Firstly make sure you make use of any and all freebie classes offered by your Janome dealer/retailer. Really it is worth so much to take the time out to spend an hour or so going through all the functions on your machine with someone who knows what they are doing.
Make sure you make (yourself!) and get to keep samples of all the functions that your machine has to offer, that way at least when you are staring at the rather basic and uninspiring manual illustrations going "does my stitch tension look right?" you will have something other than those little B+W pics to guide you (would it kill them to publish the booklet in colour?).
If your dealer does not offer you a free one-on-one lesson as part of buying their machine ask them why- it should come standard!
Watch the DVD- yeah I know its not quite the same as doing it yourself but for me it did help to "fill in" the basics of the manual. Smarter people than me have had this ready to play on their laptop next to their machine while threading up etc... Great idea!
Try not to be scared of THREADING THE MACHINE! If you can thread a sewing machine and get it to work you can do this! Really. Its just like threading your machine needle 3 or 4 times over. In fact I would even go so far as to suggest.....
PULL OUT ALL the threads (yes that's right all the ones that came very nicely threaded in the machine directly from the factory...) and RE-THREAD your machine.
From scratch...
And then see if it works...
And if not then check your manual, the DVD etc... very likely (like me) you have managed to leave a thread off some little loopy thing and if you re-do it all again it will more than likely work like it should (really!).
If not take a deep breath, walk away do something else then come back and look at your threading with a fresh eye, if you can't see whats wrong then...
You guessed it-pull out all the threads and do it again! By now you will be pretty up to speed with your looper/needle threading and will cope so much more better if you have to re-thread because one of the threads snaps/mid breaks in the middle of a project! Also you will have a much better idea of what looks right and wrong when threading up YOUR machine :)
Try using different machine functions as soon as possible. The sooner you use them the more experience you will get and the more comfortable you will feel using them! Also your projects will look better (and you will complete them faster! ) if you make the most of all the basic and fan-dangled functions that an overlocker has to offer.
Now you may think I am all talk but in the very minimal time I have had to sew lately I have experimented with:
-Threading and re-threading my machine
-4 Thread over-locking
-Using the rolled hem function (OK with mixed success but a least I tried right?)
-Sewing on stretch and woven fabrics
and 3 Thread overlocking (mainly because my machine was already minus a needle from the rolled hem experiment).
This is my test patch for the 3 thread overlocking function:
Please note that this is only a very quick sample and the wonkiness is most likely due to the fact that I haven't pressed the fabric and its crinkled a bit! From what I have read some people use the 3 -thread function on its own to get a very narrow seam on fine fabrics- I have heard mixed messages about this. My dealer says that as long as you use a smaller stitch length this should be OK , while other people on the web have had problems with unravelling (but maybe they just used a normal stitch length?). I think that if you were using a non-laddering stretch fabric it would be OK, I am yet to try it on a woven chiffon- or other sheer- for myself.
I plan on using the 3 thread in this case over my regular sewing machine stitching to make a small but very strong seam on a pair of PJ shorts I am making (using a Patternmaker pattern, but I will talk more about that in future posts).
Hopefully I will have finished them in the next few days and be able to show you the end result!
Happy sewing/overlocking!
3 comments:
I have a Janome serger too. I really like it but I need to work with it more. I have not used it much since I bought it.
I like the New Look patterns you pick up-they are one of my favorite patterns to work with.
I just bought one from another seller. It was sewing and then all of a sudden, bam, not sewing a stitch for me. There aren't any nearby classes I can take, very sad... any chance you'd have a copy of the dvd that I could buy from you??? I'm not liking the manual mine came with.
Kim- I tried to find an email under your profile to contact you directly but had no luck? Lovely blog by the way :):)
As to the DVD I won't be able to sell you a copy as a) I have no idea how to make one and b) I am pretty sure its against copyright (I work in a library....).
However I feel that if you brought yours brand new it SHOULD have had the DVD included, otherwise if you contacted Janome directly http://www.janome.com.au/ they would probably sell you a copy - I imagine people would ask for replacement copies all the time. I can ask my Janome dealer next time I see her (probably next week) for you if you like? You can email me at artistkate78@yahoo.com.au .
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