to create a new hem that looked like the original one, but because of the narrow hems on the skinny jeans, I couldn't use them in the thigh area where I was cutting the shorts. But, I made a genius discovery.

One friend mentioned when she top-stitched her blouse, she used two threads in the same needle. On another blog, a quilter mentioned she used the same color of bobbin thread as the fabric, which better defines the stitches.

In the picture, the hem under the the sewing needle is the newly created hem that I made, the one on the right is the original hem at the bottom of the jeans.

So I used double thread in the needle, and bobbin thread that matches the fabric.

Because I cut off some fabric, I was able to practice on scraps, and adjust the stitch length before I worked on the finished project.

Receiving Blanket tutorial

If you make something with this tutorial leave a comment with a link to your blog so we can all see your good works!

I've had a request for a tutorial on making this receiving blanket.

I got the pattern from a friend. It was originally made at a now out-of-business sewing center in Utah. It still gives credit to the makers on the pattern.

To print the pattern, first click on the pattern. This should take you to a new window which will enlarge the picture. Now right click on the pattern. You will get a menu that says copy image, click on that. Then open your word perfect and paste it into your wp. I would save it at that point, then print. Or you can just click on the pattern which will bring it to a new page, then if you are in Firefox browser, you can click "file" in the upper left hand corner and scroll down to print preview. This will show you what it will look like in the final printed picture. If it fits the page, then click print. If not, scale down from 100% to something else that produces one page that is readable.

Now for making the blanket:

Choose two complimentary fabrics. Decide which will be back and which front. Square up edge and cut 1.25 yard for the back and 1 yard of front fabric. Remove salvage edges and cut front piece into a yard square.

Because the fabric comes off the bolt in approximately 45 inches and you have cut off approximately 1-2 inches to remove salvage it is then necessary to make sure this piece is square.

Fold the back (larger) piece into fourths. With all four corners together, place on cutting board and measure six inches from corner either way. Mark and cut that corner off diagonally.




Fold the diagonal corner piece with right sides together in half






and stitch from fold to within 1/4 inch from edge. Leave 1/4 inch unstitched. BE SURE TO BACK STITCH AT EACH END OF THIS SEAM. When all four are done, the 1/4 inch will naturally fold inside. This will be your frame.

Turn right sides out and lay flat on floor, then put the yard front piece inside the frame. 

 

Pin the 1/4 inch under on all sides.

 Carefully stitch 1/8 inch from the edge the 1//4 inch turned under.

To keep the two pieces from separating in wash and wear, measure in 12 inches from all sides, mark with pins or a disappearing ink and sew another square in the middle of the blanket

Congratulations! You have made a receiving blanket in a little under an hour. 

Shorter time than it took to upload these photos and write this blog. There you go Jenny!

If you want this to be a softer heaver blanket rather than receiving blanket, you can cut a piece of batting the size of the finished "frame" and tuck it inside, then add the top and stitch sewing through all layers as you tuck the 1/4 inch under. I would tie or quilt the inside so the batting doesn't lump up during use and washing.


Feel free to email me at
annieofbluegables [at] gmail [dot] com
if you have any questions regarding this post.
have a great day.
~a

additional note: You can do it with any size quilt or blanket, square or rectangle. Just as long as the borders of the backing is equally larger than the blanket top. For example, in the original pattern, if your quilt top measures 36" x 36" and the backing measures 45" x 45", the back is 4.5" inches larger on all sides. So for the quilt you are making make your backing 9" bigger than the size of your quilt. So if your quilt measures 45" x 70", then make the backing 54" x 79"
If you want your quilt 36" x  45" then make the backing 45" x  54"

A Paper Snowflake

asside: Don't you LOVE the fabric in this post? I am looking for more. It is made by Nathan & Co. and I purchased it at WalMart. I have been to WalMart's all over the valley and cannot find it anymore. If anyone sees it anywhere, get a phone number from the seller & let me know. I will personally call that place and pay them to ship it to me.
Ok, On with my Tutorial
I saw this snowflake hanging in our library. In fact I saw many, many, many snowflakes hanging all over our library. There were HUGE ones and small ones. I could tell it was a cut/paste type of a craft, but couldn't figure, for the life of me, how to make one.

The kind librarian took the time to make one of the "arms" of the flake, if that is what you call it. Anyway. Once she gave me the instructions, I figured I had better make one, make a tutorial and be done with it, otherwise I would forget how.
OH and you can click on any picture to enlarge it.
So here is your paper snowflake tutorial:
Make a square by folding diagonally, so one side meets the right angle side. Cut off the excess and don't use your mom's best fabric scissors. It doesn't matter what size. fold diagonally once more.Do five more just like the first one. For larger snowflakes, sometimes it is better to make a total of eight. But that is really not a snowflake anymore, because they only have six sides.

K, so you have three sides to the triangle. For the sake of clarity (I hope), I will assign names to each side. Side A will be the side with one fold, side B will be the side with two folds, and side C will be the side with four edges. Does that make sense? I'm not so good with tutorials, I think. . .
If you have any questions on which side is which, I have put a note on each side of the triangle in my flickr site. Just hover the mouse over the picture and the note will pop up.

Next, with a pencil, draw a faint line 1/2 inch away from side B. You will be cutting UP TO this line. Then draw several lines parallel to side C all the way to the middle point, about 1/2 inch apart from one another.
With the paper folded in fourths, cut through all layers on the parallel lines.

Now for the folding: Once all are cut on the lines, open them up to the square.

take the innermost two triangles and put tape or glue on the tips and join them together.

then turn the whole piece over and take the next two points. Glue them in the center

flip it again, glue the next two points together

flip it again and glue the outer points together

by now you should have something that looks like this.


Then all you have to do is join them. take three arms and staple three points together. Do the same with the other three.

then look at the diagram. Each "x" represents where you staple. Staple the two halves together.

punch a hole in the top of one and hang from the ceiling.
if you have any questions, please ask me via email.
annieofbluegables121@gmail.com I will try to explain better. yikes tutorials are hard!
~ have a good Sabbath
~a

That Darned Hole!

My mom sent me a wool coat with a hole in the shoulder. She doesn't recall catching it on anything and really doesn't know how it got there. But she asked me if I could fix it.

Of course I love a challenge, so I went to my most favorite resource, the Internet! I have darned holes in socks and even one in my curtain, but never a piece of clothing that needs strength and has to look good.

Because there wasn't much on the Internet in the way of darning tutorials, I decided to do one here.













First thing I did was insert a piece of cardboard (I recycled the top of a box) so I wouldn't catch my stitching on something inside. I pinned it with safety pins on the outside.

I have learned the hard way that you always darn from the right side. This is the side you will see, so it needs to look the best. It is tempting to darn from the inside, but don't try it.

Then I stitched around the hole with matching thread. This is permanent, so you want to make the stitches tiny, and try to blend them with the direction of the threads in the coat.

I noticed someone had shortened the sleeves by folding them under and stitching. If I had done it, I would have cut away the length and would be unfortunately out of luck, because this is where I got my cloth to weave across the hole. I went inside the coat through the sleeve lining. Usually one sleeve in lining has a seam sewn from the outside. This is the way access the inside of the coat. I cut away the excess length of the sleeve and reattached the sleeve and lining.

That done, I began to harvest threads. Depending on the size of the hole, make your thread at least four times as long.
I harvested threads from a piece about 3 inches long. I cut the piece as closely to the grain as I could and began to gently unweave each thread.
After harvesting enough threads, I picked one up, and threaded a needle with a large hole.
The thread going lengthwise on a piece of cloth is called the warp. The thread that is woven is the weft.
From the outside going horizontally east to west, I poked my needle into the fabric about .5 inches away from the hole, then up right next to the edge of the hole on the east side, across the hole and down next to the edge of the hole on the west side, then back up .5 inches on the west side. I held the east end of the thread tightly and gently allowed the needle to un-thread leaving the darning thread crossing the hole. I continued to individually thread each new thread into the needle and weave them next to the last until the hole was covered.
I then turned the coat 90 degrees so the first threads ran north and south. I threaded the weft thread .5 inches away from the hole as I did for the warp, poked the needle in, pulled out by the hole, then wove in between each warp thread.
I took the picture so the weft thread goes north and south, but in reality it was much easier to turn the coat 90 degrees.

Here is a picture after I finished weaving.





I then went inside the coat and gently pulled all the threads to the inside.







Then I trimmed them to about .5 inches long.

Next I used a great new item called Steam a Seam. It is sticky on both sides and can be repositioned as many times as you need until you get it just right. Then when you iron it on, it becomes permanent. I took a piece of the left-over lining and cut it to fit the threads, attached the Steam-a-Seam and ironed it onto the threads and coat.














I cannot believe, now that I look at my pictures, that I didn't take a picture of the finished coat! This is the closest I have. You have to imagine the threads all tucked into the inside.

I probably forgot because I was anxious to get it back to my mom. I received this in the mail at 9 AM and by 3:30 PM had all her things fixed, (including a couple of robes, another coat and two shirts to be shortened) and back to the post office.















It really helps to have a sunny window when you work on black things.
have a nice day
~a