5 Common Sewing Bloopers and How to Avoid Them

Show Notes

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Podcast Transcript

Sarai
I'm Sarai.

Haley
And I'm Haley.

Sarai
And this is Seamwork Radio. Welcome back to Seamwork Radio, where we share practical ideas for building a creative process so you can sew with intention and joy. And this is our fifth and final episode in our Quick Tips series. We're sharing quick episodes full of tips to answer most burning sewing questions.

And today we're talking about sewing bloopers. So we're going to cover some of the most common sewing bloopers and how to avoid them. All right, so let's start with our icebreaker for today. Haley, what's the best sewing blooper that you've ever either experienced or heard about?

Haley
Well, I mean, I've made lots of mistakes, and as a sewing instructor, I've seen lots of mistakes.

But the one that I am thinking about in this moment is one time I was, like, styling on a photo shoot, and there was, like, a small designer that dropped off their samples for us to use. And one of the samples was like a shirt, like a button-up shirt, and there was two left sleeves on it. Well, left or right sleeves, I don't remember, but it was, like, not intentional. And you could tell by the way that the sleeve was, like, hanging that it was backwards. And so I was like, I don't really know what to do with it. And I had to use it for whatever reason. We had to use all of the samples that were provided. I was like, I guess we're just going to cuff, roll these sleeves up and have the model kind of like, three quarters or something.

Sarai
Yeah, side profile only.

Haley
But it was one of those things where I'm like, this is a blooper that shouldn't have happened.

Sarai
Like someone really messed up and didn't notice.

Haley
And didn't notice.

Sarai
Strange. That's a pretty good one, I think, for me. That time that I was trying on one of our muslins that we just had in the office, I don't remember why I was trying it on, but I was trying it on, I guess.

Haley
Yeah.

Sarai
And I got stuck in it because the zipper got stuck at the waistline, basically. I guess it was sewn too close to the waistline, and I got into it just fine, but I couldn't get out of we're working and working on the zipper.

Haley
Yeah, for a while.

Sarai
And then finally I just asked Haley to cut me out of it because I wasn't going to get out any other way.

Haley
Yeah, I mean, like, the good thing—sometimes the nice thing if you have happens to be, like, a sample in the office that we sewed up for a model or something and they're a similar size to you, you're like, cool, I'm going to try it on, see if this is the size I should make. And stuff happens.

Sarai
You win some, you lose some. So it just reminds me of every time I've ever gotten stuck in a dressing room and the zipper got stuck or whatever.

Haley
Oh, my God.

Sarai
It's just so mortifying.

Haley
I did that at a dressing room with a jumpsuit. It was like a step-in jumpsuit, and it was like a surplus bodice, but it was one of those that you really have to have flexible shoulders to get in and out of. And I do have flexible shoulders, but I got, like stuck, and it's like in the summertime and it's hot.

Sarai
That's the worst.

Haley
And I'm like, sweating. I'm like, oh, God, I’m going to have to have someone come and help me.

Sarai
It's going to be awful. No. So embarrassing. That's happened to me before. I've also gotten stuck in dressing rooms. Like the door has gotten stuck, which is also somehow embarrassing. I don't know why, because it's not your fault the door got stuck, but I don't know, you feel weird about it. Help me.

Haley
Yeah, those weird, embarrassing things when someone says Happy birthday and you say, you too. You're like, why did I say that? I'm going to go hide.

Sarai
All right, well, if you have an icebreaker for us for a future episode, you can leave it for us. If you're a Seamwork member, just go to seamwork.com/go/icebreakers, and that'll take you to a thread on our community where you can leave your own question that we'll use in a future episode.

All right, so we all make mistakes. I think we should just normalize that. I think we should just talk about it. That's kind of what we're covering today when we talk about sewing bloopers.

So when we talk about sewing bloopers. We're talking about mistakes that you make often. These mistakes are really easily avoidable mistakes. Which kind of makes you feel even more silly. But you don't need to feel silly because it happens to everyone. We all make those mistakes. And that's why I like the word bloopers, because I don't know, it has a little bit of a humor to it instead of a fail.

So let's talk about our mistakes and just make that a normal part of the conversation when it comes to sewing. And I think we'll all feel a lot better about them.

How often do you feel like you make a really big sewing mistake?

Haley
I mean, every project I make some kind of mistake. It's rare that I don't have to seam rip something or troubleshoot something along the way. A really big mistake. I mean, it used to be pretty frequently. I feel like I used to be a lot more in a rush when I was sewing than I am now. And I would make dumb mistakes like cutting a hole through the center of a skirt when I'm grading a seam or things like that. But like, big unsalvageable mistakes. Maybe like once a year now. Not as often, but it used to be all the time.

Sarai
Yeah, same. I usually make small recoverable mistakes. Usually at least one every single project, but the big ones that actually ruin things, not so much. It doesn't really happen very often.

Just yesterday. So I was filming a video for the skirt that I'm wearing right now, which has this really cool waistband that uses both drawstring and elastic in it. So it has kind of a ruched effect. So I was making a YouTube video about it and sewing it, and I was going to do the drawstring first and then do the elastic.

So I put the drawstring in, I tied both ends of the drawstring so they wouldn't get stuck inside. And then I put in the first elastic and I put in the second elastic. And when I went to stretch out the elastic, of course the drawstring went right into the casing and was gone. And I tried to fish it out, but it was all ruched, so it was like, almost impossible. So I had to take out the drawstring, get out the bodkin, put it through once again.

So this small mistake probably took me an extra, like, 15 minutes because of that. Not that big a deal, but those things happen.

Haley
Yeah. It's recoverable all the time.

Sarai
Yeah.

Haley
Do you notice any trends in what cause you to make mistakes?

Sarai
Well, I think, like you said, if I'm rushed, there's 100% chance of making a mistake when I'm in a rush. Yeah, that's a big one for me. I think if I'm not paying a ton of attention is another thing. I mean, I don't think 100% of my attention has to be on there. I usually listen to music or something when I sew or listen to podcasts or whatever, but if I'm really kind of zoning out or if I'm tired, then it's definitely more likely that mistakes are going to occur.

Do you feel that way?

Haley
Yeah, I mean, definitely if I'm rushing. I feel like I've improved upon my tendency to rush things. But I would say the other thing is if I'm just not in the right head space for sewing, and sometimes I push myself, too, because I can kind of snap out of it, and sewing can kind of put me into a better mindset, but sometimes you just can't force it. If you're not feeling it and you're not feeling the focus and attention to detail that you need to sew, then you're not feeling it.
Or when I'm sewing on a deadline, which kind of can be a combination of the two, you're rushing for the deadline and you're forcing yourself to sew when you don't necessarily feel like it because you have a deadline and you have to.

That's kind of like a recipe for disaster for me and I assume everyone else ever.

Sarai
Yeah, that's the one downside I feel when I'm filming a video, when I'm actually filming one of my projects. Because first of all, if you've ever tried to film an entire sewing project, it takes two or three times as long to finish the project if you're doing that. And on top of that, you want to finish it by a certain time, usually for me because I'm making a video for YouTube or something.

And so like yesterday I wanted to film the entire thing in a day. And normally when I'm sewing, I don't really put deadlines on myself like that. So by the end of it, I often feel tired and I just need to finish. I mean, I still have fun doing it, but I just feel like there's a little bit more of that pressure that causes mistakes a lot of time. Like the drawstring thing, that was the very end of the project.

Haley
It's hard when you're filming things. That's also my same experience when doing sewalongs or projects for YouTube. I always underestimate the amount of time it'll take. And it's always awkward because your camera is in the way of what you're doing sometimes.

Sarai
Yeah.

Haley
So you're like, cool, let me sew with my head way over yonder and I can kind of see what I'm doing.

Sarai
That was the story of my life yesterday. I was trying to get a close-up on something I don't remember and I don't really have—I’m just filming with like a single camera and a tripod. And I was trying to get a good angle and then the fabric kept slipping off the table and I was trying to get around the camera to put it back on and then try to film my hands without bumping into the camera. And I was getting kind of frustrated.

Haley
Yeah, it's tough. That's tough.

Well, let's dig into some of these bloopers and the things that you can do to avoid them. So the way that we framed these tips is that we have a category of mistake that can be made and then the things that you can do, kind of preventative measures so that you can avoid them in the future.

So I will start us off with mistake number one, and that is neglecting your pattern instructions. I think that this can be the source of so many various different sewing mistakes. Assuming you know how something's going to come together when in fact it was designed to come together in maybe a very specific way. So the ways that we're going to avoid this, I mean, obviously you need to use your pattern instructions.

I like to start off every project by just skimming the instructions and taking notes, taking some extra care to read a little bit more closely wherever there's a technique that is different than what I'm used to or entirely new to me.

I also make sure that I'm looking at the cutting layouts and not just like off-roading, because garments, especially if there's any kind of asymmetry to the garment at all, it can even be a subtle asymmetry, like the way the pockets are or something can make the cutting layouts not as straightforward as you would assume they would be.

And it's a total shame to waste fabric and cutting something wrong is like, that's a hard mistake to rebound from because you can't uncut fabric like you can seam rip a messed-up seam.

Note the seam allowances. Make sure that you're using the correct seam allowances, that you know what they are, that your pattern has seam allowance, because I have definitely made that mistake in the past.

And again, just flagging any tricky steps so that, you know, you can highlight them. Make sure you need to use a little extra care and slow down there.

Sarai
Yeah, those are all really good tips. I think that the cutting layout one is a really good one because that's something that happened to me recently where I was cutting garment out and I just barely squeaked by with enough fabric, and it was because I wasn't really paying attention to the cutting layout and had to recut one of my pieces because of that. So, yeah, that was definitely a lesson learned there.

All right. Mistake number two is not thoroughly prepping your project. So one thing you want to do is always measure your test square. So if you're printing your pattern at home, that'll help you to avoid those printing mistakes where you've printed something at the wrong size. So always be sure to measure that test square and make sure that you printed something at the wrong size.

Because we get that, I wouldn't say all the time, but oftentimes people have trouble with a pattern and it turns out that they printed it at 98% or they printed it at 105%, and you wouldn't think that would make a difference, but it really does, because each piece is a little bit bigger or a little bit smaller. And when you add those up, it comes out quite a bit bigger or quite a bit smaller. So that's one thing.

Pretreat and press your fabric for sure. So this is something that will really ensure that you don't get a garment that looks totally different after you've sewn it and worn it than before, because you want to have your fabric treated in the same exact way that you'll be treating it afterwards. And that'll help to remove any shrinkage and make sure that you're not sewing wrinkles into your garment and all of that. So be sure to pretreat, which usually means wash in some way and press your fabric before you use it.

Be sure to transfer all your markings as well. When I was learning to sew, this is one of the ones that it seems so silly, like, why wouldn't you transfer your markings? But oftentimes I was so lazy and I didn't really understand why they were important, and I would just ignore them half the time. I don't know why, looking back on it.

Haley
Or I would be like, I'll add them in later. And then your garment is halfway sewn and you're trying to align a pattern piece and you're like, this is a horrible choice.

Sarai
Yeah. So if you're not accustomed to doing that, definitely get into the habit. I really like the screw punch. We talk about it all the time for punching holes in your fabric. It's a really easy tool to use to punch a hole anywhere on your pattern. It doesn't have to be on the edge, and that'll help make marking a lot easier.

Haley
Yeah. Nice little keyhole for your pencil to slide through.

Sarai
Test your stitches on a swatch if you can. So this is a really simple step that you can take just to make sure that everything is going to sew correctly. Just try it out on some extra fabric after you've cut out your piece. Very easy to do.

And then finally staystitsh to prevent stretching. This is another one that's really easy to skip, especially if you aren't really that familiar with staystitching or know its purpose. But whenever you're sewing on a curve or a diagonal, there's a chance of the fabric stretching out because it's on a bias of some kind. And so stay stitching helps prevent that area from getting all stretched out. So you'll often be instructed to staystitch along necklines, along any curved edges. If you have like a diagonal pocket or something like that, then you'll often be told to staystitch. So that's what that's for if you're not too familiar with staystitching. And that's really important first step before you start sewing.

Haley
I've made so many of those mistakes, and it's because I'm not as big of a fan of the cutting prep part. I'm always excited to just get sewing.

Sarai
Yeah.

Haley
I think it can be easy to get in that mindset of like, I just want to sew and rush through those little details that make such a difference.

Sarai
Yeah.

Haley
Okay, mistake number three. This is making assumptions about fit. I don't love this mistake, but I love the tips for this one.

So I think that it can be, especially when you're coming from a ready-to-wear mindset. And just the way that I think oftentimes we are conditioned as people, and especially women, to put a lot of value into a number. And you're like, this is the size I wear, and I always wear this size. And I see so many people kind of get caught up in that a little bit, too, with their home sewing.

And the benefit of sewing your own clothes is you just have so much more information to go on. You have so many more choices. So really take advantage of all of that information that you're given so that you can ultimately get the best fit.

So tip number one here is to read the body measurement chart and the finished measurement chart. Because what this is going to tell you is the ease of the garment. The difference between your body's measurements and the measurements of the garment is the ease. You need ease to be able to move in your clothing.

It's also there for design purposes. So if you're looking at something, you want a fitted button-up, but the pattern you're looking at has ten inches of ease in the bust, then that may not necessarily be the pattern for you, because sizing down four sizes to get the ease you want isn't necessarily always the best choice to make.

So understanding that design intent and whether that garment is a good fit for you and taking into consideration the ease of the garment is so important because you don't want to set yourself up to be disappointed.

Another tip here is to take accurate and frequent body measurements and also make sure that you're making a muslin, because it's an extra step, but I promise you, you're going to be so much happier with the way that your garments fit if you take the time to mock it up in some muslin fabric and make a few adjustments for your body.

Sarai
Yeah, definitely. I'm a big believer in muslins for things that I think will need them.

Haley
Yes.

Sarai
I don't think you necessarily need to make a muslin for everything. But there are definitely some types of garments where they have saved me.

Haley
Yeah. If I'm making a pair of pants, unless it's like elastic waist, wide leg pants, I'm probably going to make a muslin. If I'm making a gathered skirt with an elastic waist like something you're wearing. No.

Sarai
Yeah. It's not exactly conforming to my body in any way except for the elastic.

Haley
Right?

Sarai
Yeah, absolutely. I think that's a really good rule of thumb. Just something to think about is how fitted it is when you're considering whether to make a muslin or not.

I think the other great thing about—it may seem like a lot of extra work, but with something like pants, likely, if you get a good fit, you'll probably make them again. So you'll save a lot of time if you get a good fit on them. If you don't get a good fit on them, you'll probably never make them again.

Haley
Which will also save you time.

Sarai
You'll go back to the elastic waist pants at that point.

All right. Going into mistake number four. Mistake number four is flying blind when you get confused or disoriented. So I often see this with things like zipper flys or sleeve plackets. It's hard to say sleeve plackets—or welt pockets. Those are things that often have a lot of steps to them. There's a real sequence that you need to follow and it's not super intuitive, but a lot of times people will get kind of confused and just try and figure it out on their own, and that can lead to a lot of issues.

So if you're getting frustrated or you're getting confused about something like that, just take a step, pause, read through that section of the instructions, and if you need to, you can even Google the technique so you can see it in a different format.

If the instructions aren't really helping you, try a video or try a photo tutorial or something else, or maybe even try a different method. But if you kind of just take a step back and make sure that you understand step by step what needs to be done, that's really going to be a lot more effective than just trying to figure it out on your own.

There's no need to try and figure it out on your own. There's tons of support out there for you.

And then if you need to, you could baste a mockup. This really helps to kind of solidify how it comes together. If you're having trouble with that, even a really small, like, half size mockup, obviously you probably don't want to do that for like a welt pocket. That just makes it harder. But if you're doing something that is on a larger scale and you need to try it out to see how it works, like, let's say you're learning the burrito method for putting in a lining, and that can be kind of confusing. But if you were to make a little half scale model, or even with paper sometimes to see how it all works, that can be really helpful.

And then sew a bunch of practice samples before you sew the real thing. So there's no reason to rush through it and get something that's not going to be a great result for you. So just take a few minutes, take some extra scrap fabric, and practice it before you get going.

Haley
Yeah, okay. And our final mistake, mistake number five, is letting imprecise sewing wreck your project.

This is one of those things I feel conflicted about, because I think striving for perfection in all places can be kind of toxic behavior. But also it's really important to recognize in sewing that multiple imprecisions can all align to make a problem that's much bigger.

A project that doesn't fit quite right, can start from imprecise cutting. If you cut something imprecise, you're like an 8th of an inch off when you're cutting, then an 8th of an inch off when you sew. All of the seams. You add all of that up and suddenly your garment is an inch and a half bigger or smaller than it was intended to be. Things can really add up. So really taking the time to practice as much precision as is available to you where you are in your sewing journey is a really worthwhile thing, and it'll save you a lot of frustration.

So some of the things that you can do besides slowing down to help you be a little bit more precise is hand basting whenever you can.

If you're in a tricky spot, you're sewing a sleeve that's giving you heck, maybe try hand basting it instead. You can also use pins or clips, whatever you prefer, very aggressively.

I always like to think of my pins as like little sets of extra hands, and more pins is more control. So use more pins than you normally would.

Double check your markings. I think that imprecise markings can really mess you up. I'll mention welt pockets. Again, if you mark your welt pocket imprecisely and you sew a little bit off, it could be a recipe for disaster.

Make sure you're always matching your notches and all of other relevant markings in your projects and clip a notch when needed so that you can make curves fit together or align inverted corners where needed.

And then use tools like your point turner or even your iron ironing as frequently as possible can also help you be a lot more precise. Precision is definitely part a mindset thing and training yourself to slow down, but it is also muscle memory that you'll need to pick up over time. So as much as it's important to focus on it, it is something that just will come with time.

Sarai
Yeah. Another thing you can do is if there's an area where you feel like it's really hard for you to be precise, hand sewing is another option. Yeah, we mentioned hand basting, but you could also hand sew certain things like hems. To this day I still have trouble with, I think everybody has trouble with, sewing bias tape, trying to catch the underside just perfectly so that you're not sewing off the edge. But you don't have a huge so that can be difficult if you don't feel comfortable doing it. You could either hand baste it before you sew or you can just stitch it by hand and there's nothing wrong with that. You have tons of control when you're hand sewing and I think it can add a really lovely touch to a lot of garments too.

Haley
Yeah. You might end up with something even nicer than you anticipated.

Sarai
Yeah. So those are our tips and I will recap them for you guys real fast.

So, mistake number one that you can make is neglecting your instructions. So be sure to read through your instructions and really understand them and flag those tricky steps.

Mistake number two is not thoroughly prepping your project. So always make sure that you've done all the prep work necessary, including with your pattern, with your fabric, making sure it's pretreated your markings are transferred, and any kind of stitching that you might need to do just as practice before you get going.

Mistake number three is making assumptions about fit. So be sure to look at all the measurement charts that you have available to you and use those to really understand how the garment is going to fit you before you choose your size and don't just go off what you think your size should be.

Mistake number four is flying blind when you're confused or disoriented and you're doing something that involves a lot of steps. So if you find yourself in that situation, just be sure to take a break and step back, go through the instructions again, and really try to understand them, whether that's through just reading them again or getting hands on and making some mockups.

And then mistake number five is letting imprecise sewing wreck your project. So that starts with having precise cutting and then using all the techniques we mentioned hand basting pins, double checking your markings, making sure that your notches are matching up, all of those things that will help you to be more precise in your sewing.

All successful sewing projects start with a good plan. And our free Sewing Planner is a printable tool to help you design and plan your sewing projects. So it includes pages for sketching looks, planning out individual projects with sketches and swatches, and you can print as many pages as you need. So this is available for free at seamwork.com/go/freeplanner.

And if you liked this episode, I would love to ask you a favor. Could you forward it to a friend that you think would also enjoy it? That's really how people learn about the podcast. It's through word of mouth. And so we wanted to just ask you guys if there's anybody, you know, who might enjoy this episode or this podcast as a whole to pass it along to them, because we see this on social media all the time, and we see people recommending the podcast or people telling us that they heard about the podcast through a friend.

It just makes my day when I hear that. So thank you to everybody who's done that. And that does it for us this week. I'm Sarai.

Haley
And I'm Haley.

Sarai
And this is Seamwork Radio.