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Hemstitching?

Hello everyone!

I've decided to make myself a traditional trousseau, but with this difference: that I shall make it now that I'm married. I want to make hand-embroidered and hand-finished table linen, sheets and so on.

I've started quite modestly, by embroidering a couple of place mats - pink fuchsias for me and bluebells for my husband. A friend of mine suggested that I simply fray the edges and oversew them to make them both decorative and functional. Then I made a couple of companion pieces - little scraps to balance our wine glasses on, decorated with the same colours, but with geometric patterns. For these little "coasters", I learnt how to make mitred corners. It wasn't a great success, as I could only mitre them with one fold, not two. Still, they can be used.

Now I'd like to do something more fancy when I make the serviettes to match. I'd like to do the pulled-thread thing, making sheaves of the remaining threads. Is this called hemstitching? Where can I find a guide to it? Could someone point me in the right direction? I've seen a few pictures of how it's done in a basic embroidery book, but it is not very clear on things like how to pull out the thread up to a certain point and no further. Does one cut it there, and if so, wouldn't it fray? Nor is it very clear if the edges can be stitched down at the same time that one makes the sheaves or whether they should be done separately. Any help would be appreciated.

All my sewing is done by hand, as I've never learnt to use a sewing machine. I imagine that I shall have to learn pretty soon, if I want to make up table cloths and bed sheets myself!

Thanks. Shanti.

Reply to
shantimb
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You should find some help with hemstitching here:

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stitch animations are very good. good luck, Mavia

Reply to
Mavia Beaulieu

here:

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> The stitch animations are very good.>

What a wonderful website! Thank you very much.

Shanti.

Reply to
Shanti

here:

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>>> The stitch animations are very good.>>

They do have great animations, but they don't show the stitch I use most often for hemstitching. I don't really even know what it's called, but it doesn't show anything on the right side. It's similar to their basic hemstitch, but you sort of create a knot on the backside as you go around the bundle of threads. I'm sure there must be directions on that somewhere on the net--probably easier to find if you know the name of it ;-)

Best wishes, Ericka

Reply to
Ericka Kammerer

I have instructions for knotted hemstitching (which Erika pointed out) that is available on pdf at this URL:

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for Section Four The Victoria website that Mavia posted is very good. I buttonhole over the edges after the threads are cut, not before. You can only do this "before" if you are working on coarser fabrics with threads that are readily viewed. Same for the instructions to wind the threads back in.

On finer cloth, you really need to start somewhat about one third of the way into the drawn thread area and pull back the threads to a marked spot. Leave the threads dangling, then trim and buttonhole. Then remove the cut threads to the other side up to a marked spot.

Knotted hemstitching is my favorite, works up quickly, is better in finer materials, is almost invisible. It's a little slow going until you get the knack. Then it speeds right along.

Dianne - who hopes that was clearer than mud.

Reply to
Dianne Lewandowski

Oh yes, that was very clear indeed. Thank you all for your suggestions and websites.

I have succumbed to an attack of Designeritis, unfortunately, and the hemstitching project is going to be shelved for a while. I want to make a sampler of homoeopathic plants, complete with Latin names, as a present to my father. This is to be freehand embroidery, rather than cross-stitch. Those familiar with homoeopathy will instantly spot the problem - too many plants come from the same families (Asteraceae and Solanaceae) and there are some pretty obscure plants for letters like J, K, X, Y and Z. Well, the remedies are obscure, not the plants. Still, I've designed the sampler with the homoeopathic maxim in the middle, and perhaps (just perhaps) it will be ready by November for my father's birthday!

Shanti.

Reply to
Shanti

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