Well I finally broke out my never before used (or even really looked at) sewing machine. I’ve been surrounded by smart, crafty creative women who sew very cool things and well peer pressure is a powerful thing.  With my first project completed, I’ve decided that this would be a good thing to add to my blog.  I don’t know how often I’ll be posting this segment, depends on how often I brave the creative depths of my abilities, but for now here’s the first one.

Haphazard Hobbies – The pin cushion.

First its worth mentioning again that I have never used the sewing machine before, it was missing it’s manual and my friend had a great deal of trouble figuring out where everything went and how to get it to work in the first place.  Once we got it all working consistently, she set about showing me how to make a pin cushion. She cut lined up the fabric, cut it and started the first two rows of pins to show me where to sew.

My turn! I finished placing the pins, a few on each side, as I prepared to make a square pin cushion. I spun the fabric around looking for which of the 3 x’s (marking the spot) to start with. After choosing not to start on each of them, I finally opted to start at one side of the gap area.  I’m sure this was the obvious starting point, but as usual if it’s obvious for the rest of you, that means it will be sure to elude me.

I set up my place to start sewing and flip the switch to cause the pressure foot to push down, I push down on the foot pedal while having my fabric lined up. I failed to remember to use the lines on the machine that tell me how far in I am. The sewing went fine, I sewed straight down one side, flipped it slightly to sew down the other side and then realized I never “locked” down (is that what it’s called?) the first stitch area to prevent it from coming undone.

Oh well, live and learn, too late to fix it now.  I keep sewing. Now I could be wrong, and because this is my first time, that’s not at ALL an unlikely possibility, but I think you have to lift up the pressure foot and raise the needle every time you rotate the fabric. Either way, that’s what I did each time. Now it was onto the 3rd side and halfway down I realized to my horror that I had FAILED to put the pressure foot back down.  I couldn’t figure out how to fix my mistake and I didn’t know what to do if I stopped completely SO I flipped the reverse tab to go back over the big gaping holes in the thread. The problem is, you have to hold the reverse tab down the entire time with one hand while holding the fabric with the other hand. I guess this is ok for a half a second’s worth of reverse sewing, but when you have a MUCH larger area, it’s a bit harder to hold the fabric steady.  First I got all bunched up, then I rapidly ran in a slightly diagonal line before I was able to stop the needle.  Forward a bit to get back lined up and then backwards again to fill in the gaps.  The 4th side went just fine, now that I remembered to check the pressure foot.

It was when I went to pull the fabric inside out, or rather right side in, that I discovered yet, another problem. It turned out that I had indeed made the gap too narrow and it was time to use a thread ripper.  Conveniently I have had a vacuum hair ripper for years, turns out it was in fact a thread/seam ripper.  BUT I didn’t have it with me, nor did I have scissors with me. Those of you familiar with this style of posting, know that I am notorious for not having the things I need when I sit down to do a project, be it cooking, organizing, or in this case, sewing. I used nail clippers to cut the excess thread and then one of my sewing pins to remove enough thread from the seam to get my fingers in there to flip it right side in. I stuffed it with enough fluff to make it slightly firm, my goal being to not have the pins go all the way through, and I was almost done.

Next step, fold in the open corner and sew, either by hand or by machine, I’ve heard you can do either one.  In this case, having had my fill of this particular first project, I folded in the sides, and having no CLUE how to get the last square corner to be there, I just tucked it in flat. I ran the sewing machine over it, backwards a bit to lock it in and then all the way across and backwards again, just because I thought that’s what you are supposed to do.

photo(2)

I completed my first of hopefully many hobby craft and ended up with a 3 sided square, 1 side triangle with a TON of thread showing, BUT no pins stick through and no blood was shed. Not to mention, nothing was broken with the exception of the needle that broke when we were figuring out this thing. As with all things of this nature, I have a very low bar setting for myself, so given that I have a finished product and it WORKS! It’s a success in my book.  Tune in next time as I chronicle my next exploration into the world of home made things in my …