Conquering My Serger - I DID IT!

Oh yeah! Oh YEAH!!!

I bought my Brother 1034D around April 17th, and as noted here, it sat and sat and I was so scared to use it. And then, my awesome husband - who knows that I *hate* being challenged - did just that. We tease that I don't like "my manhood challenged" LOL!  He told me he was going to use that serger before I did and hmmph. I was determined to figure it out.

So I did! I tried to watch the dvd but it wasn't friendly with my MacBook - Boooo! And then, good 'ole YouTube got me going. The first time I threaded it, it took nearly 30 minutes. Oh boy! Overwhelmed again.

You have the upper and lower looper threads and then left and right needle threads. But of course, the order of threading is not straightforward. It's #3, #4, #2, #1. Makes sense, right? Sheesh.

I got it figured out and ran some scrap fabric through

WOOOOOHOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!! :-)

And then I was ready to get going on real garments. And I was serging and serging and uh oh. Something isn't right...My upper looper thread is broken. How did THAT happen? So I examined it and yours truly made the biggest mistake ever - when I opened the spool of MaxiLock using a pair of scissors! Noooo! As I tried to salvage the thread, I soon realized that it was cut too deep. There was no telling how many layers of thread I cut through. So I had to give up on that spool, luckily JoAnn was having a sale, on ToldiLock by Gutermann. It feels a bit thinner than the MaxiLock and was about the same price yet is 2500 yards vs 3000 yards. I'll probably stick with MaxiLock for now, and use white or black for projects unless I really want to match thread color.

After buying the new cone of thread, it took me about 3 minutes to thread it. At one point I switched to white thread and again, had it threaded in just a few minutes.

I was serging the seams of my NL6035 skirt and something went haywire, and I broke a needle. I called in my husband for that one, and he had it replaced in no time. And again, I had it rethreaded in a matter of minutes.

Next up, I have to play around with 3 vs. 4 thread overlock, rolled hems and the like.

I am pretty stoked that I *FINALLY* conquered my fear of using my new baby and I shall name her Scarlett! :)

Confession

About 2.5 seconds after I sewed my first wearable item, I decided I needed a serger. Not wanted - NEEDED. And I was determined to get one. If you know me, you know what it means when I become determined to do something. There is NOTHING that will stop me.

So I did it. I made enough side money to buy my serger - yay me! It was delivered last Thursday. I took it out of the box and admired it. I sat it on my table

Next to my sewing machine

And there it has sat. For a week. I even sewed last weekend...but I didn't use it.

I'M AFRAID OF IT! lol!!! I don't know why but it has already intimidated me. I know that it shouldn't - it is my friend. My sewing friend. I have to tackle it, read about it, heck at least turn it on...

I have some gift items to sew up and I refuse to without serging them. I can deal with weird insides (for now) on my own items...but not items that I give away!

Friday night - it's on!

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In other news...the peurperium is moving right along! I want to make eleventy of these sweaters.

I don't have any other DK yarn though!! I'm not supposed to buy more yarn - I'm not...I do have tons of Caron Simply Soft which is tagged as worsted but it isn't...it's probably a 3.5 if there were such a thing. It's between DK and worsted. I could probably use it but the sweater wouldn't be NB, maybe more like 0-3 months...but that's ok too. NB babies grow so dang fast. Gah.

Look - it's a SWEATER! HA! It makes me think I can work the top-down, raglan sweater in Ann Budd's book (which I checked out from the library). A Twisted Little Raglan. It's basically the *same* as the Peurperium...just bigger. And I'd have to learn to knit in the round to make sleeves. But that'd be a real sweater that I could wear! That I would have made myself!

Ahhhh....