Thursday, September 26, 2013

Lovers' Quarrel

Sergio and I have been having a difference of opinion.  I love soft, silky, lightweight cotton lawns and voiles.  He does not. 

And I really needed him today to finish the seams of my second Archer shirt, which I've slowly been working on over the last several days.  Like a good girl, I did a sample; tension was off.  I adjusted his knobs (double entrendre intended) and tried it again.  And again.  And again and again and again . . . for close to 45 minutes, until I had this:


Talk about frustrating!  No matter what combination I tried, I got pretty much the same result, and the stitching wouldn't even stay consistent along one seam!  I did learn something from all my experimenting though:  I got better results with a three-thread overlock than with four.

My sewjo has been suffering lately (it seems like there's a lot of that going around, too) but things have been going mostly OK with this project.  I hope I didn't just jinx it.  Here's what I've got so far:


After I made the first Archer, I thought a LOT about the fit.  I scoped out ladies on the street who were wearing buttoned shirts, to see how theirs fit.  And then I decided to listen to those of you who said, "It's fine - leave it."  The only thing I did differently this time was to change the spacing of the buttonholes, from 3.5" apart to 2.5" apart, in order to fix the gap-osis I had with the first one.  This gave me an extra button or two down the front.  I hope it works - making the buttonholes is one of the first things I do when I make a shirt.  I might want to rethink that if this spacing is off.

Here's a better look at the fabric:


This is one of the fabrics from Anna Maria Horner's Little Folks line - I believe this one is Baby Bouquet in Berry.  I love the red, orange and pink against the light blue background.

I'm not really sure where this week has disappeared to, but it hasn't really been to sewing or knitting - I seem to be spending very little time lately on either, hence the lack of posts!  Thankfully, I have plenty of handmade garments to keep me going for quite a while :-)

19 comments:

  1. Ha, ha I own Sergio's twin brother! We have issues sometimes too - must be a family trait. I love the fabric (I agree the color combination is so pretty and unexpected with the blue background). I just bought some voile to make Pattern Runway's PB blouse. Now I'm a bit concerned since you had issues. I have to finish Anna and Lady Skater dresses then it's next in the queue and we'll see how I make out.

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    1. Forgot to mention the pattern matching and top stitching look fabulous!

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    2. Thank you! I guess our machines are brothers, hahahaha!

      It doesn't happen with every voile or lawn, but it's more likely to happen with those fabrics than others I use. I'm going to try the rethreading tip below, and also give him a nice drink of oil and some new needles and see if that helps.

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  2. Great job of matching the pattern! Very impressive.
    -- stashdragon

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  3. My serger was recently quarreling with me and I had to show it who's boss. I retreaded it completely and then it started behaving. Maybe give that try too? The fabric is great!

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    1. Great tip, thank you! I will definitely give that a try!

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  4. Oh no. I hate it when sergers don't behave. On the plus side, your fabric is lovely!

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    1. Thank you! This was meant to be PJ bottoms, but I felt it would be much better as a shirt!

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  5. bummer about the misbehaving sergio... i think mine desperately needs a new knife! the shirt is lovely though!

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    1. You know, I thought mine did too, but I had a repair guy look him over this summer and he said not. Thank goodness - those are almost as expensive as the machine itself!

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  6. Ugh, that sounds frustrating. But your shirt looks so fantastic! I love the fabric, and you did such a wonderful job matching patterns and edgestitching. I hope your serger starts behaving!

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    1. Thanks, Kelly! The serging is over for this project, so I don't need to worry about it again for a little bit!

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  7. Have you given Sergio a little loving lately (i.e. a thorough cleaning?) I find that sometimes helps my serger behave better. Awesome job with the fabric matching on the pocket, by the way.

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    1. I have - I clean out the debris every time I use him! I don't know why he's being so temperamental ;-)

      Thank you :-) Looking forward to the day when pattern-matching is second nature. Still takes me a fair bit of work and figuring!

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  8. Your sewjo will come back, I assure you! Give Sergio a good talking to and he'll be fine in a bit (after a period of sulking). The shirt looks good so far!

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    1. Thanks, Sabs! I love it that nobody questions how I'm anthropomorphizing my serger, LOL!

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  9. It's funny how machines can be temperamental. How frustrating for you.

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    1. Crisis over now - shirt is satisfactorily completed!

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