You Always Have to Run With Scissors or Always Sew Without Pins...Pick one

If you are Dutch you are probably familiar with “Dilemma on Dinsdag” or in English “Tuesday Chooseday”. It’s a fun game where you get a hilarious and absurd dilemma, and you HAVE to pick one.

But wat does it have to do with sewing? Well…while I’m chipping away at the new pattern I’ve got a dilemma (and a solution) for you eventough it's not even Tuesday yet ;)!

The dilemma:

You always have to run with scissors.

Or

You always have to sew without pins.

Which one would you pick?

When I just started sewing the latter would have seemed like a total nightmare. I can remember the first time setting in sleeves and using maybe 30 pins? The first sleeve was a mess and I thought more pins would solve everything. I can still see the eye roll from my (lovely) teacher, but I thought I had it all figured out. Boy was I wrong. Nowadays I try to avoid using pins where I can, I find it faster and easier to sew without them...

So my pick: You always have to sew without pins!

After watching a video from Margaret Islander I promise you will pick it too. In this super informative 1994’s video, including a snappy intro tune, she shares methods used in industrial sewing that will surely inspire you to try them at home.

She talks about;
positioning your hand for sewing curves,
using the feed dogs to your advantage when easing in extra fabric,
matching plaids,
sewing flat felled seams

technique called crimping for curved seams like shirts or pockets.

She does all of these examples without pins, it's magic!

I really loved her insights and I hope you find it as useful as I did. Let me know in the comments what you think!