140 Days Until Christmas

I cut the grass in the garden yesterday morning, because we are supposed to get rain tomorrow and Friday. If I wait until the weekend, it will be too tall to cut. I was done and back in the house by 8 am.

I made serger samples for the rest of the day. I’m still working on sample cards similar to the ones we made at BU. Some of the techniques are familiar to me and some are not. Every time I think that we’ve found the limits of the serger, a new and different technique pops up.

I had the entire set of serger feet for my L860 machine, but they went with the machine when I traded it in because they won’t work on the L890. The L890 has its own set of serger feet. I am adding them one by one because Bernina presser feet are not inexpensive. One of the accessories that is available on the L890—but not the other machines, because the L890 is a combo serger/coverstitch machine—is the belt loop folder. Belt loops are made on coverstitch machines, which you may not know unless you make a study of clothing.

Gail Yellen, possibly the most brilliant serger instructor on the planet, has come up with all sorts of fun things to do with the L890. She uses the belt loop folder for everything except making belt loops. Last year, she came up with the idea to use the belt loop folder to make long strips with heavy decorative thread in the chain looper, then wind those strips around a styrofoam Christmas tree form. I’ve been wanting to try this for months now, so the belt loop folder was one of the first extra accessories I purchased.

I cut some Christmas fabric into bias strips using my Accuquilt cutter. Then I set up the largest belt loop folder on the L890 and made a bunch of test strips with plain thread to get the settings dialed in.

What is happening here is that the two sides of the strip get folded under as they go through the folder. The chain looper thread loops back and forth between the needle threads on the underside, catching the sides of the strip and holding them in place.

When I was happy with how my test strips looked, I switched over to my decorative thread—one spool of silver Glamore thread (Wonderfil) and one spool of gold Glamore. Both are 12wt threads. Both threads go through the chain looper together as one thread.

I actually began with three 12wt threads per Gail’s instructions, but I didn’t like how that looked, so I cut back to two. I also put thread nets on the spools to help keep the threads from tangling.

This is a close-up view of the underside of the folded strip. The two edges are covered by the decorative thread.

After pressing the strips, I began pinning them to the Christmas tree form:

And so on and so on until the entire form was covered:

Now I get to add baubles and charms and whatever else I want to the tree. Gail even added tiny lights to one of her larger trees. Mine is about 9" tall.

This probably will end up at the store as a display sample. I am not sure it would make a good class because not everyone is going to want to buy the belt loop folder. I could make this as a demo class, though—that would be fun and low stress.

I’m not yet done with the belt loop folder. Gail has some other uses for it.