| |
Pins
- Can I sew over pins?
No. Don't. Please. While many people do sew over pins and remove
them after the seam is sewn, this is dangerous both to you and to your
machine. If the needle hits a pin, it could break, and a piece of the
needle could fly out from the machine and possibly hurt you. One of your
authors almost had his eye put out in such an occurrance. Also, it can
throw off the timing of your sewing machine, a form of damage generally
requiring service in the shop.
As an alternative to sewing over pins, you can pull them out just before
they reach the needle, or you can place the pins parallel to the seamline
rather than across it, so that the needle would never hit a pin anyway.
(That's particularly a good idea for pinning with sergers, because if you
break the knife on the serger it can cost you a bundle to repair.)
- Do I need pins?
Well, yeah, you should probably have some pins on hand because they're
occasionally very useful, but you probably don't need to use them nearly
as often as they were called for in sewing some 10 years or more ago,
and there are alternatives that you can use in many cases. Your
authors hardly ever pin.
Alternatives that you can consider using instead of pins include
paper clips, scotch tape, masking tape, basting tape (double sided
sticky tape), washable glues, and just holding it together with your
hands until it gets to the presser foot. (This is what sewing pros do -
they really don't have time to pin and baste everything, so they just
align the notches by hand and go for it because they know their skill
will make it come out right.)
- What the heck do I need pins for? I never use pins!
If you absolutely never use any pins for your sewing ever, please consider
writing some material for this FAQ, as you obviously know something about sewing
velvet and spandex that we don't...
|
