kcw spring 2013 [day six]
April 27th, 2013
Hour #6
1. arm binding: There has to be a least one sucky part of every sewing project, right? The dress was all smooth sailing up to this point. It was about time I hit a sucky patch. Enter the arm bindings. They seemed too large to begin with and then the directions tell you to shape them–with your iron–into a gentle curve. My words were not very gentle as I ironed and steamed and stretched those suckers all out of whack.
Now they were enormous! I wanted to throw them out and start over, but I thought I’d give my sad, stretched out arm bindings one more chance. I pinned, and pinned, and pinned some more before I sewed the bindings on. Pin to Win! Pin to Win! I say that to myself when I really want something to work and I’m worried that won’t. Sometimes it’s just wishful pinning, but other times you really pin and win. Okay, enough of my private sewing dorkiness.
And look! I won! Kind of. The arm binding went on without any tucks or weirdness, but the inside was super wavy. Probably because it was stretched all to hell (see above). I had been planning to machine stitch the whole arm binding on, but there are not enough pins in the world to make that work.
2. hand stitching: So hand stitching it was. And after I hand stitched the arm binding, I couldn’t do a machine hem. So hand stitching it was again. And wow that took me more than an hour! I am a super slow stitcher, it seems–say that 5 times fast!
Binding is my least favorite part of any project, too. The handstitching looks so nice, though, it’s kinda nice it happened that way!
I had trouble with the neck facing on my son’s sailor suit too. Same issue — wavy on the inside even though it seemed to be the right size, etc. I didn’t figure out until after that what had probably happened was that the facing was not cut on the EXACT grainline that the body was. Apparently even the slightest bit off will give you this wavy effect. (I have no idea if this is what happened here (and I think it looks great), but I didn’t know about this and it’s worth keeping in mind.
I have recently found your blog through the kcw, and I am really enjoying this series for the spring kcw! I really wanted to participate for my first one this time, but didn’t get it together so I’m planning on the next one. Thanks so much for showing your process of sewing with this dress, sometimes when reading for inspiration in kids sewing blogland I feel like I am the only one who has these moments of despair when my projects are not happening the way the pattern says it will. Reading this will help me persevere, and hopefully use a few less profanities the next time something goes wrong in my sewing room!! Thanks! I am excited to see the finished product!!
agree. There is always a sucky part to sewing. Different every time. It looks great though!
Wow. I am so impressed with your handstitching. I don’t think I would have even thought of that as a solution, that’s how much I dislike it. The dress is going to be gorgeous!
Ugh – I hate binding too. I never seem to get it right, especially where the binding overlaps. The hand stitching looks awesome! And I have that same ironing board cover :-)
pin to win…gotta remember that!!
This is going to be a very special dress. So much love and time! Look forward to seeing the finished product tomorrow!!
oh man, bless your soul for all that hand stitching! there is something about attaching bindings that makes me want to shoot myself
“it was about time I hit a sucky patch” Love that! Also love the pin to win, because that would never have occurred to me, but wow, that makes sense. I love this step-by-step process, it is incredibly helpful (and fun!) to read.
Hahaha, nice to see that not everything is a smooth ride for you as for so many of us. Thank you for sharing that. It will mke it so much more easy when I experience the same struggle.
By the way, the dress ended up looking beautiful!!! (I already saw it done in your latest post)
[…] Because View B is sleeveless I thought I was making my life easy – I could happily skip all those steps for the (gorgeous!!) sleeves. However, getting the bias strips around the armholes turned into a lesson in patience, pinning and hand-stitching!! At first glance the strips that you cut appear to be too big so you have to do quite a bit of easing and manipulation. (Meg (elsie marley) made this same dress for KCW Spring 2013 and you can read about her struggle with the armholes here). […]