Tuesday 14 June 2011
The Overlocker
As I have three grand-daughters aged 2, 1 and 6 weeks I have been making clothes for them. With it being winter I decided I had better forget about what I had been doing and head for the polar fleece. Of course it was pink as that is what their mother likes and I had bought 10 meters of it at a sale.
It is good in one way that patterns now come in more than one size, but you usually want to start at the smallest one so have to make paper patterns of the bigger sizes so that you can make use of all the sizes.
After doing three pair for the eldest, I decided that purchasing an Overlocker would make the process quicker and easier. I talked to the girls that I work with and they all said that a four thread one was better than a three thread one. I went to my usual shop where I buy these sorts of things and they had one on special so decided to go with it. Now in the shop it was set up with four different color threads to show you how to thread it up correctly, but when open the one that you buy all four cotton pathways were in the same color. I did not even think of looking how they went I just pulled them out and followed the chart that was on the inside of the machine. By some miraculous fluke I got it right the first time and the first seam was perfect. I can not say that for the second, third, fourth, or fifth seam. I put it in the corner in disgust, leaving it for another day. During the night it came to me that I had not put thread two between the pinchers where thread one resides so it tried it again. Again it was one seam right and then back to not sewing correctly. Back into the corner it went.
On the chart it says that seam two needs to go on a hook at the end of its needle, but for the life of me I could not see it or feel it. I decided a trip back to the shop was in order to see if they could solve the problem for me. Sure enough the tiny little bump at the end of number twos needle in fact a notch that the thread had to go through. I have long thin fingers but there was no way I could even get my finger in the gap to get the cotton around the notch. The young man at the store gave me an idea to try and it has worked, I can get the thread around that notch. The girls trousers are now all finished, all nine of them and I have moved onto overalls, in pink of course.
Why is it that men make complicated machines for women to work?
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